id stringlengths 16 182 | title stringlengths 6 152 | body stringlengths 284 6.92k | tags stringlengths 50 917 | extracted_from_tag stringclasses 177 values | category stringclasses 10 values | date stringdate 1998-09-29 21:43:09 2024-12-31 13:00:45 | use bool 1 class | label stringclasses 10 values |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
sustainable-business/2017/feb/23/australian-consortium-launches-world-first-digital-energy-marketplace-for-rooftop-solar | Australian consortium launches world-first digital energy marketplace for rooftop solar | Australian homeowners with solar panels and batteries could soon trade their electricity in a digital marketplace developed by a consortium of electricity providers, energy tech startups, energy retailers and energy agencies. The Decentralised Energy Exchange – or deX – was launched on Thursday with the promise to “change the way energy is produced, traded and consumed at a local level in Australia”. Phil Blythe, founder and CEO of GreenSync – an energy tech startup and partner in deX – says the project reflects a shift in energy production from a centralised model of large-scale power plants to a decentralised model of rooftop solar. “The uptake of rooftop solar is one of the highest in the world per capita in Australia – around 1.6 million rooftops are fitted with solar – and it’s being rapidly followed by battery storage,” Blythe says. This has led to a shift away from thinking of households solely as energy consumers towards them being viewed as active participants in the grid. “If we’re going to have customers that can participate in a grid, then they need to get paid for their participation,” he says. “We needed … a new way of thinking about how these decentralised grids are going to work and fundamentally, how do we do that cost-efficiently.” With that challenge in mind, in 2016, GreenSync got together with electricity network operators United Energy and ActewAGL, energy tech startup Reposit Power, and energy retailer Mojo under the auspices of the Australian Renewable Energy Agency’s A-Lab; an initiative that the Arena chief executive, Ivor Frischknecht, describes as an “innovation sandbox”. Arena contributed $450,000 towards the total project cost of $930,000. What they came up with has yet to be done anywhere in the world: a network of “virtual” power stations made up smart grids of rooftop solar panels and batteries. The aim is to reduce energy costs, drive investment in renewable energy, stabilise the electricity grid and buffer it against surges in demand such as the recent heatwaves. With power now being generated not only at the centre of the grid but out at the fringes, deX acts like traffic lights controlling the flow of power in all directions according to where the need is, explains Frischknecht. “For example, a particular line is overloaded at a particular time of the day or it thinks it might be, what the deX exchange does is for the network to effectively post that problem in an automated fashion and for households with batteries and solar to say, yep I’ve got a solution for you,” he says. “DeX allows that exchange to happen in both a technical way and a financial way.” This communication will be enabled by a system developed by Reposit Power that controls the home-based battery and links it to the exchange. This smart system communicates with the marketplace in real time, looking for incentives that the household’s energy portfolio can participate in. An individual household’s solar panels and battery might seem like small fry but aggregated together, they became a significant electricity resource. Several thousand households, each with a battery holding around five kilowatts, can operate together as a virtual power plant with a capacity well into the megawatt range. These virtual power plants represent a huge untapped resource; not least because they require a minuscule fraction of the cost of building a new coal-fired power plant, but also because they can be far more responsive to surges in energy demand. “If we talk about the need for a blackout this year or next year, there’s no way we can go and build a power plant in that time,” Blythe says. “We need to think about how to use the smarts to harness those assets and bring them together and advertise these contracts that can be fulfilled in three to six months at the longest, and respond to heatwaves or sudden climate events.” But if so much of the load is being taken up by individual household solar systems, does this take the pressure off governments to invest in energy infrastructure? Are we at risk of decentralising too much? Frischknecht argues that if anything, we are still too reliant on centralised energy production. “All of the load is out at the periphery of the network; the load is where this generation and storage is,” he says. “It means that the network will be better supported and ultimately we could end up with cheaper networks, which are the majority of our electricity costs, so this is a pathway to lower electricity costs.” The federal minister for the environment and energy, Josh Frydenberg, says the project is an important initiative that creates two-way interface between energy consumers and local network operators. “This holds the potential to deliver on the government’s commitment to increasing the reliability of Australia’s energy system, whilst supporting a more effective and cost-competitive rollout of renewable energy to households,” Frydenberg says. While rooftop solar currently represents around 16% of renewable energy generation in Australia, Frischknecht says it is estimated to increase its contribution to anywhere between 20 and 50% of all electricity generation. The consortium is launching two pilot projects in the ACT and on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula, each involving around 5,000 households. The projects are also being overseen by a reference group that includes the Australian Energy Market Operator, the Australian Energy Market Commission and Energy Consumers Australia. | ['sustainable-business/sustainable-business', 'sustainable-business/series/innovations-in-renewables', 'environment/environment', 'environment/energy', 'technology/technology', 'environment/solarpower', 'australia-news/business-australia', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'australia-news/energy-australia', 'profile/bianca-nogrady', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-gsb'] | environment/solarpower | ENERGY | 2017-02-22T23:47:19Z | true | ENERGY |
media/2008/jan/22/yahoo.digitalmedia | Yahoo set to lay off hundreds of staff after investor concerns | Yahoo is set to announce its biggest round of job cuts since the dotcom crash, cutting several hundred staff in response to investor concerns that the company needs to improve its profitability and become more strategically focused. The US internet giant is expected to cut staff in low-priority areas when it announces a tight 2008 budget at its earnings call next Tuesday, January 29. Yahoo has been conducting a slow-moving review of its business since the middle of 2007, when co-founder Jerry Yang replaced Terry Semel as chief executive. Yang laid out key priorities for improving the company's performance and competitiveness against its arch-rival Google, including a focus on personalised services that would better appeal to advertisers and consumers, an open development platform and faster internal decision-making. But months of incremental improvements have failed to reassure the company's investors, who have seen the company's market value fall by $12bn since January 2006. The workforce grew by 2,600 during 2007 to 14,000 people. Industry blog Silicon Alley Insider predicted cuts of up to 2,500 last week. But inside sources told the Wall Street Journal and New York Times today that layoffs would be in the hundreds - still the largest round of job cuts at the firm since the dotcom crash. The company said in a statement that it would need to make "tough decisions to help the company grow". "Yahoo plans to invest in some areas, reduce emphasis in others, and eliminate some areas of the business that don't support the company's priorities. "Yahoo continues to attract and hire talent against the company's key initiatives to create long-term stockholder value," the firm added. Industry pundits have been impatient for Yahoo to fulfill its potential. Writing on the GigaOm blog, consultant and entrepreneur Sramana Mitra said the company was "in the most promising position to be able to leverage Web 3.0" because of its reach into recruitment space, property and photo-sharing. "The monetisation needs to be much more thorough," Mitra wrote. "Their current organisation structure, which has advertisers, publishers and audiences under different executives, is in my opinion a flawed model. Accountability is unclear. "They should put each vertical under a separate general manager, one who is accountable for all three aspects of the vertical and owns the P&L [profit and loss]. "This would fix a lot of the cultural problems and finger-pointing for which Yahoo has lately become infamous." · To contact the MediaGuardian newsdesk email editor@mediatheguardian.com or phone 020 7239 9857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 7278 2332. · If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication". | ['technology/yahoo-takeover', 'media/digital-media', 'media/media', 'media/mediabusiness', 'business/business', 'technology/yahoo', 'technology/technology', 'type/article', 'profile/jemimakiss'] | technology/yahoo-takeover | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE | 2008-01-22T12:15:56Z | true | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE |
environment/2017/oct/04/sydney-waste-power-incinerator-plans-halved-amid-pollution-and-health-fears | Sydney waste-power incinerator plans halved amid pollution and health fears | Plans for the world’s biggest waste-to-energy plant in Sydney’s west have been cut in half, in an effort to address concerns from health and environmental authorities, and residents. The Next Generation, a company owned by one of the largest waste operators in Australia – Ian Malouf, founder of Dial A Dump – has lodged new documents seeking a phased development of the plant. The documents, submitted in response to more than 1,000 submissions, say: “Construction and operation will be phased. Initial waste processing will be limited to phase one, allowing up to 552,500 tonnes of residual waste fuel to be thermally treated per annum.” The company says it is now only seeking approval for phase one and that phase two “will be subject to the proponent satisfying the Environmental [sic] Protection Authority of the availability of eligible waste fuels”. The original environmental impact statement was for a plant capable of burning 1.35m tonnes of garbage a year. It was fiercely opposed by local residents because of its 800-metre proximity from the nearest suburb, Erskine Park, and its location in the sensitive Sydney basin. High-temperature incineration of industrial and household waste to generate electricity is common in Scandinavia and Germany, but in Australia it has been confined to small cogeneration plants at factories, burning waste paper and wood. The Next Generation plant would be a first. The original proposal was for a plant double the size of similar plants in Europe. The Next Generation claims that the plant offers a source of “green energy” and would use state-of-the-art technology. But the sheer scale of the original proposal – to be located at Eastern Creek at the junction of the M5 and M4 motorways – prompted objections from both the New South Wales Environment Protection Authority and the state’s health department over air quality and its likely impact on rates of recycling. The Sydney basin already has some of the poorest air quality in Australia, particularly during the summer months. The new documents contain additional modelling on the composition of fuel stock for the plant – domestic and construction waste, including plastics. They also contain new modelling on air quality from a smaller plant. “Based on the updated modelling inputs, cumulative predictions detail no exceedances [of emission limit] of the EPA criteria when the EfW [energy-from-waste] contribution is added to maximum background concentration under expected operating conditions,” the company says. But residents’ group No Incinerator for Western Sydney said that to describe the project as “clean and green” was false. “This is not clean green energy, it is simply burning fossil fuels in another form. Mass combustion incinerators rank as one of the dirties known forms of energy production, and produce far more carbon dioxide per unit of energy generated than coal-, oil- or gas-fired power stations,” the group said in a recent submission to a parliamentary inquiry looking into the project. “Incinerators also produce toxic emissions that consist of toxic metals, such as dioxin, arsenic, mercury, cadmium, and over 200 organic chemicals, including known carcinogens, mutagens and hormone disrupters.” The group is also concerned about the disposal of the toxic residual ash, which, it said, required handling similar to radioactive waste. Spokeswoman Melinda Wilson said the reduction in the size of the incinerator would not alter local opposition. “There are already air-quality problems in the Sydney basin. It’s a ridiculous to put an incinerator at this location,” she said. The other concern raised by the EPA was the impact an incinerator would have on recycling rates, particularly of plastics and organic material. The submission says new modelling has shown there is currently 551,200 tonnes of waste eligible to be used as waste-to-energy fuel, sufficient to power phase one. The proponent says the waste used in the incinerator would otherwise go to landfill. The project will be determined by an independent planning assessment commission in coming months, but faces continuing stiff opposition from residents. | ['environment/incineration', 'australia-news/sydney', 'environment/environment', 'australia-news/new-south-wales', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'environment/pollution', 'environment/waste', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/anne-davies', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/pollution | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2017-10-04T02:32:32Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
politics/2010/jan/18/boris-johnson-recycling-boost-rates | Boris Johnson acts to boost London's recycle rates | Boris Johnson will today outline plans for a scheme that rewards recycling households as he aims to cut the amount of rubbish going to landfill sites to zero within 15 years. Johnson is backing a London-based trial of an American scheme called Recycle Bank, which gives householders shopping vouchers or donations to charity to the value of how much they recycle. Johnson estimates a typical London household would make £14 a month under the scheme, one of a series of proposals contained in a draft municipal waste strategy. Figures show the capital's recycling rates lags behind both the rest of the UK and other international cities. Johnson, who chairs the London Waste and Recycling Board, wants to save £90m per year through more recycling, better coordination and greater investment in less polluting technologies to either dispose of waste or convert it into a local source of energy. Just 25% of the 4m tonnes of household waste generated each year by Londoners is recycled, with half going to landfill sites. The remainder goes to incinerators. The cost of managing this waste is approximately £600m every year, with wide variations between boroughs' recycling rates. Johnson is writing to all London borough leaders to ask them to redouble their efforts in recycling and – with landfill rates set to increase from current associated costs of around £245m to £307m by 2013 – reminding them of pressure on future council tax bills if they fail to act. The Tory mayor believes the carrot, rather than the stick, should be among the strategies applied to improve London's ranking by rewarding those who opt to recycle rather than imposing penalties on those who don't. The American Recycle Bank scheme is in line with Conservative interest in the "nudge" theories of American sociologists Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein, and has so far been adopted by Tory-led Windsor and Maidenhead council. Other incentives to reduce landfill include schemes to encourage shoppers to bring their own reusable bags in an attempt to turn London into Britain's first plastic bag-free city in time for the Olympics in 2012. The mayor wants the capital to be recycling at least 45% of its municipal waste (which includes street litter, grass cuttings and some waste from small businesses as well as household waste) by 2015, rising to 60% by 2031, sending "zero municipal waste" directly to landfill by 2025, with any residue from other waste processing being banned from landfill by 2031. Among the measures outlined to meet the targets by boosting facilities for householders living in flats – dwellings which fare particularly poorly on recycling – is putting newly designed collection points near doorways or supporting changes to bin chute designs. In a mission to see households reduce by 20% the amount of waste they generate by 2031, Johnson wants to put £5m towards a series of campaigns over the next three years promoting recycling and reuse of items usually destined for landfill sites, and also aims to work with businesses and manufacturers to reduce packaging. For the waste still generated, Johnson wants to see the bulk of the recycling board's £84m funding to set up a waste "infrastructure" to make London more self-sufficient both in treating waste through less polluting technologies than incinerators, and developing new systems to convert into reusable energy. The mayor said: "I want to work with borough councils to harvest the massive economic potential coming from London's waste both to save money off the city's bills and to improve our environment. This will be achieved through reducing the mounds of waste generated in the first place and expanding on the emerging trend for the reuse of household items through networks such as Freecycle. "We must also seek to unblock the remaining barriers to recycling making it easier to take this option rather than simply chuck unwanted stuff in the bin, for example, providing better collection facilities in flats and multi-occupancy dwellings." The mayor's approach to litter is more stick than carrot, however. With the Olympics just two years away, the mayor is keen on "enforcement measures" to clean up London's streets. The capital currently ranks sixth out of the UK's nine regions for cleanliness. He wants government funding for a "behaviour change campaign on litter and chewing gum", and intends to work with town halls to improve "enforcement of environmental crimes", such as litter and graffiti. The Green party on the London assembly welcomed the mayor's ambitions but raised concerns about the lack of progress under Johnson's watch regarding new waste facilities. The Green's Darren Johnson said: "Whilst the strategy has many good points, the key question is whether the mayor can start taking real action after 18 wasted months of talking and virtually no improvement. Londoners want to recycle and the mayor's job is to make sure that sufficient new environmentally friendly waste facilities are built to deal with the waste that is no longer sent to landfill. If not, more of London's waste will just be incinerated." • This article was amended on Tuesday 19 January 2010. Boris Johnson wants London to recycle at least 45% of its municipal waste by 2015, not 4%. This has been corrected. | ['politics/boris-johnson', 'politics/politics', 'environment/recycling', 'environment/environment', 'uk/london', 'uk/uk', 'tone/news', 'environment/waste', 'type/article', 'profile/helenemulholland'] | environment/recycling | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2010-01-18T12:30:00Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
commentisfree/2019/aug/25/observer-view-on-the-amazon-fires | The Observer view on Jair Bolsonaro and the Amazon wildfires | Observer editorial | Smoke from the wildfires burning in the Amazon plunged São Paulo, 1,700 miles from the scenes of destruction, into an eerie darkness last Monday afternoon. The temporary blackout made it impossible for residents of Brazil’s largest city to ignore the ecological carnage taking place on the other side of their country. But the ruin of rainforest we are currently witnessing will reverberate far beyond the borders of Brazil in decades to come. Home to 3m species – one in 10 of all known plants and animals on Earth – the Amazonian rainforest is the most biodiverse place on the planet. Three-quarters of plant species there are unique to the rainforest. The Amazon is also home to a million indigenous people, thousands of whom have lost their lives in recent decades defending the forest against commercial interests. The rainforest plays a critical role in regulating the Earth’s climate, absorbing millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. Halting deforestation is no less important than eliminating fossil fuel use in terms of avoiding catastrophic global overheating; scientists have estimated that protecting and restoring rainforests could reduce carbon emissions by 18% by 2030. Much, then, is at stake. For decades, the Amazon has been the site of a struggle between, on one hand, conservationists and indigenous people, who are desperate to protect the forest, and, on the other, Brazil’s business lobby, which sees lucrative potential in its destruction to make way for farming, mining and logging. For a decade, it looked as though the conservationists were winning as the rate of deforestation declined. But in the past five years, that trend has reversed with the growing influence of Brazilian agribusiness. And since the election of Jair Bolsonaro, dubbed “Captain Chainsaw” for his support of Amazonian deforestation, it has sharply accelerated. Bolsonaro has thrown his support behind Brazil’s agricultural industry and the commercial exploitation of the Amazon. Enforcement action aimed at protecting the forest has dwindled since his election. Emboldened, farmers have declared “fire days”, deliberately setting fire to chunks of the forest in order to destroy it so it can be used to graze cattle. Bolsonaro has responded by rubbishing satellite data from Brazil’s own space agency, which shows that an area the equivalent of five football pitches was cleared every minute in July, a 278% rise on the same month last year. He accused its head of “peddling lies” and sacked him earlier this month. Last week he also made the preposterous suggestion –without any evidence – that environmental NGOs had started the fires to make the government look bad. A fifth of the Amazonian biome has been irrevocably lost. And the current destruction takes the rainforest closer to a tipping point. Scientists had thought this point – at which the Amazonian ecosystem will have degraded to the extent that it can no longer sustain itself, and large swathes of forest will simply evolve into a dry savannah – was 20 to 25 years away. They now believe that if the accelerated deforestation of recent months continues, it will loom closer. It risks the extinction of thousands of species, not to mention eliminating any chance of limiting global heating to less than 1.5C above preindustrial levels. How should the international community respond? The situation is complicated by the fact that Bolsonaro is not the only rightwing populist to threaten the global action needed to avert catastrophic overheating of the planet. He is cut from the same cloth as Donald Trump, who has rejected scientific evidence about the climate crisis, withdrawn the US from the Paris agreement and reversed Obama administration policies to reduce domestic carbon emissions. But while a lack of concern for biodiversity and the climate crisis may be a common feature of rightwing populists, it is not necessarily the most popular plank of their agenda, driven instead by close links with business. In Brazil, for example, polls show that the vast majority of Brazilians want the Amazon to be protected. This suggests that there is scope for international pressure to work. Ahead of this weekend’s G7 summit, France and Ireland – in truth, likely motivated by their own trading interests as well as concern for the Amazon – threatened to veto the EU-Mercosur trade deal that is agreed but yet to be ratified. Bolsonaro has continued to condemn international intervention in what he has labelled an “internal issue”, accusing Macron of a “colonial mindset”. But away from the high-octane rhetoric, he appears to have responded and has ordered the Brazilian army to help fight the fires. It’s all very well for European governments to condemn Bolsonaro, but western demand for Brazilian beef is contributing to deforestation. The EU imported more than £490m worth of beef from Brazil last year. Consumers in Britain were indirectly responsible for the destruction of the equivalent of 500 football pitches of rainforest in Brazil last year; Italy, four times as much. Under the terms of the Mercosur agreement, that will go up. The EU must use its power as Brazil’s second biggest export market to insist that the agreement cannot go ahead unless Bolsonaro steps up enforcement action against illegal deforestation. Strong-arming less affluent nations into action through trade deals is not, by itself, enough. Wealthier countries in Europe need to do far more when it comes to stumping up proper resources for overseas conservation, an area of spending that governments have found it too easy to skimp on. Environmental rhetoric comes cheap. Only the coming months will tell if European leaders are prepared to take the action that is needed to support those Brazilians who are battling to protect the Amazon and the unique role it plays in safeguarding a biodiverse, sustainable planet for future generations. | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'environment/amazon-rainforest', 'world/jair-bolsonaro', 'world/brazil', 'world/eu', 'environment/environment', 'world/europe-news', 'tone/editorials', 'world/americas', 'world/world', 'environment/deforestation', 'environment/forests', 'type/article', 'profile/observer-editorials', 'publication/theobserver', 'theobserver/news', 'theobserver/news/comment', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/observer-comment'] | environment/deforestation | BIODIVERSITY | 2019-08-25T05:00:06Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
global/2020/jan/24/air-filtering-bus-to-launch-across-six-regions-in-the-uk | Air-filtering bus to launch across six regions in the UK | An air-filtering bus which removes pollutants from city streets while it operates is to be rolled out into six regions of the UK following a successful trial. The bus, trialled since 2018 in Southampton, is fitted with fans on the roof that draw in air at a rate of one cubic metre per second and filter out ultra-fine particulate pollution. The single-decker buses are expected to start operating in Brighton, Manchester, Newcastle, Oxford, Plymouth and Crawley from this summer. Another five buses will be introduced in Southampton. According to tests, audited by manufacturer Pall, and being assessed by the University of Southampton, the bus removed approximately 65g of pollutants from the air and cleaned 3.2 million cubic metres of the city’s air. David Brown, the chief executive of Go-Ahead group, which owns the BlueStar bus in Southampton, said the system had exceeded their expectations and he hoped that councils would help fund more routes. The trial cost the operator about £100,000 and each bus conversion is around £20,000. “We think it’s part of the solution [to air pollution], along with getting people on public transport anyway,” he said. The buses have the cleanest Euro VI engines, whose nitrogen oxides emissions are now less than a single diesel car, “so it’s a double-whammy,” Brown added. “For all local authorities who have an issue with air pollution and clean air zones, I genuinely believe this is part of the solution,” Brown said. “These are small pilots, but if you could put it on every bus it would actually make a difference.” He said the bill to convert Go-Ahead’s entire nationwide fleet would be around £100m. | ['environment/air-pollution', 'tone/news', 'environment/pollution', 'uk/transport', 'uk/uk', 'environment/environment', 'uk-news/southampton', 'uk/brighton', 'uk/manchester', 'uk/newcastle', 'uk/oxford', 'uk/plymouth', 'type/article', 'profile/gwyntopham', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/pollution | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2020-01-24T07:00:18Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
