The Guardian

Now that China and Hong Kong won’t take our rubbish, it’s time to get real

Right now you may well be surveying the wreckage of Christmas, all that old wrapping paper. Whereas in previous years I’ve skipped through the issue of post-Christmas waste in an upbeat “how to” guide, this year’s advice might be summed up as “Brace, brace”.

Let me explain. Back in July the Chinese government announced a clampdown on so-called “foreign garbage”. To get slightly more technical, that means bringing in very tight contamination limits on 24 categories of scrap, especially waste paper and plastic. This concerns us, because since 2012 the UK has shipped more than 2.7 million tonnes of plastic scrap to mainland China and Hong Kong. Put simply there is no other market to replace it right now.

Policies aimed at limiting climate change by boosting the burning of biomass contain critical flaws that could actually damage attempts to avert dangerous levels of global warming in the future. That is the stark view of one of Britain’s chief climate experts, Professor John Beddington, who has warned that relying on the cutting down and burning of trees as a replacement for the use of fossil fuels could rebound dangerously.

Beddington, a former UK government chief scientific adviser, said there was now a real risk that increasing wood-burning in order to help European countries, including Britain, reach renewable energy targets could turn out to be misguided. “These policies may even lead to a situation whereby global emissions [of carbon dioxide] accelerate,” he states in a blog on Carbon Brief, the UK-based website that covers climate and energy issues. He says wind and solar projects should dominate programmes to boost renewable energy generation in Europe.

When Stephen Moss was a boy, the seasons followed predictable patterns

When I was growing up, in the 1960s and 1970s, we had what my nan used to call “proper weather”. Snow in winter, showers in spring, sun (or at least, sunny intervals) in summer and gales in autumn. Britain’s weather may have been changeable by the day, but the seasons were seemingly set in stone, with a reassuringly predictable regularity.

That certainly suited the country’s fauna and flora. Wild animals and plants, and by extension their habitats, evolved to cope with short-term unpredictability and long-term stability. If change did occur, it happened slowly, over decades or centuries; rather than rapidly, in a single year.

She broke the solo record for sailing round the world, but now she is dedicating her life to an even greater challenge – saving it from the destructive tide of plastic pollution

Trophies from her past glories as a competitive yachtswoman are placed discreetly around the 16th-century building on the Isle of Wight, the base of Dame Ellen MacArthur’soperations today.

On a blackboard in one of the meeting rooms, the targets of a different passion are spelled out. From uncovering the scale of plastic pollution in the oceans to targeting the textile waste of the fashion industry, MacArthur, who in 2005 broke the solo record for sailing round the world, is dedicating her life to saving it.

Comins Coch, Ceredigion For years the robins ignored our open invitation to take up residence above the shed door

We inherited the old garden shed when we bought the house a quarter of a century ago. Over the door, someone had fixed an open-fronted nest box of the type thought suitable for a robin but, whether it was too exposed or the aspect was wrong, no birds took up the offer of accommodation.

Eventually, while repainting the shed, I took down the box and, for want of anywhere else to put it, left it on a high shelf just inside the door. That winter, the apple tree nearby lost a branch, breaking the shed window and adding another line to the list of jobs I would never get around to.

From rosella pie to the ‘delicate’ flesh of baby emus, the 19th century ornithologist relished the taste of the creatures he so meticulously studied

Of all the changes to the study of ornithology in the past 200 years, the most striking, when reading John Gould’s seven-volume 1848 treatise The Birds of Australia, is the apparent lack of interest among modern scientists in what their subjects taste like.

Gould left no such questions unanswered. The prototype of his beautifully illustrated guide, digitised and made available online by the State Library of New South Wales, contains many tips for the keen sportsman on how best to shoot each of the featured birds and, where Gould had opportunity to sample them, what they tasted like.

A rare golden monkey, Hawaiian green sea turtles and Malaysia’’s last female Sumatran rhinoceros all feature in this week’s pick of images from the natural world

Suganshi Ropia says a piece she read after the signing of the Paris Climate Agreement helped her realise we shouldn’t wait to make our voices heard

Suganshi Ropia, 21, is a law student from Pune, India

I try to keep in touch with news related to climate change, and am particularly interested in environmental law. My compulsion to do something positive about climate change was one of the reasons I decided to study law. When I read the opinion piece Civil disobedience is the only way left to fight climate change, by Kara Moses, in spring 2016, it crystallised my feelings about the responsibility we have as a community of humans to do more.

Fungicides are found to be the strongest factor linked to steep bumblebee declines, surprising scientists and adding to the threats to vital pollinators

Common fungicides are the strongest factor linked to steep declines in bumblebees across the US, according to the first landscape-scale analysis.

The surprising result has alarmed bee experts because fungicides are targeted at molds and mildews – not insects – but now appear to be a cause of major harm. How fungicides kill bees is now being studied, but is likely to be by making them more susceptible to the deadly nosema parasite or by exacerbating the toxicity of other pesticides.

