Environment news

• Weatherwatch: no signposts in the sea – but clear tracks overhead

  26-12-2017 22:30 via theguardian.com
  Ship condensation trails are wider and fainter than those left by aircraft, but are visible in satellite imagesOn a clear winter’s day, the sky is full of condensation trails from aircraft. More surprisingly, ships also leave faint trails in the sky, an effect not studied until the 1980s. Like aircraft contrails, ship tracks are formed when water in the atmosphere condenses around tiny particles. A study in the 1990s set out to discover whether the ships’ exhaust was responsible, or
  
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• Dear Lizzy, the Great Barrier Reef wants to live! Let me tell you how we can save it | David Ritter

  26-12-2017 21:00 via theguardian.com
  In your letter you have asked me if it’s true that the Great Barrier Reef is dying. The reef is sick, but if we stand up to those destroying it, it can recoverDear Lizzy,
  Thank you so much for writing to me. It is really nice of you to have taken the time. Continue reading...
  
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• It’s time to join the renewables revolution | Letters

  26-12-2017 19:13 via theguardian.com
  MPs’ pension fund must dump fossil fuel investment, says Caroline Lucas; and the government should look to getting out of nuclear power, writes Paul DonovanThe government’s decision to allow pension funds to dump investments in fossil fuels (Boost for fossil fuel divestment as UK eases pension rules, 18 December) is a major step forward but, with such progress on the issues around “fiduciary duty”, it is increasingly puzzling that MPs are still denied a say over where our
  
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• Sea smoke phenomenon on Lake Superior, Minnesota

  26-12-2017 17:18 via bbc.co.uk
  Footage captures the Christmas Day scene over Lake Superior, US.
  
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• Ian Langford obituary

  26-12-2017 16:11 via theguardian.com
  Ornithologist, conservationist and publisher with a special interest in wildlife artIan Langford, who has died of oesophageal cancer aged 61, was a conservationist and publisher with a special interest in wildlife art. He showcased the work of artists who were also passionate about conservation, such as John Threlfall and Carry Akroyd. The Langford Press art books he issued were sumptuous large-format volumes packed with pictures and sketches based on the patient observation of natural landscape
  
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• UK energy cap could have been avoided, lobby group says

  26-12-2017 15:58 via theguardian.com
  Body representing big six suppliers says price cap is not inevitable and could have been avoided if industry had acted more quickly on ‘rip-off’ tariffs Energy suppliers could have avoided the government imposing a price cap if they had acted faster to shift customers off the tariffs branded a “rip-off” by Theresa May, according to an industry lobby group. Lawrence Slade, chief executive of Energy UK, also said he believed it was still possible the cap might not happen &n
  
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• Buzz off: hive thieves cashing in on thriving beekeeping market

  26-12-2017 12:23 via theguardian.com
  Hobby’s increasing popularity, and the rising cost of some queens, thought to be driving thefts of bees and hivesThieves are cashing in on an increasingly lucrative beekeeping market by snatching entire hives, with 135 reported thefts over the past six years.
  New figures show that hundreds of thousands of bees have been taken from apiaries across England and Wales since 2011. Continue reading...
  
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• US government climate report looks at how the oceans are buffering climate change | John Abraham

  26-12-2017 12:00 via theguardian.com
  A key chapter of the US Global Change Research Program Report deals with how the oceans are being impacted by human carbon pollution
  In the recently released US Global Change Research Program Report, one of the chapters I was most interested in was about the changes we’ve observed in the world’s oceans. The oceans are really the key to the climate change issue, whether that be in quantifying how fast it’s happening or how much will happen in the future. As humans emit greenhous
  
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• Country diary: the way through the woods leads to a mysterious grotto

  26-12-2017 11:03 via theguardian.com
  Hartburn, Northumberland Carved into the cliff is a narrow entrance, like a grotesque maskOur footsteps are quieted by fallen leaves as we enter Hartburn Glebe, a curve of ancient semi-natural woodland hugging the steep sides of the Hart Burn. There is something of Kipling’s poem The Way Through the Woods about it, a past glimpsed beneath the undergrowth. There was “once a road through the wood”. The Devil’s Causeway, a Roman road that ran north-east to the Tweed, passed
  
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• The best of the wildlife photography awards 2017 – in pictures

  26-12-2017 09:00 via theguardian.com
  Winning images from national and international wildlife photography competitions of the year Continue reading...
  
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• Annus mirabilis: all the things that went right in 2017

  26-12-2017 09:00 via theguardian.com
  It was a tale of two years – the best of times and the worst of times. But not everything went wrong – from Mata’s 1% to orangutans, we look at the goodHow was it for you? A bit grim? Many people will be eager to see the back of 2017, the year of Trump, Twitter, terrorism, Yemen, Libya and the plight of the Rohingya, as well as environmental degradation and almost daily doomsday warnings about the multiplying threats to sustainable life on earth.But the big, bold headlines tell
  
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• World’s largest plastics plant rings alarm bells on Texas coast

  26-12-2017 08:00 via theguardian.com
  Communities voice fears of impact that new facility on farmland just north of Corpus Christi will have on environmentDonald Trump’s state visit to Saudi Arabia in May will perhaps be best remembered by his participation in an all-male sword dance where he awkwardly waved a ceremonial blade in step with his cabinet and their Saudi counterparts.But a little-noted deal signed prior to the ceremony is set to worsen a vast problem the world has yet to fully confront – plastic pollution. C
  
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• $180bn investment in plastic factories feeds global packaging binge

  26-12-2017 08:00 via theguardian.com
  Colossal funding in manufacturing plants by fossil fuel companies will increase plastic production by 40%, risking permanent pollution of the earthThe global plastic binge which is already causing widespread damage to oceans, habitats and food chains, is set to increase dramatically over the next 10 years after multibillion dollar investments in a new generation of plastics plants in the US.Fossil fuel companies are among those who have plooughed more than $180bn since 2010 into new “crack
  
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• Fox hunting: activists claim trail-hunts are a cover for continued bloodsport

  26-12-2017 07:00 via theguardian.com
  Ahead of the year’s main Boxing Day hunt, saboteurs say hunters are not obeying the law and loopholes must be closedAs horses, hounds and hunters gather on the busiest day of the year for fox hunting, activists have raised concerns that trail-hunting is being used as a cover for bloodsport more than a decade after it was banned in the UK.At least 300 hunts are expected to take place across the country on Boxing Day. Riders on horseback gallop behind a pack of hounds directed by a huntsman
  
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