Environment news

• ‘He was prescient’: Jimmy Carter, the environment and the road not taken

  06-01-2025 14:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The ex-president was a pioneer on renewable energy and land conservation but his 1980 defeat was a ‘fork in the road’When a group of dignitaries and journalists made a rare foray to the roof of the White House, Jimmy Carter had something to show them: 32 solar water-heating panels.“A generation from now,” the US president declared, “this solar heater can either be a curiosity, a museum piece, an example of a road not taken, or it can be just a small part of one of t
  
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• UK government scraps plan to ban sale of gas boilers by 2035

  06-01-2025 13:59 via theguardian.com
  
  ‘Future homes standard’ will not mandate replacing boilers withenvironmentally friendly alternativeThe government is to scrap the 2035 ban on gas boilers in its new housebuilding standards.The previous Conservative government had laid plans to phase out gas heating for homes by banning the sale of new gas boilers by 2035, so people replacing their gas boilers after that date would instead have to buy a heat pump or other environmentally friendly way of heating homes. Continue reading
  
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• Dried halibut and whale jerky: how a traditional Inuit diet fuelled an epic kayak adventure

  06-01-2025 11:00 via theguardian.com
  
  British chef Mike Keen paddled up the coast of Greenland eating only what local people did, and the health benefits led him to question the global food systemFor a period of two months last year, a typical day for chef Mike Keen would see him skipping breakfast and lunch in favour of snacks such as dried capelin (a small bait fish), dried halibut, jerky-like dried whale and a local Greenlandic whale skin and blubber treat called mattak.Mike Keen eats fermented seal blood in Sermilik fjord, east
  
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• Climate crisis ‘wreaking havoc’ on Earth’s water cycle, report finds

  06-01-2025 09:38 via theguardian.com
  
  Global heating is supercharging storms, floods and droughts, affecting entire ecosystems and billions of peopleThe climate crisis is “wreaking havoc” on the planet’s water cycle, with ferocious floods and crippling droughts affecting billions of people, a report has found.Water is people’s most vital natural resource but global heating is changing the way water moves around the Earth. The analysis of water disasters in 2024, which was the hottest year on record, found the
  
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• Snow therapy: ski tourism at the crossroads – in pictures

  06-01-2025 08:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Exploring the aberration, absurdity, madness and ingenuity of skiing, an activity that raises both questions and concerns despite its global success. It continues to fascinate and intrigue in the face of social and environmental upheavals. There are more than 2,000 resorts scattered across the world, attracting hundreds of millions of skiers, but there are also profound questions about its future amid climate challenges and societal changes Continue reading...
  
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• From farm to forest: the volunteers planting 100,000 trees in Somerset

  06-01-2025 08:00 via theguardian.com
  
  A woodland charity has enlisted about 1,000 people to create Lower Chew Forest and help fight climate breakdownOn a chilly day in December under stubborn grey skies, a band of green-fingered volunteers can be found in Somerset’s Chew valley with spades in their hands and dirt under their fingernails.There are about 30 helpers, split into pairs, carefully planting hawthorn, blackthorn and crab apple saplings, one tree at a time. Undaunted by the scale of the project, they are planting one o
  
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• Shrinking trees and tuskless elephants: the strange ways species are adapting to humans

  06-01-2025 07:00 via theguardian.com
  As people have shaped the natural world, so wildlife – from mahoganies to magpies – has had to evolve to surviveFrom the highest mountains to the depths of the ocean, humanity’s influence has touched every part of planet Earth. Many plants and animals are evolving in response, adapting to a human-dominated world. One notable example came during the Industrial Revolution, when the peppered moth turned from black and white to entirely black after soot darkened its habitat. The bl
  
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• Country diary: Gadding about on the river | Nic Wilson

  06-01-2025 06:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Hitchin, Hertfordshire: Is it a mallard, is it a gadwall? In fact we have one of each, paired-up in an example of waterfowl hybridisation that isn’t unusualWe could be hiking through an upland ravine, miles from civilisation, were it not for the graffiti and half-submerged washing machine. Hart’s-tongue ferns hang down from the steep banks above us. The tang of fox rises from fallen hemlock stems, their dried umbels pointing towards the River Hiz. The water, smutty and lacking in veg
  
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• Saving a species: The slow return of the Iberian lynx

  06-01-2025 02:28 via bbc.com
  
  After edging close to extinction, there are now some 2,000 Iberian lynxes in Spain and Portugal.
  
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