Environment news

• The Guardian view on chemical pollution: the UK can’t ignore the risks from PFAS | Editorial

  14-01-2025 19:47 via theguardian.com
  Efforts by the plastics industry to thwart regulation come from a familiar playbookAs the public wake up to the risk of “forever chemicals”, or PFAS, the industry is fighting back with a campaign researchers have compared with big tobacco’s battle against restrictions on smoking. New findings about its intense lobbying efforts are highly concerning and require a response from the environment secretary, Steve Reed. A recent consultation by the European Chemicals Agency, regardin
  
  Read more

• ‘A trash can for the US’: anger in Mexico and Canada over toxic waste shipments

  14-01-2025 19:32 via theguardian.com
  
  Exclusive: US companies are increasingly shipping toxic waste to other countries, where some argue it poses a riskUS companies ship over 1m tons of hazardous waste to other countries each year, raising questions over possible impacts on health and the environment, an investigation by the Guardian and Quinto Elemento Lab has found.Exports of toxic waste, most of which is shipped to Mexico and Canada, have climbed 17% since 2018, US records show. And while sending it away for recycling and disposa
  
  Read more

• Could Keir Starmer’s AI dream derail his own green energy promise?

  14-01-2025 19:09 via theguardian.com
  
  As PM pins hopes on AI, what effect will building energy-hungry datacentres have on Labour’s clean power pledge?Keir Starmer this week launched a plan to bring a 20-fold increase in the amount of artificial intelligence (AI) computing power under public control by 2030.But the race to build more electricity hungry AI datacentres over the next five years appears to work against another government target: to plug in enough low-carbon electricity projects to create a clean power system by the
  
  Read more

• Climate activists who target artworks ‘using Suffragette tactics’, says artist

  14-01-2025 17:53 via theguardian.com
  
  Alex Margo Arden says ‘symbolic damage’ helped force public conversation about climate crisisProtesters who targeted paintings to raise awareness of the climate crisis were using an “effective” tactic also used by the Suffragettes, according to an artist whose new show focuses on recent attacks on high-profile artworks.Alex Margo Arden, whose exhibition, Safety Curtain, opens this week at Auto Italia in east London, said the “symbolic damage” caused to the ima
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Private school run in south London linked to 27% rise in air pollution

  14-01-2025 17:07 via theguardian.com
  
  Campaigners say pollution levels in street in Herne Hill were far higher when private schools were openParents driving children to private schools is associated with a 27% increase in air pollution and congestion in a south London street, according to campaigners who are calling for private schools to make greater use of sustainable transport.The analysis by Solve the School Run found that nitrogen dioxide levels and fine particulates produced by vehicles in the street in Herne Hill were far hig
  
  Read more

• No 10 blocks beaver release plan as officials view it as ’Tory legacy’

  14-01-2025 15:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Exclusive: Natural England furious that years of work has been undone, with minister urged to push policy throughDowning Street has blocked plans to release wild beavers in England because officials view it as a “Tory legacy”, the Guardian can reveal.Natural England, the government’s nature watchdog, has drawn up a plan for reintroductions of the rodent, which until about 20 years ago had been extinct in Britain for 400 years, having been hunted for their fur, meat and scent oi
  
  Read more

• Revealed: US hazardous waste is sent to Mexico – where a ‘toxic cocktail’ of pollution emerges

  14-01-2025 13:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Investigation finds very high levels of lead and arsenic in homes near a factory processing US toxic wasteRaquel Villarreal lives in a bright-yellow house in Mexico’s Monterrey metropolitan area with her family and nine cats. Here, the emergency medicine doctor has raised three daughters, one of whom died at the age of 14.Just steps away is an industrial plant that operates 24 hours a day, emitting pollution that neighbors say blankets the neighborhood and which Villarreal says is hard to
  
  Read more

• Five years, multiple deaths: what is happening at the home of the last captive whales in Canada?

  14-01-2025 13:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Ontario’s Marineland lost five belugas last year, which the park’s management puts down to the ‘circle of life’. But activists claim animal welfare is at stakeOn the southern shores of the Niagara River, a few hundred feet from the thundering falls, sits Marineland of Canada – an amusement park, zoo, aquarium and forest occupying nearly 1,000 acres of land (400 hectares). Over the years, millions of people have clamoured to view the park’s 4,000 animals, inclu
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Sizewell C cost ‘has doubled since 2020 and could near £40bn’

  14-01-2025 12:03 via theguardian.com
  
  Treasury expected to decide whether to support EDF-backed nuclear power plant in this year’s spending reviewBusiness live – latest updatesThe cost of building the Sizewell C nuclear power plant in Suffolk has doubled since the plans were presented to the UK government in 2020 and could now reach close to £40bn, according to reports.A rise in construction charges over recent years, combined with cost overruns and delays at EDF’s Hinkley Point C nuclear project in Somerset
  
  Read more

• Amazon makes ‘largest ever’ UK order of electric trucks to cut carbon emissions

  14-01-2025 09:05 via theguardian.com
  
  Online retailer will also begin its first large-scale deliveries by train and trial heavy post-style cartsBusiness live – latest updatesAmazon is to deploy nearly 150 electric heavy goods vehicles as well as piling packages on to trains and post-style trolleys in an effort to reduce the carbon footprint of delivering goods in the UK.The tech company said it had bought more than 140 electric Mercedes-Benz heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) and eight Volvo lorries – which it says is the UK&rs
  
  Read more

• Dream come true for Australian funnel-web spider enthusiast after he discovers a new species

  14-01-2025 09:01 via theguardian.com
  
  Newcastle funnel-web spider’s last shared common ancestor with the Sydney funnel-web was 17 million years ago, experts sayGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastKane Christensen’s passion is an arachnophobe’s nightmare. For two decades, he worked with deadly spiders at the Australian Reptile Park, a zoo located 80km north of Sydney – paying such close attention to the eight-legged predators that he helped scientists discover two new species.He began th
  
  Read more

• Nobel prize winners call for urgent ‘moonshot’ effort to avert global hunger catastrophe

  14-01-2025 07:01 via theguardian.com
  
  More than 150 Nobel and World Food prize laureates sign open letter calling for immediate ramping up of food productionMore than 150 Nobel and World Food prize laureates have signed an open letter calling for “moonshot” efforts to ramp up food production before an impending world hunger catastrophe.The coalition of some of the world’s greatest living thinkers called for urgent action to prioritise research and technology to solve the “tragic mismatch of global food supply
  
  Read more

• Ministers to appeal against river pollution ruling won by Yorkshire anglers

  14-01-2025 07:00 via theguardian.com
  
  High court had ruled government was not meeting legal duty to clean up Costa Beck near PickeringThe UK environment secretary, Steve Reed, is pursuing legal action against a group of anglers who are trying to restore the ecosystem of a river.Lawyers for Reed will argue on Tuesday in the court of appeal that cleaning up individual rivers and streams devastated by pollution is administratively unworkable. Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• Cost to clean up toxic PFAS pollution could top £1.6tn in UK and Europe

  14-01-2025 06:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Exclusive: Costs of UK cleanup will reach £9.9bn a year in UK if emissions of ‘forever chemicals’ remain uncontrolledIndustry using ‘tobacco playbook’ to fend off ‘forever chemicals’ regulationThe cost of cleaning up toxic forever chemical pollution could reach more than £1.6tn across the UK and Europe over a 20-year period, an annual bill of £84bn, research has found.The number of British pollution hotspots is also on the rise. If emissions
  
  Read more

Follow @UK_Environment on Twitter!