The Guardian
Ban diesel cars from cities, say half of UK drivers in poll
Almost three-quarters of motorists also think toxic air in their area is damaging their health
More than half of UK motorists think diesel cars should be banned from urban areas due to air pollution concerns, according to a new opinion poll.
The proportion backing a ban rose to 80% when drivers were asked if diesel cars should be excluded areas around schools and hospitals. Nearly a third said diesels should be banned from all roads.
Continue reading...'They are taking out a generation of tuna': overfishing causes crisis in Philippines
Men like Raul Gomez have been catching tuna for 40 years, but as fisheries in the region edge closer to collapse, he spends longer at sea to catch ever smaller tuna
Raul Gomez is an old man who fishes with five crew on a clipper in the coral triangle, and he has spent two months now without taking enough to feed his family.
Riding out storms and searing heat in western Pacific waters, the burly, sun-inked Filipino uses a pole and line to reel in yellowfin tuna the size of an adult human.
Continue reading...Can this man save Mexico's natural wonders?
Mexico’s environmental marvels are on borrowed time, but poet Homero Aridjis is fighting to change that
As Mexico emerges from the most violent election campaign within living memory and embarks on the presidency of Andres López Obrador, one prominent citizen watches at a diagonal: a veteran of Mexico’s other war – not that over narco-traffic and its clients in politics, but that against nature.
In a recent interview with the daily El Universal, Homero Aridjis – award-winning poet and former ambassador – described all the candidates at last June’s election as “environmental illiterates” – referring to the battle he has fought for decades now, and which he sees reaching its final stages – for Mexico’s natural and cultural heritage.
Continue reading...Colombian activists face 'extermination' by criminal gangs
Nearly two years after the signing of a historic peace agreement, violence in the country continues
Enrique Fernández cannot remember the last night he slept peacefully.
He is tall and heavyset, and does not look like someone who scares easily, but as he sits in his humble rented home in western Colombia, his eyes dart nervously from left to right, scanning for any threat.
Continue reading...Europe to ban halogen lightbulbs
After nearly 60 years of lighting homes halogens will be replaced with more energy efficient LEDs
After nearly 60 years of brightening our homes and streets, halogen lightbulbs will finally be banned across Europe on 1 September.
The lights will dim gradually for halogen. Remaining stocks may still be sold, and capsules, linear and low voltage incandescents used in oven lights will be exempted. But a continent-wide switchover to light-emitting diodes (LEDs) is underway that will slash emissions and energy bills, according to industry, campaigners and experts.
Continue reading...Don't phase out solar panel subsidies, Sadiq Khan urges ministers
London mayor challenges move to axe tariffs and discounts for householders installing solar PV
Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, has embarked on a lobbying drive to persuade the government to keep the subsidies for household solar power.
Khan has made solar one of the key planks of his energy policy, supporting community solar projects and negotiating collective solar installations for homeowners in the capital.
Continue reading...Don't make waves: how to be an ethical beachcomber
A holidaymaker has been threatened with a fine for pinching pebbles, but there are some things we are encouraged to take from our beaches
A holidaymaker has been ordered to return a bag of pebbles to the Cornish beach they were taken from, or pay a £1,000 fine. This is troubling. When I put on my coat this morning – not worn since a trip to the seaside – I found in the pocket one piece of quartzite, two sandstone pebbles and a battered whelk shell. (It was the coat I wore for this article.) I hadn’t realised I was a “pebble plunderer”; I thought I just liked picking up the odd stone. So is there a way to beachcomb legally and ethically?
Continue reading...Ethiopia deploys hidden rabies vaccine in bid to protect endangered wolf
Oral vaccination campaign will use goat meat baits to pre-empt outbreaks of rabies among Ethiopian wolves
Rabies vaccines hidden inside goat meat baits have been deployed in the first campaign to protect the Ethiopian wolf, Africa’s most endangered carnivore.
There are less than 500 of the wolves in the high mountains of Ethiopia and they are very vulnerable to infectious diseases from domestic dogs. The oral vaccine approach will next be rolled out to cover all six surviving populations of the wolf.
Continue reading...Can Namibia’s desert lions survive humanity?
The lions of the Namib Desert survive against incredible odds, but can they survive trophy hunting, human-wildlife conflict and climate change?
Desert lions aren’t a distinct species or even a subspecies, but they are different. Drop a plains lion into the Namib Desert — where it may rain only 5 millimeters a year — and watch it perish.
According to Izak Smit, who runs the local NGO, Desert Lions Human Relations Aid (DeLHRA), the desert lions of Namibia are able to go long periods of time without water, getting most of their moisture from the blood of their kills. They are leaner and woolier (due to frigid nights). And they behave distinctly than other lions: prides are smaller, they have bigger home ranges and travel further and there is no infanticide — a common practice among plains lions.
Continue reading...UK fracking push could fuel global plastics crisis, say campaigners
Government aim to end plastic pollution undermined by keen support for fracking, says Campaign to Protect Rural England
The push for a large-scale fracking operation in England will fuel the global plastic crisis and undermines the government’s claims that it is tackling the issue, according to a leading charity.
The Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) says fracking will not only destroy large areas of the countryside, it will exacerbate the global plastic binge which is already causing widespread damage to oceans, habitats and the human food chain.
Continue reading...Amid plutonium fears, schools ban visits to new Colorado wildlife refuge
A nearby town is suing over fears that the land, once home to a nuclear weapons facility, still poses a threat
The nation’s newest national wildlife refuge, filled with swaying prairie grass and home to a herd of elk, is slated to open next month just outside Colorado’s largest city.
But seven Denver metro area school districts have already barred school-sanctioned field trips to the preserve. A top local health official says he would probably never hike there. And a town is suing over what the soil might contain.
Continue reading...Specieswatch: black soldier fly the UK's newest farmed creature
Maggots fed on waste food and larvae used as food on fish farms, promising revolutionary changes
The black soldier fly Hermetia illucens already numbers millions in Britain, but if you meet one in the wild it will have escaped. It is of the newest and most productive creatures farmed in these islands. So far it is being kept in controlled conditions so that its larvae can be fed to a large variety of pets – reptiles and birds, but mostly fish.
The most ambitious projects involve feeding the maggots on tons of waste food and then using the larvae as the main source of protein for fish farms. The attraction is that the larvae grow incredibly fast, gaining up to 5,000 times their own body weight in a couple of weeks. The larvae contain a large array of nutrients absorbed from the food that would otherwise be dumped.
Continue reading...Activists publish list of badger cull farmers to 'sabotage' their time
Stop the Cull group says it will not threaten cull organisers but rather disrupt them
Animal rights activists have published what they claim is a comprehensive list of farmers leading the badger cull complete with addresses, phone numbers and a map.
The Stop the Cull group has suggested its supporters get in touch with the scores of cull organisers it says it has identified to express their opposition, “sabotage” their time by making misleading phone calls or arrange demonstrations outside their farms.
Continue reading...Trump administration scraps Obama-era regulation on coal emissions
Plan would boost output from coal-fired plants and lead to as many as 1,400 premature deaths a year
The Trump administration has put forward a greenhouse gas emissions plan that could boost output from coal-fired power plants rather than push them towards closure and result in as many as 1,400 premature deaths each year.
Related: Andrew Wheeler: 'point man for Trump' focused on undoing Obama's EPA agenda
Continue reading...Australia's climate wars: a decade of dithering – video
From John Howard’s promise to introduce an emissions trading system in October 2007 to Malcolm Turnbull’s dumping of the emissions reduction target from the national energy guarantee in August 2018, the past 11 years of Australian politics has been marked by a torturous series of backflips and U-turns on energy and climate change policy. The so-called ‘climate wars’ span the leadership of five Australian prime ministers – John Howard, Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard, Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull – and show no sign of ending.
• Malcolm Turnbull survives Peter Dutton leadership challenge – for now
Continue reading...Australia has no climate policy: a quick response to a drawn-out farce | Graham Readfearn
Climate change denial is at the root of the half-baked policies and outright wrecking that have blighted the past decade
I needed to write this column really quickly, otherwise we might have had a new prime minister before I’d finished, and the climate policy we don’t have might have changed several times.
I gave myself 30 minutes because that reflects the fickle care and short-termism that has been afforded climate change in Australia in recent years.
Continue reading...Capitalism alone cannot reverse climate change | Letters
Larry Elliott rightly directs our attention to the impending perils of climate change and to some of the impediments to their avoidance (Capitalism can crack climate change. But it must take risks, 16 August). His suggested solution “that the world needs to wage war against climate change” misses the most important component. Climate change is driven by climate changers: you and me and 7.6 billion fellow humans, increasing by 83 million a year and with effects on much more than climate change.
Benign and non-coercive means to reverse that growth, to achieve something like the 2.5 to 3 billion that experts estimate the planet could sustainably support, are well known. They include the much wider and free provision of reproductive health services, including family planning, to all who need them, and of both general and health education especially to the large number of the world’s girls currently denied them.
Richard Vernon
Oxford
RSPB under fire over parking charge plans in Anglesey reserve
Locals say wildlife charity acting like a ‘corporate monstrosity’ over £5-a-day fee
The RSPB has been accused of acting like a “corporate monstrosity” for attempting to impose parking charges at one of north Wales’ most scenic birdwatching locations.
The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds plans to charge £5 a day for peak season visits to the South Stack reserve in Anglesey, despite renting the 780 acres of public land for just £7.
Continue reading...2018 bird photographer of the year – in pictures
Pedro Jarque Krebs from Peru scoops the top prize of £5,000 for his vibrant image of American Flamingos preening
Continue reading...Summer weather is getting 'stuck' due to Arctic warming
Rising arctic temperatures mean we face a future of ‘extreme extremes’ where sunny days become heatwaves and rain becomes floods, study says
Summer weather patterns are increasingly likely to stall in Europe, North America and parts of Asia, according to a new climate study that explains why Arctic warming is making heatwaves elsewhere more persistent and dangerous.
Rising temperatures in the Arctic have slowed the circulation of the jet stream and other giant planetary winds, says the paper, which means high and low pressure fronts are getting stuck and weather is less able to moderate itself.
Continue reading...