The Guardian
Clean-air scientists fired by EPA to reconvene in snub to Trump
The panel of researchers have plans to continue their studies revealing that 21 million Americans live with unacceptable air pollution
An advisory panel of air pollution scientists disbanded by the Trump administration plans to continue their work with or without the US government.
The researchers – from a group that reviewed the latest studies about how tiny particles of air pollution from fossil fuels make people sick – will assemble next month, a year from the day they were fired.
Continue reading...Albanese says Scott Morrison has a habit of being 'loose with the truth'
Labor leader declares prime minister ‘is blaming the media for reporting the facts’
Anthony Albanese has delivered his strongest criticism of the prime minister yet, declaring Scott Morrison has a habit of being “loose with the truth” and blaming the media for reporting facts when he was uncomfortable with legitimate criticisms and questions.
Albanese, who has banned his caucus from using the word “liar” when referring to Morrison or government MPs, said Morrison’s latest deflection of Australia’s climate record was part of a “pattern” he had developed when asked uncomfortable questions.
Continue reading...Royal Shakespeare Company threatened with boycott over BP sponsor
School climate strike activists call on theatre group to sever ties with oil firm
School climate protesters who took to the streets in huge numbers across the UK last week are threatening to boycott the Royal Shakespeare Company over its sponsorship deal with BP.
In a letter being sent to the RSC on Thursday, a group representing young people in towns and cities across the UK, says it will launch a boycott campaign unless the theatre company severs its ties with big oil.
Continue reading...Swedish newspaper stops taking adverts from fossil fuel firms
Dagens ETC says ban is crucial for its credibility and urges other media to follow suit
A Swedish newspaper has announced it will stop taking advertising that promotes fossil fuel-based goods and services with immediate effect.
The editor of the daily Dagens ETC said the decision was “crucial for our credibility”. He urged other media outlets to consider doing the same.
Continue reading...Wazza the koala survives 110km/h trip on NSW highway with only a gravel rash
Young female frees herself when car stops after 10km and is taken to hospital with minor injuries
Wildlife carers say they are stunned a koala that was hit by a car and dragged along a New South Wales highway at high speeds escaped with only minor injuries.
The ABC reported that the young female koala, named Wazza by her carers, was carried for about 10km on the front grille of a car on the Pacific highway, north of Kempsey, on the NSW mid north coast.
Continue reading...Scott Morrison spurns criticism of Australia's record on climate change during UN speech – video
‘Australia is doing our bit on climate change and we reject any suggestion to the contrary,’ the prime minister tells the United Nations general assembly in New York. Scott Morrison also says: ‘Australia’s internal and global critics on climate change willingly overlook or perhaps ignore our achievements as the facts simply don’t fit the narrative they wish to project about our contribution’
• Scott Morrison says Australia’s record on climate change misrepresented by media
Continue reading...Vicious cycle: delicate wash releases more plastic microfibres
Study finds 800,000 extra fibres are shed than on standard washing machine setting
Delicate wash cycles should be avoided whenever possible, according to scientists who found they can release hundreds of thousands more plastic microfibres into the environment than standard wash cycles.
Researchers at Newcastle University ran tests with full-scale machines to show that a delicate wash, which uses up to twice as much water as a standard cycle, releases on average 800,000 more microfibres than less water-hungry cycles.
Continue reading...Sydney desalination plant to double in size as dams approach critical level
Exclusive: top water bureaucrat says planning has begun for plant to move from producing 15% of water to 30%
Sydney’s desalination plant will double in size as the city’s water supply approaches the critical threshold in dam levels.
The top bureaucrat who oversees water in the NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment, Jim Bentley, told a Committee for the Economic Development of Australia (Ceda) lunch in Sydney, that planning for the expansion had now begun.
Continue reading...Greta Thunberg's 495-word UN speech points us to a future of hope – or despair
The speech draws the battle lines between those of us who want action on climate change and those, like Trump, who only mock it
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Greta Thunberg’s address to the UN’s Climate Action Summit on Monday may well prove to be the climate change movement’s Gettysburg Address. Like Abraham Lincoln’s revered speech, which ran to 273 words, Thunberg’s was also very short, only 495 words long.
Lincoln famously spoke at the dedication of the Gettysburg Cemetery, following the leading orator of the day, Edward Everett, who took two hours to deliver the official address, a 13,000 word oration. Lincoln’s speech, simply described in the day’s official program as Dedicatory Remarks, lasted less than three minutes.
Continue reading...We must act now to protect our threatened oceans | Letter
Last week, climate strikers young and old came out in force calling upon the government to act with greater urgency in tackling the global climate emergency.
Their demands should be emboldened by the stark findings of the special report on the ocean and cryosphere in a changing climate, released on Wednesday by the International Panel on Climate Change. The report highlights the intimate connection between our climate, our oceans and our very existence. It presents irrefutable scientific evidence that our warming climate is placing marine and frozen areas of our planet in grave danger, with some changes happening at a much larger scale and faster rate than previously predicted.
