The Guardian
Scientists use IVF procedures to help save near-extinct rhinos
Two embryos have been created in an attempt to rescue northern white rhinos
Scientists have successfully created two embryos of the near-extinct northern white rhino in a landmark effort to save the species.
The international team of researchers and conservationists drew on IVF procedures to create the embryos from fresh eggs collected from the two remaining female rhinos and frozen sperm from dead males.
Continue reading...Badger cull in England extended to ‘unimaginable scale’
Ministers approve culling in 11 new areas, with 64,000 animals likely to be killed this autumn
The controversial badger cull in England has been expanded to an “unimaginable scale”, according to a leading expert who warned the government is paying far too little attention to the transmission of tuberculosis between cattle when they are traded.
Ministers approved culling in 11 new areas on Wednesday, taking the total to 43. Up to 64,000 animals are likely to be killed this autumn, up from a maximum of 42,000 last year.
Continue reading...Europe's marine sanctuaries are no more than 'paper parks'
WWF conservationists say marine wildlife sanctuaries are failing to protect the seas
Europe’s marine wildlife sanctuaries are no more than “paper parks” that are failing to protect the seas, a report from conservationists has said.
European seas, from the North East Atlantic ocean to the Adriatic, are in a “poor condition”, with coastal states failing to meet targets to protect marine wildlife, a report by WWF has concluded.
Continue reading...UK to host crucial global talks on tackling climate emergency
COP26 meeting in Glasgow in 2020 will determine future course of efforts to avert crisis
Britain is to host a crunch climate conference next year at which the future direction of global efforts to avert the climate crisis will be determined, the government has confirmed.
The COP26 meeting, under the auspices of the UN, will take place in Glasgow in December 2020, with about 30,000 delegates expected as well as leaders of most of the world’s governments, making it the biggest international summit to be hosted in the UK.
Continue reading...John Hewson urges Liberal conscience vote on climate emergency motion
The former Liberal leader is championing crossbench bill and argues ‘it was an emergency 30 years ago’
The former Liberal leader John Hewson has called on Scott Morrison to grant government MPs a conscience vote on a new parliamentary motion declaring a climate emergency.
Hewson, who will join MPs on Wednesday to champion the new parliamentary motion which is being pursued by the Greens and is supported by most of the lower house crossbench, told Guardian Australia there was no controversy associated with declaring a climate emergency in 2019, “because my view is it was an emergency 30 years ago”.
Continue reading...Farming, biodiversity and a heather warning | Letters
It is good news that the National Farmers’ Union has developed a plan for British farming to become carbon neutral by 2040 (UK can meet climate targets without beef cuts, say NFU, 10 September). However, there’s a problem – it’s their plan and not a shared plan.
Irrespective of whether the UK leaves the EU, farmers will remain dependent on public subsidy, so the public need to be on board with any NFU-backed plan on climate change. The big environmental organisations – including the RSPB, WWF, Friends of the Earth, the Wildlife Trusts – mediate large swathes of public opinion. Consequently the NFU needs to get round the table with them and develop a shared plan, centred on land use, to make farming climate-neutral.
Continue reading...TUC urges members to support student climate strikes
Union umbrella body gives its backing to next global action taking place on 20 September
The Trades Union Congress (TUC) has called on members to support student climate strikers during the next global action on 20 September.
The original proposal by the University and College Union (UCU) asked the TUC to call for millions of workers to stop work for half an hour, aimed at shifting government complacency over the climate crisis.
Continue reading...Climate strikes: are you taking part in September's protests?
We would like to hear from people taking part in the Global Climate Strike in the UK on 20 September
Millions of young people around the globe are expected to protest on 20 September in a bid to ask politicians take more action on the climate crisis. Climate strikes will take place in every continent, with the movement’s inspiration, environmental activist Greta Thunberg attending the rally in New York City.
In the UK, dozens of protests are set to take place in cities including London, Manchester, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Cardiff, and Leeds.
Continue reading...Extinction Rebellion blocks UK fracking site in climate protest
Environmental activists demonstrate outside Cuadrilla’s Preston New Road site
Extinction Rebellion has blocked the entrance to the UK’s only active fracking site in a demonstration against what it called the “burgeoning catastrophe” of global warming.
Protesters from the environmental group gathered outside the shale gas site on Preston New Road, near Blackpool, on Tuesday morning alongside a yellow boat bearing the words: “Planet before profit”.
Continue reading...Climate crisis may be disrupting the 'great orgy' of coral spawning
Study finds breakdown in annual spawning synchrony in Red Sea, threatening some species with extinction
It has been described by scientists as “the greatest orgy in the world”; an annual gamete-fest, where entire colonies of coral reefs release their sperm and eggs simultaneously in a slick on the ocean surface that has been seen from space. But now scientists fear the climate crisis may be disrupting the ability of corals to synchronise this marine phenomenon, threatening them with extinction.
