Environment news

• Unstoppable eating machines: why Australian farmers are renting out goats for weed control

  12-02-2021 20:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Goats have a well-deserved reputation for eating anything. Now you can rent them to deal with your weed problems
  La Niña has been good to the backyards and farmlands of much of eastern Australia. Cooler, wetter conditions have led to a flourishing of lush grass, trees and – unfortunately – weeds.With so many more people working from home, the joy of gazing out of the home office window has turned to dread as the eye alights on knee-high greenery, terrifying tangles of blackber
  
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• 'Too good to be true': the deal with an Isis-linked Australian family that betrayed PNG's most marginalised

  12-02-2021 20:00 via theguardian.com
  
  A sustainable forestry project established to develop PNG’s Western Province has become mired in an international corruption scandal “There is always the stench of corruption around a deal that is too bad to be true or too good to be true,” a full-page advertisement in Papua New Guinea’s Post Courier baldly declared in May 2018.“Usually, because it’s not true.” Continue reading...
  
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• 'Colder and deeper’: Scientists close in on spot to drill Antarctic ice core 1.5m years old

  12-02-2021 20:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Australian Antarctic Division will drill 3,000 metres deep in bid to improve ancient climate records and future modelsAntarctic scientists are close to finalising a drilling location deep in the frozen continent’s interior that could reveal a continuous record of the Earth’s climate going back 1.5 million years.After almost a decade of work, scientists at the Australian Antarctic Division are close to pinpointing a place to drill an ice core almost 3,000-metres deep. Continue reading
  
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• The Guardian view on summer holidays: mixed messages | Editorial

  12-02-2021 18:48 via theguardian.com
  
  It is possible, as well as desirable, that some trips could be possible in the coming months. But ministers have created another muddleThe confusion dates back almost a month, to a press conference at which the health secretary, Matt Hancock, revealed that he has booked a summer holiday in Cornwall. In the following weeks other ministers made more cautious statements. But the seed was sown, and this week the contradiction at the heart of the government’s message to the public about summer
  
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• Sustainable Business Covered podcast: How can we accelerate action on nature and biodiversity in 2021?

  12-02-2021 18:04
  
  The new edie podcast episode is streaming now, featuring exclusive biodiversity-focussed conversations with Earth Security, Patagonia and the Woodland Trust.
  
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• Covid-19: How England's hotel quarantine will differ from Australia's

  12-02-2021 17:08 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Rules for those arriving into England from "red list" countries differ from those enforced Down Under.
  
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• Climate Change: Government may review road-building policy

  12-02-2021 16:47 via bbc.co.uk
  
  It follows a legal challenge from campaigners, who argue the policy does not fit with climate targets.
  
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• Boris Johnson faces pressure from his own Tory MPs to close net-zero 'policy gaps'

  12-02-2021 15:22
  
  More than two dozen Conservative MPs have committed to championing green policies and solutions that will help the UK meet its net-zero target in Parliament, amid concerns that major policy gaps remain.
  
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• To safeguard future generations, we must learn how to be better ancestors | Roman Krznaric

  12-02-2021 15:12 via theguardian.com
  
  Short-term thinking in politics and business is laying waste to the planet. But the fightback – led by young campaigners – is on
  It’s hard to see history being made when you’re right in the middle of it – especially when life has our attention spans locked into minutes, days and weeks. But in the midst of a pandemic that understandably focuses our attention on the here and now, a new global movement is rising in the name of long-term thinking and intergenerational j
  
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• Coca-Cola company trials first paper bottle

  12-02-2021 14:46 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The test is first step towards all-paper bottle that can withstand pressure from fizzy drinks.
  
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• Green recovery report: Just 12% of global Covid-19 stimulus will benefit climate and nature

  12-02-2021 14:01
  
  G20 nations have spent $14.9trn on Covid-19 stimulus packages for businesses since the Covid-19 pandemic began - but only 12% has gone to industries with a positive impact in the fight against climate change and nature loss.
  
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• Leeds Bradford Airport expansion plans approved

  12-02-2021 13:49 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The £150m scheme to redevelop the airport has come under fire from climate change campaigners.
  
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• Environmental organisations launch employment scheme for UK's BAME youth

  12-02-2021 13:16
  
  More than 35 of the UK's major environmental organisations, including RSPB, Friends of the Earth and ZSL London Zoo, are collaborating on a new scheme to help diversify the sector.
  
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• Nightlife meets wildlife: the albums mixing birdsong and techno beats

  12-02-2021 12:00 via theguardian.com
  
  A Bogotà nightclub has used the sounds of animals and birds in the Colombian capital to make a new kind of dance trackStuck inside and unable to hit the dancefloor, many of the regulars at the electronic dance nights at Bogotá’s popular nightclub Kaputt found themselves missing the clubbing community when they were forced into lockdown by Covid-19. But then came a rallying cry from DJs Jorge Pizarro and Felipe Rodríguez: start recording the “sounds from your wind
  
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• Nightlife meets wildlife: albums created from birdsong and techno beats

  12-02-2021 12:00 via theguardian.com
  
  A Bogotà nightclub has used the sounds of animals and birds in the Colombian capital to make a new kind of dance trackStuck inside and unable to hit the dancefloor, many of the regulars at the electronic dance nights at Bogotá’s popular nightclub Kaputt found themselves missing the clubbing community when they were forced into lockdown by Covid-19. But then came a rallying cry from DJs Jorge Pizarro and Felipe Rodríguez: start recording the “sounds from your wind
  
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• Billions to be slashed from Green Homes Grant budget

  12-02-2021 11:55
  
  The Government is facing criticism for a decision to pull the majority of funding for the £2bn Green Homes Grant, less than a year after it was unveiled to improve household energy efficiency and play a key role in an economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.
  