Continue reading...‘I’m not getting much Take a Break’: Extinction Rebellion’s newspaper, reviewed
The climate activists release their first print publication this week. But does a crisis-hit planet make for winning journalism?
In a move that feels more than slightly ironic, the climate activists Extinction Rebellion have decided to go into a media on the brink of extinction, having released their first newspaper this week. It is called the Hourglass, because time is running out – and because the XR logo kind of looks like one, in the right light – and comes with the strapline: “Rigorous journalism for fragile times”. More than 110,000 copies will be distributed, printed on paper made from freshly felled Amazonian trees … No, of course not, it’s recycled, most probably from litter picked up from events that didn’t even have anything to do with Extinction Rebellion, but which they attended to pick up litter because they’re better people than the rest of us.
According to a press release, readers can expect stories similar to those of “a mainstream newspaper like the Metro while at times hitting the tone of Take a Break”. “I never knew I had a twin sister until we chained ourselves to the same pink boat in Oxford Circus,” perhaps?
Continue reading...Mont Blanc glacier in danger of collapse, experts warn
Italian mayor orders roads closed and homes evacuated over fears ice will break away
Italian authorities have closed off roads and evacuated homes after experts warned that a portion of a Mont Blanc glacier is at risk of collapse.
Stefano Miserocchi, the mayor of the town of Courmayeur, said “public safety is a priority” after experts from the Fondazione Montagna Sicura (Safe Mountains Foundation) in the Aosta Valley said up to 250,000 cubic metres of ice was in danger of sliding off the Planpincieux glacier on the Grandes Jorasses peak.
Continue reading...Extreme sea level events ‘will hit once a year by 2050’
Climate report says intense storms and loss of marine life are already inevitable
Extreme sea level events that used to occur once a century will strike every year on many coasts by 2050, no matter whether climate heating emissions are curbed or not, according to a landmark report by the world’s scientists.
The stark assessment of the climate crisis in the world’s oceans and ice caps concludes that many serious impacts are already inevitable, from more intense storms to melting permafrost and dwindling marine life.
Continue reading...Environmental photographer of the year 2019 winners – in pictures
SL Shanth Kumar has won Ciwem environmental photographer of the year 2019 for his image of homes battered by flooding in Mumbai. This year’s winners were revealed alongside the UN climate summit in New York
Continue reading...1% of English residents take one-fifth of overseas flights, survey shows
FoI request to DfT reveals 10% most frequent flyers took more than half of flights abroad in 2018
Just 1% of English residents are responsible for nearly a fifth of all flights abroad, according to previously unpublished statistics.
The figures, published in a Department for Transport survey, also reveal that the 10% most frequent flyers in England took more than half of all international flights in 2018. However, 48% of the population did not take a single flight abroad in the last year.
Continue reading...Specieswatch: the English oak and its chattering friend
The jay doesn’t just eat acorns but apparently cultivates saplings to feed the new leaves to its young
The English oak, Quercus robur, our national tree, has lots of admirers but only one “best friend”, the jay Garrulus glandarius – which roughly means the “chattering acorn gatherer”.
This month jays have been busy stripping hundreds of acorns off a nearby oak and carefully burying them for future consumption in lawns, flowerbeds and handy crevices. The jays are credited with remembering where all the acorns are but each spring oak saplings appear all over the neighbourhood, so some were either not needed or forgotten.
Continue reading...Greta Thunberg turns tables on Trump and quotes his mockery in new Twitter bio
Thunberg seems to troll Trump with new bio that reads: ‘A very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future’
Climate activist Greta Thunberg seemed to troll Donald Trump on Tuesday, changing her Twitter bio to reflect the US president’s mockery of her emotional address to the United Nations on Monday.
On Monday, Thunberg gave a blistering speech at the climate summit in New York, criticizing world leaders for their “betrayal” of young people through a lack of action on the climate crisis.
Continue reading...Pacific islands seek $500m to make ocean's shipping zero carbon
Coalition of six nations aims to raise funds and achieve full decarbonisation by 2050
A coalition of Pacific island nations wants to raise $500m (£400m) to make all shipping in the Pacific Ocean zero carbon by the middle of the century.
The Pacific Blue Shipping Partnership, announced on Tuesday by the governments of Fiji, the Marshall Islands, Samoa, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands and Tuvalu, has set an emissions reduction target of 40% by 2030, and full decarbonisation by 2050.
Continue reading...Met Office issues flood alerts for England and Wales
Environment Agency issued 27 flood alerts across England by 9am
Flood alerts have been issued for parts of England as heavy rain continues to cause disruption for commuters.
The Met Office has issued a yellow weather warning for much of England and Wales today, with flooding expected in some areas.
Continue reading...Aerial footage of dramatic erosion at NSW's Stockton beach – video
Residents of Stockton, north of Newcastle, who are losing their beach to dramatic erosion, are demanding emergency action from the state government. A childcare centre that supported 72 children was forced to permanently close on 3 September and the Stockton Surf Life Saving Club – once a 150m run across the sands from the waves – now has water regularly crashing at its rock wall. In June last year, erosion exposed a dump site containing asbestos, which made its way onto the sands
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