environment/2012/jul/13/climate-change-campaigners-cautioned | Climate change campaigners cautioned over reaction to extreme weather | Climate change contrarians will dig in even deeper if campaigners try to use recent extreme weather like wildfires, drought and heatwaves as a call to action, a Republican global warming heretic has warned. Bob Inglis, a former South Carolina congressman behind a new global warming thinktank, is an endangered species as a Republican who believes in climate change. The recent freak weather does provide powerful evidence of the dangers of climate change, and could break through the GOP's wall of denial, he said. But scientists and campaigners need to go easy on the doom. "The thing that would not be helpful is for anybody associated with climate change action to be wagging their finger in Colorado and Texas or wherever it's hot saying, 'See I told you so,'" Inglis said in a telephone interview. "That is the worst possible thing for anybody wanting climate action to do because then you engender the predictable response of, 'I will show you. I will not budge an inch.'" Inglis learned the lesson the hard way, losing his seat in Congress in 2010 to a Tea Party challenger in part for his belief in climate change. It was, he says now, "my most enduring heresy". His new venture, the Energy & Enterprise Institute at George Mason University, is aimed at getting conservatives on board for action on climate change. Its tenets are unlikely to please the Democratic political establishment, or the wind and solar industry. Half of the incoming crop of Republicans in that election denied the existence of climate change or opposed action on climate change. None of the Republican contenders for the White House in this election has acknowledged the dangers of climate change. The House energy and commerce committee has yet to hold a hearing on the dangers of wildfires and drought due to climate change, despite 15 requests to date from Democrats on the committee. But Inglis said Republicans will not be shaken out of their denial through fear. "Those who do speak, speak in apocalyptic visions and that drives us further into denial as a suitable coping mechanism," Inglis said. "If you tell me we are all toast and it's just terrible, that doom is imminent, if you tell me that then eat, drink and be merry. If I am toast, I may as well just ignore it," he said. "It's sort of like death. You know there's a 100% death rate, but no one is thinking about it because denials works when you are facing an existential threat." | ['environment/climate-change-scepticism', 'us-news/us-news', 'environment/environment', 'world/world', 'science/scienceofclimatechange', 'type/article', 'profile/suzannegoldenberg'] | environment/climate-change-scepticism | CLIMATE_DENIAL | 2012-07-13T21:17:36Z | true | CLIMATE_DENIAL |
commentisfree/2024/mar/23/political-ethics-of-eyesores-lumpen-london-office-block-trumps-clean-energy | In the political ethics of eyesores, a lumpen London office block trumps clean energy | Rowan Moore | Last week the government decided to refuse planning permission for a solar farm in Northamptonshire. This is the same government that last month, possibly encouraged by a letter from the developers Mitsubishi to Rishi Sunak, approved 72 Upper Ground, a prominent, lumpen office block on the South Bank in London. In the first case they decided that “visual harm” outweighed economic benefits; in the second it was the other way round. The takeaway seems to be this: the carbon-belching construction of 79,000 sq metres of office space, the demand for which is unproven, matters more to them than the production of sustainable energy with estimated carbon savings of 11,000 tonnes a year. The Daily Doom “London may not survive another four years of Sadiq,” yelled the Daily Telegraph last week. This followed other recent warnings that “Canada’s descent into tyranny is almost complete”, that cyclists have turned Paris into “hell on earth”, that western economies have been “destroyed”, that Britain is irrevocably on a “road to serfdom”, that Nato cannot be fixed, that horse racing faces an existential threat from gambling controls. Its catastrophism is at least even handed: heat pumps, which the Telegraph doesn’t like, are “dead”; the Conservative party, which it mostly supports, faces an “extinction-level event”. To use a reference its readers would get, it is the Private Frazer of British newspapers – “We’re doomed – doomed!” as the Hebridean soldier-undertaker from Dad’s Army used to say. This might possibly be true, but not in the ways the Telegraph imagines. Mushroomgate In other media snowflake news, the Daily Mail has accused the National Trust of banning mushrooms. “The fungi is [sic] boycotted,” it said. It isn’t – just the mushrooms grown with peat, to protect plover and dragonfly habitats. (And the Trust’s tearooms have sourced alternatives grown in other ways.) This tells you all you need to know about the obsessive campaigns against the Trust run by opaquely funded rightwing thinktanks and their allies in the press – in particular, how much they are rooted in reality. So it was good to hear the historian and national treasure Mary Beard, while giving the Trust’s Octavia Hill lecture last week, take apart some of the moaners’ pet peeves. A derided 2020 report into links between National Trust properties and colonisation and slavery was, she said, “stating the bleeding obvious”. The installation of a disco ball in Sudbury Hall in Derbyshire is a harmless, and easily reversible, way of engaging children, while also highlighting that its revered interiors were originally party spaces. “The pomposity and self-righteousness” of the attackers, she said, “is best responded to by a bit of a giggle”. We should be grateful to mushroomgate for giving us that. No architectural joke It’s almost possible to admire the brass neck of the developers who, frustrated by the presence of a listed former hospital on a site in Birmingham, propose to perch a 440ft tower over it. Might it, conceivably, become a beloved piece of David-and-Goliath urbanism, like the former Wickhams department store in the East End of London, where the two-storey premises of Spiegelhalters jewellers, its owners having refused to sell up, pops up incongruously in the giant Ionic colonnade of what was hoping to be a cockney Selfridges? Conceivably, it might, but probably not. To judge by the way that towers like this are almost always built, it would lack the grace and joy to pull off a giant architectural joke, which would leave it looking like nothing but a cynical ploy. • Rowan Moore is the Observer’s architecture critic | ['commentisfree/series/observer-notebook', 'commentisfree/commentisfree', 'artanddesign/architecture', 'uk/uk', 'tone/comment', 'environment/solarpower', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'media/telegraphmediagroup', 'type/article', 'profile/rowan-moore', 'publication/theobserver', 'theobserver/news', 'theobserver/news/comment', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/observer-comment'] | environment/renewableenergy | ENERGY | 2024-03-23T18:56:00Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/2019/nov/28/bags-for-life-making-plastic-problem-worse-say-campaigners | 'Bags for life' making plastic problem worse, say campaigners | Plastic “bags for life” should be banned or raised in price, campaigners say, as new figures reveal a surge in the bags is fuelling a rise in the plastic packaging footprint of leading supermarkets. Despite high profile promises by the country’s best known supermarkets to tackle the amount of plastic waste they create, their plastic footprint continues to rise, according to research from the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and Greenpeace. In 2018, supermarkets put an estimated 903,000 tonnes of plastic packaging onto the market, an increase of 17,000 tonnes on the 2017 footprint. The surge is fuelled in part by a huge rise in the sale of “bags for life” by 26% to 1.5bn, or 54 bags per household. Seven out of the top 10 supermarkets increased their plastic footprint year-on-year. Only Waitrose, Tesco and Sainsbury’s achieved reductions, and those were marginal, the report said. The report is calling for a ban on bags for life, or a rise in price to at least 70p to cut the plastic mountain which is fuelling pollution. Juliet Phillips, an ocean campaigner at EIA, said: “It’s shocking to see that despite unprecedented awareness of the pollution crisis, the amount of single-use plastic used by the UK’s biggest supermarkets has actually increased in the past year. “Grocery retailers need to tighten up targets to drive real reductions in single-use packaging and items. We need to address our throwaway culture at root through systems change, not materials change – substituting one single-use material for another is not the solution.” The rise in the sale of bags for life suggests some consumers are simply switching from single-use plastic bags – many of which have been removed from stores – to the thicker bags, which contain far more plastic by weight and are therefore of particular concern. Iceland’s sales of such bags rose tenfold in the past 12 months, and Tesco increased its sales from 430 million to 713 million. “The impact of this simple substitution is a major concern, given the significantly higher plastic content of bags for life,” the report said. Sales of “food to go” for lunches – worth an estimated £25bn to the supermarkets – are also fuelling the continued rise in plastic packaging. “This is an area ripe for major transformation, as currently almost all products are sold in one-way packaging,” the report said. “So far there has been limited attention; M&S is the first UK supermarket to offer a reusable option in trial stores for on-the-go food options.” Branded goods make up 367,000 tonnes of the packaging supermarkets put onto the market. The survey revealed that these big brands were a driving factor behind the rise in plastic packaging, showing supermarkets had failed to force their suppliers to take action. Only Tesco had given suppliers an ultimatum to cut excessive plastic or face products being delisted, and the campaigners urged others to follow suit. The report praised innovations like Waitrose’s experiment with refillables in its Oxford store, where more than 160 items of loose fruit and vegetables and 48 other products are available for customers to refill, including pasta and grains, coffee, frozen fruit, beer, wine and cleaning products. “Feedback to date has been overwhelmingly positive. Analysis from the 11-week trial has provided ‘confidence that the concept can be a success elsewhere’ and the company is now rolling out the concept to three additional stores,” the report said. But Fiona Nicholls, an ocean plastics campaigner for Greenpeace UK, said supermarkets were failing on plastics and failing their customers. “We hear piecemeal supermarket announcements on plastic every other week, but in reality they are putting more plastic on the shelves than ever,” she said. “Supermarkets need to buck up and think bigger. They must change their stores to offer loose food dispensers, reusable packaging, and move away from throwaway packaging altogether.” | ['environment/plastic-bags', 'environment/plastic', 'business/supermarkets', 'uk/uk', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/sandralaville', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/plastic | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2019-11-28T07:00:31Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
environment/2024/apr/17/australians-choose-hybrids-over-evs-as-sales-of-conventional-cars-decline | Australians choose hybrids over EVs as sales of conventional cars decline | Australians are choosing hybrid over electric vehicles but sales of both continue to climb while internal combustion engines record a decline. Hybrids outsold EVs in three consecutive quarters with 95,129 sales – overtaking 69,593 EVs sold, according to the Australian Automobile Association’s quarterly EV Index released on Tuesday night. The data also reinforced a trend of declining sales of conventional cars, which have fallen by 8.03% in the fourth quarter of 2023 to the first quarter of 2024. Their market share also dropped to 78.18%, sinking below 80% for the first time. EVs rose to 8.70% market share in this time, while hybrids jumped to 11.95% – up from 6.26% in the first quarter of 2023. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup “People are wanting to go into that lower cost, lower emissions motoring, but they just don’t think they are ready for the full EV experience,” said the Australian Automotive Dealer Association chief executive, James Voortman. Premium prices amid a cost-of-living crisis, as well as a lack of recharging infrastructure, were the main concerns stopping consumers from making the transition to EVs, he said. Three in five consumers are “less open to paying more money for an electric vehicle due to the current cost-of-living pressures,” Voortman said, pointing to AADA survey results released in February. “During this time where everything is costing more” it could be more difficult for consumers to look beyond an EV’s upfront price premium and towards fuel savings, he said. Charging infrastructure was “no doubt” another concern. “There is a growing acceptance that you can do a lot of your charging at home, but not everyone has access to home charging,” Voortman said. “I think as the infrastructure rolls out, we will see more and more people willing to take up an electric vehicle.” The specific types of vehicles available can also pose as a barrier for consumers in need of a larger vehicle, like a ute, van or SUV at an affordable price point. “It is going to take time for those vehicles to arrive,” Voortman said. In the meantime, “hybrid technology [is] a stepping stone,” Voortman said. While “there is no doubt that driving a hybrid is a lot more friendly for the environment than a pure petrol or diesel vehicle”, it is also “a lot more affordable for those customers”. “There are significant benefits for for both customers but also for the environment,” Voortman said. “There is no doubt the future is fully electric and zero emissions motoring, but there is going to be a bit of a journey to get there. “Hybrids are a good stepping stone to that future.” | ['environment/electric-cars', 'environment/electric-vehicles-australia', 'environment/environment', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'campaign/email/afternoon-update', 'environment/carbon-emissions', 'environment/automotive-emissions', 'business/automotive-industry', 'australia-news/business-australia', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/rafqa-touma', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/carbon-emissions | EMISSIONS | 2024-04-16T15:00:49Z | true | EMISSIONS |
environment/2000/apr/05/landfill.uknews1 | Compost success fertilises botanic garden | There is one place in Britain where the government's green tax is working as it should do - providing a huge increase in recycling along with investment in worthwhile environmental projects. That place is the Isle of Wight. Desperately short of land to create dumps, and needing to dispose of 138,000 tonnes a year of rubbish, the island's county council has been forced to take drastic action. It has a £40m deal under which 41% of domestic rubbish is being recycled -compared to an average 7.8% in the rest of Britain. Island Waste, a subsidiary of Biffa, the waste company arm of Severn Trent Water, has re-equipped the council's dustcarts to separate kitchen waste, and is rebuilding an "energy from waste" power station (which will supply the national grid) so it can be fuelled by waste pellets processed at a refuse collection plant next door, one that also removes and recycles aluminium cans. The most striking investment is £2.2m to build the UK's largest composting plant, a Canadian made machine that turns waste into compost within 14 days and can process 15,000 tonnes a year -more than can be used on the island at the moment. The plant is responsible for a boom in organic farming. This year one of the island's biggest tomato growers intends to use the compost to grow his entire crop. The council also sells compost to gardeners and puts the rest on its parks and gardens. This month the council closed one of its landfill sites, and within 15 to 20 years landfill will stop altogether. Any material that cannot be recycled will then have to be shipped to the mainland - making it very expensive. Bruce Gilmore, general manager of Island Waste, is predicting that by next year more than 50% of rubbish will be recycled. "We shall be expanding our doorstep collection, which already covers newspapers, to include three types of glass and possibly textiles," he promised. The company is also trying to change attitudes to recycling by talking to schools and by targeting pensioners, the group most resistant to change. Unlike some other schemes, distribution of landfill tax credits is given to a national body, the Royal Society for Nature Conservation, that has no connection with the waste industry. The main beneficiary on the Isle of Wight will be Ventnor botanic garden, which will get a visitors centre paid for by £600,000 from landfill tax and £830,000 from the Millennium Commission. Another beneficiary will be the red squirrel, which will get new tree corridors. The one flaw is that the firm monitoring Biffa's success in re-cycling is funded by landfill tax credits from the scheme - and, because of the way the landfill regulations are drawn up, the credits originally come from Biffa; but there is no other way to fund monitoring of the scheme. What a waste •The UK produces 27m tonnes of municipal waste each year •2.2m tonnes of newsprint are recycled every year •Every day approximately 80m food cartons and drinks cans end up in landfill •Over 9m disposable nappies are used in Britain every day, for 4% of waste •Last year 20m plastic bottles were recycled in the UK •There are 22,000 bottle banks in the UK; 27% of all glass waste is recycled | ['environment/environment', 'environment/waste', 'uk/uk', 'environment/recycling', 'lifeandstyle/compost', 'type/article', 'profile/davidhencke'] | environment/recycling | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2000-04-05T16:38:16Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
science/2010/oct/03/juliette-jowit-plants-extinct | Conservation: Turn over a new leaf and give plants the respect they deserve | Juliette Jowit | The mission to catalogue threats to our natural world produced more gloomy news last week: that more than one in five plants is at risk of extinction. Probably more. The Sample Red List of plants will be added to a database being built by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, which has already found that more than one in four amphibians, one in five mammals and one in eight birds face the same problem. The plants result, though, is potentially more worrying, especially for the likely fate of millions of other species, mostly insects, which have not yet been assessed. As a result, it will be presented to world leaders this month at Nagoya in Japan, to spur them to start saving the planet from what experts call the sixth great extinction. Firstly, unlike bigger animals, hundreds of new plants are still being "discovered" by scientists each year – in 2009, 2,000 names were added to a list of about 380,000-400,000 species. Inevitably they tend to be more isolated, in smaller numbers and small areas – making them much more likely to be classified by the IUCN as "critically endangered", "endangered" or "vulnerable". "We expect if we had a full assessment the threat would be at least this high, and likely higher," said Eimear Nic Lughadha, one of the scientists at Kew Gardens in west London who helped lead the study. The rate aside, there is a more fundamental reason to worry about extinction of plants: they are the "basis of life" in the words of the IUCN's Craig Hilton-Taylor. Ben Collen, a researcher at the Institute of Zoology, explained more: "Plants provide a number of functional things. Oxygen production is perhaps the main one we're interested in. They [also] provide the basis of all food chains: they grow and fix nitrogen, they are eaten by things that eat plants, which are then fed on by larger organisms, which are fed on by larger organisms." Another study to be published formally at Nagoya will be the Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) report, which will try to list many of the other "ecosystem services" which plants and the biodiversity they support provide: climate control, water recycling, soil fixing, animal habitats, genetic material for disease resistance and human health, fibre and fuel, carbon storage. But despite more than a century of the conservation movement, biodiversity is more fragile than ever. As a result all eyes are on Nagoya. There will be dozens of initiatives targeted at particular species and habitats. A more global suggestion is a protocol on "access and benefit sharing", something the UK government is pushing, to set common standards for countries to tackle over-exploitation. The biggest goal, however, will be to start changing the way humans value their natural environment, so the costs of destroying, say, an area of forest are made explicit in any decisions. Such a fundamental change in economics will take much longer than a conference, but is something TEEB was intended to begin. "What we do from now is going to lead to the future of plants," Nic Lughadha told the launch. "We need to challenge the idea that plants are there to be exploited by us." | ['environment/plants', 'environment/conservation', 'science/science', 'environment/environment', 'world/world', 'tone/news', 'environment/nagoya', 'environment/biodiversity', 'type/article', 'profile/juliettejowit', 'publication/theobserver', 'theobserver/news', 'theobserver/news/seven-days'] | environment/biodiversity | BIODIVERSITY | 2010-10-02T23:07:15Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
commentisfree/2011/mar/16/editorial-japan-disaster-cost-crisis | Japan disaster: the cost of a crisis | Editorial | The FTSE down over 1%. The Dow off 200 points by the afternoon. Oil down. Tokyo shares plunging by more over a two-day period than they did during the crash of 1987. Investors spent yesterday sizing up the damage done to the world economy by Japan's earthquake and tsunami. The truth is that it is still far too early to form even a provisional answer to that question, for the very obvious reason that we still don't know how bad this crisis will get. As the engineers battling to regain control of the Fukushima nuclear plant could tell you, an awful lot remains in the balance. However, there are some key questions emerging. Their answers will partly determine the medium-term economic impact of the tragedy that has befallen Japan. The first is obviously how the crisis develops. Fukushima's owner, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, has now admitted that there is a possibility of a partial meltdown, while officials say that is a "high possibility". Basic, important information such as the age of the fuel rods inside the plant has still not been disclosed – yet without knowing how new the rods are, the public can have little idea of the possible radioactive threat. As the OECD pointed out yesterday, we know that the four prefectures most affected by the earthquake account for 6% to 7% of Japan's GDP, but the destruction caused is "so large that it is not possible … to estimate its economic impact". Without even trying to put numbers on all this, the short-run impact is likely to be sharply deflationary, knocking out energy generation and disrupting the supply of both power and goods. It may well be that Friday's quake has tipped Japan back into recession. The second is how policymakers react. The Bank of Japan has already begun pumping 23 trillion yen (£180bn) into the country's financial system. The prime minister, Naoto Kan, may well also unveil a round of reconstruction spending. After the Kobe earthquake of 1995 the government spent about 5tn yen, or what then amounted to 1% of national income. Until it was overtaken by China a few months ago, Japan was the world's second-largest economy. It remains the source of much investment abroad. With little in the way of natural energy resources, Japan is likely to rely less on nuclear power in the coming months and more on gas and oil imports. That may well keep prices high over the coming weeks, especially if other countries rethink their nuclear plans. These and other consequences will mount up in the next few days and weeks. The true economic impact of Friday's superquake is still to be accounted; what is clear is that it came while the global economic recovery was itself neither broad nor strong. | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'world/japan-earthquake-and-tsunami', 'world/natural-disasters', 'world/japan', 'world/world', 'business/economics', 'business/global-economy', 'business/business', 'tone/editorials', 'world/asia-pacific', 'world/tsunamis', 'type/article', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/editorialsandreply'] | world/tsunamis | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2011-03-16T00:01:04Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
us-news/2015/nov/05/seaworld-blackfish-fallout-profits-fall-by-10m | SeaWorld still battling Blackfish fallout as profits fall by $10m for the year | SeaWorld on Thursday warned investors that its full-year profits will fall by a further $10m this year, due to continuing collapsing attendance at its orca theme parks in San Diego and San Antonio. The warning caused SeaWorld’s shares, which have lost half of their value since the release of Blackfish, a film cataloguing alleged mistreatment of whales at its parks, to fall 9% to $17.80 in early trading on Wall Street. Joel Manby, SeaWorld’s new chief executive, said he was “very disappointed” to cut the company’s full-year 2015 profits forecast from $370m to $360m. The company said the drop in attendance, on top of big falls in previous quarters, was due to “continued SeaWorld brand challenges” stemming from Blackfish. The documentary, released in 2013, claimed that the company’s treatment of whales provoked violent behaviour in the animals, contributing to the deaths of three people. Manby refused to specify exactly how much attendance was falling at the San Diego park, but said that without the drop-off in California and Texas, overall attendance for the company, which also operates the Busch Gardens chain, would have been up on the previous year. The company does not break down attendance for each park. But figures from San Diego authorities showed a 17% drop in attendance at the park in 2014 from 4.5 million to 3.7 million. Manby, who took over as SeaWorld chief executive earlier this year, said he recognised that the company “clearly has more work to do” to restore public trust. He said the company had noticed an improvement in sentiment towards SeaWorld following a multi-million-dollar publicity drive involving TV ads and social media to counteract continued campaigns from animal rights activists. However, the company has continued to face public setbacks. Last month, California authorities banned SeaWorld from attempting to breed new whales in a planned $100m extension to its whale tanks in San Diego. Manby has vowed to fight the ban through the courts. It was also revealed in the current quarter that SeaWorld sent a employee undercover to infiltrate Peta, the animal rights group behind many of the protests against the company. Manby admitted that the company had not acted quickly enough to address the public relations fallout from Blackfish and the changing attitudes of its guests, but said he would reveal a new strategy on Monday. “I am excited about how we evolve the SeaWorld brand to match the changing expectations of our guests,” he said. | ['us-news/san-diego', 'us-news/san-antonio', 'environment/whales', 'travel/theme-parks', 'environment/marine-life', 'environment/environment', 'business/business', 'us-news/us-news', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/rupertneate'] | environment/marine-life | BIODIVERSITY | 2015-11-05T16:38:33Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
business/2008/may/05/britishenergygroupbusiness.utilities | French bid may secure nuclear firm | Foreign power companies such as France's EDF will lead the charge to take control of Britain's largest nuclear power generator when detailed offers are submitted to the government this Friday. But hopes among ministers that British Energy will command a price of up to £12bn are likely to be dashed, with bids expected to be closer to half that. Downing Street will also have to contend with a backlash from others in the power sector who have already lobbied the regulator, Ofgem, to ensure that one big utility does not become dominant in the sector by acquiring British Energy. EDF is still regarded as the frontrunner to win control of British Energy and will submit a cash offer of little over 600p a share - worth some £6bn. The French company is still in talks with British Gas's owner, Centrica, about some form of cooperation that could help deflect public criticism about BE being handed over to a foreign predator. The German utilities E.ON and RWE are also still considering whether to make a cash offer but the latter has been hampered by its potential partner, Vattenfall of Sweden, deciding to opt out, as well as criticism from RWE's own shareholders. After soaring on initial euphoria, BE shares have fallen in recent weeks to about 730p as potential bidders take a harder look at the condition of the existing power stations. The foreign utilities are primarily interested in using BE's sites for building a new generation of atomic plants. But Britain's independent power generators are becoming increasingly concerned that BE could be acquired by a rival that also has a large retail customer base. At least one of the independent generators has raised with Ofgem the implications for the wholesale market. All six of the big retail energy suppliers - RWE, E.ON, EDF, Iberdrola-owned Scottish Power, Scottish & Southern Energy and Centrica - have their own generating capacity and five of the six, the exception being SSE, are among the companies examining BE's books with a view to a possible bid. British Energy is the biggest merchant generator - one that does not have its own retail customer base - and there are concerns that if the nuclear operator were acquired by one of the vertically integrated groups it could distort competition in the wholesale electricity market. Vertically integrated companies account for just over half Britain's generation. They can rely on their own generation for part of their supply and have to buy the rest on the wholesale market. Merchant generators are concerned that adding BE, the UK's biggest generator, to the integrated sector would hamper the wholesale market. If BE is acquired by one of the vertically integrated companies, the merchant sector would account for only about 30% of the overall market. If it were bought by RWE or E.ON the combined group would have between 27% and 30% of the generating market. | ['business/britishenergygroup', 'business/utilities', 'business/business', 'environment/nuclearpower', 'uk/uk', 'world/france', 'world/world', 'business/regulators', 'world/europe-news', 'type/article', 'profile/terrymacalister', 'profile/markmilner', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/financial3'] | environment/nuclearpower | ENERGY | 2008-05-04T23:10:12Z | true | ENERGY |
