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Weatherwatch Species that breed around the Arctic Circle are already heading south

July may not feel like autumn, but in the world of birds, the return migration has already started – bringing an autumnal tinge to the air. Species that breed around the Arctic Circle – mostly waders such as plovers and sandpipers – are already heading south, towards their winter quarters in sub-Saharan Africa.

These birds may only have passed through Britain in the opposite, northerly direction a few weeks ago, in mid-to-late May. They have to time both their outward and return journeys very carefully, to coincide with a brief window of opportunity during the middle of the summer, lasting just a few weeks.

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There is ample evidence of systematic cruelty and regulatory failure with which to justify the New South Wales government’s decision to ban greyhound racing. But this is a single industry in a single state – if we step back and look at the wider picture we see a telling lack of consistency in animal welfare policy and practice around the nation.

The ABC Four Corners investigation that sparked the NSW inquiry found wrongdoing in multiple jurisdictions. Yet only the ACT is set to follow NSW’s lead in banning the greyhound industry rather than simply pledging to increase oversight.

How many trainers will simply move interstate, taking the animal welfare problems with them?

Even within states, there is considerable inconsistency in the regulation of different animal sectors. The Baird government has rightly condemned the killing of up to 68,000 greyhounds over the past 12 years. Yet tens of thousands of cats and dogs are killed every year in NSW because the government has failed to control their breeding and sale.

The government has already held two inquiries into this issue: first by the Companion Animals Taskforce, which reported in 2012, and then by a parliamentary committee on companion animal breeding practices in 2015. But in contrast to the swift response on greyhounds, the recommendations have been timid and government action glacial.

Still in NSW, but on a very different issue, the increased land clearing likely to accompany proposed changes to native vegetation laws will have significant impacts on the habitat of native animals. Why is this not also a major animal welfare issue?

Inconsistent policy and practice are not confined to NSW. In Victoria, while the state government has tightened laws governing pets, it continues to allow jumps racing for horses and the recreational shooting of ducks. Both activities are banned in many other parts of the country.

Philosophical anomalies

Policy inconsistency reflects anomalies at the philosophical level. Without a hint of irony, the NSW inquiry condemns the treatment of greyhounds as “commercial commodities, not animals to be cherished and loved”. However, this legal property status underpins the regulation of all domestic animals.

This is most clearly evident in livestock industries, with the routine commodification of animals and acceptance of mass “wastage”. This is precisely the issue cited as the main rationale for the greyhound ban.

How to explain this different thinking, when livestock animals are as individual as pets and just as capable of feeling pleasure and pain? If it is necessary to rely on animals as our main source of food and fibre – and this idea is increasingly contested – does not their sentience demand at the very least a much greater measure of humane treatment?

In any case, if greyhounds are considered more deserving because they are dogs rather than cows, pigs or chickens, this brings us back to the question of why breeders of pet dogs and cats haven’t met with similarly strong action as those who breed dogs for racing.

Barriers to reform

The NSW greyhound inquiry has also raised another issue that cuts across animal industries: the conflict of interest that arises when one body is responsible both for promoting the industry and for regulating welfare within it. It is no coincidence that examples of animal cruelty in the live export and greyhound racing industries have both been exposed by animal activists and the media, rather than the regulators.

Premier Mike Baird has acknowledged his failure to pay sufficient attention to the concerns of animal advocates, including the dissenting views of John Kaye, the late Greens MLC and deputy chair of a 2014 parliamentary inquiry into greyhound racing. In that inquiry, the majority report found that “the incidence of greyhound cruelty and neglect is minimal”, despite compelling submissions to the contrary.

It is heartening to note Baird’s recognition of the importance the public attaches to animal welfare. Unfortunately, belated and inconsistent government conduct tends to trigger cynicism even if the action is properly informed and courageous; witness Baird’s subsequent denials that it was all a ruse to hand dog tracks to property developers.

The reaction to the ban by industry and the NSW Labor opposition make it clear that a conservative government is not immune to the kind of political and legal backlash that followed the federal Labor government’s 2011 suspension of live exports to Indonesia over animal welfare issues.

