The Guardian

Laxton, Northamptonshire The red kite thrives, and surely there’s no other prodigal English species that brings such pleasure

Kites soar and circle above the small limestone village mentioned in the Domesday book but rebuilt a little over 200 years ago to a design by Humphry Repton. There is a substantial red kite roost near the village, and 40 of them bring the sky to life with their twists and turns, tails contorting and long wings clawing the air.

Related: Red kites exported after success of reintroduction programme in Britain

As the Finkel review submission deadline arrives it’s time to accept the inevitable and fix the shambles that is our energy policy

Every few years the fossil fuel industry pressures politicians to force “clean coal”, carbon capture and storage (CCS) and more recently coal seam gas (CSG) on an increasingly sceptical community to justify its continued expansion.

This cycle started with the promotion of Adani’s massive Carmichael coalmine in Queensland, for coal export to India. The South Australian blackout followed last September when violent storms blew down transmission towers, prompting instant federal government accusations that excessive reliance on renewable energy was the cause, despite clear advice to the contrary. This also prompted a review of the energy system, led by Dr Alan Finkel, with final submissions due on Friday.

Ten finalists capture the theme of ‘through young eyes’ in this young photographers’ competition that aims to engage youth around the world in wildlife conservation. The winner will be announced at noon EST in New York

University of Leicester study shows how air pollution affects bacteria in the nose, throat and lungs

Black carbon found in air pollution can increase the resistance of bacteria that cause respiratory disease, research has suggested.

The findings could lead to a greater understanding of the effects of air pollution on human health, according to the lead scientist of the University of Leicester study.

CEO Francis Egan complains about protesters ‘harassing’ contractors supplying Preston New Road site in Lancashire

The chief executive of Cuadrilla, a leading fracking company, has complained at what he calls intimidation and harassment by “irresponsible” activists protesting at a shale gas site the firm is constructing in Lancashire.

Related: Cuadrilla starts work on Lancashire fracking site

Experts are puzzled how the shark, normally found near equator, could have reached UK

A crocodile shark, a marine creature normally found in deep tropical waters, has been discovered washed up on a beach in Devon.

A family found the shark at Hope Cove beach on the south coast and, thinking it was still alive, braved its sharp teeth to try to return it to the water before realising it was dead.

Endangered pygmy elephants and orangutans threatened by scheme for Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary

David Attenborough and Steve Backshall have joined conservationists and charities asking the Borneo government to reconsider a bridge that threatens one of the last sanctuaries of the rare pygmy elephant.

There are now just 1,500 of the world’s smallest pachyderm, according to WWF, and about 300 of them make their home in the 26,000-hectare Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary, in the state of Sabah in Malaysian Borneo. But construction teams have begun preparatory work for a bridge that will cross the Kinabatangan river which weaves through the region. The area is also home to critically endangered orangutans, proboscis monkeys, clouded leopards, gibbons, sun bears, pangolins and thousands of other jungle species, and hosts a thriving eco-tourism industry where travellers can view wildlife from boats on the river or while hiking into the forests.

Campaigners say cuts to waste collection services have increased the problem of illegal dumping

Fly-tipping is on the rise again, with the number of incidents up for the third year in a row, official figures show.

Councils across England reported 936,090 cases of fly-tipping in 2015/2016, up 4% on the previous year, the data from the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) reveals.

Only China dumps more plastic in the ocean than Indonesia. But by 2025, the world’s largest archipelago aims to reduce marine waste by 70%

Indonesia has pledged up to US$1 billion a year to dramatically reduce the amount of plastic and other waste products polluting its waters. The announcement was made by Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, Indonesia’s Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs at last week’s 2017 World Oceans Summit in Nusa Dua, Bali.

Pandjaitan told delegates at the conference that Indonesia would achieve a 70% reduction in marine waste within eight years. He proposed developing new industries that use biodegradable materials such as cassava and seaweed to produce plastic alternatives. Other measures could include a nationwide tax on plastic bags as well as a sustained public education campaign.

In India, 6,000 tonnes of plastic waste lies uncollected every day. Some of this washes up in Tamil Nadu state, where it pollutes and contaminates the food and water of communities living along the Bay of Bengal

All photographs by Jacques de Lannoy

Report’s authors say Sydney unprepared for knock-on effects of a significant increase in average summer temperatures

New South Wales, which has just experienced its hottest summer on record, is 50 times more likely to experience another similarly hot summer and 10 times more likely to experience extremely hot days under climate change, according to a group of Australian climate scientists.

The mean temperature in Sydney was 2.8C above average in December, January, and February, according to the Bureau of Meteorology, and the three-day heatwave from 9 February to 11 was the hottest on record from Sydney to Brisbane, breaking records set in 1939.

Flies, worms, slugs, woodlice, centipedes, moulds – the compost bin throbs with life

Several times each week I take vegetable peelings from the kitchen to the three compost recycling bins at the bottom of the garden. Even in winter, they are hotbeds of biodiversity.

Today, as I lift the lid of the newest bin, I am greeted by a blizzard of minute moth-flies (Clogmia albipunctata) that have bred in the film of water covering decaying garden weeds and autumn leaves.

ANU’s centre for water economics says ‘no discernible impact in reduced water use on a per-hectare basis’

More than $5bn used for reforms to safeguard the Murray-Darling river system from drought has been largely in vain, new research has found.

