Environment news

• Heavy rain warning as Storm Austen sweeps across Scotland

  22-10-2026 23:59 via BBC News
  
  The Met Office has issued a yellow warning for rain across most of central and eastern Scotland on Friday.
  
  Read more

• Andy Burnham vows UK will hit net zero target despite Jackdaw gasfield approval

  22-10-2026 23:34 via Environment | The Guardian
  
  PM pledges commitment to address climate crisis, saying in Guardian article that his ‘determination is unwavering’ Andy Burnham: We will make the net-zero transition work for BritainAndy Burnham has said he will not “abandon the responsibility” of fighting the climate crisis after the government approved the Jackdaw gasfield, pledging to block new North Sea licences and keep Britain on track for net zero by 2050.The comments are the prime minister’s most forthright yet on net zero, aft
  
  Read more

• Gasps as Prince William makes surprise appearance on Graham Norton Show

  22-10-2026 23:21 via BBC News
  
  The Prince of Wales was marking his Earthshot Prize, to which all of Norton's guests were linked.
  
  Read more

• Firefighters and public 'knowingly put at risk' during summer wildfires

  22-10-2026 20:48 via BBC News
  
  Crews and control centre staff say the fires were relentless with many firefighters still off work injured.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Unsafe water, burning eyes and kerosene slicks: residents demand answers on River Taff leak

  22-10-2026 19:58 via Environment | The Guardian
  People near south Wales river were told to keep windows and doors shut after thousands of litres of kerosene from a GE Aerospace site got into the waterOily slicks of kerosene still appeared to be leaking into the River Taff this week, several days after a breach of thousands of litres was spotted by members of the public.The breach into the Welsh river was identified last Friday, after people reported strong chemical odours emanating from it. Natural Resources Wales (NRW) officers arrived on si
  
  Read more

• We will make the net-zero transition work for Britain – approving the Jackdaw gasfield is part of the plan | Andy Burnham

  22-10-2026 19:00 via Environment | The Guardian
  Protecting jobs and strengthening energy security in the short term does not mean wavering on Labour’s deep commitment to a cleaner, greener futureOn Wednesday, the energy secretary, Miatta Fahnbulleh, gave the go-ahead for gas production to begin at the Jackdaw gasfield in the North Sea. This has been the subject of fierce debate for many years, with strong views on both sides. I want to explain what the decision means and how it fits with Britain’s climate commitments.At a time of acute gl
  
  Read more

• Weather warning in place ahead of Storm Boelo

  22-10-2026 17:14 via BBC News
  
  A Met Office weather warning is in place from 18:00 BST on Saturday until 15:00 GMT on Sunday.
  
  Read more

• Damaging hail pelts Phoenix in rare storm

  22-10-2026 17:11 via BBC News
  
  Videos from the Arizona capital show people sheltering inside a car as hail smashes the windscreen, while intense downpours covered neighbourhoods in ice.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• First human case of Shamonda virus detected in France, officials say

  22-10-2026 15:53 via BBC News
  
  The disease, which usually affects cattle, has been identified in a patient who died in early October.
  
  Read more

• Activists celebrate as land given protected status

  22-10-2026 15:30 via BBC News
  
  Volunteers say they have been campaigning for 30 years to keep a wild space free from development.
  
  Read more

• Have scientists finally found a way to save the banana from disaster?

  22-10-2026 15:00 via Environment | The Guardian
  With the climate crisis and diseases threatening one of the world’s most popular fruits, researchers are hoping a breakthrough in breeding techniques could give the Cavendish banana a certain futureLove them or loathe them, bananas are one of the world’s most popular fruit. But a combination of the climate crisis and new killer diseases have had growers concerned over the banana’s threatened extinction, something that would impose a huge toll on farmers in countries from Guatemala to Malaw
  
  Read more

• Marine life in Gulf of Mexico has still not fully recovered from 2010 BP oil spill

  22-10-2026 14:00 via Environment | The Guardian
  New study reveals dramatic population drops in fish, cephalopods and more after the Deepwater Horizon spillMarine life in the Gulf of Mexico plummeted by about 60% after BP’s 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill and has still not fully recovered, according to a new study.The April 2010 explosion of an offshore drilling unit 50 miles off the Louisiana coast triggered the largest marine oil spill in history, releasing 134m gallons of oil into the ocean. According to the study published Monday in PNA
  
  Read more

• At least four dead after storm brings flooding to southern France

  22-10-2026 13:23 via BBC News
  
  The deaths include two women found drowned in a cellar in the Bouches-du-Rhône region.
  
  Read more

• ‘Pure arrogance’: anger in Finland as Google illegally fells 250,000 trees for datacentre

  22-10-2026 13:22 via Environment | The Guardian
  Company ordered to stop work at two sites in country, which has found itself at forefront of tech firms’ latest pushBehind a wire fence lies a vast gaping wound of earth. Before Google’s arrival a few months ago, an estimated quarter of a million trees occupied the 330 hectares (815 acres) of forest near the town of Muhos in rural northern Finland. Now they are all gone.After the tech company illegally stripped the entire area to build a datacentre – taking even the top soil with it – al
  
  Read more

• Project aims to protect rare arctic-alpine plants

  22-10-2026 13:11 via BBC News
  
  The three year scheme is awarded £65,000 to collect seeds and plant them in the fells.
  