None of this is conducive to the sustained reform that is urgently needed. Moreover, it is symptomatic of a regulatory framework that is showing its age. A more coherent strategy is required, one that identifies animal welfare problems consistently and proactively, with long-term planning and nationally consistent implementation. The establishment of an independent office of animal welfare, ideally at federal level, is critical to leading this kind of change.

Better planning and greater consistency would improve animal welfare as well as minimising the negative impact on human lives when changes are made. This would also prove advantageous for governments, by helping to shield action taken in good faith from attacks by political opponents and vested interests.

Elizabeth Ellis is a life member of the RSPCA and a member of the Australasian Animal Studies Association and Animals Australia.

Capuchin monkeys in Brazil have used stone tools for at least 700 years, according to scientists.

ENDS UK: Environment agency consults on new air quality monitoring network that would detect the release of particulates and sulphur dioxides

The eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in 2010 led to the closure of European airspace and harmed air quality.

The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) is consulting on a new air quality monitoring network intended to detect the release of particulates and sulphur dioxide from Iceland’s volcanoes.

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A swarm of Silver Y moths at the Stade de France turned into a swarm of memes after one moth tended to the injured Ronaldo. Watch out, they could be heading for Premier League stadiums next

It will forever be remembered as the moth balls final: a rather drab climax to Euro 2016 enlivened by a swarm of moths.

Related: Euro 2016: Guardian writers pick their highs and lows from France

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Earth’s record hottest 12 consecutive months were set in each month ending in September 2015 through May 2016

2014 and 2015 each set the record for hottest calendar year since we began measuring surface temperatures over 150 years ago, and 2016 is almost certain to break the record once again. It will be without precedent: the first time that we’ve seen three consecutive record-breaking hot years.

But it’s just happenstance that the calendar year begins in January, and so it’s also informative to compare all yearlong periods. In doing so, it becomes clear that we’re living in astonishingly hot times.

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The zero-fuel aeroplane, Solar Impulse, has begun what should be its penultimate flight, leaving Seville in Spain bound for Cairo in Egypt.

EU proposal on a free trade deal with the US could curb energy saving measures and a planned switch to clean energy, say MEPs

The latest draft version of the TTIP agreement could sabotage European efforts to save energy and switch to clean power, according to MEPs.

A 14th round of the troubled negotiations on a Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) free trade deal between the EU and US is due to begin on Monday in Brussels.

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Developing northern Australia: all talk and no action - until now.

The era of cheap fossil fuel power in Australia is dead and buried. And unless the Coalition has the stomach to take on Australia's energy oligopoly, the country's chances of having a cheap renewable energy system will also be diminished.

Climate change and El Niño the culprits, says Norm Duke, an expert in mangrove ecology, after seeing 7,000ha of dead mangroves over 700km

Climate change and El Niño have caused the worst mangrove die-off in recorded history, stretching along 700km of Australia’s Gulf of Carpentaria, an expert says.

The mass die-off coincided with the world’s worst global coral bleaching event, as well as the worst bleaching event on the Great Barrier Reef, in which almost a quarter of the coral was killed – something also caused by unusually warm water.

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Clean water can help to break the link between poor hygiene and eye diseases such as trachoma. Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association (CAAMA)

Nations are gathering in New York this week to discuss the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which aim to improve health, wealth and well-being for countries both rich and poor.

As a developed nation, it might be assumed that Australia will easily meet these new goals at home – including goal number 6, to ensure “availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all”. But the unpalatable truth is that many Australians still lack access to clean water and effective sanitation.

The World Bank’s Development Indicators list Australia as having 100% access to clean water and effective sanitation. But a discussion paper we released last week with our colleagues outlines how some remote Aboriginal communities struggle to meet Australian water standards.

Making water safe

High standards of health and well-being are unattainable without safe, clean drinking water, removal of toilet waste from the local environment, and healthy hygiene behaviours.

The Western Australian government has reported that drinking water in some remote communities is contaminated with uranium, faecal bacteria and nitrates above the recommended levels.

This contamination – combined with problems such as irregular washing of faces, hands and bodies (often without soap), and overcrowding in homes – means that residents in these communities suffer from water- and hygiene-related health problems at a higher rate than the general Australian population.