About $3bn of taxpayers’ funds used for improving farm irrigation had been a boon to private individuals but led to no cut in water use from the start of the last drought crisis, according to the Australian National University study.

If you are campaigning against high levels of toxic air or planning to relocate because of it, we’d like to hear from you

There are 802 educational institutions in London where pupils as young as three are being exposed to high levels of nitrogen dioxide.

The schools, nurseries and colleges are within 150 metres of nitrogen dioxide pollution levels that exceed the EU legal limit of 40µg/m3 (40 micrograms per cubic metre of air), putting tens of thousands of children at risk from lifelong health problems.

Public information film unseen for years shows Shell had clear grasp of global warming 26 years ago but has not acted accordingly since, say critics

More than a quarter of a century ago, oil giant Shell made an extraordinary public film about the dangers of global warming, called Climate of Concern, which has just been rediscovered. The film, says one leading climate scientist, is one of the best he has ever seen: the science is sharp, the predictions uncannily accurate and the suggested solutions smart. The film even had an urgent message: “Action now is seen as the only safe insurance.”

Yet Shell has spent the 26 years since investing many billions in highly polluting tar sands and helping to lobby against climate action. As Bill McKibben told me: “Imagine if Shell had taken their own advice and we’d spent the last quarter century in all-out pursuit of renewables, energy efficiency, and conservation. We wouldn’t have solved the problem of global warming, but we’d be well on the way. Shell made a big difference in the world – a difference for the worse.”

The much-loved creature of the suburban garden is in rapid decline – with new builds, roads and badgers to blame. Can we prevent their extinction?

Hit by a car. Savaged by a dog. Slashed by a strimmer. Burnt in a bonfire. Tangled in garden netting. Poisoned by slug pellets. Caught in a postman’s discarded rubber bands. Head stuck in a tin can. Tricked out of hibernation by increasingly unpredictable winter weather. Modern life, governed by humans, designs a multitude of ingenious ways for a hedgehog to die. It is no wonder that this treasured animal, a suburban garden fixture, which consistently tops favourite-species polls and is the source of many people’s first close encounter with a wild creature, is vanishing from Britain.

This disappearance is rapid, and recent. A survey of more than 2,600 people by BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine in February found that 51% of gardeners didn’t see a hedgehog at all last year, up from 48% in 2015. Barely one in 10 saw a hedgehog regularly. Scientific studies are unequivocal. Britain’s hedgehog population was calculated to be 1.55 million in 1995. Since the turn of the century it has declined by a third in urban areas and up to 75% in the countryside. A survey based on roadkill calculates that hedgehogs are declining by 3% each year. This exceeds the International Union for Conservation of Nature red list criteria, which identifies species at greatest conservation risk. Why are we obliterating hedgehogs? Will they become extinct? Or can we save them?

Campaign group Mighty Earth says aerial drones, satellite imaging and field research show farmers carried out forest-burning for fast food giant’s soy suppliers

The hamburger chain Burger King has been buying animal feed produced in soy plantations carved out by the burning of tropical forests in Brazil and Bolivia, according to a new report.

Jaguars, giant anteaters and sloths have all been affected by the disappearance of around 700,000 hectares (1,729,738 acres) of forest land between 2011 and 2015.

Spring is sprung 26 days earlier than a decade ago, causing problems for the natural cycle of plants and wildlife, Climate News Network reports

Spring is arriving ever earlier in the northern hemisphere. One sedge species in Greenland is springing to growth 26 days earlier than it did a decade ago. And in the US, spring arrived 22 days early this year in Washington DC.

The evidence comes from those silent witnesses, the natural things that respond to climate signals. The relatively new science of phenology – the calendar record of first bud, first flower, first nesting behaviour and first migrant arrivals – has over the last three decades repeatedly confirmed meteorological fears of global warming as a consequence of the combustion of fossil fuels.

Broad coalition writes to chancellor, urging him to tackle air pollution with compensation scheme for motorists

Taxi drivers and business leaders have added their voices to the growing campaign calling on ministers to introduce a diesel scrappage scheme to tackle dangerous levels of air pollution.

A broad alliance of business organisations and environmental charities has written to the chancellor, Philip Hammond, urging him to introduce a system in next week’s budget to compensate motorists switching from diesel to more environmentally friendly vehicles.

Staying below dangerous climate thresholds requires a carbon pollution price much higher than the federal estimate

The ‘social cost of carbon’ is an estimate of how much carbon pollution costs society via climate damages, and can also be considered the optimal carbon tax price. The US federal estimate ($37 per ton of carbon dioxide pollution) underpins at least 150 regulations across various federal agencies, and has thus become a prime target in the Trump administration’s efforts to roll back Obama’s climate policies.

Yesterday, the House Subcommittees on Environment and Oversight held a hearing on the social cost of carbon. The Republican Congressmen and their witnesses argued the federal estimate is too high, but a majority of economists think it’s too low. Not surprisingly, the Republican witnesses have been heavily funded by the fossil fuel industry. They made two main arguments: 1) that the $37 estimate should be based on domestic, not global climate impacts, and 2) that the government should have used a higher discount rate, which would result in a lower estimate.