australia-news/2018/mar/02/panel-to-study-impact-of-coalmining-on-sydney-drinking-water | Panel to study impact of coalmining on Sydney drinking water | Coalmining in Sydney’s drinking water catchment will be scrutinised by water experts, the New South Wales Department of Planning and Environment has announced. Enviroment groups, which have been warning for years of the impact of coalmining on drinking water welcomed the move but called for a moratorium on any expansion of mining activity until the conclusion of the review. The department announced that a new independent expert panel on mining in Sydney’s drinking water catchment would be established, and headed by the yet-to-be appointed NSW chief scientist and engineer. In the interim, emeritus professor Jim Galvin will be the acting chairman. The deputy secretary of planning services at the Department of Planning and Environment, Marcus Ray, said the panel would provide advice to the government on mining operations in protected areas near Sydney’s main water catchments such as the Avon, Cordeaux, Cataract and Woronora dams. The panel has been directed to consider recommendations from an audit conducted last year, which warned: “The cumulative, and possibly accelerated, impact of mining on flow regimes in the catchment is likely linked to the increased prevalence of the current longwall methods of underground mining.” The terms of reference include providing advice on specific proposals for expansion at the Russell Vale, Dendrobium, Metropolitan and Wongawilli mines. “There are proposals for a significant expansion of coal mining under the catchment special areas,” said the Lock the Gate Alliance NSW coordinator, Georgina Woods. “Consideration of these project must be halted while the panel considers the long-term damage these operations are inflicting on Sydney’s catchment and water security. “This is the time to choose. Do we want to safeguard Sydney’s drinking water, or let it be jeopardised for more coal mining?” The Coolong Foundation, which has campaigned on the issue for years, while welcoming the move, said Ray was wrong in declaring that mining had taken place so far without any big impact on water supply. “There clearly have been significant impacts, if major impacts include the drying out of upland swamps and streams due to widespread cracking of surface rocks,” the director of the Coolong Foundation for Wilderness, Keith Muir, said. “So the department needs independent advice on what should define ‘major impacts’. “I encourage the independent expert panel to get lots of exercise walking the areas that have been mined. Too often inquiries become mired in expert reports, when the truth is out there in what should be our pristine drinking water catchments.” | ['australia-news/sydney', 'australia-news/new-south-wales', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'environment/water', 'environment/coal', 'environment/mining', 'environment/energy', 'type/article', 'profile/michael-slezak', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/mining | ENERGY | 2018-03-02T02:44:27Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/2013/jul/26/reuters-climate-change-scepticism-coverage | Reuters' climate-change coverage 'fell by nearly 50% with sceptic as editor' | Reuters' climate-change coverage fell by nearly 50% after a climate sceptic joined the news agency as a senior editor, a study has found. The sharp decline in coverage since 2011, recorded by the Media Matters for America advocacy group, reinforces charges from a former staffer that Reuters cut back on climate stories under the influence of Paul Ingrassia, who is now the agency's managing editor. Media Matters found a 48% decline in climate-change coverage over a six-month period, after Ingrassia joined the agency in 2011. The New York Times and other news organisations have cut back on climate coverage, closing down blogs and redeploying correspondents, at times citing financial constraints. However, Bloomberg, Reuters' main competitor, has deepened its investment in climate change and sustainability coverage. The agency's founder, New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, has been a strong advocate for action on climate change. Charges of an ideological component to Reuters' declining coverage – related to Ingrassia's personal doubts about established climate science – have sharpened concern in media and environmental as well as business circles, because of the agency's focus on financial news. "It is just not responsible in our opinion to be cutting back on an issue that is having such a profound impact on every sector of the economy," said Mindy Lubber, who heads the Ceres sustainable business network, which represents companies and investors controlling some $11tn in assets. "This is a financial risk that needs to be looked at and addressed." The Climate Progress blog has since criticised Reuters for injecting references in stories to fringe groups that reject established climate science, and represent barely 3% of scientists publishing on climate change. The news agency did not respond specifically to the findings of a deep cut in climate-change coverage. But in an emailed statement, a spokesperson wrote: "Reuters covers climate change closely both as a scientific and public-safety issue, as well as the impact of climate change on businesses, the economy and the markets. We have a dedicated staff, including a team of specialist reporters at Point Carbon and a columnist, who all generate significant coverage on the topic across our various platforms. We remain committed to providing fair and independent coverage of climate change that complies fully with our Trust Principles." The scrutiny of Reuters' climate-change coverage began earlier this month when David Fogarty, the former Asia Climate Change Correspondent , wrote in a blog post that climate-change coverage had been dramatically cut back after Ingrassia's hire. Fogarty, a 20-year veteran at Reuters, covered climate change for four and a half years. But early last year it became increasingly difficult to get climate-change stories published. Editors suggested he pursue other stories. Then Fogarty described a conversation with Ingrassia, then deputy editor, at a social event. "In April last year, Paul Ingrassia [then deputy editor-in-chief] and I met and had a chat at a company function. He told me he was a climate-change sceptic. Not a rabid sceptic, just someone who wanted to see more evidence mankind was changing the global climate. "Progressively, getting any climate change-themed story published got harder. It was a lottery. Some desk editors happily subbed and pushed the button. Others agonised and asked a million questions. Debate on some story ideas generated endless bureaucracy by editors frightened to take a decision, reflecting a different type of climate within Reuters – the climate of fear. "By mid-October, I was informed that climate change just wasn't a big story for the present, but that it would be if there was a significant shift in global policy, such as the US introducing an emissions cap-and-trade system. Very soon after that conversation I was told my climate change role was abolished." Fogarty left the agency soon after. Disclosure: the Guardian is a Reuters client. | ['environment/climate-change-scepticism', 'media/reuters', 'environment/environment', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'science/scienceofclimatechange', 'media/us-press-publishing', 'us-news/us-news', 'tone/news', 'type/article', 'profile/suzannegoldenberg'] | environment/climate-change-scepticism | CLIMATE_DENIAL | 2013-07-26T19:31:00Z | true | CLIMATE_DENIAL |
money/2012/nov/26/flood-insurance-talks-reach-crisis-point | Flood insurance talks reach 'crisis point' | Hundreds of thousands of flood victims face steep increases in their home insurance costs or risk losing it altogether, following a breakdown in talks between the government and the insurance industry. The collapse in talks was branded "outrageous" by charity the National Flood Forum (NFF), which said being refused insurance "could spell financial ruin for thousands". Insurers agreed a statement of principles with the government in 2008 to renew cover for flood victims, usually at a very high premium and with an even higher excess. But this agreement runs out on 30 June 2013, when householders face being refused cover unless the government and the industry come to a new agreement. The Association of British Insurers (ABI) recently proposed a scheme to make sure 200,000 households affected by flooding will be able to renew their policies next year. It meant any house that would normally incur a much higher premium because of flood risk would have the extra paid out of a levy on every home policy in the UK. While the industry is not asking the government for funding for the scheme, its proposal does require it to provide a temporary overdraft facility that would be used to pay claims if there were heavy floods in the early years of the scheme before it had built up its reserves – but the government has not agreed to this. The ABI has now called for the government to commit to a joint solution to ensure affordable flood insurance for high-risk households, describing the current state of talks as being "at an impasse". Nick Starling, director of general insurance at the ABI, said talks had reached a crisis point: "The government has indicated it will not provide any temporary overdraft facility for the insurance industry's not-for-profit scheme, which makes it very difficult for it to go ahead. "As a result negotiations have hit an impasse. Insurers know their customers are increasingly worried about flood cover and we will therefore continue talks with government to try and find a way forward. David Cameron's official spokesman said the government met the ABI last week to discuss flood insurance. "We put a proposal to the ABI and it is considering that proposal," the spokesman said. Speaking at a regular media briefing in Westminster, the spokesman declined to discuss the details of the proposal, saying only: "We want to ensure people are able to get insurance at an affordable price. There is a negotiation ongoing." He added that teams from the Environment Agency are on the ground checking flood defences and keeping a close eye on developments. Meetings are taking place twice daily within Defra to monitor the situation, he added. Environment minister Richard Benyon blasted the insurance industry for a "rather demeaning" attempt to highlight negotiations over the future for flooding cover at the same time as households were besieged by flood water. Speaking on Radio 4's Today programme, Benyon said: "It is rather a shame that it has been raised at this particular moment when there are a lot of distressed people with flooded homes. We are just concentrating flat out with dealing with this situation. What we are talking about on insurance is an absolute priority for our department, but at the moment we are dealing with flooded properties and I really want to concentrate on that." Rain has caused severe flooding in Cornwall, Devon, Gloucestershire and Worcestershire, with 265 flood warnings and 288 alerts in place covering all regions in England and Wales. More than 800 homes have already been flooded in the latest bout of bad weather. The NFF hit out at both parties. Chairman Charles Tucker said: "This is kicking people when they are down. These negotiations have been going on for over two years; for them to break down at this stage is outrageous. It's now time for action. We need to see exactly what is being proposed by both sides and knock heads together – and fast. "Being hit with a four-figure insurance premium adds insult to injury, and being refused insurance could spell financial ruin for thousands. Every household and community hit by flooding is relying on them to ensure that flood risk insurance is available to all, is affordable, and is based on social justice." Starling added that no country in the world has a free market for flood insurance with high levels of affordable cover without some form of government involvement. | ['money/homeinsurance', 'money/property', 'money/insurance', 'money/money', 'environment/flooding', 'world/natural-disasters', 'environment/environment', 'politics/politics', 'uk/uk', 'tone/news', 'type/article', 'profile/markking'] | environment/flooding | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2012-11-26T11:19:00Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/2018/nov/22/tyres-and-synthetic-clothes-big-cause-of-microplastic-pollution | Tyres and synthetic clothes 'big cause of microplastic pollution' | Vehicle tyres and synthetic clothing are the two leading contributors to microplastic pollution from UK households, according to a new report from Friends of the Earth. The report estimates that between 9,000 and 32,000 tonnes of microplastic pollution enter British waterways each year from just four sources. The two leading sources are tyre abrasion, with between 7,000 and 19,000 tonnes entering surface waters each year, and clothing. In the UK an estimated two-thirds of clothing is made from synthetic plastic material, according to analysts from Eunomia, who wrote the report for FoE. Up to 2,900 tonnes of microplastics from the washing of synthetic clothing such as fleeces could be passing through wastewater treatment into our rivers and estuaries. The scale of plastic pollution from household plastics is of the same magnitude as that from large plastic waste such as bottles and takeaway containers – about 26,000 tonnes of which enters UK waterways each year. The environmental campaign group is calling on the government’s resources and waste strategy – expected next month – to include measures for tackling microplastics as part of a comprehensive action plan. The four key contributors to microplastic pollution in the oceans from UK sources, according to the report, are: Vehicle tyres: 68,000 tonnes of microplastics from tyre tread abrasion are generated in the UK every year, with between 7,000 and 19,000 tonnes entering surface waters; Clothing: the washing of synthetic clothing could result in the generation of 2,300-5,900 tonnes of fibres annually in the UK – up to 2,900 tonnes of this could be passing through wastewater treatment into our rivers and estuaries; Plastic pellets used to manufacture plastic items. Up to 5,900 tonnes are lost to surface waters in the UK every year; Paints on buildings and road markings – weather and flake-off results in between 1,400 and 3,700 tonnes ending up in surface water every year. Julian Kirby, FoE plastics campaigner, said: “It’s staggering that so little is being done to prevent thousands of tonnes of microplastic pollution from car tyres, clothing and paints pouring into our rivers and seas every year. “Microplastic pollution may be largely invisible, but it’s having a potentially devastating effect on our natural environment – especially as it can be mistaken for food by some our smallest ocean creatures, which are then eaten by bigger creatures as part of the food chain. “Ministers are right to be concerned about the impact of bags, straws and single-use coffee cups on our environment, but we mustn’t ignore the threat from tiny bits of plastic, too.” Friends of the Earth is urging the government to consider a number of measures to tackle car tyre pollution, including a standardised test to measure tyre tread abrasion rate and a car tyre levy to pay for research into solutions, and to consider mitigation measures. | ['environment/plastic', 'environment/pollution', 'environment/rivers', 'environment/oceans', 'environment/friends-of-the-earth', 'environment/environment', 'uk/uk', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/sandralaville', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/pollution | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2018-11-22T06:01:30Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
news/2021/aug/24/covid-19-seasonal-pattern-flu-coronavirus | Does Covid-19 follow a similar seasonal pattern to flu? | It is well known that influenza is seasonal, peaking in the winter in temperate regions and during the wet season in tropical locations. So does Covid-19 follow a similar seasonal pattern? To answer this question scientists compared coronavirus rates between March 2020 and March 2021 from five countries – Canada, Germany, India, Ethiopia and Chile – with daily mean temperature, humidity, ultraviolet radiation and air-drying capacity (a measure of how quickly droplets evaporate). In countries with temperate climates they found Covid-19 peaked during the winter months, when temperature and humidity were low. Meanwhile, in countries with tropical climates the cases peaked during the summer monsoons, when humidity was high. The results, published in the journal GeoHealth, reveal that there were two variables – ultraviolet levels and air-drying capacity – that consistently correlated with Covid-19 levels in all countries. Bright sunshine and fast evaporation were associated with falling rates of coronavirus, while cloudy skies and slow evaporation appear to aid the spread of the virus. Anticipating the seasonality of Covid-19 will be important in combating its spread, ensuring booster vaccines are given before the peak season takes-off, for example. But seasonality is only one factor, we shouldn’t drop our guard just because it is sunny and dry. | ['news/series/weatherwatch', 'world/coronavirus-outbreak', 'environment/winter', 'environment/summer', 'world/world', 'society/vaccines', 'type/article', 'tone/features', 'profile/kate-ravilious', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/weather2', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-weather'] | news/series/weatherwatch | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2021-08-24T05:00:24Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/2020/apr/07/great-barrier-reefs-third-mass-bleaching-in-five-years-the-most-widespread-ever | Great Barrier Reef's third mass bleaching in five years the most widespread yet | The government’s top Great Barrier Reef scientist says a third mass bleaching event in five years is a clear signal the marine wonder is “calling for urgent help” on climate change. One quarter of the Great Barrier Reef suffered severe bleaching this summer in the most widespread outbreak ever witnessed, according to analysis of aerial surveys of more than 1,000 individual reefs released on Tuesday. Dr David Wachenfeld, chief scientist at the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, told Guardian Australia: “My greatest fear is that people will lose hope for the reef. Without hope there’s no action. “People need to see these [bleaching] events not as depressing bits of news that adds to other depressing bits of news. They are clear signals the Great Barrier Reef is calling for urgent help and for us to do everything we can.” Prof Terry Hughes, director of the Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University, surveyed 1,036 reefs from a plane over nine days in late March. The marine park authority also had an observer on the flights. Hughes has released maps showing severe levels of bleaching occurred in 2020 in all three sections of the reef – northern, central and southern – the first time this has happened since mass bleaching was first seen in 1998. Some 25% of the reefs were severely bleached – meaning that more than 60% of the corals on each reef had bleached. Hughes said previous observations had shown that bleaching at that extent leads to “high levels of mortality” of corals. The Great Barrier Reef has experienced five mass bleaching events – 1998, 2002, 2016, 2017 and 2020 – all caused by rising ocean temperatures driven by global heating. Hughes said there probably would not be the same level of coral death in the north and central regions in 2020 as in previous years, but this was partly because previous bleaching outbreaks had killed off the less heat-tolerant species. The 2020 bleaching was second only to 2016 for severity, Hughes said. Corals can recover from mild bleaching, but scientists say those corals are more susceptible to disease. Severe bleaching can kill corals. Hughes said severe mass bleaching had never before hit the southern section of the reef – from Mackay south. That area had high numbers of heat-sensitive corals that “light up like a Christmas tree” when viewed from the air. “It’s not too late to turn this around with rapid action on emissions,” he said. “But business-as-usual emissions will make the the Great Barrier Reef a pretty miserable place compared to today.” In February the reef was subjected to its hottest sea surface temperatures since records began in 1900. Some scientists fear that rising levels of heat being taken up by the ocean have pushed tropical reefs to a tipping point at which many locations bleach almost annually. Wachenfeld said the reef’s sheer size – it comprises about 3,000 individual reefs – made it resilient, “but climate change brings a new scale of impact unlike anything we have seen before”. He told Guardian Australia: “Three mass bleaching events in five years is showing us the enormous scale at which climate change can operate. “No one climate event will kill the Great Barrier Reef, but each successive event creates more damage. Its resilience is not limitless and we need the strongest possible action on climate change.” The globe has already warmed by about 1C above pre-industrial levels, caused primarily by rising levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels. Wachenfeld said: “We’re at about 1C and we have just had three marine heatwaves in five years that have all damaged the reef.” Measures to improve the resilience of the reef include improving water quality, controlling outbreaks of coral-eating starfish, and research and development to improve the heat tolerance of corals. “None of that is a substitute for strong action on emissions,” Wachenfeld said. “Dealing with the climate problem is the underpinning for everything else to work.” Under the Paris climate agreement, countries agreed to deliver country-wide plans that would keep global heating well below 2C, with an aim to keep temperatures to 1.5C. “That’s the window we have to aim for,” Wachenfeld said. “As we approach and go beyond 2C, I don’t see the tools we have today, and the tools that research and development is working on, will protect the reef. “The world is heading for 3C of warming – we will not be able to protect coral reefs under those circumstances. “The reef is, after this event, a more damaged ecosystem, but it can still recover. It needs more help from us and it needs it urgently. This is a call to action.” In a statement to Guardian Australia, the environment minister, Sussan Ley, said: “It is deeply concerning the reef has suffered another bleaching event and our focus has to be on the ways that we can reduce the pressure on the reef and strengthen its resilience. “The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority has been monitoring the situation closely and highlighting the concerns over temperatures. “Thankfully, some of the most recognised tourism areas have been less impacted but that does not change the importance of the issue and the importance of coordinated global action on emissions reduction to reduce ocean temperatures.” Queensland’s minister for environment and the Great Barrier Reef, Leeanne Enoch, said climate change, pollution from run-off and other threats “are testing the reef’s ability to recover from major disturbances like mass bleaching events, severe tropical cyclones and crown-of-thorns starfish.” She said the Palaszczuk government had “committed to a zero net emissions target by 2050” and allocated more than $427m for reef protection and resilience between 2015 and 2022. “The missing piece continues to be leadership and action from the federal government on climate change,” she said. | ['environment/great-barrier-reef', 'australia-news/queensland', 'environment/environment', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'environment/coral', 'environment/wildlife', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'environment/marine-life', 'australia-news/icymi-australia', 'type/article', 'profile/graham-readfearn', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/marine-life | BIODIVERSITY | 2020-04-06T19:00:04Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
environment/2019/feb/22/boy-12-said-to-have-created-nuclear-reaction-in-playroom-lab | Boy, 12, said to have created nuclear reaction in playroom lab | An American 14-year-old has reportedly become the youngest known person in the world to create a successful nuclear reaction. The Open Source Fusor Research Consortium, a hobbyist group, has recognised the achievement by Jackson Oswalt, from Memphis, Tennessee, when he was aged 12 in January 2018. “For those that haven’t seen my recent posts, it will come as a surprise that I would even consider believing I had achieved fusion,” Oswalt wrote on the Fusor.net forum. “Over the past month I have made an enormous amount of progress. I now have results that I believe to be worthy.” The enterprising teenager said he transformed an old playroom in his parents’ house into a nuclear laboratory with $10,000 (£7,700) worth of equipment that uses 50,000 volts of electricity to heat deuterium gas and fuse the nuclei to release energy. “The start of the process was just learning about what other people had done with their fusion reactors,” Jackson told Fox. “After that, I assembled a list of parts I needed. I got those parts off eBay primarily and then oftentimes the parts that I managed to scrounge off of eBay weren’t exactly what I needed. So I’d have to modify them to be able to do what I needed to do for my project.” His father, Chris Oswalt, who works at a medical equipment company, told USA Today: “I think there is a great disbelief until they actually see it.” However, scientists are likely to remain sceptical until Oswalt’s workings are subject to verification from an official organisation and are published in an academic journal. Still, the teenager may now have usurped the previous record holder, Taylor Wilson, who works in nuclear energy research after achieving fusion aged 14. | ['environment/nuclearpower', 'science/science', 'environment/energy', 'us-news/us-news', 'world/world', 'us-news/tennessee', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/mattha-busby', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-foreign', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-news'] | environment/nuclearpower | ENERGY | 2019-02-22T17:16:13Z | true | ENERGY |
