Environment news

• Pollutionwatch: hazy air of cities 'reducing solar panel efficiency'

  13-09-2018 22:30
  As urban air pollution affects the passage of daylight, photovoltaic panels lose efficiency finds studyHaze over cities is a visual reminder of the air pollution we breathe. This is less obvious than the coal smoke induced gloom that Victorians suffered. In the 1880s central London had just 17% of the winter sunshine that was measured in the countryside. This had only improved to 45% by 1916–20.However, even modern haze is still reducing sunlight in cities. Scientists find that in Delhi ai
  
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• 'One of the boys': lost narwhal finds new home with band of beluga whales

  13-09-2018 22:07
  Researchers in Quebec discovered the narwhal, over 100km outside its typical range, was playing with the whalesWhale researchers in Quebec’s St Lawrence River are celebrating a remarkable discovery: a juvenile narwhal far from its arctic home, that appears to have been adopted by a band of beluga whales.The narwhal, more than 1,000km outside its typical range, was filmed by a drone swimming and playing with dozens of belugas that were treating it as one of their own. Continue reading...
  
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• World heritage status of Lake District is being 'violated', protestors say

  13-09-2018 20:21
  Locals say motor traffic in national park threatens world heritage statusA patch of land in the Lake District once owned by Beatrix Potter and described by Alfred Wainwright as “the loveliest in Lakeland” is being ruined by 4x4 drivers who are threatening the world heritage site status of the national park, according to campaigners.They say cars and motorbikes have devastated farm tracks, churning up soil and exposing the bedrock beneath, leaving them impassable to farm traffic. Cont
  
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• Australia on track to miss Paris climate targets as emissions hit record highs

  13-09-2018 20:00
  NDEVR Environmental data suggests Australia will miss targets by 1bn tonnes of carbon dioxide under current trajectoryAustralia remains on track to miss its Paris climate targets as carbon emissions continue to soar, according to new data. Related: Climate poll shows Morrison politically vulnerable as more voters back actionContinue reading...
  
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• My fear for a future of climate change | Letters

  13-09-2018 19:19
  I have had a long and happy life, writes 90-year-old Anthea Hardy, but what am I leaving my great-grandchildren?At last, protest marches against global warming, the most relevant issue of our time (Report, 8 September). I am over 90 years old and cannot join one but wish I could. All other questions fade into second place: Brexit, the gap between rich and poor, even the wars of the Middle East. We are not even reaching the 2% per annum target and even 0.2% would be too high. We are faced wi
  
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• 'A single piece of plastic' can kill sea turtles, says study

  13-09-2018 18:14 via bbc.co.uk
  New study: Ingesting even a single piece of plastic exposes sea turtles to a 20% chance of death.
  
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• Westminster council's actions show it puts cars first, not people

  13-09-2018 17:55
  Council’s successful legal challenge to Cycle Superhighway 11 follows scrapping of pedestrianisation of Oxford StreetA legal challenge by Westminster city council to block a major cycle route in London has succeeded on a procedural point, in a move that could send Transport for London back to the drawing board and set safety improvements to one of London’s most dangerous junctions back by months.The council’s successful judicial review of Cycle Superhighway 11 (CS11), which was
  
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• Huge increase in badger cull will see up to 42,000 shot

  13-09-2018 16:48
  Ministers expand England’s culling area by 70% to try to curb TB in cattle as scientists dispute programme’s effectivenessThe controversial badger cull in England has been hugely expanded into 10 new areas, with up to 42,000 animals now due to be shot in an attempt to curb tuberculosis in cattle, up from 32,500 last year.The farming minister George Eustice claimed the cull is starting to show results in Gloucestershire and Somerset, with drops in tuberculosis incidence, but did not h
  
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• Single-use plastic bottles banned from half marathon in London

  13-09-2018 15:03
  The capital's first marathon event pledging to be completely free of "single-use" plastic drinks bottles is to take place in north-west London.
  
