Environment news

• Natural history GCSE on hold as qualification seen as ‘Tory initiative’, claims campaigner

  02-12-2024 17:46 via theguardian.com
  
  New GCSE was announced under previous government in 2022 but now ‘sitting in limbo’, says Mary Colwell, one of its architects The natural history GCSE has been shelved because it is “seen as a Conservative party initiative”, one of the architects of the proposed new qualification has said.The conservationist and campaigner Mary Colwell told the Guardian she was “hugely frustrated” with the halt to the proposed new GCSE, which had been announced in 2022 and was
  
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• Bee-harming pesticides found in majority of English waterways

  02-12-2024 16:35 via bbc.com
  
  The chemicals can harm insects and marine wildlife, environmental charities warn.
  
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• Anti-whaling activist to learn if he will be extradited to Japan within 14 days

  02-12-2024 15:31 via theguardian.com
  
  Paul Watson, an early Greenpeace member, says his imprisonment in Greenland is a ‘political case’The anti-whaling activist Paul Watson will learn within 14 days whether he will be extradited to Japan, a court has been told, as his four-month imprisonment in Greenland was extended.At a hearing in Nuuk on Monday, the capital of the autonomous territory of Denmark, the judge Lars-Christian Sinkbæk said that Watson, who turned 74 today, would continue to be detained in a high secur
  
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• How can News Corp call its gas splash an ‘exclusive’ and a ‘special report’ when it’s paid for by industry? | Adam Morton

  02-12-2024 15:00 via theguardian.com
  Readers are led to believe a short-on-facts advertorial exhorting government to let companies extract more gas is straight news coverageGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastThe big news on Monday morning was that the story splashed across the front of News Corp’s biggest-selling tabloid newspapers wasn’t news at all. It was an advertorial paid for by a fossil fuel industry. Not that readers glancing at page one of the Daily Telegraph, Herald Sun, Courier-Mail or
  
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• Country people believe they’re different to city people, but on key issues our views align | Gabrielle Chan

  02-12-2024 15:00 via theguardian.com
  Researchers at ANU found no real difference between the climate opinions of regional and urban Australians. Remember that as we head into the next federal election, with renewable energy on the front lineSign up for the Rural Network email newsletterI have many heritages: Chinese, Irish, Anglo and Japanese among them. I am a journalist. I grew up in the city but have lived in the country for 30 years. How should I define my identity?Rural life has colonised my writing life. But I would hazard a
  
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• A pufferfish: ‘probably nature’s greatest artist’ | Helen Sullivan

  02-12-2024 15:00 via theguardian.com
  The word ‘probably’ will haunt this fish for the rest of its days – a deflating description for a cute, toxic creaturePufferfish are cute, and most pufferfish are toxic. Like people, they spend their weeks moving between states of puffed up and deflated. Or, really, three states: normal, puffed up and then the hangover after the puffing up. Ironically, the pufferfish toxin, called tetrodotoxin, is deadly because it stops a person’s diaphragm from moving – in other w
  
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• ‘The smell hurts’: why has the supreme court washed its hands of Argentina’s ‘rotten river’?

  02-12-2024 14:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Campaigners fear ruling on the toxic Matanza-Riachuelo basin will worsen the region’s many health crises and sends the message that environmental damage is not a priorityTwo decades ago, the waters in Argentina’s basin flowed over abandoned shipwrecks and rusting cars. Animal residue from abattoirs bled into its rivers, along with household waste and toxins from factories, including arsenic, lead and cadmium.Today, those living along the riverbanks, which snake around Buenos Aires&rs
  
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• Norway forced to pause plans to mine deep sea in Arctic

  02-12-2024 13:35 via theguardian.com
  
  Small Socialist Left party threatens to block budget if government becomes first to issue licences for deep-sea explorationThe Norwegian government has paused its plans to mine the deep sea in the Arctic, after pressure from a small leftwing party.The agreement was reached after the Socialist Left (SV) party said it would not support the government’s budget unless it halted the first round of licences for deep-sea mining exploration, planned for the first half of 2025. Continue reading...
  