science/antarctica-live/2013/dec/04/live-australasian-antarctic-expedition | Join us live from the Antarctic | You can follow the Australasian Antarctic Expedition 2013 on the Guardian's Antarctica Live blog. In the spirit of Douglas Mawson's original expedition of 1911, in which he was the first to send regular wireless messages from Antarctica, our website will publish daily updates from the expedition, sent direct from the field. Our coverage will include articles, tweets, pictures and videos from Guardian journalists taking part in the expedition. We will feature the dozens of scientists on board the ship as they make their climate and wildlife measurements at sea, on the islands of the Southern Ocean and on Antarctica itself. We will also report everyday life (and Christmas) on board a working research vessel. Through the expedition, which runs until 4 January, we will give Guardian readers several opportunities to talk live to people on board the ship as we sail through some of the roughest seas in the world, visit the windiest place on Earth and try (icebergs permitting) to reach Mawson's huts, the heroic explorer's base camp more than 100 years ago as he drew the first maps of this part of the world. Website: theguardian.com/science/antarctica-live Twitter: Follow @alokjha @loztopham @GdnAntarctica and @guardianscience Facebook: facebook.com/guardianscience Any questions for Alok and Laurence on the expedition? Perhaps you'd like to hear about their preparation for the trip, or what they feel are the biggest challenges they'll be facing? Post your questions below the line and we'll write up some of their responses in a blog post. | ['science/antarctica-live', 'science/science', 'tone/blog', 'world/world', 'world/antarctica', 'environment/poles', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'profile/alokjha', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews'] | environment/poles | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2013-12-04T12:49:22Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/blog/2011/mar/04/sustainable-development-rip | Sustainable development, RIP | Jonathon Porritt | First they killed the SDC. Now they are trying to kill off sustainable development itself. The paper that Spelman put out on Monday, under the compelling title 'Mainstreaming sustainable development: The government's vision and what this means in practice', is without a doubt the most disgraceful government document relating to Sustainable Development that I have ever seen. Far from demonstrating how sustainable development will be mainstreamed across government (which was the commitment it made when it axed the SDC), it reveals that its clear intent is to marginalise SD over the next four years to the point where it will be all but invisible. Even I did not think the coalition government could sink this far. Historically, the Tories have been pretty sound on articulating what SD means, going right back to the UK's first sustainable development strategy in the 1990s. No one will be more distressed at this derisory 'vision' than Chris Patten who was responsible for the strategy. And as for the Lib Dems ... You probably ought to read it for yourself to see for yourself that I'm not exaggerating. Here are one or two highlights: 1. "Ministers have agreed an approach for mainstreaming SD which in broad terms consists of providing Ministerial leadership and oversight, leading by example, embedding SD into policy, and transparent and independent scrutiny." However, the government has rejected out of hand the recommendations from the Environmental Audit Committee that SD should become the responsibility of the Cabinet Office. It will therefore stay within Defra – the weakest department in Whitehall, with the weakest set of ministers anyone can remember. Does anyone suppose that any other departments will pay the slightest attention when Defra "reviews other departmental business plans in relation to SD principles". 2. Spelman will apparently exercise her mainstreaming role via her (newly announced) membership of the Economics Affairs Committee. One can only assume that Defra officials were having a laugh here as they crafted the words "to enforce the government's commitment to sustainability across policy-making". And they must have been in hysterics in penning this little gem: "HM Treasury will support green growth and build a fairer, more balanced economy." 3. As I've said all along, there will be no comprehensive, independent scrutiny of government performance on SD. Here's what it says: "Independent monitoring of sustainability in government operations, procurement and policies by the Environmental Audit Committee." Yesterday, at the SDC's valedictory event, Joan Walley, Chair of the Environmental Audit Committee, declared categorically that the EAC would not be able to carry out that function – especially as no additional resources had been made available. The EAC is a parliamentary committee. Ministers cannot instruct parliamentary committees as to what they should do. So, had officials checked with Joan Walley before issuing the 'vision'? Or was Spelman seeking to mislead or even deliberately deceive in allowing the document to go out with that wording? 4. Astonishingly, there is just one tokenistic reference to Scotland and Wales, where SD still has some traction: "We will continue to work closely with our neighbours in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, sharing approaches and best practice in SD." The reality is that there is now no UK-wide SD capability left. So who will represent the UK at the Rio+20 conference in Rio de Janeiro next year? Will Spelman (or David Cameron himself, perhaps?) have the nerve to lay claim to that role? The rest of it is just guff. The role of the Lib Dems in this dismantling exercise remains startling. We already know that Nick Clegg literally couldn't care less about SD. Ditto Vince Cable. But what does this 'vision' tell us about Chris Huhne? About Norman Baker? About all those benighted and deluded Lib Dem MPs who always thought that SD was one of their greatest strengths – instead, now, of a source of enduring shame. And how, I wonder, will our environmental NGOs read this? "Just one of those things"? or definitive confirmation that the next four years are going to be bloody – and that they had better get themselves prepared for that reality. So, that's that. SD RIP. • This article first appeared on Jonathon Porritt's blog | ['environment/blog', 'global-development/environmental-sustainability', 'environment/corporatesocialresponsibility', 'environment/environment', 'environment/green-politics', 'politics/caroline-spelman', 'politics/politics', 'tone/blog', 'environment/sustainable-development', 'type/article', 'profile/jonathonporritt'] | environment/green-politics | CLIMATE_POLICY | 2011-03-04T17:00:17Z | true | CLIMATE_POLICY |
commentisfree/2021/oct/06/we-need-to-get-real-about-carbon-offsets-in-australia-they-wont-stop-climate-change | We need to get real about carbon offsets in Australia – they won’t stop climate change | Richard Denniss | Emissions offsets are to climate action what ivermectin is to medical treatment. Both have their own small uses under the right circumstances, but neither is useful when you are trying to solve a global problem. Just as ivermectin is a good way to treat scabies and a bad way to prevent Covid, “carbon offsets” can play a small role in avoiding dangerous climate change. But make no mistake – not chopping down a few trees won’t protect us from the emissions that come with opening enormous new gas wells and coalmines. Australia is the third largest exporter of fossil fuels in the world, coming in behind Saudi Arabia and Russia. We are the world’s largest exporter of liquefied natural gas and the second largest exporter of coal. And we aren’t transitioning away from fossil fuels, we are transitioning towards them, with plans to open enormous new gas basins and dozens of new coalmines. Encouraging people to chop down fewer trees is a good idea, but it’s no substitute for actual emissions reductions. Except, of course, if you are Scott Morrison. The Coalition government is stuck on the horns of a dilemma of its own making. Tony Abbott made protecting the fossil fuel industry a “core value” of the Coalition, and it has helped win over some Labor voters in regional Australia. But the love of gas and coal is starting to cost them a lot of votes in the leafy Liberal seats that they have always taken for granted. They don’t want to lose their regional vote to One Nation or Clive Palmer but they also don’t want to lose their inner-city vote to independents or the Greens. Luckily for the Coalition, but not the climate, Morrison is the master of promising everything to everyone. And luckily for Morrison, carbon offsets give him an opportunity to walk both sides of a very wide street. Put simply, carbon offsets mean he can both promise “net zero” emissions to city voters, and new subsidies to help expand fossil fuel exports out in the regions. Just as an individual’s home office expenses can be “offset” against their salary to determine their “net income” for tax purposes, countries and companies can use “avoided” emissions to offset their actual emissions from burning fossil fuels to determine their “net emissions”. Avoided emissions are those emissions that were expected to happen but, thanks to government policy, did not eventuate. Those serious about climate change try to reduce their actual emissions as fast as they can, and buy carbon offsets to make up the remainder. But in Morrison’s Australia, where actual emissions from burning fossil fuels are rising not falling, the plan seems to be to keep polluting and rely on offsets to meet our emission reduction targets. It’s not hard to generate lots of offsets. The Australian Tax Office requires receipts to prove you actually spent money on your home office. But the government’s Clean Energy Regulator will settle for a promise that you really were going to generate a humongous amount of emissions and then when you merely produce a very large amount instead it gives you “offset credits”. It’s like promising you were going to smash a lot of windows and then getting praise for only breaking a few. Take “avoided deforestation” for example. Recent research by the Australia Institute and the Australian Conservation Foundation argues that millions of tonnes of avoided deforestation offsets have been generated in New South Wales because the regulator assumed landholders were going to clear enormous amounts of land that they weren’t actually likely to clear. Nothing has really been “avoided” and therefore no emissions were “reduced”. But that isn’t stopping the government claiming they have. The latest offsets plan involves carbon capture and storage. When oil and methane (which the industry prefers you to call “natural gas”) are extracted from the ground, lots of methane and C02 leaks out. Sometimes the methane is captured and burned, but much of the methane and all of the CO2 usually escapes. But now the energy and emissions reduction minister Angus Taylor is proposing to pay the oil and gas industry for capturing some of the C02 that leaks out when they are extracting their fossil fuels which, when burned, will actually cause more climate change. What this means is that if we expand the oil and gas industry we can increase the number of these “offsets” produced, making it then possible for the government to simultaneously support the fossil fuel industry while assuring voters it’s doing something about climate change. It’s a very Morrison solution to a very real problem. Unfortunately, as the politicians promoting ivermectin as a solution to Covid are now finding out, relying on fake solutions to very real problems can be even more dangerous than denying those problems exist in the first place. • Richard Denniss is the chief economist at the independent thinktank the Australia Institute | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'environment/carbon-emissions', 'environment/carbon-capture-and-storage', 'australia-news/australian-politics', 'science/scienceofclimatechange', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/richard-denniss', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-opinion'] | environment/carbon-capture-and-storage | EMISSIONS | 2021-10-06T03:44:28Z | true | EMISSIONS |
sustainable-business/2015/sep/25/walmart-coca-cola-recycling-closed-loop-fund-plastics-baltimore | Coke, Walmart and others kick off $100m recycling fund with three new projects | A consortium of 10 of the US’s largest corporations – including Walmart, Coca-Cola and Johnson & Johnson – has announced three new projects designed to boost dismal recycling rates in the US. Just 34% of waste in the US is recycled, placing it well behind other developed countries such as Switzerland, which recycles more than 50% of its waste. Outdated facilities and technologies are partly to blame, as is a lack of access to something as simple as a recycling bin in many parts of the country. The Closed Loop Fund (CLF), created last year by some of America’s most well-known consumer brands, is providing zero and low-interest loans to US cities and recycling companies to improve recycling infrastructure. The fund plans to put $100m (£66m) towards recycling initiatives by 2020 and this week announced the first three projects to receive funding. Two will bring single-stream recycling – meaning residents will no longer have to separate materials like glass, paper and cardboard for pickup – to Portage County, Ohio, and Quad Cities, Iowa, while the third will support an innovative plastics recycling facility in Baltimore. According to the fund, US cities spent more than $5bn on landfill fees in 2013. Why companies benefit There’s a financial incentive for companies to boost recycling. Major brands are losing out on $11.4bn in recycling revenue each year, according to a recent study by advocacy groups the Natural Resources Defense Council and As You Sow. Corporations such as Walmart have also set ambitious goals to use more recycled materials in their packaging, which they won’t be able to achieve if the supply of recycled content lags. “Significantly increasing recycling of products and packaging is a global challenge requiring large-scale investment in infrastructure, public-private collaboration, and a fundamental shift in public behavior,” said Kathleen McLaughlin, senior vice president of sustainability at Walmart. Each investment made by the CLF into recycling projects has to fulfil certain criteria, said co-founder and managing director Rob Kaplan. The fund provides loans, not grants, which need to be repaid, so the project can be financially sustainable. It also needs to divert “significant tonnage” from landfill, Kaplan said, although he did not specify a figure. Finally, projects need to be scalable, so they can be replicated. The fund has received about 70 “legitimate” proposals since October, with requests for loans totaling more than $170m, Kaplan said. “It shows there’s clearly a demand for this type of initiative,” he said. Of the first investments, two will help more than 200,000 households in Portage County and Quad Cities move from dual to single-stream recycling. The projected tonnage diverted from landfills over the next decade is about 90,000 in Iowa and nearly 40,000 in Ohio. The third investment backs a new technology to help sort hard-to-recycle plastics. According to the CLF, most communities in the US don’t have the facilities to recycle no 3 to no 7 plastics – which include yogurt containers, polystyrene cups and iPod cases. These plastics are usually combined into a single bale, which ends up in a landfill or gets exported, Kaplan said. A new recycling facility in Baltimore that is due to receive funding uses what Kaplan calls a “unique” technology that can both separate the products within the bale and convert them into raw materials to be used in new products and packaging. As a joint venture between recycling companies QRS and Canusa-Hershman, the plant can process approximately 4,500 tons of materials each month, more than double what is currently possible in the US, according to the CLF. “These are plastics that don’t currently have a market,” Kaplan said. “It’s an exciting model – you could build five or 10 of these facilities across the country.” The fund is looking to invest in three key areas in the future: low income communities, where there is very little in the way of recycling; new technologies that can help recycling facilities sort through their materials faster and more efficiently; and methods to recycle plastic film and flexible packaging (like the pouches used for baby and pet food), which has increased tremendously in recent years. Some critics, however, are less convinced about the fund’s long-term impact. Matt Prindiville, executive director for Upstream, commends companies for taking some responsibility for recycling packaging materials. But, he adds, “investing in a facility to handle low-value plastics – much of which should be redesigned – and converting a few communities over to single-stream is not a game-changer.” “Rather than sprinkling some money here and there to a handful of local governments, it would be far better for these companies to support extended producer responsibility policies, which puts the accountability for designing and stewarding packaging materials – and building a circular economy – firmly in their court.” | ['sustainable-business/series/circular-economy', 'sustainable-business/sustainable-business', 'sustainable-business/waste-and-recycling', 'environment/recycling', 'environment/environment', 'environment/waste', 'sustainable-business/renewables', 'business/wal-mart', 'business/cocacola', 'film/plastic', 'business/business', 'business/retail', 'business/fooddrinks', 'environment/ethical-living', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'tone/sponsoredfeatures', 'profile/alison-moodie'] | environment/recycling | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2015-09-25T17:01:52Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
environment/2022/feb/17/air-pollution-may-affect-sperm-quality-says-study | Air pollution may affect sperm quality, says study | Air pollution may affect semen quality, specifically sperm motility — the ability of sperm to swim in the right direction — according to a new study analysing the sperm of over 30,000 men in China. The research, published today in the journal JAMA Networks, also suggests that the smaller the size of the polluting particles in the air, the greater the link with poor semen quality. “Our findings suggest that smaller particulate matter size fractions may be more potent than larger fractions in inducing poor sperm motility,” wrote the authors of the paper. The researchers believe that these findings highlight yet another reason for the need to reduce exposure to air pollution among men in their reproductive age. Researchers have long been trying to establish whether there’s a link between air pollution and sperm quality, but it’s been unclear whether the former has adverse health effects on male fertility because the results from studies are often inconsistent among themselves and complicated to put into perspective. There does appear to be reason to believe that pollution may negatively affect fertility in general for the whole of the population, as suggested in this international literature review published in December 2021. Researchers at the School of Medicine of Tongji University in Shanghai looked at data records from a total of 33,876 men from 340 Chinese cities, aged 34 on average, with a varied degree of exposure to air pollution among them, and whose wives got pregnant through assisted reproduction technology with their sperm between January 2013 and December 2019. They then looked for patterns between semen quality in relation to whether the participants had been exposed to amounts of particulate matter smaller in diameter than 2.5 micrometres, between 2.5 and 10 micrometres, and 10 micrometres, in various key moments of the 90 days before their visit to the hospital for semen ejaculation. To establish the quality of the semen, the researchers concentrated on factors such as sperm count, concentration, and sperm motility. Although the researchers couldn’t find a significant link between air pollution and sperm quality in terms of sperm count or concentration — they did find that the more a participant was exposed to smaller particulate matter, the lower both the progressive and the total sperm motility was. Progressive sperm motility is the sperm’s ability to swim forward, while total sperm motility simply refers to the sperm’s ability to swim in general. Specifically, when exposed to particulate matter smaller in diameter than 2.5 micrometres. there was an estimated decrease in sperm motility of 3.6%, while when exposed to particulate matter of 10 micrometres in diameter, there was 2.44% less sperm motility. Meaning that it’s possible that different size fractions of particulate matter might have differing effects on semen quality, maybe because the smaller the particulate matter, the more likely it is to travel deeper into the human lungs. The data indicates that the effects of pollution are more prominent when exposure takes place during the initial part of the 90 days of sperm creation — the one called spermatogenesis — rather than the other two phases. This, in turn, may mean that particulate matter affects sperm on a genetic level, according to the researchers, but these are just speculations, and there’s more research to be done in this area. “The possibility of a link between air pollution and semen quality has been suggested in a number of studies over the years, although not all of them have agreed with this conclusion,” said Allan Pacey, professor of andrology at the University of Sheffield, who was not involved in the research. “This paper adds to the evidence base suggesting the link is real, and is impressive because it uses semen quality data from over 30,000 men.” “But the level of decline in sperm motility seems to be quite low,” said Pacey, stressing that correlation is not causation. He noted that the paper failed to provide any information about the morphology, shape and size of the sperm, which made it impossible to determine whether pollution might be responsible for deformation of sperm and that’s why their motility is decreased, or whether there were other reasons. According to Pacey, it is important to take these findings with a pinch of salt. Although the data suggests that pollution may have a negative effect on sperm mobility, there still isn’t enough information to infer whether this can have a significant clinical effect at large, and result in the overall decrease of the ability of men in high pollution areas to become fathers. More research out in the field might help answer that question with more certainty in the future. | ['environment/air-pollution', 'science/biology', 'uk/uk', 'science/science', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/sofia-quaglia', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/air-pollution | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2022-02-17T16:00:40Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
us-news/article/2024/jun/26/flooding-deaths-midwest | Two people die from floods ravaging US midwest as more storms forecasted | At least two people have died as a result of devastating floods in the US midwest. Flood warnings remain in place across South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa and Minnesota as more rainfall and storms are expected to hit the region this week. More than 3 million people have been affected by days of flooding that washed away homes and submerged vast swaths of farmland. On Sunday, a railroad bridge connecting Iowa and South Dakota collapsed from flooding. William Schulze, 75, of Elburn, Illinois, died while trying to drive through rapid flood waters in Iowa. His body was found on Monday. Kim Reynolds, the governor of Iowa, issued a disaster emergency proclamation in response to flooding, and on Monday night, Joe Biden approved federal funding to aid the state with recovery efforts. “The projected damage is staggering and at this time it’s estimated that at least 1,900 properties are impacted and hundreds have been destroyed,” said Reynolds at a Sunday press conference. “Businesses are shuttered, main streets have been impacted, hospitals, nursing homes and other care facilities were evacuated.” Kristi Noem, the governor of South Dakota, has also declared a state of emergency. At a Sunday news conference she shared that at least one person has died in South Dakota as a result of flooding. No additional details of the fatality were shared. “My heart goes out to the families on McCook Lake whose homes were destroyed by this flooding,” Noem said in an X post. “We are working on a schedule for families to get their belongings. Until then, downed power lines, sinkholes, and other threats make it too dangerous to go in alone.” In Minnesota, a dam on the Blue Earth River partially collapsed on Tuesday. State officials warn that the Rapidan dam, built in the early 1900s, is in “imminent failure condition”. The water surging over the dam eroded river banks, and at least one house collapsed into the river. On Monday, a power station was washed away, leaving roughly 600 households without power. On Saturday, Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, declared a peacetime state of emergency authorizing the national guard to help with flood response efforts. “This is an extremely challenging time,” Walz wrote on X. “But we have rebuilt before, and alongside our local and federal partners, we will rebuild again.” Today, Brad Finstad, the Minnesota congressman, met with the mayor of Jackson, Minnesota, a city located near the Des Moines River. The water levels there are expected to crest at 16.2ft (4.9m) today. | ['environment/flooding', 'us-news/minnesota', 'us-news/south-dakota', 'us-news/iowa', 'us-news/nebraska', 'us-news/us-weather', 'us-news/us-news', 'world/extreme-weather', 'campaign/email/today-us', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/aliya-uteuova', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-news'] | environment/flooding | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2024-06-26T17:21:56Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
world/2022/oct/12/power-outages-puerto-rico-hurricane-fiona | Thousands still without power weeks after Hurricane Fiona hit Puerto Rico | Alexis Robles has slept a mere three hours a night since Hurricane Fiona hit Puerto Rico on 18 September, causing a total blackout across the Caribbean island. Robles, 52, a systems analyst in the seaside town of Cabo Rojo in south-west Puerto Rico, has been living without power for 25 days. At night, the temperature barely dips below 80F, and Robles wakes up after an hour or two covered in sweat. The days are marked by high temperatures and rain, and without a fan or air conditioning the mosquitoes are unbearable. Robles lives in an 80-apartment condominium complex with a backup generator that produces only enough electricity to power the water pump and light the communal areas after dark. Those with somewhere else to go have left, he says; the remaining residents are just trying to get by. “We have no electricity during the day, people here are desperate, just trying to survive, worried that this could end up like Maria,” said Robles. Fiona, a category 1 storm when it struck the island and the first major hurricane of the 2022 season, hit Puerto Rico exactly five years after hurricanes Irma and Maria made landfall two weeks apart, destroying much of the island’s electricity transmission and distribution infrastructure, leading to thousands of preventable deaths and the longest blackout in US history. The storm left the vast majority of Puerto Rico and its 3 million residents without power or water for several days. After Maria, Robles and his neighbours were left without power for five months. Now, three and half weeks after Fiona, they have no idea when electricity will be restored. “What infuriates us the most is that Luma is claiming most of the island has power, when that is obviously not true,” said Robles, referring to the private US-Canadian consortium that took over electricity transmission and distribution in June 2021. Luma claims it has restored power to 99% of homes and businesses. But three and a half weeks on, about 20,000 customers – the equivalent of 40,000 people – remain without power, according to the company’s own figures. The worst-affected neighbourhoods are in the south and south-west of the island, where Fiona made landfall. Andrés Gutiérrez, a general physician in Cabo Rojo, said around a third of the town’s 50,000 inhabitants remain without power – including many of his patients. Electricity posts are still down, cables damaged by falling vegetation – which many Puerto Ricans blame on the lack of regular maintenance. “The situation is very tense, people are tired of being stuck in the middle of Luma and political interests. We pay so much for electricity and billions of dollars have gone into the system that is basically obsolete,” said Gutiérrez, 46, who also went five months without power after Maria. Luma claims to have restored power to his street, he said, but half the homes still don’t have any service from the grid and rely on backup generators and solar panels. They are among the lucky ones able to invest in backups after Maria, Gutiérrez said, but for many on low incomes – including some of his patients – this wasn’t an option. “I have diabetic patients living off fast food and bread because the refrigerator is off – it’s causing a domino effect on people’s health,” he said. Over the past two decades, Puerto Rico – along with Haiti and Myanmar – has been among three territories most affected by extreme weather such as storms, floods, heatwaves and droughts, according to the Germanwatch Climate Risk Index, which are becoming more intense due to global heating. As those threats increase, Fiona for many residents has illustrated the ongoing fragility of the island’s energy system – despite the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) having approved an unprecedented $16bn for reconstruction and mitigation. Much of the existing energy infrastructure – plants, transmitter towers, poles and cables – is in flood-prone areas or at risk of sea level rise, storm surges and tsunamis, as well as strong winds and earthquake damage. None of the federal funds have been allocated to distributed rooftop solar – a decentralised energy alternative which grassroot activists and environmental experts argue would be cheaper, cleaner and more resilient. About 10 miles north-east of Cabo Rojo on the outskirts of the city of Mayagüez, another doctor, Alfredo Pérez, is spending more than $40 a day on diesel to power his generator – a polluting luxury that has been in short supply. Pérez, 57, a neurologist, also has many patients without electricity including an elderly neighbour with Parkinson’s disease whose wife is fretting about how long this power outage will go on. “This was only a category 1, and here we are again, 25 days later waiting for answers.” Luma has been contacted for comment. | ['world/hurricane-fiona', 'us-news/puerto-rico', 'us-news/us-news', 'inequality/inequality', 'world/americas', 'world/world', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/nina-lakhani', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/west-coast-news'] | world/hurricane-fiona | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2022-10-12T10:00:29Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