The health situation in affected communities throws up some sobering facts. Australia is the only developed country that has not eradicated trachoma, a preventable tropical disease that can cause blindness. It persists in remote areas with poor hygiene, where children repeatedly pass on the infection.

Cleaning faces can break the link with long-term ear and eye health impacts such as trachoma and deafness. The Footprints Network

Similarly, glue ear, which is influenced by poor water and hygiene practices and can cause permanent hearing loss and developmental difficulties, is prominent in these communities. The Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that one in eight Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people reported ear and/or hearing problems in 2012-13. This is significantly more than non-Indigenous people.

Installing properly managed community swimming pools can provide a community-wide (and enjoyable) amenity that will also contribute to preventing glue ear, trachoma and other hygiene-related infections.

Community swimming pools have been found to be the best way to ensure clean skin and prevent the spread of neglected tropical diseases. OzOutback How committed is Australia to delivering at home?

In signing up to the SDGs last September, the Australian government stated that this agenda:

…helps Australia in advocating for a strong focus on economic growth and development in the Indo-Pacific region … [and is] well aligned with Australia’s foreign, security and trade interests.

What is glaring about this statement is the lack of any mention of a national focus.

Australia should focus on delivering safe water at home as well as abroad – especially given Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s new role as a member of the United Nations' High-Level Panel on Water.

Our discussion paper sets out how Australia can approach the task of delivering safe water, sanitation services and hygiene practices both at home and in the Asia-Pacific region.

One crucial recommendation is for government departments to avoid addressing the 17 SDGs (which have 169 different targets) as a simple “checklist”, because many of them overlap and intersect in complex ways.

For example, education quality (SDG 4) can affect gender equality (SDG 5), which in turn affects behaviour around water use and hygiene (SDG 6). Similarly, within SDG 6 itself are targets to protect water-based ecosystems, but this obviously influences the accompanying targets of water quality and universal human access to safe water.

The World Health Organisation has estimated that access to clean, safe water and sanitation could reduce the global disease burden by almost 10%. The UN SDGs provide aspirational goals to address this. In Australia, the disease burden is low but persistent. This means that the goal for proper water and sanitation cannot be said to have been satisfactorily met.

This week’s UN talks offer an ideal time to put Australia’s remote communities in the spotlight and draw much-needed attention to the preventable toll of water-related health issues they still experience.

Cindy Shannon is affiliated with AIATSIS as an external appointment.

Nina Lansbury Hall and Paul Jagals do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.

Round 2 of ACT battery storage auction, a $2m funding round for 2MW of solar storage, has attracted 17 bids to install more than 8MW.

Watendlath Tarn, Borrowdale At my approach the soot-black, long-necked bird opens its hook-tipped bill, and utters a harsh croak

Watendlath Tarn shines like a burnished mirror. Perfect reflections of the surrounding hills and a Chelsea blue sky are disrupted only by the occasional splash of mallards and greylag geese and jumping trout. Black buzzer flies (chironomids or non-biting midges) on the surface are hatching from the tarn bed.

I think of Judith Paris, the historical novel by Hugh Walpole, which was a bestseller in the 1930s, though little read these days. It is partly set in revolutionary Paris and partly in Watendlath, with tales of passion and murder played out against vivid descriptions of the Cumbrian countryside.

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Australia’s third-biggest island could combine wind, solar, PV and battery storage to fuel own electricity needs – and set a blueprint for the rest of the country

Kangaroo Island is one of the great icons of Australian tourism. As Andrew Boardman, the chief executive of the Kangaroo Island council, says: “You can’t buy a name like that.”

But now the third-biggest island in Australia, which lies just 120kms from Adelaide, wants to make its mark in a different way: by supplying 100% of its electricity needs and much of its transport fuels through locally sourced renewable energy.

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Speculation abounds as Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk tweets that he is ready to drop part two of his top secret Master Plan.

The good news: NSW homes and businesses can still get fantastic returns from solar. The less good news: the returns won’t be the same, and most meters will need to be changed.

Recent science and new developments have highlighted the urgency of reducing global warming emissions to “net zero” as soon as possible.

Panasonic expects its annual sales of auto-related lithium-ion batteries to more than double within 3 years owing to demand for Tesla’s products.

Solar Juice and Fronius have proudly announced a distribution partnership.