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• Handful of countries responsible for climate crisis, top court told

  02-12-2024 12:59 via theguardian.com
  
  Vanuatu envoy makes claim as landmark hearing gets under way at international court of justice in The HagueA handful of countries should be held legally responsible for the ongoing impacts of climate change, representatives of vulnerable nations have told judges at the international court of justice (ICJ).During a landmark hearing at the Peace Palace in The Hague, which began on Monday, Ralph Regenvanu, Vanuatu’s special envoy for climate change and environment, said responsibility for the
  
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• Countries call for binding targets to cut plastic production after talks fail

  02-12-2024 11:33 via theguardian.com
  Group of 85 countries and blocs press for ambition in plastic waste treaty after no agreement was reached in BusanBinding global targets to cut plastic production must be at the centre of any continuing negotiations to secure the world’s first treaty to tackle plastic waste, a group of 85 countries has said.Talks in Busan, South Korea, attempting to secure agreement between more than 200 countries on the details of a plastic pollution treaty ended in failure over the weekend. Continue read
  
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• Top UN court to rule on key climate questions

  02-12-2024 10:51 via bbc.com
  
  The significant case could clarify governments' legal responsibilities in relation to climate change.
  
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• ‘Ground zero for climate change’: the shoreline sculpture park coming to Miami

  02-12-2024 10:04 via theguardian.com
  An ambitious multi-part project will transform seven miles of seabed into an artistic destination with a cautionary messageOver the next few years, coastal waters just off of Miami Beach will be transformed by The ReefLine, an ambitious new project that aims to occupy seven miles of seabed within shouting distance of the sands. The ReefLine aims to one day create an enormous, art-studded underwater playland, including a sculpture park, snorkel trail, and artificial reef.One of the first pieces o
  
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• More than three-quarters of UK universities join fossil fuel pledge, say activists

  02-12-2024 10:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Move to exclude fossil fuel firms from investment portfolios follows years of campaigning by staff and studentsMore than three-quarters of UK universities have pledged to exclude fossil fuel companies from their investment portfolios, according to campaigners.The move, which is part of a wider drive to limit investment in fossil fuels, follows years of campaigning by staff and students across the higher education sector. Continue reading...
  
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• ‘I’m used to people thinking I’m lying’: are Scotland’s sea eagles killing hundreds of lambs?

  02-12-2024 08:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Bringing back the long-vanished bird to the UK was hailed as a conservation triumph. Then farmers started finding the corpses of their prized livestockPhotographs by Murdo MacLeodTwo spinal cords, a dozen ribs and a hollowed-out head lie next to a peak called “rock of the eagle” in Gaelic. These are the remains of a pair of three-month-old lambs. It’s muggy, and maggots and foxes will make light work of the remaining skin and bone. In a few weeks, it’ll be as if it never
  
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• 'We're inundated with abandoned goats'

  02-12-2024 07:10 via bbc.com
  
  A shelter in Kent says it is struggling to cope with an influx of goats being dumped at its door.
  
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• Country diary: The myriad sounds of a cemetery in the rain | Kate Bradbury

  02-12-2024 06:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Hove, East Sussex: Standing under the sycamore the leaves drum, under the elm they patter; the yew makes no sound at allIn the cemetery everything is yellow: the carpet of leaves on the ground, mirrored by those still clinging to trees. Plastic flowers laid on gravestones, new graffiti on the wall. It’s raining, and there’s a serenity here that’s often hard to find in the city. Just outside, cars and buses rumble, children play football, a train rolls by. But in the cemetery ev
  
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• Greenland split over benefits of tourism as territory opens to the world

  02-12-2024 06:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Direct flights from the US to Nuuk expected to double next year but there are concerns about the expected influxThe capital’s new airport has been opened, two more are in the making, and expectations are high: the Americans are coming to Greenland.On Thursday, the first ever international flight into Nuuk, the most populous settlement on the autonomous Danish territory, landed to cheers on the ground and in the cabin of Air Greenland flight GL781 where passengers were served miniature bott
  
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• Could the decline of fossil fuels be Australia’s chance to become a clean exports giant? | Frank Jotzo

  02-12-2024 00:35 via theguardian.com
  Leading the charge towards clean energy would bring some much-needed positive momentum to international climate policyWhen Australia announces its 2035 emissions target to the world, there will be a unique opportunity to promote Australia’s ambition to help other countries decarbonise through exports of renewable energy-based commodities, while coal and gas exports will fall.Coal and gas exports from Australia are equivalent to well over a billion tonnes of CO2 when burned in other countri
  
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• ‘Like a zombie’: Aurimas Mockus and his gruelling quest to row from San Diego to Brisbane – mostly naked

  02-12-2024 00:00 via theguardian.com
  The Lithuanian faces up to eight months of cyclones, adverse winds and extreme loneliness as he rows in solidarity with UkraineFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesSign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news emailIn his first three days at sea, Aurimas Mockus says, he got only five hours of sleep. His body ached and his hands were covered with wounds and blisters.But alone in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, facing up to eight months of rowing, pain quickly turned to &l
  
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