The Guardian
Air pollution linked to greater risk of mouth cancer, finds study
Research in Taiwan has show a link between very high levels of air pollution and oral cancer
High levels of air pollution are linked to an increased risk of mouth cancer, new research has revealed.
Scientists have previously linked high air pollution to a host of health problems, from an increased risk of dementia to asthma and even changes in the structure of the heart, with recent research suggesting there is no “safe level” of air pollution.
Continue reading...Environmental warnings should stop drivers taking the road to ruin | Letters
Following the UN’s report concluding carbon emissions need to be reduced massively and rapidly to prevent an average increase in global temperatures of more than 1.5C (Global warming must not exceed 1.5C, landmark UN report warns, 8 October), one quick and simple way in which the UK could make a start is by cutting the top speed vehicles can travel on motorways from 70 to 60mph. All cars operate most efficiently at a speed between 50 and 60mph. At the stroke of a pen we could ensure all vehicles on motorways are running far closer to their most efficient levels. It won’t save the world on its own, but it’s a cost-free and easy step to take that gets us moving in the right direction.
Matt Wheeler
Bushey, Hertforshire
• It is increasingly evident how difficult it will be to stop global warming; the need is pressing, obvious and requires strong leadership from governments. But, incredibly, our government is planning to build a major road (the so-called expressway) between Oxford and Cambridge. Painful as it might appear, the time has come when we have to stop building new major roads altogether, anywhere. We have to slash use of roads and fossil fuels, not encourage them.
Continue reading...The time is now for a new global climate pact | Letter
On 10 April 2018, the United Nations general assembly adopted a resolution that paved the way for negotiations on a global pact for the environment. This international treaty would combine the guiding legal principles for environmental action into one single and far-reaching text. In 2015, the adoption of the sustainable development goals and the Paris climate agreement represented major progress. However, environmental damage persists and is more serious than ever before. The years 2017 and 2018 have seen record-breaking temperatures. Biodiversity continues to decline at a rapid pace.
With the global pact for the environment, the international community would be equipped for the first time with a treaty of a general nature that covers all environmental areas. It would be the cornerstone of international environmental law, therefore overseeing the different existing sectoral agreements (climate, biodiversity, waste, pollution, etc), filling the gaps and facilitating their implementation.
Continue reading...UK fracking rules on earthquakes could be relaxed, says minister
Exclusive: Claire Perry says level at which operations must be halted could be raised
Rules designed to halt fracking operations if they trigger minor earthquakes could be relaxed as the shale industry begins to expand, the UK energy minister, Claire Perry, has said.
A series of small tremors seven years ago prompted tough regulations that mean even very low levels of seismic activity now require companies to suspend fracking.
Continue reading...Robotic bees could pollinate plants in case of insect apocalypse
Dutch scientists say they can create millions of bee-like drones to take over if the insects die out
Intensive modern farming methods and the unravelling consequences of global climate change are said to have put the future of the common bee under threat like never before.
But in Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands a group of scientists working on long-term solutions to some of the world’s thorniest problems have developed a solution that could have come straight from a sci-fi novel: robotic bees.
Continue reading...Dutch appeals court upholds landmark climate change ruling
Netherlands ordered to increase emissions cuts in historic ruling that puts ‘all world governments on notice’
A court in The Hague has upheld a historic legal order on the Dutch government to accelerate carbon emissions cuts, a day after the world’s climate scientists warned that time was running out to avoid dangerous warming.
Appeal court judges ruled that the severity and scope of the climate crisis demanded greenhouse gas reductions of at least 25% by 2020 – measured against 1990 levels – higher than the 17% drop planned by Mark Rutte’s liberal administration.
Continue reading...Amazon at risk from Bolsonaro's grim attack on the environment | Fabiano Maisonnave
Threats to the rainforest and its people and an end to the Paris agreement are among the promises of Brazil’s presidential hopeful, reports Climate Home
No more Paris agreement. No more ministry of environment. A paved highway cutting through the Amazon.
Not only that. Indigenous territories opened to mining. Relaxed environmental law enforcement and licensing. International NGOs, such as Greenpeace and WWF, banned from the country. A strong alliance with the beef lobby.
Continue reading...We Feed the World: photo stories of farmers fighting climate change in five continents
Five photographers follow the challenges facing small-scale farmers, and their pioneering solutions for a farming system that does not cost the planet
- The We Feed the World exhibition runs at the Bargehouse Gallery, Southbank, London, 12-21 October
Images show baby humpback whale trapped in shark net off Queensland coast
Whale was freed but marine charity says proposed new laws would have made it illegal to highlight the distress of the animal
Extraordinary photographs that revealed a baby humpback whale caught in a shark net on the Gold Coast could not have been taken under new laws proposed by the Queensland government, two environmental groups have said.
The baby whale is seen entangled in the shark net in photos and video released by the Humane Society International and the Australian Marine Conservation Society on Tuesday.
Continue reading...'Tipping points' could exacerbate climate crisis, scientists fear
IPCC report ‘underestimates potential of these key dangers to send Earth into spiral of runaway climate change’
Key dangers largely left out of the IPCC special report on 1.5C of warming are raising alarm among some scientists who fear we may have underestimated the impacts of humans on the Earth’s climate.
The IPCC report sets out the world’s current knowledge of the impacts of 1.5C of warming and clearly shows the dangers of breaching such a limit. However, many scientists are increasingly worried about factors about which we know much less.
Continue reading...Plastic bottle washes up looking 'almost new' after nearly 50 years at sea
Coastguard expresses shock after decades-old piece of debris ends up on UK beach
A plastic washing-up bottle that is at least 47 years old has been found washed up on a beach in the UK with its lettering and messaging still clear, prompting warnings about the enduring problem of plastic waste.