  Read more

• Blockades, checkpoints and court action: fending off Brazil’s biofuel giants in the Amazon

  22-10-2026 13:00 via Environment | The Guardian
  After decades of violent displacement and land theft, the country’s quilombola communities are fighting backFor most of his 39 years, Josias Dias dos Santos, known as Jota, has endured degrading cycles of displacement as a quilombola, a descendant of Black people once enslaved on Brazil’s sugar cane and coffee plantations. He says his and other quilombola families subsisting in the rainforests in Pará, northern Brazil, were first forced out of their settlements by violent loggers, then by r
  
  Read more

• Two storms in two days as Austen and Boelo target UK

  22-10-2026 12:34 via BBC News
  
  The Met Office has named a new storm, Boelo, which is set to bring another round of stormy weather to the UK over the weekend.
  
  Read more

• Big pharma accused of ‘free-riding on nature’ as global fund attracts just $7,000

  22-10-2026 11:00 via Environment | The Guardian
  The Cali Fund, set up to raise $1bn a year for biodiversity from drug companies, remains near emptyBig pharmaceutical companies have been accused of “free-riding on nature”, after a landmark biodiversity fund that invites businesses to put some of their profits back into conservation was left virtually empty.The Cali Fund set out to raise $1bn (£750m) annually, by asking companies that profit from nature’s genetics to contribute towards conservation in low-income countries. But more than
  
  Read more

• Jackdaw decision 'taken outwith Scotland about Scotland's energy'

  22-10-2026 09:26 via BBC News
  
  Scottish Green Mark Ruskell, the SNP’s Keith Brown and Scottish Labour’s Jenny Young weigh up the Jackdaw decision.
  
  Read more

• Is the UK set to green-light a huge untapped oil field?

  22-10-2026 08:09 via BBC News
  
  Scotland editor James Cook visits Rosebank - the UK's largest known untapped oilfield - in the North Atlantic.
  
  Read more

• Whale carcass closes Maroubra and Coogee beaches in Sydney – video

  22-10-2026 07:38 via Environment | The Guardian
  Video released by Randwick city council shows a whale carcass floating in the water in a Sydney bay, causing the closure of two busy beaches. The whale's decomposed body was found on Thursday morning at Lurline Bay, a rocky cove surrounded by cliffs in Sydney’s eastern suburbs. It’s believed to be a juvenile humpback‘Almost looks fake’: two Sydney beaches closed after whale carcass washes up Continue reading...
  
  Read more

• NI risks missing 2030 energy goals, says Stormont committee

  22-10-2026 07:09 via BBC News
  
  A committee hears that Northern Ireland could lose out on economic opportunities if action is not accelerated.
  
  Read more

• ‘This isn’t greenwashing’: thousands of butterflies surprise experts on restored West Sussex farmland

  22-10-2026 07:00 via Environment | The Guardian
  Rare small blues and dingy skippers among species found on former wheatfields two years after start of transformation under commercial nature projectAn “amazing” abundance of 5,290 butterflies, including rare small blues and dingy skippers, has appeared on land that was barren wheatfields just two years ago.The speed with which nature has bounced back at Halnaker Hill farm in West Sussex has surprised experts after 133 hectares (330 acres) of intensively farmed land were turned into a commer
  
  Read more

• Strongmen like Trump would destroy the planet out of pure spite – and Brazil shows we’re all in peril | George Monbiot

  22-10-2026 07:00 via Environment | The Guardian
  If Flávio Bolsonaro is elected, Brazil’s ecosystems will face collapse. The ruling class would rather burn the world than share it with the poor
  However grim the trajectory might seem, I’ve always believed that sense will ultimately prevail. As the great perils of dismantling the living world become increasingly obvious, even the most rapacious exploiters must come round. Nobody wants to live on a dead planet, do they?There are – or were – signs that this wasn’t just wishful thinking.
  
  Read more

• How autumnal high pressure brings on the dark doldrums

  22-10-2026 07:00 via Environment | The Guardian
  With no wind to disperse the low cloud, mist and fog and less sunlight to burn it off, anticyclonic gloom can set in In summer, a high-pressure system over the UK usually means fine weather. But in the colder months it can result in anticyclonic gloom, characterised by grey skies, mist, fog and drizzle.A settled high-pressure system brings stable conditions and impedes the usual vertical movement of air. This is a recipe for sunshine when humidity is low, but can act like a lid, trapping atmosph
  
  Read more

• Why is a peat fire so bad? BBC is in Indonesia to find out

  22-10-2026 00:02 via BBC News
  
  The BBC's Liza Tambunan is in central Kalimantan, to explain what peat is and why Indonesia is facing its worst wildfire season in a decade.
  
  Read more

Follow @UK_Environment on Twitter!