business/nils-pratley-on-finance/2022/sep/01/energy-contracts-reform-can-bring-prices-down-if-the-new-pm-is-tough-enough | Energy contracts reform can bring prices down – if the new PM is tough enough | Nils Pratley | Welcome news: a consensus is emerging around one way to attack energy costs – stop paying sky-high prices for electricity that is generated in the UK by firms whose costs are unaffected by soaring gas prices. We’re talking about nuclear power plants, windfarms, solar projects and biomass facilities, some of which are making fortunes thanks to the UK’s outdated wholesale energy pricing system. The basic problem, revealed starkly by the crisis, is that electricity in the UK is tied to global gas prices. When the gas price spikes, as now, it has perverse consequences: a nuclear power station is paid as if its input costs had just risen fivefold, when they plainly haven’t. This “clearing price” setup was designed for another age – not one where nuclear and renewables together produce about 60% of electricity in the UK. One idea to crack the problem in the short term (ie before the government settles on a method to decouple gas and electricity prices, which is the plan) was sketched out here on Tuesday. Academics at the UK Energy Research Centre (UKERC), followed by the consultancy Cornwall Insight, have been pushing the idea of shifting as many UK generators as possible onto contracts for difference, or CfDs. Under CfDs, the problem of overpayments doesn’t arise: when wholesale prices are above a fixed “strike” price, the projects return cash to be recycled into lowering bills. But the CfD setup has been only been widely used since 2017. Before then, the main system for encouraging investment in renewables was renewable obligation certificates, or ROCs, which are still attached to 40% of UK electricity generation. Such projects get the wholesale price plus, for instance, one ROC worth at least £50 per megawatt hour. The arrangement looked roughly fair when wholesale prices were £100 per megawatt hour, but, at £400-plus, somebody is raking in undeserved and unintended windfalls. If it’s not the owner, then it’s middlemen who bought the power via forward-selling arrangements. Thus a switch to CfDs has right on its side. The chancellor, Nadhim Zahawi, said on Thursday that the government is looking at a voluntary shift to CfDs, albeit one that won’t be ready until next year in order to get around the forward-selling wrinkles. The lure to developers would be a 15-year contract that guarantees still-profitable terms when the current emergency has passed and (we hope) gas prices plunge. That sounds roughly like the original UKERC proposal from April. And Energy UK, the trade body, says the industry is backing the plan. All that is welcome – it is movement in the right direction. But, before anyone gets the idea that salvation has arrived, two related points needed to be made. First, the obvious one: the savings may not be huge if ROC generators don’t all sign up for CfDs, or if the new contracts are too generous. Energy UK is projecting only £150-£250 for a typical household, albeit businesses would also benefit. So the second issue is how robust the government wishes to be. A blistering letter in the Times this week from five former energy bosses, including former chiefs of Shell, National Grid and BG Group, backed a more radical idea to address the same core problem: just cap the prices of domestic electricity produced by non-gas generators. The firms could still make returns “that reflect the investment risk”, but energy prices would be reduced at source. Yes, that idea indicates what could be possible with a bit of arm-twisting. An invitation to generators to enter a “voluntary” negotiation is far more likely to produce big savings if it is accompanied with the threat of a windfall tax. The picture is riddled with politics, it should be said. A contract for 15 years is less appealing if your nuclear power station is due to close in five; and the 80% owner of the existing nuclear fleet is EDF, under the control of the French state. Therein lies an awkward negotiation, just as commercial terms for EDF-backed Sizewell C are on the table. And getting nuclear to sign up would be crucial to maximising savings – it is the big player. But the bottom line here is that tackling prices in the wholesale generation market looks an open goal for an incoming prime minister. Some versions of the CfD suggest average household savings of £500-£600 would be possible with maximum corporate participation. But it would require an incoming PM to, first, recognise the problem; and, second, be willing to face down vested interests. | ['business/nils-pratley-on-finance', 'business/energy-industry', 'business/business', 'environment/nuclearpower', 'business/gas', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/nilspratley', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/financial3', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-business'] | environment/nuclearpower | ENERGY | 2022-09-01T17:58:55Z | true | ENERGY |
commentisfree/2019/jun/11/youth-activists-demand-urgent-action-political-establishment-failing-them | Urgency is what's demanded by young activists. But they're met with crumbling complacency | Eve Livingston | If there’s one word to sum up today’s political pace, perhaps it is urgency. Climate catastrophe is coming; hate crimes are rising; the far right is advancing and none of us can remember the last time parliamentary democracy wasn’t characterised by a hopeless race against a ticking clock. And yet, having spent a lifetime lulled into the complacency that comes with privilege and a centrist establishment, it seems our political class just isn’t getting it. We have 30 years to change the course of history, say school climate strikers. People are dying now, say human rights and equalities campaigners. Real change takes time and consensus and a series of repetitive votes in a crumbling old palace, say politicians. This generational divide between an establishment desperate to cling on to the idea of slow, gradual change and a youth fired up and impatient for radical overhaul was highlighted again last week when ex-BP boss John Browne was asked in the Observer what he would say to climate campaigner Greta Thunberg. “I would say that I have been at this for longer than you’ve been on the planet and that [decarbonisation] will take time,” he responded. “Remember that energy is a very big system and there is not one solution.” Aside from his patronising tone and the fact that Thunberg’s activism is in part only necessary because of his lifetime commitment to burning the fossil fuels that caused the climate crisis, Browne’s response is undoubtedly frustrating for youth activists in other ways. While the older generation has little to lose from patience and timidity, a new wave of activists has already lost, born into a world damaged beyond repair through no fault of their own. With no rose-tinted memories of the so-called good old days, they have little to gain from sitting patiently and waiting while white men 50 years older than them debate a future they won’t be part of. It’s easy for the establishment to patronise young activists because the former exist within a political structure that has been built explicitly to accommodate their type of politics: a slow, bureaucratic, opaque process overseen by people who have far more invested in their own reputations and interests than in those they represent. It might have ticked along nicely for a while – at least for those privileged enough to feel its benefits – but, ultimately, it has failed. And so perhaps Browne’s response points to something else about this generational divide that is somewhat more uncomfortable to acknowledge. It’s one thing to accept that our politicians and experts simply have a different theory of change, frustrating as it might be. But the fact is that it was their commitment to the establishment wisdom of steady, gradual change that led us here in the first place. To accept that anything else is required is also to accept responsibility and, ultimately, failure. In our feral and uncompromising political system, will anyone be brave enough? What the political establishment crucially fails to acknowledge is that a new generation of activists has grown up watching things go wrong on a dramatic scale in the blink of an eye. For millennials and generation Z, political life has been defined by the collapse of institution after institution. In 2008, a generation of students went to sleep one night and woke up to an unforgiving job market that may never recover fully from the financial crash. In 2016, they watched along with their younger peers as hate-crime statistics soared following the UK’s decision to leave the European Union. In their relatively short lives they’ve seen fascists win elections, terrorist attacks devastate countries across the world, climate change-accelerated natural disasters claim the lives of thousands. How can anyone expect them to believe that change should be slow and steady when disaster has been so swift and ruthless? Ultimately, it’s not just that the older political establishment has a different approach or an inherited wisdom, but that it is actively standing in the way of progress on issues that require radical and urgent solutions. In a system built explicitly to advance the slow and gradual politics that have benefited its representatives for decades, this is no small ask. But the ways of the past have failed us. While today’s youth have little to lose and everything to gain from a radical new approach, the power and successes of today’s establishment hang in the balance. To sacrifice progress and change for pride and self-interest would certainly be business as usual. But it was business as usual that got us into this position. It will have to be urgency that saves us. • Eve Livingston is a journalist specialising in politics, social affairs and inequalities | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'environment/activism', 'tone/comment', 'uk/uk', 'environment/greta-thunberg', 'politics/politics', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'society/society', 'society/youngpeople', 'type/article', 'environment/environment', 'world/protest', 'world/world', 'profile/eve-livingston', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-opinion'] | environment/greta-thunberg | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM | 2019-06-11T13:04:51Z | true | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM |
world/2012/aug/30/isaac-inland-warnings-arkansas-missouri | Isaac moves inland and prompts warnings for Arkansas and Missouri | Tropical storm Isaac ploughed inland on Thursday, causing fresh flooding and power outages in Louisiana and Mississippi and prompting emergency evacuations and warnings, even as New Orleans began its post-hurricane clear-up. Authorities sent convoys of military Humvees, buses and specialised high-water vehicles around the shores of Lake Ponchartrain, north of New Orleans, to rescue stranded people and evacuate others deemed at risk. They ordered residents to leave low-lying, rural areas along the Tangipahoa river amid concern the 700-acre dam at Percy Quin state park may fail and add to the already swollen river. Flood waters rose waist-high in some areas, trapping people in cars and homes, and three tornadoes were reported overnight in Mississippi and Alabama, prompting warnings to Arkansas and Missouri to brace for Isaac on Friday even though it was now downgraded to a tropical depression. Rains around New Orleans eased enough to allow helicopter operations, including the rescue of a couple and their dogs from a flooded house. Pets have been a leitmotif of the emergency, with many people ignoring evacuation orders because they had nowhere to bring pets, or wading through waters with nothing but pets in their arms. President Barack Obama declared federal emergencies in Louisiana and Mississippi late on Wednesday, freeing federal aid for affected areas. The nightmare scenario – a devastating hit on New Orleans on the anniversary of hurricane Katrina – failed to materialise. Isaac skirted the city on Wednesday as a category 1 hurricane, dumping more than a feet of water in places and turning streets into wind tunnels, but no serious flooding was reported. Officials said the $14.5bn bolstering of the city's flood control system worked as it should, averting a repeat of the 2005 catastrophe when levees failed and 1,800 people died. There was at least one technical glitch: the US army corps of engineers could not start drainage pumps for the 17th St Canal remotely overnight, causing a delay as they had to be operated manually. It was not a significant problem as the canal was not full, said Sandy Rosenthal of levees.org, an advocacy group, but could potentially have been a "major disaster" had the storm been more powerful. Overall, she said, he preparation and response was "100 times better" than seven years ago. "We felt much safer." Even so, the 70mph winds knocked out power to 730,000 homes in Louisiana and Mississippi. Police, state troopers and national guard units enforced a dawn to dusk curfew to deter looters and keep people off streets littered with debris and broken power lines. "If you loot, you'll wear an orange suit," the mayor, Mitch Landrieu, told a news conference. Sixteen looting-related arrests were reported by Thursday. He tweeted an appeal for caution amid signs of returning normality. "I would ask everyone to work really really hard to be patient & to assist public officials by staying out of their way." Homeowners began to take down boards from windows and some stores opened. Just 20 miles south however in Plaquemines parish, a sparsely-populated rural area, there were still dramatic scenes of surging waters and rescues. The town of Braithwaite was drowned, with tops of buildings peeking from the water. Uniformed officials were checking homes for signs of people left behind. About 800 homes in the parish were damaged, said Bobby Jindal, Louisiana's governor. Officials considered intentionally breaching a levee this weekend to let some floodwater flow back out of the inundated area, he added. Major flooding was also reported in the town of Slidell, north-east of New Orleans. There were two reported casualties in and around New Orleans – a tow-truck driver felled by a tree, and another man who fell from a tree. Several highways and airports remained closed on Thursday. | ['us-news/hurricane-isaac', 'us-news/us-weather', 'us-news/alabama', 'us-news/arkansas', 'us-news/louisiana', 'us-news/mississippi', 'world/hurricanes', 'us-news/missouri', 'world/natural-disasters', 'us-news/us-news', 'world/world', 'environment/flooding', 'environment/environment', 'tone/news', 'type/article', 'profile/rorycarroll'] | us-news/hurricane-isaac | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2012-08-30T17:50:00Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
world/2023/jul/05/china-mineral-mining-green-energy | China accused of scores of abuses linked to ‘green mineral’ mining | A new report into China’s dominance in the green-energy market has identified more than a hundred allegations of environmental and human rights violations linked to its overseas transition mineral investments over the past two years. China dominates the processing and refining of lithium, cobalt, copper, manganese, nickel, zinc, chromium, aluminium and rare-earth elements – and the manufacturing of technologies like solar panels, wind turbines and batteries for electric vehicles (EV), which require so-called transition minerals. The Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRRC), a corporate watchdog that tracks the local impact of thousands of global businesses, identified 102 alleged abuses in 2021 and 2022 linked to Chinese mining interests spanning 18 countries. Copper is the mineral most frequently associated with allegations of harm, followed by nickel. The abuses include Indigenous rights violations, attacks against grassroots leaders, water pollution, ecosystem destruction and unsafe working conditions. The highest number of alleged abuses – 27 – were recorded in Indonesia, which has the world’s largest nickel reserve, followed by Peru, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Myanmar and Zimbabwe. More than 70% of the alleged violations were documented in these five countries where weak governance and human rights abuses have been widely reported, and where China is a major economic partner. The findings underline growing concerns that the transition to renewable energy is repeating unjust business practices that have long dominated fossil-fuel and mineral extractions, with Indigenous people, and marginalised rural and communities of colour most likely to bear the brunt of violations and least likely to benefit from the extracted natural resources. China is not alone. Allegations of human rights violations, environmental harms and labour abuses are rife in mining operations linked to Canadian, US, UK, Australian and European companies and investors – which has long been taking place alongside the extraction of fossil fuels, according to data collated by the watchdog and multiple other human rights and environmental groups. But experts have warned that the global dash for transition minerals needed for green-energy technologies threatens to provoke a new wave of land-grabs, water shortages, environmental damage and community conflicts as countries rush to meet their climate-action goals with little thought about the collateral damage. “The energy and land needed for exploration, extraction and processing of transition minerals leaves behind a significant carbon footprint, characterised by human rights abuses and puts more strain on scarce surface and ground water resources,” said Eric Ngang from Global Witness, which documented more than 300 assassinations of anti-mining activists between 2012 and 2021, the worst violence linked to any environmentally harmful industry. “While mining is needed for green transition, it will ramp up the [negative] impacts if appropriate regulations are not developed and implemented … as transnational companies and business enterprises seem to take advantage of weak governance,” Ngang added. China has been buying up overseas mines and investing heavily in mineral-rich countries like Indonesia and Zimbabwe, and is set to dominate the supply chain for years to come despite US and European efforts to diversify the market. Mining for transition minerals is often “the defining project for China’s relationship with these countries,” said Antonia Timmerman, an editor for the China Global South Project, a website, who has investigated Chinese involvement in Indonesia’s nickel mines. That means that abuses can be exacerbated by a lack of accountability from local partners and governments, who are keen to court investment from Chinese companies. “This is a dirty business,” Timmerman said. In Indonesia, for example, the government “can be very brutal when it comes to defending and protecting these companies, especially the large ones. This happened long before the EV phenomenon.” The report only includes alleged harms published by the media, academics and nonprofits related to the transition mineral supply chain, so the true number could be higher. It also suggests Chinese companies are failing to comply with Beijing’s commitments on transparency and human rights policies, with less than one in five of the Chinese firms responding to the allegations when approached by the Centre – compared to 56% of mining companies globally. In May, China’s mining industry business association launched a pilot mediation scheme for communities, workers and other stakeholders to file complaints against companies involved in any part of the minerals supply chain. It is the first grievance mechanism established by a Chinese industry association. But participation is voluntary and the scheme has no enforcement powers. “The core function of this mechanism is to promote and facilitate the parties to a dispute to have open communication channels … and facilitate problem resolution by providing professional advice and services,” said Li Yanling, one of the scheme’s principal researchers. But Chinese companies do not work in a vacuum, according to Betty Yolanda, director of regional programmes at BHRRC. “Many are suppliers to western buyers like Tesla, Ford and BMW … [who] need to be examined to check whether they have fulfilled their own due diligence responsibility across their supply chains.” | ['world/china', 'environment/green-economy', 'environment/energy', 'world/world', 'environment/environment', 'world/asia-pacific', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/nina-lakhani', 'profile/amy-hawkins', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-news'] | environment/energy | ENERGY | 2023-07-05T23:02:45Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/2016/jan/02/flooding-home-insurance-small-print | Broken dreams, sodden homes and businesses – the flood victims feeling shortchanged by insurers | They were still removing sodden drum kits and waterlogged guitar amps from York’s Melrose Yard Studios yesterday. A week earlier, floodwaters from the nearby river Foss had inundated the popular music studios with ruinous effect and left the North Yorkshire business among those feeling shortchanged by its insurers. A hitherto unnoticed clause in Melrose Yard’s insurance policy has left the firm ineligible for reimbursement, despite its owners calculating that it will need at least £20,000 to get the studio back up and running. “It looks like we were badly advised, It’s very small print, cleverly worded,” said Sam Holdstock, who set up the studios in the city’s Walmgate area seven years ago. The situation facing the York studios, where bands including The Enemy and Halo Blind have rehearsed, has turned the spotlight on how insurers are responding to companies at risk of flooding, with the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) reiterating demands for new initiatives that ensure modestly sized firms can get affordable flood insurance. Recent FSB research suggests around 75,000 smaller businesses at risk of flooding have run into difficulties finding insurance, while another 50,000 have been refused flood cover. Proportionally, the organisation says this equates to 9% of small firms in flood-risk areas reporting difficulties. Insurers and the government have made references to the an insurance scheme, Flood Re, which comes into effect from April and claims to guarantee affordable flood cover. However, small businesses are excluded from the programme. Sixty-five miles further west in Whalley, in the Ribble Valley in Lancashire, homeowner Andy Davis thinks his insurance will cover much of the damage to his house. But it’s the impact on his family that he is struggling to deal with as the extent of the damage from the floods over Christmas becomes clear. “It looks like a war zone, doesn’t it?” he says, surveying the rubble, the ruined extension he’d almost completed, and the orchard of fruit trees now set against a swath of grey-brown earth. “One moment you’re up, the next you’re back down on the floor because someone has told you it could be six months before you can come back home,” he says. “Overall it’s pretty depressing. I’ve spent hours and hours trying to clean up and dry things out, but this morning I couldn’t be bothered.” Davis works every day with water as a design engineer for diving equipment. He knows only too well its immense, unyielding power. Previous floods had spared him, his wife, Clare, and their children, Ruby, four, and Wilf, two, from misery but this time, with his family safely with relatives, he stood as the water lapped at his thighs, trying to grab anything and everything. By the time he abandoned his cottage home, the water had breached the garden wall and was three feet deep in the building. His beloved VW campervan was swamped and, worse still, the diary in which he and Clare had written from their early days together was lost to the water. “We found it in a pile of debris,” he said. “It was sodden and stuck together. Some friends have taken it away to see if they can salvage it, but it’s still pretty crushing. That was the moment Clare broke down.” With his campervan now towed away to be restored, Davis is trying to concentrate on the most important tasks as they present themselves, but is dismayed by the loss of an extension that would have given the family a third bedroom. “The house would have been worth between £350,000 and £400,000 with that, but the flood came within days of us having it plastered.” Gangs of friends and neighbours are helping each other with both moral and practical support. The Davis family benefited when a group of locals shifted 15 tons of sand and silt from their garden. Much of it went to rebuild the road that was washed away. Four years ago, the Environment Agency wrote a report which recommended a flood defence designed to withstand disasters. The document has yet to be acted upon, though Davis believes that, even had it been built, it still would have been breached. He points to the massive increase in water run-off created by new housing estates. “For every new estate there are hundreds of new driveways and watercourses,” he said. “It means that whereas water might previously have sat in fields, now it goes rushing in straight lines to the river.” In York, Holdstock says that the sense of injustice is compounded by claims that flood defences introduced to protect businesses like theirs failed because of budget cuts. “It [the studio] had never flooded before … the only reason it has this time is that someone took the decision to lift the flood barrier,” he said. “There’s a lot of speculation that it’s because of recent cuts to maintenance… Until now, it hasn’t flooded since those defences were put up in 1982.” | ['environment/flooding', 'world/natural-disasters', 'environment/environment', 'money/insurance', 'uk/uk', 'tone/news', 'type/article', 'profile/marktownsend', 'profile/nigel-bunyan', 'publication/theobserver', 'theobserver/news', 'theobserver/news/uknews'] | environment/flooding | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2016-01-02T22:00:18Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
uk-news/2021/oct/31/sunaks-budget-has-drinkers-over-a-barrel | Sunak’s budget has drinkers over a barrel | Brief letters | Sebastian Monblat (Letters, 28 October) needn’t worry about unhealthier livers. The chancellor has cut duty, not pump prices. Can you see anybody reducing a £4 pint by 3p? The reduction in tax will benefit brewers, not customers. More pork barrel than beer barrel. John Gately Battle, East Sussex • Timothy Garton Ash (Why we need a new golden age of European rail, 27 October) suggests reviving long-distance overnight trains. In fact, sleeper trains are already on the rise across the continent. For example, Nightjet trains run on more than 20 routes connecting major cities, and there are several Euronight services. Indeed, Mr Garton Ash could even discover this from the man in seat 61 he mentions. Graham Feakins Herne Hill, London • Like Steve Mason (Letters, 28 October), I am an “oldie” and cherish the English language of my youth. However, in those far-off days, WFH and WTF would have been described as abbreviations. Acronyms have to be pronounceable words. Ken Vines Horrabridge, Devon • Re recycling (Letters, 28 October), my mother was given a rolling pin made of glass as a wedding present in 1935. I inherited it and have been using it frequently since then, and am now 84. The rolling pin is 86 years old and still intact! Jill Westby Nottingham • I don’t like Facebook (Editorial, 29 October). Does that make me “Metaverse”? Theresa Graham Clevedon, Somerset • Have an opinion on anything you’ve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication. | ['uk-news/autumn-budget-2021', 'type/article', 'food/beer', 'tone/letters', 'commentisfree/series/brief-letters', 'society/alcohol', 'politics/taxandspending', 'politics/politics', 'uk/uk', 'uk/rail-transport', 'world/rail-transport', 'environment/recycling', 'technology/facebook', 'environment/environment', 'environment/ethical-living', 'media/media', 'media/socialnetworking', 'technology/technology', 'uk/transport', 'environment/waste', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/journal', 'theguardian/journal/letters', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-letters-and-leader-writers'] | environment/waste | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2021-10-31T17:49:43Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
