The Guardian
Man arrested for smuggling king cobras to the US in crisp canisters
California man faces up to 20 years in prison after the three live snakes were illegally shipped from Hong Kong
A man has been arrested on federal smuggling charges after customs officers intercepted a shipment with three live king cobras hidden inside potato chip canisters that were being mailed to his California home, US prosecutors said.
Rodrigo Franco, 34, was scheduled to be arraigned on Tuesday afternoon in Los Angeles on a charge of illegally importing merchandise. It was not immediately clear if he had an attorney who could comment on the allegations.
Continue reading...Ireland's staggering hypocrisy on climate change
The national climate policy is a greenwash – the country is certain to miss its 2020 emissions target and still handing out drilling licences
On the face of it, Ireland appears to be acting on climate change. Last year it appointed its first ever “climate action minister”, and in June it outlawed onshore fracking. What’s more, the telegenic new taoiseach Leo Varadkar dedicated much of the first day of his Cabinet retreat to discussing climate change.
Last week Varadkar introduced Ireland’s first national mitigation plan (NMP) in more than a decade, and said that addressing climate change would “require fundamental societal transformation and, more immediately, allocation of resources and sustained policy change.” If success could be measured simply by repetition – the word “sustainable” appears no fewer than 110 times in the NMP – Ireland would undoubtedly be among the world’s leading countries.
Continue reading...Pegas reborn: Romania's communist bicycle returns with oomph and style
A proletariat era symbol gets a modern makeover as a nostalgic nation warms up to its iconic bike brand
In communist Romania, almost every child had a Pegas bicycle. In a country cut off from the outside world, the state-owned company’s distinctive bikes were all people knew. However, with the violent end of Nicolae Ceaușescu’s reign in 1989, all that changed.
Continue reading...Captive by Jo-Anne McArthur: plight of animals in captivity – in pictures
McArthur’s book of photographs puts the spotlight on ethics of zoos around the world. Accompanied by essays by Born Free Foundation’s Virginia McKenna and philosopher Lori Gruen, the images and stories are also shared online through A Year of Captivity. Images from both projects will be exhibited at Toronto’s Harbourfront Centre from 7 to 10 September
Continue reading...Damned as dangerous but ragwort is full of life
Wenlock Edge, Shropshire A fantasia of hoverflies, solitary bees, bumblebees, butterflies and beetles feed on ragwort
Ragwort makes fields of gold, and to walk in them feels far more transgressive than a bucolic stroll through wheat or barley. Unlike the pale, safe, beige of ripening cereal crops, the ragwort is bold as brass. Unlike the slim pickings in the stashes of mice (and men), the ragwort swarms with life.
The insects, and those creatures who feed on them, are harvesting a crop that is toxic to humans yet the antidote to the intensive agriculture that harms insects.
Continue reading...Call for action to protect Scotland's endangered capercaillie birds
Survey finds Highlands population has halved since 1990s, believed to be because of climate change and human activity
Conservationists have called for action to protect the capercaillie, one of Scotland’s rarest and most treasured birds, after data showed its population had fallen 50% in just over two decades.
An extensive field survey of capercaillie breeding grounds in the Highlands estimated a population of only 1,114 birds between 2015 and last year, compared with an estimate of 2,200 between 1992 and 1994.
Continue reading...Mega-farms’ devastating effects go far beyond the chicken shed | Letters
The “unnoticed” expansion of mega-farms raises serious concerns about farm animal welfare and our food system (Mega-farms transforming UK countryside, 18 July). Even less visible is the air pollution generated by intensively housed animals and the devastating impact it is having on nearby wildlife.
At high concentrations, such as from these mega-farms, ammonia and other nitrogen emissions cause direct damage to lichens, mosses and other plants, including bleaching and discolouration.
Continue reading...Solar energy and moonshine politics | Brief letters
Did I invent the solar panels scheme which paid a generous feed-in tariff to install panels on your roof? I think I may also have imagined a green deal which was so advantageous that nobody much took it up. I fear this new initiative (UK ‘on verge of clean energy revolution’, 25 July) is going to place a similar strain on my mental faculties when it vanishes without trace under the label “green crap”.
Murray Marshall
Salisbury
• Paul Brownsey (Letters, 24 July) takes a negative view of civil partnerships that is not shared by many same-sex and heterosexual couples, who view them as a way of conferring the same legal and financial protection that is provided by marriage, without taking on board all the religious and societal baggage of that institution. As such many see them as superior rather than inferior to marriage.
John Mills
Stoneleigh, Warwickshire
Google enters race for nuclear fusion technology
The tech giant and a leading US fusion company develop a new computer algorithm that significantly speeds up progress towards clean, limitless energy
Google and a leading nuclear fusion company have developed a new computer algorithm which has significantly speeded up experiments on plasmas, the ultra-hot balls of gas at the heart of the energy technology.
Tri Alpha Energy, which is backed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, has raised over $500m (£383m) in investment. It has worked with Google Research to create what they call the Optometrist algorithm. This enables high-powered computation to be combined with human judgement to find new and better solutions to complex problems.
Continue reading...Vote in the Observer Ethical Awards 2017
Vote in the Observer Ethical Awards, now in their 11th year. You can vote in as many or as few categories as you like using the form below.
