Environment news

• Coronavirus variants and mutations: the science explained

  23-12-2020 18:01 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Scientists are rushing to find out more about mutations in variants of coronavirus causing concern.
  
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• DeepMind's AI agent MuZero could turbocharge YouTube

  23-12-2020 17:00 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The successor to AlphaGo is being used to create a more efficient type of video compression.
  
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• Giant Antarctic iceberg A68a is not done yet

  23-12-2020 16:28 via bbc.co.uk
  
  It might have suffered a big break-up this week but the iceberg is still carrying substantial bulk.
  
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• Octopuses filmed punching fish in the Red Sea

  23-12-2020 13:59 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Scientists have filmed octopuses in the Red Sea lashing out at fish during a group hunt.
  
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• Two-way street: how Barcelona is democratising public space

  23-12-2020 13:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Citizens are finally getting the urban patios and parks promised when the cramped medieval city was extended in the 1900sAt the turn of the 20th century, the Catalan engineer Ildefons Cerdà had a revolutionary idea for extending Barcelona beyond the cramped confines of its medieval walls. In the grid system of the extension he planned, each city block would be built around a large open space or patio, designed to be a park for residents.When he began his work, the old city was hemmed in p
  
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• Biden must be our 'climate president'. He can start by ending pipeline projects | Faith Spotted Eagle and Kendall Mackey

  23-12-2020 12:30 via theguardian.com
  
  There is no way to mine fossil fuels without driving the planet past 1.5℃ of warming and putting Indigenous communities at risk
  As we prepare to turn the page on 2020, and inaugurate Joe Biden as president on 20 January 2021, the incoming administration has a climate mandate to listen to people across America – and keep fossil fuels in the ground. This means stopping the Keystone XL, Dakota Access and Line 3 pipelines on day one.While Trump props up failing fossil fuel companies, inc
  
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• Organic meat production just as bad for climate, study finds

  23-12-2020 11:42 via theguardian.com
  
  Analysis also found the lowest impact meat was still far more damaging than the worst plant foodsThe cost of the climate damage caused by organic meat production is just as high as that of conventionally farmed meat, according to research.The analysis estimated the greenhouse gas emissions resulting from different foods and calculated how much their prices would need to rise to cover the harm they cause by fuelling the climate emergency. Continue reading...
  
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• edie's big fat sustainabiliy quiz of the year: 2020 edition

  23-12-2020 11:23
  
  Take edie's 2020 quiz of the year to test your knowledge on some of the biggest moments in the global sustainability apce over the past 12 months.
  
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• The good old ways: can we still farm like our grandparents?

  23-12-2020 11:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Against the odds, small-scale farmers are learning new ways to survive in an age of industrial-scale competitionVideos: Dom Bush‘I can tell you a story about every cow’ Continue reading...
  
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• Five EU countries object to bloc's latest hydrogen 'manifesto'

  23-12-2020 09:09
  
  Austria, Denmark, Luxembourg, Portugal and Spain have issued a joint letter calling on the EU to clearly prioritise renewable energies under an EU-led project aiming to accelerate hydrogen deployment, research and infrastructure.
  
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• Nasa's Mars rover and the 'seven minutes of terror'

  23-12-2020 09:02 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The US space agency releases an animation to show how its Perseverance robot will land on Mars.
  
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• Chernobyl fears resurface as river dredging begins in exclusion zone

  23-12-2020 08:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Scientists warn of threat of nuclear contamination from work on giant E40 waterway linking Baltic to the Black SeaThe race to save Polesia, Europe’s secret AmazonRead more in our series Biodiversity: what happened next?The river running past the Chernobyl nuclear reactor is being dredged to create an inland shipping route, potentially resurfacing radioactive sludge from the 1986 disaster that could contaminate drinking water for 8 million people in Ukraine, scientists and conservationists
  
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• Specieswatch: tramp slug reclassified as invasive species

  23-12-2020 07:00 via theguardian.com
  
  ‘Aggressive’ slug which has colonised 46 countries is regarded as threat to native biodiversity
  A slug (Deroceras invadens) that has colonised at least 46 countries and damaged crops as far apart as New Zealand, the US and Argentina was first discovered in England in the 1930s. But the tramp slug, as it is often known, originated in southern Italy so has been reclassified from a native to an invasive species.Not that there is any hope of getting rid of it. Distribution maps show that
  
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• Country diary: a hilltop dew pond is a night-time haunt for birds

  23-12-2020 06:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Combe Hill, North Wessex Downs, West Berkshire: The wild ducks come in for the evening softly quacking as they circle the chimney of wood to find the disc of pewter water within I reach the spinney on the hill just as the flash-in-the-pan boil of a sunset goes out. The circular wood, of beech, oak and pine, hides a lens of water on these otherwise dry downs. The last low clouds are clearing in a stiff wind and the orange needles of a larch suffuse a marmalade glow to the entrance.I step carefull
  
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• Stop believing in fairytales: Australia’s coal industry doesn’t employ many people or pay its fair share of tax | Richard Denniss

  23-12-2020 06:08 via theguardian.com
  
  The evidence to the contrary comes from the Morrison government’s own dataJust as people in the Middle Ages mistakenly believed the sun revolved around the Earth, many modern-day Australians mistakenly believe our economy revolves around the coal industry. Of course, such misunderstandings aren’t an indictment of those who have been misled, but those who did the misleading.Galileo was imprisoned for life for the “heresy” of ignoring dogma and relying on empirical evidence
  
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• Stop believing in fairy tales: Australia’s coal industry doesn’t employ many people or pay its fair share of tax | Richard Denniss

  23-12-2020 06:08 via theguardian.com
  
  The evidence to the contrary comes from the Morrison government’s own dataJust as people in the Middle Ages mistakenly believed the sun revolved around the Earth, many modern-day Australians mistakenly believe our economy revolves around the coal industry. Of course, such misunderstandings aren’t an inditement of those who have been misled, but those who did the misleading.Galileo was imprisoned for life for the “heresy” of ignoring dogma and relying on empirical evidence
  
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• Kernowite: New mineral found on rock mined in Cornwall

  23-12-2020 02:32 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The dark green mineral has been called kernowite as the rock comes from a mine in Cornwall.
  
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