The item, found by a coastguard warden at a beach in Somerset, “still looks almost new”, said the organisation. “We were staggered yesterday by how much debris has washed up on the beach,” wrote the Burnham Coastguard on Facebook. “It’s shocking how long … rubbish can survive and ultimately harm nature.”
Continue reading...Morrison on IPCC emissions report: ‘There are a lot bigger players than us out there’ – video
The Australian prime minister Scott Morrison says the Coalition will look carefully at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report which was released on Monday. The report shows even half a degree of extra warming will affect hundreds of millions of people and urges governments around the world to phase out coal power by 2050. Morrison says, 'Let's not forget Australia accounts for just over 1% of global emissions. There are a lot bigger players than us out there. ... Emissions per capita in Australia are at their lowest level in a decade.'
But environment department figures show emissions increased 1.3% in the year to March 2018 and that Australia is likely to miss the target.
• Australian government backs coal in defiance of IPCC climate warning
Queensland man becomes third shark attack victim in past month
The 50-year-old was bitten on the shoulder near Yeppoon on Tuesday and was taken to Rockhampton hospital
A shark has mauled a man off the central Queensland coast – the state’s third shark attack in as many weeks.
A boat carrying the victim, aged in his 50s, reached the mainland near Yeppoon early on Tuesday but it’s understood he was bitten on the shoulder on Monday, paramedics said.
Continue reading...What to do with plastic wrapping on the Guardian’s Weekend magazine? | Letters
Having just read “Crunch time for forests and plastic pollution” (Letters, 6 October), I wonder if anyone can help me? For about a year I’ve been collecting the plastic film wrappers from the Guardian’s Weekend magazine and other Saturday sections. I’ve now filled a very large sack. Does anyone know of a firm that will recycle this material? Our local authority waste collection does not.
Mary Fawcett
Bath
• My wife is a Women’s Institute member and we were impressed to note that its magazine, WI Life, has switched from polythene wrapping to a compostable potato-starch alternative. It would be good to see the Guardian burnish its green credentials and adopt the same method for the Weekend magazine.
Geoff Walmsley
Wirral, Cheshire
World leaders 'have moral obligation to act' after UN climate report
Even half degree of extra warming will affect hundreds of millions of people, decimate corals and intensify heat extremes, report shows
World leaders have been told they have moral obligation to ramp up their action on the climate crisis in the wake of a new UN report that shows even half a degree of extra warming will affect hundreds of millions of people, decimate corals and intensify heat extremes.
But the muted response by Britain, Australia and other governments highlights the immense political challenges facing adoption of pathways to the relatively safe limit of 1.5C above pre-industrial temperatures outlined on Monday by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Continue reading...Richard Northcote obituary
“I’d like to taste the freedom that nature holds so high, to wander round a global dream before I have to die.” That was the prophetic verse of a 17-year-old Richard Northcote, who ultimately lived in many countries and travelled extensively. His dream was the creation of a sustainable world.
As chief sustainability officer for Covestro, a manufacturer of high-tech polymer materials, my father, Richard, who has died suddenly aged 58, found an organisation that shared his passion. Thanks to his enthusiastic advocacy, Covestro embraced the UN sustainable development goals, helping to launch innovative products and technologies that reduce environmental impact.
Continue reading...Geoengineering may be used to combat global warming, experts say
IPCC authors suggest there is high agreement that injection of chemicals into stratosphere could help limit rises
The world may increasingly look to geoengineering in the wake of the latest UN climate report, which says it could be adopted as a temporary “remedial measure” if the world heads towards dangerous levels of warming.
The authors of the new 1.5C study by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change say there is high agreement that the injection of millions of tonnes of sulphur dioxide or nitrous oxide into the stratosphere could help limit temperature rises to the most ambitious target of the Paris accord.
Continue reading...Little-noticed treaty could help delay climate catastrophe
2016 Kigali amendment on hydrofluorocarbons could reduce warming by a small but crucial 0.5C
From the beginning of next year, a new global pact will take effect that could have a profound impact on climate change, cutting harmful greenhouse gas emissions by amounts that could help stave off some of the worst impacts predicted by the IPCC.
This little-noticed treaty has nothing to do with the Paris accord, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiations that have dragged on since 1992, or energy sector emissions, which have resumed their rise.
Continue reading...Limiting warming to 1.5C is possible – if there is political will | Christiana Figueres
The UN’s climate change report shows every fraction of a degree matters but world governments now have the chance to deliver a safer future
The new 1.5C report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is a sophisticated intelligence briefing on the fate of our planet. Its message is relevant to every human being on Earth.
Based on more than 6,000 scientific studies, the report was compiled by more than 80 of the world’s top climate scientists from nearly 40 countries, and calibrates 40,000 peer-review comments. It is a robust and outstanding example of international cooperation, and an extraordinary source of shared intelligence.
Continue reading...The Trump administration has entered Stage 5 climate denial | Dana Nuccitelli
If we’re already doomed to disastrous climate change, then there’s no reason to cut carbon pollution, argues the Trump administration
Several years ago, I wrote about the five stages of climate denial:
In 2013 @dana1981 wrote about the 5 stages of #climatechange denial.
Stage 1: Deny the Problem Exists
Stage 2: Deny We're the Cause
Stage 3: Deny It's a Problem
Stage 4: Deny We can Solve It
Stage 5: It's too Late
Look where the Trump Administration is.https://t.co/FRQGZ8gQ4r