The Guardian
Five countries hold 70% of world's last wildernesses, map reveals
First map of Earth’s intact ecosystems shows just five nations are responsible for most of them – but it will require global action to protect them
Just five countries hold 70% of the world’s remaining untouched wilderness areas and urgent international action is needed to protect them, according to new research.
Researchers from the University of Queensland (UQ) and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) have for the first time produced a global map that sets out which countries are responsible for nature that is devoid of heavy industrial activity.
Continue reading...Labor to propose new environmental laws to enforce biodiversity and conservation
Bill Shorten’s government would, if elected, create a national environment protection authority and a new environment act
A Labor government would bring in new federal environment laws and strong independent agencies including a national environment protection authority (EPA) to enforce them, under a draft policy platform signed off by the ALP national executive.
Developed by a 60-member policy forum chaired by the opposition leader, Bill Shorten, and the outgoing party president, Mark Butler, the platform is the basis for debate at Labor’s national conference in Adelaide next month.
Continue reading...Hydrogen gas trial in western Sydney could unlock $1.7bn in renewable exports
Chief scientist estimates Australia could reap benefits from hydrogen technology
Australians will soon power their homes with hydrogen in a five-year trial that scientists say could open the door to the widespread use of a new form of renewable energy.
Within two years, gas company Jemena and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (Arena) plan to mix a small amount of hydrogen into the domestic gas grid in western Sydney.
Continue reading...Couple fell to deaths from Yosemite cliff while taking selfie, brother says
Vishnu Viswanath and Meenakshi Moorthy of India apparently set up their camera near popular overlook with no railing
An Indian husband and wife who fell to their deaths from a popular overlook at Yosemite national park in California were apparently taking a selfie, the man’s brother said Tuesday.
Park rangers recovered the bodies of Vishnu Viswanath, 29, and Meenakshi Moorthy, 30, on Thursday about 800ft (245 meters) below Taft Point, where visitors can walk to the edge of a vertigo-inducing granite ledge that doesn’t have a railing.
Continue reading...Is planting trees the best thing you can do for your health and the planet?
‘What’s all this tree-planting for?” I was asked when I began writing about restoring a piece of land I had bought in Somerset as a wood-cum-orchard. The truth is, I just love trees. And I am not alone. “As I get older, all I really long for is to plant trees,” Prince Charles says in a forthcoming BBC documentary in which he is filmed in the wood he planted on the day Prince George was born. I, too, love to be among trees, and want to leave young ones behind when I die. This is why I planted them, and continue to plant them.
We have inherited mature and wonderful trees in our cities, towns, villages, gardens, cemeteries, woods and countryside. They were planted, or self-sown, years, even centuries ago. We take them for granted, ignore the creatures living among them, remain in ignorance of the good trees are doing us (cleaning the air, for instance) and cut them down for new developments. Yet we retain a feeling of affection for the idea of them, which may account for the reaction the government faced in 2010 when it sought to sell off publicly owned woods, and for the wide support the Woodland Trust attracts.
Continue reading...No picnic: Americans face encounters with black bears as population rebounds
Largely relieved of pressure from deforestation and hunting, bears are increasingly coming into contact with people
The swift rebound of bear populations in the US is presenting a growing number of Americans with a major challenge – what to do about the enormous hirsute neighbors that are breaking into their homes, gorging on their food and guzzling their cans of soda?
Black bears, largely relieved of pressure on their numbers from untrammeled deforestation and hunting, are increasingly coming into contact with people in places where the two species haven’t interacted in many decades.
Continue reading...Conservationists to target 'middle Australia' in election climate push
ACF aims to pour resources into three marginal seats to inflict electoral pain on major parties for policy failures
The Australian Conservation Foundation will target three marginal seats in Victoria and Queensland in a bid to push “middle Australia” to demand more action on climate change, its chief executive has said.
Kelly O’Shanassy made the comments at the National Press Club on Tuesday, unveiling the environmental group’s election action plan to break the political deadlock over climate change.
Continue reading...WWF report warns annihilation of wildlife threatens civilisation – video
The 2018 Living Planet report from the WWF has found that a shocking 60% of the earth's mammals, birds, fish and reptiles have been lost since 1970. The findings have led the world’s foremost experts to warn that the annihilation of wildlife is now an emergency that threatens civilisation.
• Humanity has wiped out 60% of animals since 1970, major report finds
Continue reading...Humanity has wiped out 60% of animals since 1970, major report finds
The huge loss is a tragedy in itself but also threatens the survival of civilisation, say the world’s leading scientists
Humanity has wiped out 60% of mammals, birds, fish and reptiles since 1970, leading the world’s foremost experts to warn that the annihilation of wildlife is now an emergency that threatens civilisation.
The new estimate of the massacre of wildlife is made in a major report produced by WWF and involving 59 scientists from across the globe. It finds that the vast and growing consumption of food and resources by the global population is destroying the web of life, billions of years in the making, upon which human society ultimately depends for clean air, water and everything else.
Continue reading...Australia's east coast named as 'deforestation front' in WWF Living Planet report
Assessment underscores threat to koalas and other native species
• Humanity has wiped out 60% of animals since 1970, major report finds
Australia’s east coast has been compared to the Amazon as a “deforestation front” in a new global report by the World Wide Fund for Nature that underscores the threat to populations of koalas and other native species.