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• Revealed: no penalties issued under 'useless' UK farm pollution laws

  12-02-2021 11:35 via theguardian.com
  
  Exclusive: Environment Agency has failed to prosecute or fine any of 243 documented violations since 2018Campaigners have called legislation designed to reduce water pollution caused by agriculture in England “useless” as data reveals there have been no prosecutions or fines issued despite regular documented breaches of the rules.The Environment Agency has documented 243 violations of the “farming rules for water” since they came into effect in April 2018, according to da
  
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• Revealed: no penalties issued under 'useless' English farm pollution laws

  12-02-2021 11:35 via theguardian.com
  
  Exclusive: Environment Agency has failed to prosecute or fine any of 243 documented violations since 2018Campaigners have called legislation designed to reduce water pollution caused by agriculture in England “useless” as data reveals there have been no prosecutions or fines issued despite regular documented breaches of the rules.The Environment Agency has documented 243 violations of the “farming rules for water” since they came into effect in April 2018, according to da
  
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• Science Photographer of the Year winners revealed

  12-02-2021 11:13 via bbc.co.uk
  
  From microscopic observations to images showing climate change in action.
  
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• Bank of America targets net-zero financed emissions and supply chains by 2050

  12-02-2021 10:28
  
  After being accused by investors and green groups of continuing to finance high-carbon projects, Bank of America has pledged to reach net-zero emissions across the projects it finances and its supply chain by 2050.
  
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• Record number of beavers to be released in Britain this year

  12-02-2021 08:01 via theguardian.com
  
  Industrious rodent to make a comeback in five counties where they have been extinct for centuriesA record number of beavers will be released by the Wildlife Trusts into Britain this year as the industrious mammal is restored to five counties where they have been extinct for hundreds of years.The popular rodent, whose dams have been shown to boost hundreds of species of insects, amphibians, birds, fish and plants, is returning to Dorset, Derbyshire, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, Nottinghamshir
  
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• Global green recovery plans fail to match 2008 stimulus, report shows

  12-02-2021 08:01 via theguardian.com
  
  Just 12% of spending on economic rescue packages is going towards low-carbon projects, research findsEfforts by governments around the world to forge a green recovery from the coronavirus pandemic are so far failing even to reach the levels of green spending seen in the stimulus that followed the 2008 financial crisis, new analysis has shown.Only about 12% of the spending on economic rescue packages around the world is going towards low-carbon projects, such as renewable energy and clean technol
  
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• Stonehenge: Did the stone circle originally stand in Wales?

  12-02-2021 07:24 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Archaeologists now believe the stone circle stood 150 miles from its current location in Wiltshire.
  
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• UK landfill tax seems to have incentivised fly-tipping, says watchdog

  12-02-2021 07:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Government is told it must find better ways to measure effects of environmental taxesAn environmental tax imposed to cut the amount of landfill appears to have incentivised illegal waste disposal such as fly-tipping, Whitehall’s spending watchdog has discovered.The National Audit Office also said the government was collecting too little information about the effect of environmental taxes, which it said needed to be monitored to help the government reach its climate goals. Continue reading.
  
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• Queen's property chief delays sale of Scottish seabed windfarm plots

  12-02-2021 07:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Auction paused after runaway bids for leases in England and Wales hand windfalls to Queen and TreasuryThe Queen’s property manager in Scotland has delayed the auction of Scottish seabed plots for windfarms after runaway bids for leases in England and Wales handed the Queen and the Treasury a multibillion-pound windfall.Crown Estate Scotland paused its auction in order to carry out a review of the process after the “unprecedented” bidding in an auction for England and Wales leas
  
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• Pollutionwatch: campaign calls on doctors to champion clean air

  12-02-2021 07:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Cardiac organisations want GPs to advise us about the air we breathe, much as they began to warn against smoking in the 1960s
  Conversations with our doctors frequently include ways that we can reduce health risks: eating better and taking more exercise, for instance.Air pollution is now a top five global risk factor for an early death. This has prompted an international group of cardiac organisations, societies and foundations to call for doctors to advise us on the air that we breathe. They wan
  
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• Country diary: spooked by the starlings as they rushed all around me

  12-02-2021 06:30 via theguardian.com
  Inkpen, West Berkshire: I was out with the dog when the sound came – like the sea being sucked out, only with the speed of a passing jetIt happened once before, at dusk in December, on the same hollow track that passes through the wood. This time, again, it was upon me, and I had the same unsettling instinct to run with it, my heart racing.The sun had set, the pheasants had roosted and all was still. I was out with the dog. When the sound came, it rushed above us like a great gust of wind
  
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• 'Hedge trimmer' fish facing global extinction

  12-02-2021 02:50 via bbc.co.uk
  
  These extraordinary fish, which are a type of ray, are vanishing in many countries due to overfishing.
  
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• The global race to produce hydrogen offshore

  12-02-2021 01:13 via bbc.co.uk
  
  There is much excitement about the prospect of making hydrogen on offshore windfarms. Could it work?
  
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