Environment news

• Birds on the battlefield: Country diary 100 years ago

  23-04-2017 23:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 27 April 1917Reports of the arrival of the swallow are coming in thick and fast from all parts of the district; it is impossible to mention them in detail. A few straggled in earlier, but from the 16th onwards they have been arriving or passing in considerable numbers, and now the long-delayed sand martins are with them. On the 22nd a house martin was seen at Stretford. On the 21st, the cuckoo was calling in Hertforshire; we may expect it here a
  
  Read more

• Winter returns to Europe with a vengeance

  23-04-2017 22:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Farmers fear for crops after a week of frost and snow, while a persistent heatwave in India costs scores of livesAfter a very warm start to April, parts of Central and Eastern Europe reverted to winter mode over the Easter weekend and throughout last week as unusually cold air for this time of year spread southwards bringing snow and sub-zero temperatures. In Slovakia, a heavy snowstorm reportedly caused a 40-car pile-up.However, the wintry weather hasn’t just brought travel disruption. It
  
  Read more

• Giant redwoods brought to British shores on a tide of Victorian fashion

  23-04-2017 22:30 via theguardian.com
  
  In woods across the UK, an imported American stands higher and broader than the trees that surround itA wooded ridge overlooking the Ouzel Valley in Bedfordshire has a remarkable set of trees sticking head and shoulders above the rest.Credited with being able to grow into the world’s largest living thing, they can reach a height of 100 metres, nearly three times as high as a mature oak. Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Michael Bloomberg to world leaders: ignore Trump on climate change

  23-04-2017 21:02 via theguardian.com
  
  Former New York mayor defends Paris climate deal in new book
  Bloomberg argues states and markets will ensure US hits emissions goalsThe former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg has urged world leaders not to follow Donald Trump’s lead on climate change, and declared his own intention to stave off the “tragedy” that would be the collapse of the Paris climate deal. Related: Trump aides abruptly postpone meeting on whether to stay in Paris climate dealContinue reading...
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Jon Vogler obituary

  23-04-2017 18:23 via theguardian.com
  
  My father, Jon Vogler, who has died aged 77, used his skills as an engineer to set up the UK’s first large-scale recycling system. In 1974, when recycling at home was virtually unknown in Britain, Jon designed a household scheme in West Yorkshire for Oxfam called Wastesaver.His innovative “dumpy” device, made of metal tubing, held four different coloured bags into which households sorted their waste. With the co-operation of Kirklees council, the sorted material was collected f
  
  Read more

• Do former transport ministers dream of electric buses?

  23-04-2017 17:53 via theguardian.com
  
  Ex Lib Dem MP Norman Baker has swapped the ‘constant battle’ of working with Theresa May for running a Brighton eco-firm that’s launching a green bus routeVince Cable and Ed Davey, the former business and energy secretaries respectively, are among the Liberal Democrats that lost their seats in 2015 who are plotting their way back to parliament in this general election.But an erstwhile colleague has rejected the opportunity to regain his seat in Lewes in East Sussex. Norman Bake
  
  Read more

• Energy bills: what's the difference between Tory cap and Miliband freeze?

  23-04-2017 17:08 via theguardian.com
  
  As newspapers alter their views on energy market intervention consumers must work out what it would mean for themIt’s not what you know but who you know. To prove the aphorism, compare the response to Theresa May’s promise to cap energy bills, and the furore over Ed Miliband’s pledge to do something very similar four years ago. When the former Labour leader called for a 20-month price freeze in the face of rising gas and electricity costs, he was ridiculed. “Back to the b
  
  Read more

• Aurora photographers find new night sky lights and call them Steve

  23-04-2017 16:58 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Steve is a "remarkably common" gas ribbon in the upper atmosphere.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Hillary Clinton in surprise Tribeca appearance for Bigelow elephant film

  23-04-2017 14:36 via theguardian.com
  
  Defeated presidential candidate discusses The Protectors: Walk in the Rangers Shoes, a short VR film about the fight against poaching and the ivory tradeThe premiere of a virtual reality short by Oscar-winning director Kathryn Bigelow was already a high-profile event at the Tribeca Film Festival on Saturday night. And then Hillary Clinton walked onstage.Related: March for Science puts Earth Day focus on global opposition to TrumpContinue reading...
  
  Read more

• Kuki Gallmann shot and wounded at Kenya conservation park

  23-04-2017 12:54 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Kuki Gallmann, author of I Dreamed of Africa, is flown to hospital after an ambush.
  
  Read more

• Trump: 100 days that shook the world – and the activists fighting back

  23-04-2017 11:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Three months in, the future is totally unpredictable. But a dramatic fightback is under way. Four activists tell us how they are adapting to the new normalThe first 100 days of President Donald Trump: how has my life changed? First of all, there was the mourning period. Not for me, but for my fellow citizens. I was just mad. And I wasn’t even maddest at the Trump voters. I understood that the critical battle lines now are not left versus right, but the 1% neoliberal globalisers making off
  
  Read more

• Shipping container architecture – in pictures

  23-04-2017 10:09 via theguardian.com
  
  Designers and architects are exploring the potential of repurposed shipping containers, but critics say they are not necessarily sustainable or cost-effective Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Sharks: deter rather than cull, says Western Australia premier

  23-04-2017 08:07 via theguardian.com
  
  Laeticia Brouwer, 17, was killed by a shark in Esperance on Easter Monday but Mark McGowan waited to comment as he did not want to politicise the issueThe premier of Western Australia remains in favour of personal devices to deter sharks instead of culling, nets and drumlines following the death of a 17-year-old girl.Laeticia Brouwer was surfing with her father during a family holiday in Esperance on Easter Monday when she was mauled on the leg.Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Can slag heaps help save the planet?

  23-04-2017 08:00 via theguardian.com
  
  British scientists are exploring ways to use the steel industry’s waste to capture carbon dioxide in the atmosphereThe Industrial Revolution left a deep mark on our world. Its dawning saw the start of the widespread burning of coal for factories and steam engines and, as a result, the beginning of significant outputs of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Our climate is now warming noticeably as these emissions have accumulated across the planet.The British landscape has also been changed
  
  Read more

• The eco guide to fast fashion | Lucy Siegle

  23-04-2017 07:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Reforms are under way but not enough has been done to end poverty wages in the garment industryTomorrow is the anniversary of the 2013 Rana Plaza catastrophe, in which 1,134 garment workers in Bangladesh were killed when their factory collapsed. The workers died in the overcrowded and poorly constructed building while working to meet our demands for fast fashion.Across the world conscious consumers will join fashionrevolution.org – a vibrant global civil movement focused on cleaning up the
  
  Read more

Follow @UK_Environment on Twitter!