The Living Planet report, produced by WWF every second year for the past 20 years, says global populations of vertebrate species have declined 60% since 1970. But koala numbers have disappeared at a much faster rate – more than 20% a decade – to the extent they could disappear from the wild in New South Wales by 2050.
Continue reading...Venice flooded by high tide – in pictures
The ‘acqua alta’ created havoc in Venice, as schools and hospitals were closed and citizens were advised against leaving their homes. The flooding, caused by a convergence of high tides and a strong sirocco wind, reached around 156cm on Monday
Continue reading...Strongest tremor yet halts fracking at Cuadrilla site near Blackpool
1.1-magnitude tremor second to have breached regulatory threshold in recent days
Fracking has stopped again at a shale gas well near Blackpool after the area was struck by the most powerful earthquake since operations began.
A total of 27 minor earthquakes have occurred near energy company Cuadrilla’s site since fracking started a fortnight ago.
Continue reading...UK to consult on plastic packaging tax, chancellor says
Budget seeks to reduce non-recycled plastics but resists call for levy on coffee cups
The government is to introduce a new tax on plastic packaging as it seeks to ramp up efforts to tackle the scourge of litter and waste from single-use plastics, it was confirmed in the budget.
Food and drink companies will be taxed on plastic packaging that does not include at least 30% recycled content, in a drive to reduce dependence on “virgin plastics” that are difficult or impossible to recycle, such as black food trays and plastic straws.
Continue reading...£60m 'greenery drive' to plant 10m trees in England
Conservationists say money is step in the right direction in tackling climate change
More than 10m trees will be planted across England with the injection of £60m of new funding over five years, as part of what the government billed as its “drive to preserve the country’s greenery”.
The bulk of the money, £50m, will pay landowners for planting trees that lock up carbon, which observers said raised questions over how accessible those woodlands would be to the public. That fund, the Woodland Carbon Guarantee scheme, should pay for 10m trees.
Continue reading...To save the planet we need a treaty – and to consider rationing | Letters
We, the undersigned, support the call for the UK and other OECD governments to negotiate a fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty to complement the Paris agreement on climate change, as proposed in your article “We need a fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty – and we need it now” (theguardian.com, 23 October).
The latest report from the IPCC shows we cannot afford to burn the vast majority of remaining reserves of fossil fuels if we are to keep warming below 1.5 or even 2 degrees. A new line in the sand is needed. We support an agreement with a moratorium on any further expansion of the fossil fuel industry in rich countries, together with a fund to support renewable energy development in poorer countries to reduce the need for fossil fuels, paid for by redirecting the staggering $10m per minute that governments currently spend on fossil fuel subsidies. The best way to mark the 50th anniversary of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty would be to begin negotiation of its fossil fuel equivalent.
Bill McKibben Founder, 350.org
Naomi Klein Writer and activist
Caroline Lucas MP Green party
John Sauven Executive director, Greenpeace
Craig Bennett CEO, Friends of the Earth
Ann Pettifor Prime Economics
Leo Murray 10:10
90% of world's children are breathing toxic air, WHO study finds
Report says air pollution is having a devastating impact on children worldwide, storing up a public health time bomb
Poisonous air is having a devastating impact on billions of children around the world, damaging their intelligence and leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths, according to a report from the World Health Organization.
The study found that more than 90% of the world’s young people – 1.8 billion children – are breathing toxic air, storing up a public health time bomb for the next generation.
Continue reading...World's top fishing nations to be given millions to protect oceans
Bloomberg Philanthropies to launch major grant for coastal communities to improve the health of oceans
Millions of pounds’ worth of funding to tackle global overfishing and protect coral reefs will be announced at a major conference in Indonesia this week.
Politicians, marine experts and philanthropists will convene in Bali at the Our Ocean conference on Monday to agree commitments on how to address the pressures facing our oceans, including rising sea temperatures, unsustainable fishing practices, marine pollution and coral bleaching.
Continue reading...Thousands of ships could dump pollutants at sea to avoid dirty fuel ban
Owners planning to install ‘emissions cheat’ systems to avoid having to buy cleaner, more expensive fuel
Thousands of ships are set to install “emissions cheat” systems that pump pollutants into the ocean to beat new international rules banning dirty fuel.
The global shipping fleet is rushing to meet a 2020 deadline imposed by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) to reduce air pollution by forcing vessels to use cleaner fuel with a lower sulphur content of 0.5%, compared with 3.5% as currently used.
Continue reading...Great Barrier Reef authority chairman appointed days after dire bleaching forecast
Australian Marine Conservation Society calls on Ian Poiner to take ‘aggressive’ stance on reef’s behalf
The Australian government has appointed marine scientist Ian Poiner as the new chairman of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, days after a dire new forecast for coral bleaching was issued.
The appointment to the authority, which manages the reef and advises the government on its care, also comes months after the government granted $443m in reef funding to the private Great Barrier Reef Foundation instead of key agencies including the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority.
Continue reading...Bees of Australia: up close with native species – in pictures
Bees are at the heart of Australia’s multibillion-dollar agriculture industry, as 75% of our food crops rely on animal pollination. However, native bees face serious threats. Habitat loss, exotic species, climate change and pesticides are all affecting bee populations. The author and photographer James Dorey has created the book Bees of Australia, showcasing the species unique to Australia using macro photography
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