Environment news

• Ministers pledge UK action to ratify high seas treaty by end of year

  10-06-2025 22:00
  
  Move comes after efforts at UN ocean summit to establish marine protected areas in international watersBritain will take action to ratify the high seas treaty by the end of this year, a landmark agreement that will protect marine life in some of the oceans’ most remote waters, ministers have announced.The move follows a surge in support and ratifications for the treaty at the UN oceans conference in Nice, France. Emmanuel Macron, the French president and co-host of the conference, told del
  
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• Distorted moles to lesser bilbies: a new way to marvel at Australia’s supremely weird and unique mammals

  10-06-2025 21:30
  
  Users of Ozboneviz site can spin and zoom 3D scans of bones and skeletons. Scientists hope it helps disprove the myth that marsupials are less evolved• Sign up for climate and environment editor Adam Morton’s free Clear Air newsletter hereThe skeleton of Australia’s supremely weird southern marsupial mole has a distorted skull “that looks like a god rammed it into a mountain side on its day of creation”, says Vera Weisbecker.It is one of 189 Australian mammals in a n
  
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• The Guardian view on Labour’s nuclear bet: big promises, but bigger questions remain unanswered | Editorial

  10-06-2025 19:33
  
  A bold state investment signals nuclear revival, but unresolved issues around cost, waste and safety demand urgent ministerial clarityThe government’s decision to invest £14.2bn in nuclear energy, on top of existing funds, marks a return to significant state funding of nuclear power after Hinkley Point C, financed by the private sector, was dogged by delays and cost overruns. It is also a decisive shift in energy policy. Ministers have high hopes of a nuclear energy renaissance. Ed M
  
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• What’s behind Keir Starmer’s decision to back nuclear power?

  10-06-2025 16:37
  
  Does the UK need nuclear to keep the lights on? What has big tech got to do with it? And do the costs stack up?Keir Starmer has committed the UK to its first significant stake in a new nuclear power plant since the 1980s.The decision to invest almost £18bn of taxpayer money into the Sizewell C nuclear power plant in Suffolk was welcomed by Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, as the beginning of a “golden age” of nuclear investment that would be critical to the government’s
  
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• A drop in the ocean: does experimental technology hold the key to saving the world’s seas?

  10-06-2025 12:00
  Investment is pouring into companies promising to geoengineer a rapid change in the pH of our waters – but critics are concerned at the speed at which unproven methods are being adoptedIn October 2024, a US company called Ebb Carbon announced the world’s largest marine carbon removal deal to date, signing a multimillion-dollar agreement with Microsoft to try to help fix a very real problem in the world’s seas: ocean acidification.Ebb plans to use a method called electrochemical
  
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• Dead elephants and feral sea lions: how poisonous algal blooms harm the planet

  10-06-2025 09:00
  As the Earth heats up, the amount of algae in our waterways is rapidly increasing, transforming the colour of lakes and killing entire ecosystemsBefore the elephants collapsed, they walked in aimless circles. Some fell head first, dying where they stood moments earlier; their carcasses scattered near watering holes across the Okavango delta. The unexplained deaths in May 2020 alarmed conservationists. By July, at least 350 elephants had died and nobody knew why.“The animals all had their t
  
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• Scientists warn against attempts to change definition of ‘forever chemicals’

  10-06-2025 06:01
  Move to narrow classification of Pfas and weaken regulation is ‘politically and/or economically motivated’A group of 20 internationally renowned scientists have issued a strong warning against attempts to narrow the definition of “forever chemicals” in what they describe as a politically or economically motivated effort to weaken regulation of the potentially harmful chemicals.Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (Pfas) are a large group of synthetic chemicals used for the
  
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• How does woke start winning again? | Gaby Hinsliff

  10-06-2025 06:00
  British progressives have suffered major setbacks in recent years, in both public opinion and court rulings. Was a backlash inevitable, and are new tactics needed?Inside a coffin-like glass box lies the figure of a man, his face streaked with scarlet paint. Above it a video plays on loop, showing the afternoon in June 2020 when an exuberant crowd of Black Lives Matter protesters yanked this statue of the 17th-century slave trader Edward Colston from its plinth near Bristol harbour and rolled it
  
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• New Zealand is failing to protect its vast ocean resources. We owe it to the world to act | Helen Clark and Kayla Kingdon-Bebb

  10-06-2025 03:33
  Less than 1% of our country’s seas are highly protected and the damaging practice of bottom-trawling must be restrictedIt’s a remarkable feat that a small, isolated island nation of just five million people has managed to stake a claim to one of the largest ocean territories in the world.New Zealand’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) spans more than 4m square kilometres – an area 15 times the size of our landmass.Rt Hon Helen Clark is a former prime minister of New Zealand,
  
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• Variety of wildlife in UK’s woodlands falling as habitats degrade, says report

  10-06-2025 01:01
  Only 7% of Britain’s woodlands in good condition, while number of birds fell by 15% over last five yearsThe variety of wildlife in the UK’s woodlands continues to decline as the habitats deteriorate, according to a new report.The Woodland Trust found that the progressively worsening ecological condition of woodlands is making them a less effective habitat for the wildlife living in them. Continue reading...
  
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