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• Climate change means Hurricane Florence will dump 50% more rain

  13-09-2018 14:50
  Scientific study finds diameter of storm heading for US east coast will be 50 miles wider due to human-caused warming of planetHurricane Florence is set to bring 50% more rainfall to the US east coast due to human-induced climate change, according to a landmark forecast that has outlined the influence of warming temperatures upon the looming storm. Related: 'Monster' storm: Hurricane Florence is a rare threat in an unusual locationContinue reading...
  
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• Did Usain Bolt win the space race?

  13-09-2018 14:18 via bbc.co.uk
  Retired sprinter Usain Bolt took part in a zero gravity race as part of a champagne promotion.
  
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• Hen harrier disappears after satellite tag stops working

  13-09-2018 14:11 via bbc.co.uk
  Hen harrier Heulwen had flown across Snowdonia when her satellite tag stopped transmitting.
  
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• Hundreds of global investors commit to bolster climate strategies

  13-09-2018 13:11
  A coalition of almost 400 investors with $23trn in collective assets have pledged to step up their climate action plans in a bid to help the global finance sector meet the aims of the Paris Agreement.
  
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• German police confront treehouse activists after six-year standoff

  13-09-2018 12:52
  Occupiers protesting against coalmine expansion in Hambach forest call for mass mobilisationHundreds of police officers have descended on a patch of forest in western Germany occupied by activists living in treehouses, in an escalation of a long-running environmental battle.Dozens of protesters have occupied 60 treehouses, some as high as 25 metres off the ground, since 2012 in an attempt to protect the ancient Hambach forest from being felled to make way for the expansion of an open-pit coalmin
  
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• Robots ahoy! Mapping Earth's surface

  13-09-2018 12:10 via bbc.co.uk
  Most of the planet hasn't yet been mapped properly. Autonomous vehicles are set to change all that.
  
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• A road full of bottlenecks: Dutch cycle path is made of plastic waste

  13-09-2018 11:16
  First path entirely made of recycled bottles, cups and packaging opens in ZwolleThe world’s first plastic bicycle path made of recycled bottles, cups and packaging has opened in the Netherlands, as part of a pilot that could see similar roads open up across the country.The 30-metre path, made of recycled plastic equivalent to more than 218,000 plastic cups, is expected to be three times as durable as an asphalt alternative. Continue reading...
  
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• Scotland's flicks switch on country's largest battery

  13-09-2018 09:30
  Scotland's first utility-scale battery facility has opened this week, a move which experts hope will help pave the way for an energy storage boom in the UK.
  
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• Scotland flicks switch on country's largest battery

  13-09-2018 09:30
  Scotland's first utility-scale battery facility has opened this week, a move which experts hope will help pave the way for an energy storage boom in the UK.
  
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• Electric future? Global push to move away from gas-powered cars

  13-09-2018 09:00
  Business and political leaders commit to make more vehicles emissions-free – and plan to bypass US government to do soPolitical and business leaders gathering in San Francisco for a major climate change summit have committed to moving towards what was once a fantastical thought – the demise of the internal combustion engine in cars, trucks and other vehicles.A group of 26 city, business and regional or state leaders, representing a 122m people around the world, have used the Global C
  
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• Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards - in pictures

  13-09-2018 09:00
  Some of the finalists in this year’s competition, sponsored by the Born Free Foundation and designed to raise awareness of the natural world Continue reading...
  
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• Who killed the largest birds that ever lived?

  13-09-2018 08:45 via bbc.co.uk
  Scientists are a step closer to explaining a 10,000-year-old crime mystery on the island of Madagascar.
  
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• Elephant birds: Who killed the largest birds that ever lived?

  13-09-2018 08:45 via bbc.co.uk
  Scientists are a step closer to explaining a 10,000-year-old crime mystery on the island of Madagascar.
  
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• Country diary: wood pigeons gorge in huddles among the stubble

  13-09-2018 06:30
  Sandy, Bedfordshire: There are rich pickings to be had as the harvested cereal fields simmer under a weakening sunLate in the summers of my childhood, black specks would fall out of the sky, floating in through my open bedroom window, snagging on the net curtains. Though we lived a good half mile from the nearest field, the charred shreds from stubble-burning made no distinction between town and country. Sooty showers rained down on suburban sensibilities year after year. Though people complaine
  
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