In the wake of Colombia’s peace deal, the rush to clear Amazon jungle for cattle ranches and coca caused deforestation to soar. A new scheme hopes to enable farmers to make a sustainable living from the forest

In a cool forest patch along a rutted dirt road outside the Amazon jungle town of El Retorno in Guaviare, southern Colombia, Luis Vergara lifts his machete to clear a path through the brush. He walks through a 90-hectare plot of land he has replanted with valuable abarco trees – Colombian mahogany – in an attempt to replace what he logged from it.

From the Pink Floyd shrimp that makes a noise so loud it can kill small fish, to giant stick insects and new types of orangutans and gibbons, here is a round up of new animal species discovered this year

As the rest of the country relaxes into that comfortable space between Christmas and the new year, Andrew Lock is returning to the Arctic Circle with his expedition partner, Neil Ward, in an attempt to become the first to cross the Brooks Range in the depths of winter.

The planned 10-week, 1,600km expedition will be the second attempt for the pair. Almost 12 months ago a record-breaking cold snap, a foot infection and inadequate gear forced Lock and Ward to abandon their attempt just 10 days into the journey.

Before leaving, Lock sat down with Guardian Australia to discuss what went wrong, and why he is going back

Advanced plans by Dutch power grid aims to build power hub possibly at Dogger Bank whose scale would dwarf current offshore sites

Britain’s homes could be lit and powered by windfarms surrounding an artificial island deep out in the North Sea, under advanced plans by a Dutch energy network.

The radical proposal envisages an island being built to act as a hub for vast offshore windfarms that would eclipse today’s facilities in scale. Dogger Bank, 125km (78 miles) off the East Yorkshire coast, has been identified as a potentially windy and shallow site.

Stamford, Lincolnshire Hieroglyphics left by fleeting feet provide a record of their ways, written on the ground

Cold comes, and life hunkers. A hedgehog asleep in a nest of leaves behind the shed. Inside it, there are big spiders and signs of shredding, mice probably. So much life that stays unnoticed most of the year, then moves indoors undetected. But the birds are always noticed. Though in winter, less.

Morning, and the inside is filled with a quiet, odd brightness. Outside is a four-inch mantle of snow. Softening, just. No signs of life. Then I see something inscribed in the white. What Richard Clapham called “the hieroglyphics left by the feet of nature’s wild things” (Bird Tracks in the Snow, 1920).

This year is set to be the third warmest on record in the US, as scientists say the fingerprints of climate change can be seen in numerous extreme weather events

Scientists say 2017 is set to be the third warmest year on record in the US as they look back on a year littered with stark signals of climate change.

The year-to-date average temperature across the contiguous US has been 2.6F above the 20th century average, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), placing it only behind 2012 and 2016 in terms of record warmth.

As the year draws to a close, we celebrate the finest weather photos our readers’ have snapped this year – from January dawns to December snowfalls

We have to develop digital forecasts of species’ responses to climate change, design robust strategies to protect as many as possible, and help nature to adapt

Each day increasingly dangerous hurricanes, wildfires, and floods betray the influence of climate change. We are appalled at the accruing losses of life and property. The arguments to address climate change at the recent UN climate conference in Bonn focused most often on these more concrete risks. However, the worst effects of climate change will come not from severe weather but from the irreversible loss of species and ecosystems.

Moulded over millions of years by natural selection, the diversity of species on Earth does more than just inspire awe. They are technical marvels and solutions to problems we do not yet know exist.

Wrest Park, Bedfordshire The statue was pitted and scarred with marine fossils, drooling threads of spider web anchored to its teeth

Even before the stonemason struck soft rock with hard metal for the first time, he must have known that he was destined for imperfection. Three hundred years later, the evidence was plain to see on an animal sitting on the terrace of the big house, haughty, imperious and mildly deformed.

The mason had chiselled a block of sediment from an ancient sea into a guard dog of the land. The sculpture was well executed – the claws on the beast’s forepaws overlapped the plinth, making a pleasing break to the block’s rectangularity. A loop of its tail coiled daringly beyond the straight edge.

As the worst-polluting coal plants near the end of their life, the focus must turn to tackling gas dependency, says analysis firm

British wind farms generated more electricity than coal plants on more than 75% of days this year, an analysis of energy figures has shown.

Solar also outperformed coal more than half the time, the data provided by website MyGridGB revealed.

Warmer weather has been good for some of the UK’s flora and fauna, while others have suffered or almost disappeared completely

“Haywire” seasons caused by global warming are having a worrying effect on flora and fauna, a leading conservation charity has warned.

In its annual wildlife and weather review, the National Trust said mixed-up seasons and warming seas in 2017 had led to a “freak” year for nature.