Environment news

• Trump administration plans to allow oil and gas drilling off nearly all US coast

  04-01-2018 23:17 via theguardian.com
  Ryan Zinke unveils plan to offer leases in Pacific, Arctic and AtlanticEnvironmental groups and some Republicans lead outcry The Trump administration has unveiled a plan that would open almost all US offshore territory to oil and gas drilling, including previously protected areas of the Atlantic, Arctic and Pacific oceans.Related: Trump plan to shrink ocean monuments threatens vital ecosystems, experts warnContinue reading...
  
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• Grand Designs £27,000 eco-home in Wales burns to the ground

  04-01-2018 22:13 via theguardian.com
  Simon and Jasmine Dale spent six years building their home, which is now the subject of a crowdfunding appealAn eco-home labelled the “cheapest house ever built in the western hemisphere” on the Channel 4 programme Grand Designs, has been destroyed by a fire. The three-bedroomed house, which is based in the sustainable community of Lammas in rural Pembrokeshire, was featured on the TV programme in 2016 after its owners, Simon and Jasmine Dale, spent just £27,000 building it.Con
  
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• Coral reefs head for 'knock-out punch'

  04-01-2018 22:10 via bbc.co.uk
  Repeat bouts of warmer seawater are posing a significant challenge to the world's tropical corals.
  
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• The window for saving the world's coral reefs is rapidly closing

  04-01-2018 21:25 via feedproxy.google.com
  The world’s reefs are under siege from global warming, according to a novel study published today in the prestigious journal Science.
  
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• The Ocean Is Losing Its Breath

  04-01-2018 21:18 via feedproxy.google.com
  In the past 50 years, the amount of water in the open ocean with zero oxygen has gone up more than fourfold. In coastal water bodies, including estuaries and seas, low-oxygen sites have increased more than 10-fold since 1950. Scientists expect oxygen to continue dropping even outside these zones as Earth warms.
  
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• Oceans suffocating as huge dead zones quadruple since 1950, scientists warn

  04-01-2018 20:00 via theguardian.com
  Areas starved of oxygen in open ocean and by coasts have soared in recent decades, risking dire consequences for marine life and humanityOcean dead zones with zero oxygen have quadrupled in size since 1950, scientists have warned, while the number of very low oxygen sites near coasts have multiplied tenfold. Most sea creatures cannot survive in these zones and current trends would lead to mass extinction in the long run, risking dire consequences for the hundreds of millions of people who depend
  
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• Coral reef bleaching 'the new normal' and a fatal threat to ecosystems

  04-01-2018 20:00 via theguardian.com
  Study of 100 tropical reef locations finds time between bleaching events has shrunk and is too short for full recoveryRepeated large-scale coral bleaching events are the new normal thanks to global warming, a team of international scientists has found.In a study published in the journal Science, the researchers revealed a “dramatic shortening” of the time between bleaching events was “threatening the future existence of these iconic ecosystems and the livelihoods of many millio
  
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• Overweight Children More Likely to Underestimate Their Size

  04-01-2018 19:40 via feedproxy.google.com
  Overweight children are less accurate in estimating their own body size. And the bigger their body is, the more inaccurate their guesses.
  
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• NASA Study: First Direct Proof of Ozone Hole Recovery Due to Chemicals Ban

  04-01-2018 19:33 via feedproxy.google.com
  For the first time, scientists have shown through direct satellite observations of the ozone hole that levels of ozone-destroying chlorine are declining, resulting in less ozone depletion.
  
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• Danforth Center Uncovers a Genetic Mechanism That Could Enhance Yield in Cereal Crops

  04-01-2018 19:22 via feedproxy.google.com
  Solving the world’s food, feed and bioenergy challenges requires integration of multiple approaches and diverse skills. Andrea Eveland, Ph.D., assistant member at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, and her team identified a genetic mechanism that controls developmental traits related to grain production in cereals. The work was performed in Setaria viridis, an emerging model system for grasses that is closely related to economically important cereal crops and bioenerg
  
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• We Need One Global Net­work of 1000 Sta­tions to Build an Earth Ob­ser­vat­ory

  04-01-2018 19:17 via feedproxy.google.com
  We also need to share our data. So says world’s most prominent geoscientist, professor Markku Kulmala.Environmental challenges, climate change, water and food security and urban air pollution, they are all interlinked, yet each is studied as such, separately. This is not a sustainable situation, for anybody anymore. To tackle this, professor Markku Kulmala calls for a continuous, comprehensive monitoring of interactions between the planet’s surface and atmosphere in his art
  
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• Is Arctic Warming Influencing the UK's Extreme Weather?

  04-01-2018 19:11 via feedproxy.google.com
  Severe snowy weather in winter or extreme rains in summer in the UK might be influenced by warming trends in the Arctic, according to new findings. 
  
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• It's Official: 2017 Was the Second Hottest Year on Record

  04-01-2018 19:06 via feedproxy.google.com
  Last year was the second hottest year on record worldwide, behind 2016, according to a European Union climate monitoring program. Global temperatures averaged 14.7 degrees Celsius (58.46°F) — 1.2 degrees C (2.2°F) above pre-industrial times.
  