world/2020/apr/16/the-trees-are-my-grandparents-the-ecuador-tribe-trying-to-save-its-culture | 'The trees are my grandparents': the Ecuador tribe trying to save its culture | The Amazon rainforest has been home to the Achuar people for thousands of years. Skilled hunters and fishermen, they have a spiritual connection with nature and consider themselves the forest’s greatest protectors. Life is governed by their ancestors, with family history passed down orally from generation to generation. Yet traditions are being undermined as the young are tempted away by modernity, while their fragile ecosystem faces man-made destruction. But now, the same technological developments so often deemed a threat to traditional ways of life, have offered the Achuar people, and other remote tribal people, the opportunity to preserve their legacy and fight back against the eradication of their histories. A team from the global genealogy website MyHeritage has been spending time with groups like the Achuar in an attempt to preserve their family heritage. Entsakua Yunkar, shaman of the Achuar Sharamentsa community in Ecuador, said the project was helping to assuage his fears that “history can disappear” very quickly. “I feel like the father of this community,” Yunkar said. “If I don’t exist here, this community can’t have power and be successful. I feel that I give positive energy to the communities and families here. “The big trees are my grandparents. They speak to me. I feel very sad when I think about what will happen in a long time. The world is changing. Our goal is to protect this area and our culture so it will be alive for many years.” The very existence of tribal communities around the world is threatened by a whole host of factors. Imported diseases, such as influenza, measles and chickenpox, can prove deadly when tribespeople have not had the chance to develop any immunity, according to Survival International, the global charity for tribal people’s rights. Deforestation and climate change are also huge threats, while technology and modernity risk destroying communities by luring younger members away to urban regions. The genealogy project is the brainchild of Golan Levi, a qualified architect who earlier in his career spent years creating giant sculptures with tribes around the world. “I heard fascinating stories [during his time as an architect],” he said. “They had a history of oral tradition, but they didn’t have a means to preserve their heritage. “The oral tradition keeps the essence of their communities but they’re losing the pieces. They might know the meaning behind a ceremony but they wouldn’t be able to tell you the name of their great great grandparents. “When I started working at MyHeritage I realised it was the perfect fit to document those stories.” The group’s first project was with the Himba people of Namibia in 2015, with subsequent delegations visiting the Nenets in Siberia, the Emberá, Ngäbe, Naso and Guna in Panama, and several tribes in Papua New Guinea. “Everything varies from tribe to tribe … but family and how they collaborate with each other is key,” said Levi. He explains the groups have initially been met with scepticism, but their willingness to muck in breaks down barriers with the tribespeople, who eventually agree to be photographed, filmed and interviewed. “It takes time to build trust,” he adds. “We live as they live in order to understand how they view the world and this is something they greatly appreciate.” Franklin Wasump, an Achuar who hails from the Wayusentsa community, echoed Entsakua Yunkar’s concerns about his culture disappearing. “In many years the Achuar culture may disappear, as happened with other nationalities, because there are many young people that don’t want to preserve the culture,” he said. “I am sad because although today it is still preserved, in the future it might not. “It is the responsibility of the father to teach, to talk to the young children in order not to lose the culture.” Yampia Santi, an Achuar leader from the Wayusentsa community, said he hoped the project would raise awareness. “The Achuar tribe will be around for many more generations, which is why we ask you tell your friends about the rainforest and the Achuar people who live there.” | ['world/ecuador', 'environment/deforestation', 'environment/amazon-rainforest', 'world/americas', 'world/world', 'environment/environment', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'environment/conservation', 'environment/forests', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'tone/features', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/international', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-foreign'] | environment/forests | BIODIVERSITY | 2020-04-16T04:00:33Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
environment/2019/may/17/great-australian-bight-parties-soften-stance-as-voters-protest-over-drilling | Great Australian Bight: parties soften stance as voters protest over drilling | A last-ditch effort to win votes in key seats in South Australia and Victoria has prompted both major parties to make changes to their policies on oil drilling in the Great Australian Bight. The resources minister Matt Canavan – who has previously said offshore oil exploration should be a national priority – said on Thursday a re-elected Coalition government would commission an independent audit of the oil regulator’s consideration of exploration in the Bight. Canavan and the environment minister Melissa Price said in a statement they recognised “the Great Australian Bight and the surrounding region are important to local communities, and the fishing and tourism industries”. “The region is known for its unique environment and deserves strong protection,” they said. Labor meanwhile updated its proposal to conduct an independent scientific study of the impacts of an oil spill in the Bight to add that such a study would be completed before the regulator, Nopsema, made a decision on any project. The rush to act on concerns about the risky deepwater drilling is an appeal to voters in the seats of Boothby in South Australia, held by Liberal MP Nicolle Flint, and the Victorian seat of Corangamite, held by Liberal MP Sarah Henderson. Opposition to plans by the Norwegian company Equinor for oil exploration in the Bight has been a key issue in both seats during the campaign. In Corangamite, the independent candidate Damien Cole has made opposition to the Bight the focus of his campaign and is directing his preferences away from the Liberals. He has coordinated the paddle-out protests occurring at beaches around the country and Henderson herself attended one at Torquay in April. Simulation models have shown the potential for an oil spill in the Bight to hit coastline and ocean extending to Victoria and Tasmania, Esperance in Western Australia, or Sydney and the New South Wales coast. What is unclear, however, is how either of the major parties’ proposals for reviews would work in practice given Nopsema is scheduled to make a determination about Equinor’s environmental plan on 25 May, just a week after the election. Nathaniel Pelle, a senior campaigner at Greenpeace, said it was “about time” both major parties recognised “the risk in the Bight is exceptional” Guardian Australia asked both parties for more detail but neither indicated if they planned to intervene to suspend the Nopsema process. A Labor campaign spokeswoman said the proposed oil spill study “is intended to inform the independent regulator’s decision-making”. The Greens environment spokeswoman Sarah Hanson-Young has written to MPs in Norway urging them to withdraw from the proposal. Equinor is 67% state owned. Leon Bignell, a Labor MP in the South Australian parliament, has written a similar letter to Norway’s prime minister in which he states that, “Bill Shorten, and Labor’s environment shadow minister, Tony Burke, aren’t fans of drilling in the Bight”. Equinor was met with opposition from Australians and Norwegians at its annual general meeting in Stavanger on Wednesday. Lyndon Schneiders, the national director of The Wilderness Society, said the message had clearly got through to MPs, at least in the southern parts of Australia, that there was high community unrest over the Bight proposals. “Five weeks ago the Liberals and Labor were on a unity ticket saying ‘we’ll let the process run it’s course’,” he said. “This is an example of people power actually working.” But he questioned why it had taken the government, in particular, so long to change its position when protests had been occurring throughout various assessments by the regulator involving the Bight for years. “Why does it literally take until 48 hours before polls close to finally discover there may be a problem,” Schneiders said. | ['environment/great-australian-bight', 'australia-news/australian-election-2019', 'business/oil', 'environment/oil', 'australia-news/south-australia', 'australia-news/victoria', 'environment/environment', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/lisa-cox', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/oil | ENERGY | 2019-05-16T18:00:41Z | true | ENERGY |
news/2020/jul/10/the-weather-game-fantasy-league-for-forecasters-opens-to-public | The Weather Game: 'fantasy league' for forecasters opens to public | Do you fancy your chances at forecasting the weather? Could you beat the professionals at their own job, putting the likes of Tomasz Schafernaker and Helen Willetts to shame? Well now you have a chance to prove your weather forecasting prowess. The University of Reading’s Meteorology Department has opened up its “fantasy league” weather forecasting game to the public for the first time. Every Friday players submit how much rain, wind and sunshine there will be in four different locations around the world, one of which changes from week to week. Forecasts can draw on sources like the Met Office and BBC Weather, but the top scoring players usually rely on their own intuition too. Points are awarded depending on how accurate the predictions are, and going counter to the expert forecasts when the weather is changeable can be a good strategy. Of the 276 players currently in the game, only one managed to predict exactly how much rain would fall in Reading over the weekend. The average prediction in every category was too high, suggesting that most of us overestimate how wet or how warm and sunny the weather will be. The Weather Game will continue to run for another 4 weeks, and new wannabe forecasters are welcome to join. | ['news/series/weatherwatch', 'science/meteorology', 'education/readinguniversity', 'type/article', 'tone/features', 'profile/kate-ravilious', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/weather2', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-weather'] | news/series/weatherwatch | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2020-07-10T20:30:26Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/2023/dec/07/uk-householders-could-be-at-risk-of-net-zero-scammers-says-citizens-advice | UK householders could be at risk of net zero scammers, says Citizens Advice | Households could be at risk of net zero “scammers” amid a surge in green home upgrades unless the government tightens consumer protections, Citizens Advice has warned. The charity said that if the government does not tighten consumer protections to keep pace with the work required to decarbonise Britain’s homes, “rogue traders” could take advantage of households and erode trust in the UK’s climate agenda. Almost every home in the country will have to make changes in the coming years to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions in line with Britain’s legally binding climate targets, according to a report from Citizens Advice. These upgrades could include better home insulation or installing electric heat pumps, solar panels and batteries. Currently installers do not have to be accredited unless they are carrying out work funded by government grants. This could leave the door open for rogue traders who offer no guarantee that work will be carried out to a decent standard, Citizens Advice warned. The consumer champion has called on the government to create a single accreditation scheme – such as the Gas Safe mark – for all installers in the net zero market, before Britain’s green home transition takes off. Clare Moriarty, the chief executive of Citizens Advice, said existing consumer protections “have too many gaps” which could allow “rogue traders and scammers to prey on people’s good intentions”. “To meet our net zero targets, people will have to place their trust in new and unfamiliar technologies,” Moriarty said. “The government has to ensure people feel confident to install heat pumps, insulation or other energy efficiency measures in their home.” She warned that without protections which are fit for Britain’s low-carbon future, negative experiences could start to undermine trust in net zero and make the transition to a low-carbon future more challenging. The take-up of heat pumps has been “disappointingly low”, due in part to the low levels of public trust in the technology and “insufficient independent advice for homeowners”, according to a report by the House of Lords earlier this year. Currently there are about 3,000 heat pump installers in the UK, but meeting the government’s goal of 600,000 installations a year to replace gas boilers will require a workforce of around 50,000, according to the UK Heat Pump Association. There is also expected to a surge in installation work for households which opt to fit electric vehicle chargers linked to home solar panels and batteries. A government spokesperson said: “The UK has one of the strongest consumer protection regimes in the world with government-backed schemes requiring suppliers to be accredited. We always recommend consumers choose a supplier who is a member of a trader scheme, such as the Trust Mark or MCS, for non-government-backed work.” | ['environment/energyefficiency', 'environment/energy', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'business/oilandgascompanies', 'business/business', 'uk/uk', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/jillian-ambrose', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-business'] | environment/energy | ENERGY | 2023-12-07T00:01:45Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/2017/nov/24/black-friday-to-cause-spikes-in-air-pollution-and-plastic-waste-warn-environmentalists | Black Friday to cause spikes in air pollution and plastic waste, warn environmentalists | The online shopping frenzy of the Black Friday weekend will see 82,000 diesel vans and trucks on UK roads, raising concerns of air pollution spikes on residential streets as more than £7bn of purchases are delivered. In the UK online shoppers are expected to spend up to £1.35bn today alone, according to analysts at IMRG, the UK’s online retail association. Plastic toys, games and electronic goods are among the most sought after items in the biggest weekend of shopping in Britain and the US, with environmentalists and health experts warning that it will add to the mountain of plastic waste and increase air pollution. The relatively modern post-Thanksgiving tradition has been adopted from the US, where nearly 70% of Americans – 164 million people – plan to shop this weekend, which spans Black Friday through to Cyber Monday, according to the National Retail Federation. In the UK, Black Friday is mostly an online event, although retailers also saw queues this morning at shopping centres across the country. 81% of Black Friday purchases include a home delivery, with Amazon expected to take the majority of sales. A diesel truck will leave an Amazon fulfilment centre every 93 seconds at peak times, according to Staveley Head, which insures trucks and vans for retailers. Stephen Holgate, professor of immunopharmacology at the Medical Research Council, said online shopping contributed to the air pollution crisis. “Vans are key contributors to diesel pollution. In our RCP [Royal College of Physicians] report we show van use continues to increase. Vans are now up to 10-12% of vehicles in our cities. They, along with small goods transport vehicles, are almost all diesel and make up about 12% of diesel emissions in urban settings. “Supermarket and internet shopping really drives this and unlike people going to the shops themselves, the vans penetrate into quiet residential roads where vulnerable groups like children and the elderly live in large numbers. These vans sit and idle for hours in the road as they wait to deliver more packages, and this is a huge problem.” He said the chancellor had missed an opportunity not to tackle “white van man” in the budget. Vans were explicitly left out of increases in tax on new diesel cars. The weekend also marks the start of the Christmas shopping season, during which air pollution spikes are recorded around shopping centres, according to Gary Fuller of King’s College London. “Any increase in traffic, and especially diesel traffic on our roads, will not be helpful for air pollution,” he said. Brian Kay, director of Green Business Watch, said reports still suggested online shopping impacted less on the environment than individuals driving to the shops. “What is important is that this online shopping is done in an as environmentally friendly way as possible, so, for example, those 82,000 diesel vehicles should be electric,” he said. Some retailers are not taking part in Black Friday. In Seattle, outdoor clothing retailer REI is giving its 12,000 employees a paid holiday and will not process any online orders. Instead it is encouraging customers to spend time outside with family and friends. Greenpeace is launching an alternative to what it labels the “hyper-consumerism” associated with Black Friday. It has organised an international makers festival – called “Make Smthng” – where people around the world are asked to come together to make, upcycle or repair something rather than shop. “Black Friday has become one of the major peaks of consumerism,” said Chiara Campione, Greenpeace’s global project leader. “This shopping binge also generates greater volumes of waste than ever. This dangerous trend is harming our planet. We buy without thinking for a minute, but the waste we create will sometimes last for centuries.” Plastic toys and games are expected to be some of the most sought after items over the weekend, according to Euromonitor International. But Roland Geyer, author of the first global analysis of mass produced plastics, said recycling and incineration would not be enough to stem the plastic flow from such consumerism. “Even if we stay on the current trends of increasing recycling and incineration rates, we will have doubled the amount of plastic waste discarded since 1950 in the next 20 years,” he said. “The easiest way to reduce plastic waste is to not buy that product made of plastic or packaged in plastic, destined to become rubbish much sooner than we like to think.” | ['environment/waste', 'environment/air-pollution', 'business/black-friday', 'uk/uk', 'environment/ethical-living', 'business/consumerspending', 'business/business', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/sandralaville', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/waste | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2017-11-24T11:50:54Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
sport/2020/mar/04/womens-world-t20-late-bid-for-australia-to-have-rain-reserve-day-rejected | Women's World T20: late bid for Australia to have rain reserve day rejected | Australia’s Women’s Twenty20 World Cup fate may yet be determined by the weather after Cricket Australia’s request to introduce a reserve day was rejected by the International Cricket Council. The CA chief executive, Kevin Roberts, told SEN he had asked the ICC if the tournament’s semi-finals at the SCG – which are under threat due to forecast showers in Sydney on Thursday – could potentially be played on Friday. But Roberts said he was told the late proposal “was not part of the playing conditions” or scheduling, which was drawn up before the event began and allows for just one reserve day throughout the tournament – for the final – would not be altered. “We respect [the decision],” Roberts said. “You want the match to be won and lost inside the ropes rather than won or lost based on the weather, don’t you?” Roberts said the situation should give organisers pause for thought about how to improve the tournament in the future, although he conceded now was not the “time to tinker” with the schedule. As it stands, Australia’s failure to beat India in their opening game could prove costly as, should there be no result due to rain, South Africa will move into the final by default, with the higher-placed team in the group stage automatically going through. Group A winners India, who are scheduled to meet England in Thursday’s earlier semi-final, will also make the title decider in the event of abandonment or a no result. Tournament rules state each team must bat for at least 10 overs for a result in the semi-final to be produced, an increase from the five overs required for a group stage match. But that may play into the host nation’s hands, given their explosive batting lineup; openers Beth Mooney and Alyssa Healy, along with Ash Gardner, all boast strike rates of over 120. “Potentially [it could suit Australia],” Mooney said. “We won’t know until the day but we are going in like we are playing a T20. But we will sit down as a group tomorrow and come up with plans. “It’s a conversation that could happen on the day of the game if it does get reduced.” Rain hit Sydney on Tuesday evening and forecasts indicate the inclement weather is there to stay for the rest of the week. But Roberts said he remained optimistic of play on Thursday. “We’re optimistic based on the drainage at the SCG combined with the weather forecast that’s not perfect but not terrible either,” he said. “We’re really hopeful and planning for different scenarios tomorrow night. “The important thing is getting our team ready to play a 10-over match, 12-over match, 18-over match or whatever it happens to be if it’s not a full T20 contest.” The group stage was played out relatively unaffected by the weather, with just two matches – Monday’s clashes between South Africa and West Indies, and Pakistan and Thailand – the only ones to produce no result. Each team was awarded a point. Australia have the upper hand over South Africa, having never lost any of the 19 matches across all formats between the two sides, although they will be without star all-rounder Ellyse Perry for the match after she was ruled out of the rest of the tournament with a serious hamstring injury. Tournament organisers are hoping to attract a record crowd to the MCG on 8 March – Sunday is International Women’s Day and with pop star Katy Perry on board to perform, a crowd nearing 100,000 is the aim – but the participation of the host nation’s team is likely to be needed for that to happen. | ['sport/womens-world-t20-2020', 'sport/womens-world-twenty20', 'sport/womenscricket', 'sport/cricket', 'sport/australia-sport', 'sport/sport', 'sport/australia-women-s-cricket-team', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/mike-hytner', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-sport'] | sport/womens-world-t20-2020 | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE | 2020-03-04T01:17:44Z | true | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE |
science/2007/oct/07/nuclearpower | Windscale radiation 'doubly dangerous' | Britain's worst nuclear accident, the Windscale fire in Cumbria, released twice as much radioactive debris as was previously thought. Scientists studying weather patterns and amounts of radioactive material distributed after the 1957 blaze say previous estimates have played down its deadly impact. 'We have had to double our estimates of amounts that were released,' said former UK Atomic Energy Authority researcher John Garland. As a result of this re-evaluation, scientists say the fire - which sent a plume of caesium, iodine and polonium across Britain and northern Europe - may have caused several dozen more cases of cancer than had been estimated previously. It was originally thought that little harm had been done by the blaze and that only a few cancer cases had been triggered. Then in 1990 radiation experts, using new epidemiological methods, calculated that up to 200 cases of cancer - including thyroid and breast cancer and also leukaemia - could have been triggered by the fire's emissions. Now researchers say they may have to raise that estimate yet again. 'Several dozen more cancer cases may have to be added to our total,' said epidemiologist Professor Richard Wakeford, of Manchester University. However, Wakeford said it was impossible to determine which individual cancer cases might be linked to the incident at Windscale, now called Sellafield. 'We can only say an excess in cancer cases was caused by the fire.' The fire, which took place 50 years ago this Wednesday, occurred when graphite rods used to control reactions in the nuclear plant's core caught fire. For two days the core blazed out of control. At one point workers used sledgehammers to try to knock the damaged, highly radioactive fuel rods out of the reactor before eventually managing to extinguish the blaze. After the fire, the government placed a six-week ban on consumption of milk from cows grazing within 200 miles of Windscale. However, the weather carried nuclear contamination far beyond that boundary and it covered much of England and parts of northern Europe. The reactor was left in such a dangerous state of intense radioactivity that it has lain undisturbed - too dangerous to decommission. The fire's anniversary occurs just as the government's public consultation over plans to build new nuclear reactors in Britain is ending, a point that was seized on by green activists last week. 'This anniversary should act as a reminder of what can happen when a nuclear power plant goes wrong,' said Jean McSorley, of Greenpeace. 'The Windscale plant's construction was rushed and so are the government's plans for new reactors in this country. Nuclear energy is not the answer to climate change.' But this claim was rejected by nuclear engineers. They said the accident has no implications for future reactors that might be built in Britain. The Windscale plant - one of a pair of reactors constructed to manufacture plutonium for Britain's nuclear weapons programme - was air-cooled, had no proper containment vessels and had insufficient monitoring of conditions in the core. 'Current reactors are water cooled, properly contained and well-monitored,' said Paul Howarth, of the Dalton Nuclear Institute, Manchester University. 'We have vast experience in running nuclear plants in Britain. It would be daft if we used this as a reason for not building new and better ones.' This last point was backed by Wakeford. 'The Windscale plant was a primitive piece of equipment. We should never forget that.' | ['science/science', 'environment/nuclearpower', 'tone/news', 'type/article', 'profile/robinmckie', 'publication/theobserver', 'theobserver/news', 'theobserver/news/uknews'] | environment/nuclearpower | ENERGY | 2007-10-07T14:15:01Z | true | ENERGY |
commentisfree/2024/nov/06/warn-valencia-government-flooding | I tried to warn Valencia’s government about flooding, but it didn’t listen | Juan Bordera | It’s almost impossible to describe what we have experienced in the flooded villages and towns around the city of Valencia. Many of those villages and towns are in ruins, with at least 217 dead and others to be pulled out of the mud. There are many areas that still need urgent help. There are towns without water or electricity that have not been able to clean up. There are still flooded garages, buildings on the verge of collapse, and health problems that may result from the accumulated water. But what also defies belief is the regional Valencian government’s sheer negligence in its pre- and post-disaster management. Let me try to summarise some of the most serious shortcomings. The regional government received every possible warning about the floods from a huge range of sources. The scientific community has been warning for decades that the entire Mediterranean is becoming a breeding ground for increasingly powerful storms, which are covering an ever-widening spread of territory. The State Meteorological Agency (AEMET) warned five days before the floods that there would be a potentially unprecedented rainstorm, and 12 hours before the public warnings from our local government, it specified that the situation was at the highest level of risk. By the time that the “official” warnings reached people’s phones by text that evening, many homes were already under water. The University of Valencia, at least, heeded warnings from the scientists and told its students to stay at home that day, almost certainly saving many lives. The regional government of Valencia also received the warnings directly from me and other people far removed from its self-defeating management model, which was based on denying scientific evidence and a “business as usual” mentality. The truth is that nothing is usual any more, nor will it ever be for the people of these devastated communities. In September 2023, members of Compromís, a leftwing alliance in the Valencian regional parliament, presented a proposal tackling “the increasing risks of flooding in the Mediterranean”. The government voted against it. Just last month, we raised the issue three further times, even presenting an urgent proposal that was to be debated in November. All we were asking for was the scientific studies on these growing risks to be taken seriously, and more and better coordination of forces to deal with the risks. We didn’t ask for much because we knew that in Valencia’s rightwing government, led by the People’s party, there were people with a terrible record on believing in the climate crisis and taking it seriously. Our requests were made with the knowledge that the ocean temperatures of the entire planet are rising to dangerous levels and are a cause of increasingly extreme weather phenomena. And because we have already exceeded 1.5 degrees above preindustrial temperatures, the safety limit set by the scientific community. We are now racing against the clock to tackle a planetary emergency that may cause ocean currents to collapse (including the most crucial for northern Europe, the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, or Amoc). We also tried to get the increased risk of floods on the political agenda locally because too many people in power were ignoring the warnings. Carlos Mazón, the president of our Valencia region, assured the public at lunchtime on the fateful day of 29 October that there was nothing to worry about, that by the afternoon the storm would have dissipated. He has since deleted a post containing a video of this press conference from his social media. Since the floods, members of the rightwing People’s party have disgustingly suggested that some blame lies with Spain’s meteorological agency. But it’s too late for the politicians to hide, as it is for the thousands of people who have lost everything. The regional government is going to be hit by lawsuits from individuals, businesses and civil society organisations. There is a debate in Spain about who or what is to blame: bad political management or the climate crisis. But this question misses the point. In reality, the two are interconnected. When political authorities ignore the scientific community, ignore the warnings of the emergency agencies and reject proposals presented to them by opposition MPs to avert a forthcoming disaster, the tragic consequences are clearly their responsibility. On the other hand, global heating is accelerating and its consequences are escalating. We can’t deny the reality. I hope that across Spain and Europe we are all becoming increasingly aware of the risks facing countries that are threatened by serious droughts and increasingly extreme floods, desertification and forest fires. However, I am still not convinced that we are able to connect the dots. Juan Bordera is a climate journalist and an independent MP for Compromís in the Valencian parliament. He has donated his fee for this article to a fundraiser for those affected by the storm Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'world/spain', 'world/extreme-weather', 'world/europe-news', 'world/world', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'environment/environment', 'environment/flooding', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/juan-bordera', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-europe-project', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-opinion'] | environment/flooding | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2024-11-06T07:00:08Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