A Tel Aviv university study, published in Science, has found the release of eggs and sperm in certain reef-building corals in the Gulf of Eilat in the Red Sea have changed over time and have lost their synchronicity. For a coral, reliant on a chance encounter, timing is everything. But researchers have found some are spawning “out of tune” with normal patterns, with the result that fewer baby corals are forming.
Continue reading...Fukushima: Japan will have to dump radioactive water into Pacific, minister says
More than a million tons of contaminated water lies in storage but power company says it will run out of space by 2022
Tokyo Electric Power will have to dump radioactive water from its destroyed Fukushima nuclear power plant directly into the Pacific ocean, Japan’s environment minister said on Tuesday.
After the plant was crippled by an earthquake and tsunami in 2011, Tokyo Electric, or Tepco, collected more than 1m tons of contaminated water from the cooling pipes used to keep fuel cores from melting. The utility says it will run out of tank space by 2022.
Continue reading...No need to cut beef to tackle climate crisis, say farmers
NFU says growing fuel for power stations and capturing CO2 can slash emissions
Farming can become climate neutral by 2040 without cutting beef production or converting substantial areas of farmland into forest, according to a plan published by the National Farmers’ Union.
Instead, the NFU says three-quarters of the UK’s agricultural emissions can be offset by growing fuel for power stations and then capturing and burying the carbon dioxide, which could lead to energy plants becoming the nation’s biggest crop after wheat. Increasing the carbon stored in soils and using technology to reduce the emissions caused by cattle and fertiliser use are also needed, the NFU says.
Continue reading...World 'gravely' unprepared for effects of climate crisis – report
Trillions of dollars needed to avoid ‘climate apartheid’ but this is less than cost of inaction
The world’s readiness for the inevitable effects of the climate crisis is “gravely insufficient”, according to a report from global leaders.
This lack of preparedness will result in poverty, water shortages and levels of migration soaring, with an “irrefutable toll on human life”, the report warns.
Continue reading...Australians increasingly fear climate change related drought and extinctions
Climate of the Nation survey also growing support for net zero emissions by 2050 and rapid phase-out of coal power
Australians are increasingly concerned about droughts and floods, extinctions and water shortages associated with climate change, and most people think all levels of government aren’t doing enough to combat the effects of global warming, according to new research.
The annual Climate of the Nation survey, which has been tracking Australian attitudes to climate change for more than a decade, finds concern about droughts and flooding has risen from 74% of the survey in 2017 to 81% in 2019.
Continue reading...Climate crisis is greatest ever threat to human rights, UN warns
- Rights chief Michelle Bachelet highlights role in civil wars
- ‘The world has never seen a threat to human rights of this scope’
Climate change is not only having a devastating impact on the environments we live in, but also on respect for human rights globally, the UN has warned.
Related: 'Chaos, chaos, chaos': a journey through Bolsonaro's Amazon inferno
Continue reading...'Chaos, chaos, chaos': Amazon still ablaze as Brazil dismisses 'fuss' over fires
A 2,000km road and river odyssey through rainforest reveals consensus from all sides: Bolsonaro has spurred a record burning season and ushered in a new age of wrecking
From afar it resembles a tornado: an immense grey column shooting thousands of feet upwards from the forest canopy into the Amazonian skies.
Up close it is an inferno: a raging conflagration obliterating yet another stretch of the world’s greatest rainforest as a herd of Nelore cattle looks on in bewilderment.
Continue reading...Climate crisis drives Tunisia fishing trade into troubled waters
As dwindling stocks sound the death knell for their industry, fishermen face difficult and often dangerous choices
Boats gently knock together along the dock in Kelibia. The gentle melody of their wooden hulls colliding has been heard in this small Tunisian fishing village for decades. In the midday sun, fishermen feed scraps to stray cats in a scene that seems almost preserved in amber.
But the fishing trade is in its death throes here, as the pressures of the climate crisis impact on global fish stocks and put new social pressures on the fishermen themselves.
Continue reading...England’s tree of the year 2019 – the Woodland Trust shortlist
The Woodland Trust’s annual competition highlights and celebrates the best trees in the country. Once again it’s being supported by the award-winning horticulturalist and TV personality David Domoney. A carefully chosen panel of judges spent a day debating the positives of hundreds of trees to find the very best England has to offer.
Here you can see the 10 shortlisted trees. Go online at woodlandtrust.org.uk/treeoftheyear to choose your favourite, which will be named England’s tree of the year for 2019
Continue reading...Survival of the chickest: the unlikely battle of the urban brush turkey
Australian researchers are trying to understand how the birds, which receive no parental care, survive against all odds in big cities
The chicks are considered “hors d’oeuvres” of the bird world and now Sydney scientists need public help trying to understand how brush turkeys survive against the odds in urban environments.
Brush turkeys’ six-month breeding season kicked off in July and a team of researchers from the University of Sydney and Taronga Zoo have put out a call for community sightings of nesting mounds, breeding activities and chick hatchings across New South Wales and Queensland.
Continue reading...Wildlife photographer of the year – highly commended images
The Natural History Museum has released a selection of highly commended photographs from a range of categories. The winners will be announced on 15 October and the exhibition opens on 18 October
Continue reading...