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• Brazil raises hopes of a retreat from new mega-dam construction

  04-01-2018 18:56 via theguardian.com
  Hydropower policy to be rethought in face of environmental concerns, indigenous sensitivities and public unease, says surprise government statement After swathes of forest clearance, millions of tonnes of concrete and decades of hydro-expansion, Brazil has raised hopes that it may finally step back from the construction of new mega-dams.In a surprise statement, a senior government official said hydropower policy needed to be rethought in the face of environmental concerns, indigenous sensitiviti
  
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• Focus on quality not weakened regulation post-Brexit, Gove tells farmers

  04-01-2018 18:11 via theguardian.com
  Quality and provenance must be the future of the British food industry, rather than lowering regulation or welfare standards, says environment secretary The future of the British food industry after Brexit must focus on quality and provenance rather than weakened regulation, environment secretary Michael Gove has said.“The future for British food is in quality and provenance and traceability and competing at the top of the value chain,” Gove told a packed auditorium at the Oxford Rea
  
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• Sky boss Jeremy Darroch lands WWF ambassador role

  04-01-2018 17:48
  Broadcaster Sky's chief executive Jeremy Darroch has today (4 January) become a WWF ambassador to assist the organisation in its efforts to safeguard the natural world.
  
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• Scientists find surprising evidence of rapid changes in the arctic

  04-01-2018 16:50 via feedproxy.google.com
  Scientists have found surprising evidence of rapid climate change in the Arctic: In the middle of the Arctic Ocean near the North Pole, they discovered that the levels of radium-228 have almost doubled over the last decade.
  
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• New Study Identifies Thermometer for Global Ocean

  04-01-2018 15:23 via feedproxy.google.com
  There is a new way to measure the average temperature of the ocean thanks to researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego. In an article published in the Jan. 4, 2018, issue of the journal Nature, geoscientist Jeff Severinghaus and colleagues at Scripps Oceanography and institutions in Switzerland and Japan detailed their ground-breaking approach.
  
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• Post-Brexit farming funding set out by Michael Gove

  04-01-2018 14:18 via bbc.co.uk
  Farmers are to receive payments for "public goods", such as planting meadows, instead of subsidies.
  
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• Why I pity Britain’s latest polar bear cub to be born in captivity | Patrick Barkham

  04-01-2018 13:36 via theguardian.com
  Despite the efforts of the Highland Wildlife Park, the first British-born polar bear for 25 years will suffer from enclosure – and from the adoration of its human fansPicture the scene. Every weekday, between 9am and sunset or 7pm, whichever is the earlier, people stand in solid blocks. More often than not, they seem to be staring at nothing. Then somebody shouts, “She’s getting up!” The throng presses forward. “And there’s the baby!” Whereupon one hears
  
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• Carbon footprint of Scottish homes slashed by 25%

  04-01-2018 13:18
  Scottish households have reduced their energy consumption by an average of 25% in eight years thanks to the growth of renewables and improved energy efficiency measures, new analysis has found.
  
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• Community leader tortured and killed over land trafficking in Peru

  04-01-2018 12:59 via theguardian.com
  José Napoleón Tarrillo Astonitas murdered for opposing land traffickers seeking to clear land in the Chaparrí Ecological Reserve, say local witnessesA criminal gang involved in land trafficking has tortured and murdered a community leader in northern Peru, according to his wife and local villagers who witnessed the killing.José Napoleón Tarrillo Astonitas, 50, was attacked by four men in his home on Saturday night. His wife, Flor Vallejos, told police he was bo
  
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• Michael Gove: UK to reward farmers for environmental practices post-Brexit

  04-01-2018 12:15
  Michael Gove has indicated that the UK will replace the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) post-Brexit with a system that gives subsidies to farmers who try to enhance the natural environment.
  
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• Innovate UK backs project to boost EV range to 400 miles

  04-01-2018 11:16
  In order to place the UK as a centre of excellence for battery development, a project to boost the range of electric vehicles (EV) to 400 miles and above has received £7m in funding from Innovate UK.
  
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• New £40m partnership to help UK communities take over solar farms

  04-01-2018 08:31
  A £40m investment partnership has been launched with the aim of helping communities take ownership of solar farms across the country.
  
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• Country diary: we have reached an arrangement with our mole

  04-01-2018 06:30 via theguardian.com
  Claxton, Norfolk The front lawn has been contested territory between the humans who assume they own it and the tiny creature that truthfully has possessionContinue reading...
  
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• Farmland could turn into meadows after Brexit, says Michael Gove

  04-01-2018 06:07 via theguardian.com
  Gove will tell farmers that the current subsidy regime, which rewards land ownership, will be replaced by a scheme focused on supporting the environmentFarmers will get subsidies for turning fields back into wildflower meadows after Brexit, according to environment secretary Michael Gove.
  More than 97% of the UK’s wildflower meadows have been destroyed since the second world war and their loss has played a significant role in the falling numbers of bees, birds and other wildlife. Continue
  
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• Farmland could be turned into meadows post-Brexit, says Michael Gove

  04-01-2018 06:07 via theguardian.com
  Gove will tell farmers that the current subsidy regime, which rewards land ownership, will be replaced by a scheme focused on supporting the environmentFarmers will get subsidies for turning fields back into wildflower meadows after Brexit, according to environment secretary Michael Gove.
  More than 97% of the UK’s wildflower meadows have been destroyed since the second world war and their loss has played a significant role in the falling numbers of bees, birds and other wildlife. Continue
  
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• Which works better: climate fear, or climate hope? Well, it's complicated

  04-01-2018 06:00 via theguardian.com
  Communication is everything when it comes to the climate change debate – and there isn’t just one way to speak to people’s emotionsThere’s a debate in climate circles about whether you should try to scare the living daylights out of people, or give them hope – think images of starving polar bears on melting ice caps on the one hand, and happy families on their bikes lined with flowers and solar-powered lights on the other.The debate came to something of a head this
  
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