australia-news/2021/feb/25/morrison-governments-new-environment-commissioner-toothless-conservation-groups-say | Morrison government’s new environment commissioner ‘toothless’, conservation groups say | Conservation groups say a new environmental assurance commissioner proposed by the Morrison government would effectively be “toothless” because it would have no power to investigate individual decisions related to projects. They also expressed concern that ministers would have the authority to make decisions that are inconsistent with new national environmental standards if they considered it in the public interest to do so. The government has introduced a bill to set up a framework for environmental standards and an independent commissioner who would sit in the environment department. It forms part of its response to the once-in-a-decade review of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act led by the former competition watchdog head Graeme Samuel. The proposed assurance commissioner would be appointed by the governor general to monitor and audit the processes governments use to make environmental decisions and how well they are functioning. “The environment assurance commissioner will not have a role in monitoring or auditing individual decisions,” the environment minister, Sussan Ley, told parliament on Thursday. “It is not a second decision-making body and it isn’t a replacement for, or a precursor to, legal review processes for decisions.” Under the legislation, the commissioner would be responsible for auditing and monitoring bilateral agreements that would allow state and territory governments to make environmental decisions under federal laws. The bill expressly prohibits the commissioner from auditing individual decisions about developments or the environment and the commissioner would be required to prepare and submit a plan of work to the federal environment minister each year. The government estimates the new role will cost $9m over four years but hasn’t made clear whether some of that money would be spent on employing additional staff to support the commissioner. The model has been criticised by environment groups who said a commissioner needed to have powers to audit individual decisions to be able to determine whether national environmental standards were being properly applied. “You don’t want legislation to limit a commissioner,” Rachel Walmsley of the Environmental Defenders Office said. “You want them to be responsive and agile and able to look into specific issues.” The Australian Conservation Foundation said while it welcomed the introduction of a commissioner, the government needed to address the flaws in its proposal before it tried to pass separate legislation to hand federal environmental decision-making powers to the states and territories. “This is why a national EPA (Environment Protection Authority) would be a clearer, cleaner model,” chief executive Kelly O’Shanassy said. The legislation introduced Thursday also establishes a framework for proposed new national environmental standards, which would enable federal environment ministers to make and update standards and determine what decisions under national laws would be subject to them. The centrepiece of Samuel’s 38 recommendations was the creation of a new set of national environmental standards focused on outcomes for the environment. His report recommended that any move to transfer environmental approval powers be underpinned by standards that were legally enforceable and laid out a set of interim standards that should be immediately adopted. Samuel’s standards detailed the environmental outcomes that Australia’s laws should achieve, including maintaining and improving environmental conservation; maintaining and improving habitat for all listed threatened species; avoiding destruction of habitat critical to the survival of endangered wildlife; and using environmental offsets only after all steps have been taken to avoid or mitigate environmental damage. But the interim standards the government has adopted strip out these recommendations and instead mimic the existing failed laws. The proposed legislation also creates a caveat allowing ministers to make decisions that are inconsistent with environmental standards if they consider it is in the public interest to do so. Nicola Beynon, of the Humane Society International, said this loophole was concerning and poorly defined in the bill. She said a caveat for “national interest” in the existing laws had been abused by governments to approve projects that would have an otherwise unacceptable impact on threatened wildlife and habitat. “Weak standards and loopholes only serve to increase the grave risks of handing environmental approval decisions to states and territories,” she said. Suzanne Milthorpe, of The Wilderness Society, said Samuel’s review highlighted two decades of failure by Australian governments to properly protect the environment. She said if the government’s legislation represented a step towards implementing the full package of reforms proposed by the review, it would be welcome. “But given we haven’t seen a full government response to the Samuel review and given the legislation itself looks pretty thin, we are deeply concerned that this might be simply a matter of political expediency aimed at helping pass the regressive EPBC devolution bill,” she said. The final EPBC report also called on the government to create an independent office for environmental compliance and enforcement but the government has not yet acted on this or issued a full response to the final report and its recommendations. The government’s standards bill will be subject to an inquiry by a senate committee which is due to report back in June. Labor’s environment spokesperson, Terri Butler, said despite the vast amounts of money and time dedicated to the Samuel review, the government had ignored the substance of the Samuel report and “cherrypicked” from its recommendations. “Scott Morrison’s low standards are on full display yet again, with the introduction of a second tranche of environment legislation which is inconsistent with the Samuel review,” she said. The Greens environment spokesperson, Sarah Hanson-Young, said the government had “blatantly ignored their own expert’s recommendations and is instead taking a chainsaw to environmental protections”. “They have absolutely no intention of reversing the unsustainable environmental trajectory Prof Samuel warned about in his once-in-10-year review,” she said. “They haven’t even bothered to respond after more than 100 days sitting on the final report.” | ['australia-news/australia-news', 'law/law-australia', 'environment/environment', 'australia-news/australian-politics', 'environment/endangered-habitats', 'environment/endangeredspecies', 'environment/conservation', 'environment/wildlife', 'type/article', 'profile/lisa-cox', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/endangered-habitats | BIODIVERSITY | 2021-02-25T06:54:28Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
commentisfree/cif-green/2009/apr/02/g20-climate-change | Dan Roberts: The G20 summit has been disappointing on green issues | The big disappointment of the G20 so far is that green issues have been acknowledged, but not embraced. Something will be in the communiqué, but it will mainly be a commitment to hold more talks in Copenhagen. Ed Miliband put on a brave face this afternoon arguing there had been huge progress convincing world leaders that tackling climate change was not in conflict with rescuing the economy. This is much is true. Even a few months ago, there was a real fear that the worsening financial crisis would force politicians to chose between saving jobs or saving the planet. President Obama's election is probably the single biggest reason why this attitude has changed. By talking about specific green stimulus measures such as making aid to the car industry conditional on fuel efficiency gains, he has reminded the world that industrial innovation is one of the most powerful forces for environmental change. But postponing further discussion on cutting carbon emissions until Copenhagen is a major missed opportunity. Given how much spending is being talked about at the G20 (whether new money for the IMF or existing national fiscal stimulus) this was the ideal moment to link the two issues more explicitly. Sadly, the difficulty of reaching agreement on other thorny issues such as regulation has kicked climate change into the long grass at just the wrong moment. | ['commentisfree/cif-green', 'commentisfree/commentisfree', 'business/dan-roberts-on-business-blog', 'world/g20', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'environment/green-politics', 'politics/economy', 'environment/environment', 'politics/politics', 'business/business', 'tone/comment', 'uk/uk', 'world/world', 'type/article', 'profile/dan-roberts'] | environment/green-politics | CLIMATE_POLICY | 2009-04-02T14:20:41Z | true | CLIMATE_POLICY |
environment/2024/nov/12/australia-cicada-season-noise-species | All the buzz: chorus of ‘deafening’ cicadas to soundtrack Australian summer | The east coast of Australia is heading into a big, loud cicada summer. Prof David Emery, a veterinary immunologist and cicada expert, called it a “phenomenal season so far” for green grocer cicadas, which emerged in huge numbers in the Blue Mountains in September and are now making their appearance in Sydney and parts of Victoria. Green grocers aren’t the only species turning up in abundance. Emery said multitudes of the largest and noisiest varieties – green grocers, double drummers, black princes, razor grinders, red eyes and cherrynoses – were also emerging along the New South Wales coast. Australia was the “cicada capital of the world” and home to “upwards of a thousand species”, with many yet to be scientifically categorised. “Some of the little fellas don’t make much noise, so they’re less intrusive,” he said. “But the big guys in large numbers can be quite deafening.” Dr Lindsay Popple, a cicada researcher, said early observations and the warmer weather indicated a “pretty big summer for cicadas”. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email Green grocers were usually one of the earliest, he said. “Then you get this wave of all the other species coming out. Between Christmas and New Year over the eastern seaboard, that’s a peak time for cicadas.” The insects spent most of their life as nymphs underground. They fed on plant roots, waiting for temperature and rainfall cues to climb out of the ground, shed their exoskeleton and grow wings, he said. That was when the males began singing to attract females, which could go on for weeks. Green grocers were thought to emerge in greater numbers on a seven-year cycle. There were likely two main batches, which explained boom years in 2010, 2013, 2017, 2020 and 2024. Less was known about the life cycles of the other species, Popple said. Cicadas were a big part of children’s culture in Australia, Popple said, especially in Sydney which had many of the larger and louder varieties. Green grocers were particularly sought after, coming in different colours with evocative names including “yellow monday”, “masked devil” and the appropriately rare “blue moon”. The insects produced their pulsating chorus by expanding and contracting a flexible organ called a tymbal, a sound amplified by their body structure, he said. “In big numbers, they’re incredibly acoustically conspicuous.” Double drummers and green grocers were some of the noisiest according to the Australian Museum, which reported noise levels as high as 120 decibels at close range. Christophe Delaire, the chief executive of Marshall Day Acoustics, said research found cicada noise measured at 50cm could range from the high 70s to more than 100dB. That was “extremely noisy”, he said. “On a hot summer day the noise of a thousand cicadas would be deafening. You wouldn’t be able to hear yourself think.” In the middle of the range – 90dB – cicadas could be as loud as a lawnmower, albeit with different characteristics, and much louder than conversation at 60 to 70dB. But noise level was just one factor that acoustic consultants considered in assessing noise and acoustics, Delaire said. It was also important to consider other factors such as frequency and reverberation, and subjective elements. “To some people the sound of cicadas may be the sound of summer, and therefore they find it relaxing,” he said. Whereas someone working on a farm, unable to communicate above the din of cicadas, may have a different perception. In general, the closer you are the louder they sound, he said. “The advantage that you have with cicadas is once you get too close to them, they stop singing.” | ['environment/series/australian-climate-and-environment-in-focus', 'environment/insects', 'environment/environment', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'environment/wildlife', 'australia-news/new-south-wales', 'campaign/email/breaking-news-australia', 'australia-news/sydney', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/petra-stock', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/wildlife | BIODIVERSITY | 2024-11-11T14:00:21Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
world/2023/sep/05/boy-rescued-from-flood-waters-after-record-heavy-rain-in-spain | Boy rescued from flood waters in Spain after clinging to tree for eight hours | A 10-year-old Spanish boy has been rescued after clinging to a tree for eight hours to escape the flood waters that have claimed at least five lives as much of the country was lashed by record heavy rains over the weekend. The boy’s family were staying at their holiday home in Aldea del Fresno, to the west of Madrid, when the storm hit on Sunday. Alarmed by the flash flooding, they climbed into their car late on Sunday night but soon found themselves swept away. The boy was found, dirty and bruised but still alive, the following morning – as were his mother and sister. His father is still missing. “The poor boy spent the night perched in a tree,” Isabel Díaz Ayuso, the president of the Madrid region, told reporters. Two people died in the central province of Toledo as a result of the storm, the head of the regional government of Castilla La Mancha, Emiliano García-Page, said, without giving details. Spanish media said a man was found dead by police during a rescue attempt on a road near the town of Bargas while another man died as rescuers tried to reach him in the town of Casarrubios del Monte. He is thought to have drowned in a lift as he tried to access the garage where his car was parked. Police announced on Monday afternoon that the body of a man in his 50s was found near a river in the town of Camarena, also in the province of Toledo. Meanwhile, two people who had gone climbing in Huesca province, in north-eastern Spain, also died in the heavy rains. Three people are still missing. People in Madrid were alerted to the emergency on Sunday by a loud alarm and a text message that was sent to their mobile phones. It was the first time the authorities had used this mobile phone alert system. Several theatres closed early on Sunday, and the day’s football match between Atlético Madrid and Sevilla was suspended. A number of metro lines were closed in Madrid during the morning rush hour on Monday due to flooding caused by heavy overnight rains, although by the mid-afternoon they were all open again. High-speed rail links between Madrid and the southern region of Andalucía and the east coast region of Valencia, which closed on Sunday, reopened on Monday although trains were running at slower speeds in some sections, the railway operator Renfe said. The heavy rainfall eased on Monday morning, prompting the state meteorological office, Aemet, to lower its alert level for the Madrid region from red to yellow. • Agence France-Presse contributed to this report | ['world/spain', 'environment/flooding', 'world/europe-news', 'environment/environment', 'world/world', 'world/extreme-weather', 'campaign/email/this-is-europe', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/samjones', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/international', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-foreign'] | environment/flooding | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2023-09-05T08:44:33Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/ethicallivingblog/2009/jan/14/gladiators-carbon-footprints | Lucy Siegle on making low-carbon television | Excitingly, the next series of Gladiators will be low carbon, in line with BSkyB's carbon-slashing agenda. Apparently it used 35% less energy to make the new series than the previous one. There must be further gains to be made. Pugil sticks could be lightweighted in order to cut the transportation burden to Pinewood, the Eliminator could run at half speed. I don't know. But look, in the future, TV output could come with a carbon rating. Look closely and you can already see the carbon burden of selected products – er, Walkers crisps and the odd bottle of shampoo, but what about Newsnight, Skins, The Wire? Will we ever know their contribution to anthropogenic emissions and therefore be able to adjust our viewing habits accordingly? Emissions-wise things do not look good for Big Brother, not least because of that heated outdoor area they've insisted on including this year – what's next, an Aga (see George Monbiot today)? You can see the green-gladiators in this online gallery. | ['environment/climate-crisis', 'environment/carbonfootprints', 'environment/environment', 'tone/blog', 'environment/carbon-emissions', 'media/media', 'media/television', 'culture/tvandradioblog', 'culture/culture', 'media/bskyb', 'environment/green-living-blog', 'type/article', 'profile/lucysiegle'] | environment/carbonfootprints | EMISSIONS | 2009-01-14T10:22:24Z | true | EMISSIONS |
commentisfree/2022/oct/13/green-energy-guardian-reader-growth-net-zero-liz-truss-jacob-rees-mogg | I’m maligned as a ‘green energy sceptic’. I’m not. Dear Guardian reader, here’s what I think | Jacob Rees-Mogg | It is always intriguing to see my own views through the lens of a newspaper refracted away from what I think. Although I am no admirer of Extinction Rebellion, I can assure Guardian readers that I am not a “green energy sceptic”. I am in favour of intelligent net zero in which green energy will play the biggest role. I’m proud to belong to a country that has cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 40% since 1990, while growing the economy by over 70% in that time. It is in this light that we can achieve our commitments to net zero by 2050, as dark satanic mills are replaced by onshore and offshore windfarms. But if the green agenda does not provide economic growth, it will ultimately not have political support and it will be self-defeating. Getting the British people on board with net zero requires us to demonstrate that we can go green in a way that makes them better off, not worse off, that drives growth instead of hindering it and that stimulates investment and innovation rather than driving traditional industries to the brink of ruin. The effect we have had on energy-intensive industries increases carbon emissions as we import more from abroad while destroying high-paid jobs in the United Kingdom. There are ways to make this work which the country is adopting. Consider the Contracts for Difference scheme. This programme has grown to support a bountiful range of renewable energy sources, from onshore wind to offshore, solar power to tidal and from remote island wind to energy production from waste – all while bringing down costs and growing the economy. The drive to produce up to 50GW of offshore wind by 2030 means that this sector alone should grow to support 90,000 jobs. The scheme has successfully overcome demands for upfront capital and settled uncertainties for generators navigating volatile wholesale prices. It has spurred £90bn of investment in renewables since 2012 and contributed to a five-fold increase in electricity generation from renewable sources over the decade. The latest auction round last year secured 93 new contracts for 11GW of renewable generation capacity – enough to power 12m homes. In 2010, renewables accounted for a mere 7% of the UK’s electricity generation. Programmes such as Contracts for Difference mean that renewables now meet about 40% of our needs, reducing our reliance on authoritarian regimes such as Russia and strengthening our domestic energy sector. The war in Ukraine has thrown into sharp relief the need to rapidly increase our domestic energy supply and strengthen our energy security, from all forms of renewables to nuclear and our domestic oil and gas reserves, which are of course significantly greener than shipping liquefied natural gas from overseas. That is why our recently announced growth plan will accelerate the delivery of major infrastructure projects including onshore and offshore windfarms. This plan will also boost the UK’s nascent hydrogen industry, which will work in harmony with the renewables and gas sectors alike. The government will also align onshore wind planning policy with other infrastructure to allow it to be deployed more easily in England. We understand the strength of feeling that some people have about the impact of wind turbines in England. The plans will maintain local communities’ ability to contribute to proposals, including developing local partnerships for communities that wish to see new onshore wind infrastructure in return for benefits such as lower energy bills. We are exploring options to support low-cost finance to help householders with the upfront costs of solar installation, permitted development rights to support deployment of more small-scale solar in commercial settings and designing performance standards to further encourage renewables, including solar PV, in new homes and buildings. We also need to focus on another key part of our energy infrastructure, reinforcing the grid so that renewable electricity can be transported to homes and businesses all over the country. Grid connection can often be on the critical path for getting new renewable infrastructure online, which is why I am committed to significantly reducing timelines for building new network infrastructure. But in exchange for the unprecedented support that is being offered to renewable energy companies, they must charge consumers and taxpayers a fair price for the energy they produce. By separating the price of renewable energy from the most expensive form of production, which today is gas, and moving these companies on to Contracts for Difference, the government is providing the renewables sector with long-term stability and a sensible price that is fair to the industry and consumers alike. The energy prices bill, introduced this week, will strengthen energy security and stop Putin holding our energy policy to ransom. It also has the potential to save billions of pounds for British billpayers, without deterring essential investment in low-carbon generation as we progress towards net zero. Given the stakes, it’s important that the public debate on net zero and energy security is robust and lively, but I hope my commitment to making it a reality is clear. • Jacob Rees-Mogg is secretary of state for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'environment/energy', 'business/energy-industry', 'environment/solarpower', 'environment/windpower', 'business/business', 'environment/environment', 'politics/politics', 'uk/uk', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/jacob-rees-mogg', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-opinion'] | environment/solarpower | ENERGY | 2022-10-13T05:00:02Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/article/2024/aug/17/dr-adi-paterson-nuclear-for-australia-climate-change | Chair of Nuclear for Australia denies that calling CO2 ‘plant food’ means he is a climate denier | The chair of a leading Australian nuclear advocacy group has called concerns that carbon dioxide emissions are driving a climate crisis an “irrational fear of a trace gas which is plant food” and has rejected links between worsening extreme weather and global heating. Several statements from Dr Adi Paterson, reviewed by the Guardian, appear at odds with statements from the group he chairs, Nuclear for Australia, which is hosting a petition saying nuclear is needed to tackle an “energy and climate crisis”. Nuclear for Australia was founded by 18-year-old Queensland nuclear advocate Will Shackel, who has said repeatedly he believes reactors are needed to fight “the climate crisis”. Two climate science experts told the Guardian that Paterson’s statements were misguided and typical of climate science denial. Paterson defended his statements, telling the Guardian he was “not a climate denier”. He described himself as “a climate realist” and an “expert on climate science”. In May, Paterson, who resigned in 2020 as the chief executive of the government’s Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, suggested on LinkedIn that concerns about climate change were “an irrational fear of a trace gas which is plant food”. He has been a regular guest on right-wing media outlets since the Coalition earlier this year said it wanted to lift the ban on nuclear and build reactors in seven locations. On his Facebook page, Paterson has said that “cold is more dangerous than warm” and described a leading scientist as a “climate creep”. On LinkedIn, he said US space agency Nasa was “deliberately confusing public understanding by publishing ground surface temperatures”, saying the agency’s climate work “should be given to a credible independent group. Defund NASA!” In April, Paterson told an audience at the Centre for Independent Studies that “you can’t make a correlation between extreme events and climate” and said “no matter what you believe about carbon dioxide – it is plant food”. “Increasing carbon a little bit is not going to dramatically change the climate. The plants will grow better,” he said, saying the planet was in a period of low CO2. Prof David Karoly, a councillor at the Climate Council and a respected atmospheric scientist who has been studying the affects of CO2 on the climate since the late 1980s, said Paterson’s statements were typical of those from climate science deniers. He said while CO2 levels were currently low in comparison to other times in Earth’s history, they were higher than at any time since the emergence of homo sapiens. “He is misguided,” Karoly said. “CO2 has led to increases in temperature extremes, extreme rainfall, sea level rise and increases in bushfires and fire weather. CO2 has already dramatically changed the climate.” Dr John Cook, an expert on climate change misinformation at the University of Melbourne, said Paterson was “regurgitating arguments” across a range of “thoroughly debunked talking points”. He said: “It’s inconsistent to argue that CO2 is a trace gas which can’t possibly make any difference but at the same time claim that CO2 is going to green the planet.” Shackel did not respond to questions. In an interview with the Guardian, Paterson argued the UN’s climate change panel “has made it very clear” that it was “not possible at this point” to link extreme events to changes in the climate. But the panel’s latest report said it was “an established fact that human-induced greenhouse gas emissions have led to an increased frequency and/or intensity of some weather and climate extremes”, with evidence for rising temperature extremes, extreme rainfall, droughts, tropical cyclones and more dangerous fire weather. Paterson said he did think rising levels of CO2 were a problem and that fossil fuels needed to be limited “as soon as we can”. “It is a very, very serious problem but it is not a climate crisis,” he said. He said he had been concerned about climate change for many years but said unduly worrying children over the issue was “a form of child abuse”, and “the chance of significant catastrophic events” occurring in the next 30 years “related to an increase of CO2 in the atmosphere in the southern hemisphere” was “small”. Paterson added he was more concerned about the “ecocide” from building wind and solar farms” than about climate change. | ['environment/carbon-emissions', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'australia-news/energy-australia', 'environment/environment', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'australia-news/nuclear-power', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/graham-readfearn', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/carbon-emissions | EMISSIONS | 2024-08-16T15:00:40Z | true | EMISSIONS |
