Environment news

• Swimming with seals in Anglesey: Country diary 100 years ago

  17-07-2016 23:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 21 July 1916I had no intention of commenting upon a highly sensational account of a “Lady’s Thrill” which appeared in one of the papers, but when it was copied into several others I felt that it was time to protest. The account stated that a lady, when bathing at Bull Bay, in Anglesey, was chased by a ferocious “sea lion.” The sea lion, which we may see diving, swimming, and catching fish which are thrown to it in t
  
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• From food supplies to coastal defences, the UK is ill-prepared

  17-07-2016 22:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Climate change is bringing problems that we, as yet, know too little about to plan a response. More research is neededIt is written like a school report – “could try harder” – although the phrase that recurs through the UK Climate Change Assessment released last week is “more action needed”. Subjects like flooding and soil loss need “new stronger or different government policies” to deal with them. Related: UK poorly prepared for climate change imp
  
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• Close encounters with the seabirds of Orkney

  17-07-2016 22:30 via theguardian.com
  
  “Although I found the remains of this ancient settlement fascinating, I was constantly distracted by the array of birds along the beach”From the way the bird was moving, it was obvious she was distressed. One wing held out at an awkward angle, tail fanned, she piped loudly to attract my attention. But I knew that despite appearances, this ringed plover was not injured, but using all her wiles to lure me away from her nest. Moments later, we found the object of her concern: a tiny chi
  
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• Decaying carcass of Wally the whale may have returned to California beach

  17-07-2016 15:36 via theguardian.com
  
  Officials say a dead whale keeps floating to the southern coastThe humpback whale’s body has already been towed back to sea twiceOfficials say a dead whale that keeps floating to the southern California coast after being towed out to sea may have returned to the shoreline again. Encinitas lifeguards say a whale body that came ashore Saturday at Grandview beach had been decaying in the water for about two weeks, KABC-TV reports. Continue reading...
  
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• Fracked! review – Alistair Beaton's environmental satire has rampant energy

  17-07-2016 14:17 via theguardian.com
  
  Minerva, Chichester
  Anne Reid and James Bolam star in Beaton’s dark comedy about fracking that becomes an outright plea for direct actionAlistair Beaton’s forte is topical satire. His most recent piece, The Accidental Leader, pre-empted events by showing the shadow cabinet rebelling against Jeremy Corbyn. Now he takes on the topic of fracking (helpfully defined in the programme as “a process of mechanically liberating oil or gas direct from shale”), which has prompted ang
  
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• Down by the Kent seaside: ‘People don’t know what fish is, unless it’s got Bird’s Eye on it’

  17-07-2016 14:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Thanet boasts the biggest fishing industry in the south-east. So why do most of its chip shops only serve frozen fish?On a clear day, you can see as far as France; the coast of Pas-de-Calais glimpsed across the milky green water, beyond the thicket of masts in Ramsgate harbour, and the handwritten sign advertising local skate, cod, plaice, huss and sole.Alongside Broadstairs and Margate, Ramsgate is one of the principal towns of Thanet, a former island on the east coast of Kent that once served
  
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• Factbox - Turkey's huge and rising role in world trade of oil, gas, grains

  17-07-2016 12:58
  (Reuters) - A failed Turkish military coup attempt briefly closed the Bosphorus Strait to shipping traffic on Saturday, reminding the world of Turkey's huge and growing importance as a transit route for commodities between Russia, Central Asia and Europe. Below are the key facts about Turkey's role as a major transit country for oil and grains, as well as a significant consumer of commodities such as natural gas and gold. THE BOSPHORUS The Bosphorus is one of the world's most important chokepoin
  
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• 1,000mph car

  17-07-2016 12:24 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Andy Green says the Bloodhound 1,000mph supersonic car project has to file a mountain of paperwork before it can go racing in South Africa next year.
  
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• China's urban air quality improves in first half - ministry

  17-07-2016 11:24
  Air quality in China's largest cities continued to improve during the first six months of 2016, the country's environment ministry said on Sunday. China's largest 338 cities enjoyed more clean air days in the first half compared with the same period of 2015, the ministry said on its website. It said 76.7 percent of January-June days had clean air, an increase of four percentage points from a year earlier.
  
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• An industrial strategy is hard to achieve. But at least laissez-faire is over

  17-07-2016 08:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The new business secretary, Greg Clark, may or may not match up to Heseltine, Mandelson or Benn. But, significantly, he has an explicit licence to interveneOver the years, politicians of all stripes have had big ideas for Whitehall’s business department. When he was industry secretary in the 1970s, Tony Benn thought state ownership, planning agreements with companies and protectionism were the answer to Britain’s productivity problem.Twenty years later, Michael Heseltine said he woul
  
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• The Dartmoor lynx has ‘rewilded’ itself. Should Britain follow suit? | Keith Kirby

  17-07-2016 01:05 via theguardian.com
  
  Momentous times in our national life call for great vision, including on the future of our environmentDuring the Second World War small groups of people were thinking about how wildlife and the countryside might best be conserved in the hoped-for aftermath of the conflict. From such discussions emerged in 1949 the Nature Conservancy, the first government conservation body in Britain. It sought to protect examples of heaths, meadows, moorland and coppiced woodland. These were, by then, starting t
  
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