Continue reading...Trump proposes scrapping Obama-era fracking rule on water pollution
Bureau of Land Management says it is moving to discard 2015 regulation as it duplicates state rules and ‘imposes unjustified costs’ on oil and gas industry
The Trump administration has proposed scrapping an Obama-era rule that aimed to ensure fracking for oil and gas does not pollute water supplies.
Related: Pennsylvania nuns oppose fracking gas pipeline through 'holy' land
Continue reading...Alien species invasions and global warming a 'deadly duo', warn scientists
Foreign animals and plants can cause huge damage, with the march of Argentine ants in the UK a new example of how climate change is boosting the threat
Invasions by alien species and global warming form a “deadly duo”, scientists have warned, with the march of Argentine ants in the UK a new example. The public are being asked to be on alert for invaders such as the raccoon dog and Asian hornet, as eradication can be near impossible after a species becomes established.
As trade and human travel has become globalised many thousands of species have crossed oceans or mountain ranges and become established in new regions, with some causing “invasional meltdown” and over a trillion of dollars of damage a year.
Continue reading...Dozens of Laotian elephants 'illegally sold to Chinese zoos'
Laos accused of breaching Cites treaty to protect endangered species and China of encouraging trade in live animals
Dozens of elephants from Laos are being illegally bought by China to be displayed in zoos and safari parks across the country, according to wildlife investigator and film-maker Karl Ammann.
According to Ammann, so-called captive elephants in Laos sell for about £23,000 before being walked across the border into China by handlers or “mahouts” near the border town of Boten. Thereafter they are transported to receiving facilities, which buy them from the agents for up to £230,000 per animal. “That is a nice mark-up,” says Ammann, “and makes it exactly the kind of commercial transaction which under Cites rules is not acceptable.”
Continue reading...A plant to make a man as merry as a cricket
Allendale, Northumberland The melancholy thistle’s heads are magenta shaving brushes lighted on by hoverflies and bees
The garden is all heat and light on this summer afternoon, pulsing and multilayered with insect sounds and constant movement.
Wild flowers jostle with the cultivated, in varieties chosen for their nectar and pollen. Bumblebees wiggle up into the blue throats of viper’s bugloss, hoverflies taste scabious, dabbing with their tongues, soldier beetles clamber over wild carrot, bumping into each other before hurriedly parting.
Continue reading...'Out of control': saltwater crocodile attacks terrorise Solomon Islands
Steps to control protected reptiles have seen 40 killed this year and could bring an end to the ban on exporting their skins
A growing number of crocodile attacks is forcing police in the Solomon Islands to shoot the animals and to consider lifting a 30-year ban on exporting their valuable skins in order to control the population.
There have been more than 10 crocodile attacks on people this year, as well as dozens of assaults on livestock and domestic animals around the Solomon Islands, which is home to 600,000 people.
Continue reading...Religious leaders occupy environment minister's office to protest Carmichael coalmine
Rabbi, Uniting church reverend, former Catholic priest and Buddhist leader call for Frydenberg to withdraw support for mine
Religious leaders from several faiths have occupied the electorate office of Josh Frydenberg today, demanding the federal environment minister withdraw his support for Adani’s Carmichael mine, and vowing to stay there until he does so.
Related: Fresh legal challenge looms over Adani mine risk to endangered finch
Continue reading...Extreme El Niño events more frequent even if warming limited to 1.5C – report
Modelling suggests Australia would face more frequent drought-inducing weather events beyond any climate stabilisation
Extreme El Niño events that can cause crippling drought in Australia are likely to be far more frequent even if the world pulls off mission improbable and limits global warming to 1.5C.
International scientists have released new modelling that projects drought-causing El Niño events, which pull rainfall away from Australia, will continue increasing in frequency well beyond any stabilisation of the climate.
Continue reading...Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought | Dana Nuccitelli
How we define “pre-industrial” is important
In the Paris climate treaty, nearly every world country agreed to try and limit global warming to no more than 2°C above pre-industrial temperatures, and preferably closer to 1.5°C. But a new study published in Nature Climate Change notes that the agreement didn’t define when “pre-industrial” begins.
Our instrumental measurements of the Earth’s average surface temperature begin in the late-1800s, but the Industrial Revolution began in the mid-1700s. There’s also a theory that human agriculture has been influencing the global climate for thousands of years, but the mass burning of fossil fuels kicked the human influence into high gear.
Continue reading...Emissions scandal: VW showing 'utter contempt' for Londoners, says Khan
London mayor accuses Volkswagen of making the UK a laughing stock over refusal to pay £2.5m in compensation while it’s paid billions to US customers
Sadiq Khan has accused Volkswagen of showing “utter contempt” for Londoners after it refused to pay £2.5m compensation for its role in the dieselgate scandal.
The German car manufacturer has paid billions of dollars compensation in the US after admitting around 11m cars worldwide were fitted with “defeat devices” that switched the engine to a cleaner mode to improve results in tests.
Continue reading...How climate change scepticism turned into something more dangerous – podcast
Doubts about the science are being replaced by doubts about the motives of scientists and their political supporters. Once this kind of cynicism takes hold, is there any hope for the truth? By David Runciman
Subscribe via Audioboom, iTunes, Soundcloud, Mixcloud, Acast & Sticher and join the discussion on Facebook and Twitter
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