environment/2011/mar/18/plastic-recycling-plant-takes-all-sorts | Plastic recycling plant takes all sorts | Hopes of an end to the bewildering and complex procedure of sorting different types of plastic for recycling have been raised by the unveiling of a new plant in north-east England. The processing unit at Redcar, on Teesside – an area of high unemployment in spite of the recent rescue of the Tata steelworks – is the first in Britain to integrate all forms of plastic reuse. This means bags, yoghurt pots and supermarket packaging no longer need to be sorted separately. Biffa Polymers and Wrap, the not-for-profit advisory company set up with government funding in 2000, have recruited 28 staff for the £1.87m project. The money was released by Wrap in January after research into the feasibility of mixing flimsy film, sturdy milk cartons and other plastics in simple collection skips. Production starts in April, with an initial target of 15,000 tonnes a year, rising to 20,000 by 2012. The system sorts and washes the jumble of plastic before processing the items according to different polymer types and colours. End products from the waste, contributed by householders, local councils and companies, will include paint trays, plant pots, storage boxes, pallets, bottles, car parts, office furniture and kitchenware. Suitably high-grade plastic will be transferred to Biffa's separate specialist food-grade plant at Redcar to be made back into milk bottles. Lord Henley, the junior environment minister responsible for waste and recycling, said: "The innovative technology will make life easier for families who have puzzled over recycling their yoghurt tubs and food trays. It is also a welcome boost to green jobs in the north-east." Teesside has focused on recycling and waste disposal as part of its attempt to reinvent a local economy previously based on steel and chemical giants such as ICI. Marcus Gover, Wrap's director of market development, said: "The Redcar facility shows that it is commercially viable to recycle mixed plastics and that there are real end markets for the high-value, quality outputs. "Recycling mixed plastics adds value to the UK economy by transforming a waste into a usable, commercial product, retaining the value rather than allowing it to end up in landfill." | ['environment/recycling', 'environment/waste', 'environment/environment', 'uk/uk', 'tone/news', 'type/article', 'profile/martinwainwright', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews'] | environment/recycling | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2011-03-18T15:41:30Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
sustainable-business/2017/may/26/zara-hm-step-up-instore-recycling-tackle-throwaway-culture | Zara and H&M back in-store recycling to tackle throwaway culture | When you walk into a high-street shop, you’re probably looking to snap up a bargain, not get rid of an old jumper. But clothing retailers and brands are increasingly asking shoppers to dump their cast-offs in store. Britain alone is expected to send 235m items of clothing to landfill this spring, the majority of which could have been re-worn, reused or recycled. Major retailers are coming under pressure to tackle the waste. In response, brands including H&M and Zara are stepping up in-store recycling initiatives, which allow customers to drop off unwanted items in fashion “bins” in high-street shops. While companies such as Adidas and luxury group Kering – the owner of brands including Alexander McQueen and Gucci – agreed at this month’s Copenhagen Fashion Summit to set 2020 targets for garment collection. The idea is to boost textile collection and recycling rates, and reduce needless waste to landfill. But if the same companies continue to drive high levels of consumption – some are launching up to 24 new clothing collections every year – can in-store recycling be more than a tokenistic gesture? H&M says it has collected about 40,000 tonnes of garments since launching its scheme in 2013, which it passes on to its partner recycling plant in Berlin. What can’t be reused is downcycled into products like cleaning cloths or insulation fibres. Nike too has a long-running collection scheme, Reuse-A-Shoe, which sees 1.5m worn out trainers per year collected in store or by post and sent to facilities in Tennessee and Belgium to be ground up into material for sports and playground surfaces. But corporate enthusiasm for such schemes appears to be growing: H&M wants to increase collection to 25,000 tonnes a year by 2020, says Catarina Midby, its UK and Ireland sustainability manager. Tactics include advertising campaigns, vouchers and educating employees who can inform customers about the scheme. Zara, which started installing collection bins during 2016 in stores across Europe, says it will soon have completed installation in all of its stores across China. The Inditex brand is donating the collected clothing to charities including the Red Cross. Bad habits are hard to change Despite growing investment, however, consumer behaviour is proving hard to change – a recent survey by Sainsbury’s suggested three quarters of householders in Britain chuck old clothes out with their household waste. Cyndi Rhoades, founder of recycling technology company Worn Again, hopes the growing prevalence of high-street collection schemes will kickstart behaviour change around textiles much in the way that it’s now widely understood paper and plastic can be recycled. “It’s part of the wider communication campaign to consumers to say – whether it’s rewearable or not, whether it’s returned in store, to charity shops or textile banks – clothing can be recycled.” Some observers, however, question the ability of in-store recycling to effect real change. As part of a wider strategy to increase resource-efficiency, such schemes can be valuable, says Dilys Williams, director of sustainable fashion at the London College of Fashion. But in isolation, she warns they could “encourage a guilt-free consumption attitude where customers think it’s a good idea to buy and wear (or not) in ever increasing amounts without thought for clothing’s inherent precious value in terms of people and resources.” What happens to recycled clothes? Collecting clothes is only half the battle, says Rhoades; what happens after they are collected is just as important. Current mechanical recycling of natural fibres like cotton and wool results in shorter, lower quality textile fibres that can’t be used again in clothes. Instead, they are used to make lower value products like cleaning cloths, which may eventually end up incinerated or in landfill. Rhoades would like to see more brands investing directly in the tech companies pioneering a more circular model, where raw materials in clothes are recaptured and returned into the fashion supply chain at a competitive price. “There is very little venture capital for research and development [and] without brands playing an active role in financing, these solutions will not make it to market,” she says. Jade Wilting, project coordinator of the Circle Textiles Programme at social enterprise, Circle Economy, agrees that brands have responsibility to fund the infrastructure and technology needed for more efficient solutions, but says a cultural shift is also needed. Even if the solution to recycle clothes into new clothes appeared overnight, Wilting says we would still have to question why we consume at the rate which we do. Buying fewer clothes would not only help the environment, but also enhance our wellbeing, says Williams. “After the initial ‘thrill of the till’ at bagging a bargain, our satisfaction quickly fades to feelings of guilt,” she says. “The expectation is to keep up with the ever-changing trends, refreshing our wardrobe every few weeks, but studies have proven that far from bringing us happiness it can actually make us feel empty.” Sign up to be a Guardian Sustainable Business member and get more stories like this direct to your inbox every week. You can also follow us on Twitter. | ['sustainable-business/series/circular-economy', 'sustainable-business/sustainable-business', 'fashion/fashion', 'environment/recycling', 'fashion/h-and-m', 'environment/environment', 'environment/ethical-living', 'lifeandstyle/lifeandstyle', 'environment/waste', 'fashion/fashion-industry', 'fashion/zara', 'business/nike', 'business/business', 'type/article', 'fashion/sustainable-fashion', 'profile/hannah-gould', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-professional-networks'] | environment/waste | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2017-05-26T06:00:04Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
sport/2020/mar/06/australia-avoid-nightmare-scenario-but-icc-face-questions-with-england-the-fall-guys | Australia avoid nightmare scenario but ICC faces questions as England pay price | Adam Collins | “The public love a backflip,” a cabinet minister once said to me. “It shows them you are listening.” The organisers of the T20 World Cup had the chance to get nimble this week for the sake of the credibility of their tournament. Instead, they elected to do the opposite to try and spin their way out of trouble. It didn’t work. To recap, the semi-finals of the competition did not contain a provision for a reserve day in the event of rain. In turn, England and Australia – the lower qualified teams for their final four clashes – were in the gun at the SCG. If the downpour didn’t stop, they would be eliminated without a ball being bowled. That turned out to be the fate for Heather Knight’s team with India getting the golden ticket. If nine additional minutes were lost in the second semi, Australia would have been washed out of contention with them. Instead, that nightmare scenario – after so much time and money invested in filling the MCG for the final – has been avoided. But just because organisers got their dream decider doesn’t mean the ridiculous situation should now be forgotten about. Kevin Roberts, Cricket Australia’s boss, said during the week that they had put a polite inquiry into the International Cricket Council about whether a reserve day might be made available on Friday. It was rejected out of hand because it wasn’t in the playing conditions before the tournament. Conversation over. “It gives you cause to reflect and think about how you might improve things in the future,” Roberts said. Well, little good that does Knight and co now, the England skipper declaring in the aftermath that she hopes this never happens again. In practice, it meant that, after they lost their first game on the opening weekend, there was no way they could make the final. The ICC’s response? Contrition at the oversight? Hardly. “Allowing for any other reserve days would have extended the length of the event, which isn’t feasible,” a spokesman said when reflecting on why there wasn’t a shift when the brutal weather forecast was seen. It doesn’t pass the sniff test. How would playing on Friday have extended this event? By way of comparison, there were reserve days built in for last year’s men’s 50-over World Cup semi-finals. Then, in the case of the first fixture, two days were needed to complete a game in which New Zealand overcame India in a stunning contest; without without access to the spare day, the Black Caps would have been eliminated. More pertinently with respect to the ICC line, the second semi factored this in too. Had there been rain on that occasion, the game would have been completed on that Friday afternoon ahead of a Sunday final. Yes, the logistics were a challenge and putting the show on again at the SCG on Friday would have been costly. But what price the reputational damage for the biggest standalone women’s cricket tournament ever staged to not think of this? Of course, India and South Africa would have been entitled to reject the workaround had it been put to them. But both captains hinted it would have been fine with them. After South Africa’s narrow loss to Australia, Proteas skipper Dane van Niekerk, said she would rather “lose than get a free pass” to a final. It wouldn’t have been a free pass – they played well to top their group after knocking off England to begin – but her point stands. What must happen now is a full reconciliation on how the initial decision was arrived at by the organising committee and participating nations. In particular, how wasn’t it considered that hosting a semi-final in the city that has more days of international cricket lost to rain than any other in Australia – in Sydney’s wettest month of the year – wasn’t a risk worth insuring against? Much like the boundary countback farrago in last year’s World Cup Super Over, somebody should have picked this up. What decision-makers can’t do now is double down when the men’s World Cup rolls around in October. It might mean copping some blowback for getting it right for the men after neglecting to so for the women, but the public relations gymnastics required there will be the price of doing the sensible thing. It’s just a shame they didn’t bother with it this week. | ['sport/womens-world-t20-2020', 'sport/womens-world-twenty20', 'sport/womenscricket', 'sport/cricket', 'sport/australia-women-s-cricket-team', 'sport/england-women-cricket-team', 'sport/australia-sport', 'sport/sport', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/adam-collins', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-sport'] | sport/womens-world-t20-2020 | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE | 2020-03-05T21:56:41Z | true | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE |
uk-news/2021/mar/03/environmental-groups-not-convinced-by-sunaks-green-growth-budget | Bank of England given green remit to aid net zero carbon goal | The chancellor has changed the remit of the Bank of England’s interest rate-setting monetary policy committee to include a duty to support the government’s net zero carbon ambition alongside its longstanding responsibility to keep inflation in check. Rishi Sunak made the change to reflect the importance of environmental sustainability, he said. Under the green upgrade, the Bank must support the government’s strategy to “level up opportunity in all parts of the UK” and to “transition to an environmentally sustainable and resilient net zero economy”, according to the Treasury. The surprise extension of the remit formed part of an otherwise modest set of Treasury measures to help spur the UK’s burgeoning green economy including plans to issue a £15bn Green Gilt sovereign bond, a £22bn National Infrastructure Bank based in Leeds, and a string of small-scale development funding pledges. The chancellor promised a “real commitment to green growth” in his budget, though environmentalists expressed concern about a lack of detail over how that might be achieved. Analysts said the Bank’s new green mandate means its banking policy decisions would now work in lock-step with the government’s agenda, which together with the National Infrastructure Bank could help channel billions of private capital towards green spending. Karen Ward, a chief strategist at JP Morgan and a former adviser to Philip Hammond when he was chancellor, said investors “should not underestimate the impact this could have on the already strong momentum behind sustainable investing”. “This could tilt the preference of the central bank’s asset purchases and involve considerable regulatory change to encourage private capital to do likewise,” she said. The Treasury also hopes to galvanise the financial might of the City around its £15bn Green Gilt and a new scheme to become a global leader in the burgeoning market for “offsetting” carbon emissions by investing in projects which save or avoid emissions. Sunak has appointed Dame Clara Furse, a former chief executive of the London Stock Exchange, to set up a working group to develop the new markets. Sunak also hopes to harness the saving power of retail investors through a “world first” green bond, to be launched by National Savings & Investments, designed to give UK savers the opportunity to buy bonds which help support green projects while boosting their savings. The cross-party environmental audit committee welcomed the decision to put climate action at the heart of the Bank of England’s work after calling for its remit to be more consistent with the government’s climate ambitions. But it joined the calls of many green investors and campaigners in urging the Treasury to go further. Jeegar Kakkad of the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change thinktank said the new infrastructure bank would invest less in the UK each year than the £7bn that used to come from the European Investment Bank before Brexit. “While an infrastructure bank was long overdue, it is baffling why the government has chosen to give it only a fraction of the funding recommended by the National Infrastructure Commission,” said Kakkad. Sunak devoted a scant two minutes of his budget speech to government plans to reach net zero emissions, in which he promised “green” growth, innovation or jobs seven times. However, there was no mention of measures to accelerate the take up of electric vehicles or the green homes grant, a scheme to subsidise insulation and low-carbon heating with grants of up to £10,000 per household. Sunak also kept fuel duty frozen for the 11th year in a row, which is likely to raise emissions by 300,000 tonnes this year. The freeze is also estimated to have cost the Treasury at least £50bn in revenue so far. Carbon dioxide from transport, which makes up more than a third of the UK’s emissions, has barely budged in the past decade as gains from people switching to electric vehicles have been more than wiped out by increasing numbers of people driving SUVs. Green experts said the budget failed to bolster the UK’s green reputation ahead of the presidency of the G7 summit this summer and as host of vital UN climate talks, called Cop26, this November, and showed little sign of the “muscular interventionism” needed to spur a green recovery. Nick Mabey, the chief executive of the environmental thinktank E3G, said: “Ahead of Cop26, this budget was a missed opportunity by failing to set out an unequivocal direction of travel towards a green zero carbon future. The chancellor has dropped the green recovery ball before the try line.” | ['uk-news/budget-2021', 'environment/carbon-emissions', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'politics/taxandspending', 'environment/green-economy', 'uk/budget', 'environment/environment', 'politics/politics', 'uk/uk', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/fiona-harvey', 'profile/jillian-ambrose', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/special-supplement', 'theguardian/special-supplement/special-supplement', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/carbon-emissions | EMISSIONS | 2021-03-03T20:04:34Z | true | EMISSIONS |
commentisfree/2016/oct/11/the-guardian-view-on-haiti-time-to-repay-our-debts | The Guardian view on Haiti: time to repay our debts | Editorial | Haiti, yet to recover from 2010’s terrible earthquake, is reeling again. This time, Hurricane Matthew has devastated the country, whose acting president, Jocelerme Privert, has warned that famine could soon take hold. The UN has launched an emergency appeal for almost $120m to provide “life-saving assistance and protection” and has warned that 750,000 people need help urgently. The current death toll of many hundreds could spiral: there are fears that flooding and other damage to water supplies could prompt a fresh spike in cases of cholera, which has killed 10,000 people in six years. Haiti’s vulnerability owes something to geography, and much to history. In general, poor and underdeveloped countries suffer more from such events than more developed ones do – and Haiti is one of the poorest and most unequal in the world. Almost a quarter of its population lives under the national extreme poverty line of $1.23 a day. Inadequate infrastructure, poorly constructed homes and hand-to-mouth living all contribute to the risk that events such as hurricanes turn into catastrophes – not really natural but unnatural disasters. The country’s leaders have failed their people repeatedly – and another repercussion of the current crisis has been the postponement of long-delayed elections to produce a legitimate government – but others must take the blame too. After the slave-led revolution of 1791 created the world’s first black republic, France demanded compensation for its settlers and slave-owners: 90 million gold francs – estimated at somewhere between $17bn and $21bn in contemporary terms. At one stage, repayments consumed four-fifths of the national budget. The Caribbean nation did not pay off this debilitating debt until 1947. French president François Hollande last year acknowledged the debt his country owes to what was its most profitable colony – but hastily described it as “moral”, lest Haitians get carried away with the idea that repayment might be forthcoming. It is more than that: it is a real, concrete obligation, which cannot be relegated to the past because of its enduring impact. The case for reparations to Haiti is not even, as it is elsewhere, about attempting to compensate for the damage caused by slavery and colonisation; it is about the outrage of forcing a country to pay for freeing itself. A really substantial contribution to relief and recovery efforts, in a manner that genuinely aids its former colony, is the very least Paris could offer. There are more recent debts, too. Foreign involvement has often proved better for donors than the recipients, as Bill Clinton acknowledged of policies under his presidency that wiped out Haitian rice farming. Development experts complain that much money poured into the country since 2010 has been wasted, in part because of reliance on foreign consultants rather than local programmes and actors. Worst of all, Haiti’s current cholera outbreak is entirely the responsibility of the UN, whose peacekeepers brought it from Nepal after the 2010 earthquake, and refused to acknowledge its role until very recently. The UN’s efforts to develop a proper package of payments to victims and families will for now take second place to boosting the battle against the disease, but must not be forgotten. What Haiti needs most is justice, not charity. | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'world/hurricane-matthew', 'world/world', 'world/haiti', 'world/natural-disasters', 'world/americas', 'world/france', 'world/europe-news', 'world/francois-hollande', 'world/unitednations', 'tone/editorials', 'tone/comment', 'type/article', 'profile/editorial', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/editorialsandreply', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-letters-and-leader-writers'] | world/hurricane-matthew | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2016-10-11T18:29:43Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
technology/2020/nov/19/invention-that-makes-renewable-energy-from-rotting-veg-wins-james-dyson-prize | Invention that makes renewable energy from rotting veg wins James Dyson prize | A novel material made from rotting fruit and vegetables that absorbs stray UV light from the sun and converts it into renewable energy has landed its designer the first sustainability gong in this year’s James Dyson awards. From a record 1,800 entries – despite the challenges of Covid-19 – the award was given to 27-year-old Carvey Ehren Maigue, a student at Mapúa University in the Philippines, for his Aureus system which uses the natural scientific principles behind the northern lights. The other top prize in the international competition has been handed to the inventor of a low-cost biomedical device that can be used at home to detect breast cancer, harnessing artificial intelligence to analyse urine. Aureus is made from crop waste and can be attached in panels to windows and walls. It allows high energy photons to be absorbed by luminescent particles derived from fruit and vegetables, which re-emit them as visible light. Unlike solar panels, the system is effective even when not directly facing the sun because it can pick up UV through clouds and bouncing from walls, pavements and other buildings. Maigue, who was forced back to the drawing board with his invention after an earlier version proved too costly, said: “Winning the James Dyson Award is both a beginning and an end. It marked the end of years of doubting whether my idea would find global relevance. I want to create a better form of renewable energy that uses the world’s natural resources, is close to people’s lives, forging achievable paths towards a sustainable and regenerative future.” The two overall winners, who each receive a cash prize of £30,000 to further develop their inventions, were lauded by judges for tackling problems of global importance; sustainable methods to effectively generate renewable energy and women missing breast cancer screenings. The overall international award went to 23-year-old postgraduate student Judit Giró Benet for her Blue Box, which offers a simple home-based alternative to routine mammogram screening. Benet, from Tarragona, Spain, and now studying at the University of California, Irvine, was inspired by her mother’s diagnosis of breast cancer and – with 40% of women failing to attend their mammograms – the need for a less invasive and more accessible alternative. Her early work explored evidence that dogs had detected cancer in humans after sniffing their breath. Now in its 15th year, the James Dyson award operates in 27 countries, and is open to students and recent graduates studying product design, industrial design and engineering. It recognises and rewards imaginative design solutions to global problems. The Tyre Collective, a group of masters students from Imperial College London and the Royal College of Art, were one of two runners-up for their solution for the growing environmental scourge of tyre wear caused by road transport. The other is Scope, from students at the University of Waterloo, Canada, who designed a new lens using liquid crystals to give high quality zoomed-in photos on mobile phone cameras. | ['technology/james-dyson', 'technology/technology', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'environment/energy', 'environment/environment', 'world/world', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/rebeccasmithers', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/special-supplement', 'theguardian/special-supplement/special-supplement', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/renewableenergy | ENERGY | 2020-11-19T06:00:04Z | true | ENERGY |
sport/2023/aug/19/wales-south-africa-rugby-union-match-report | Inexperienced Wales suffer mauling at hands of ruthless South Africa | So that’s what happens when you pit the world champions and their behemoths against an inexperienced side filled with players from the fringe. Warren Gatland names his World Cup squad on Monday and selected this matchday 23 in the hope a few lesser-known names would put their hand up. After an eight-try pummelling, this felt like asking a young boxer to cut his teeth against Mike Tyson in his prime. South Africa were bigger, stronger, faster and more ruthlessly efficient than their hosts. They monstered the breakdown and clattered anyone in red who had the misfortune of getting near them. The Springboks move ahead of France into third in World Rugby’s rankings and if anyone needed evidence of the chasm that exists between the top teams and the rest, this was it. Malcolm Marx opened the scoring inside five minutes. The giant hooker was a menace with ball in hand and on the floor but his job was made simple by Siya Kolisi who wriggled past an overly exuberant Tom Rogers and off-loaded like a man who has not missed 119 days of competitive rugby. Wales had the lead on 21 minutes thanks to two penalties from Sam Castelow but that was as good as it got. Soon after Canan Moodie was the latest beneficiary of a Willie le Roux assist that came off the back of a rampaging run through the middle by RG Snyman. There were green jerseys everywhere. Le Roux was pulling strings at first receiver. Cheslin Kolbe was zigzagging like lightning. Jaden Hendrikse kept the ball fizzing from scrum-half and that meaty pack kept on rumbling. Moodie would have had his second on 34 minutes but Rio Dyer knocked the ball from his grasp and straight into touch. After deliberation, the referee, Andrew Brace, called for a penalty try before showing Dyer yellow. “The only positive we can take is hopefully there is a lot of learning from that,” said Gatland, who questioned the penalty try and the yellow card, arguing that Moodie missed the bouncing ball. “It’s disappointing. We gave up some soft tries.” Jesse Kriel closed out a dominant half by falling on to his first Test try for five years after Kolbe tackled Mason Grady into the goal area. At 24-9, this was over as a contest. But those Welsh fringe players still had a case to make and they started the second half with greater intent. They came close to scoring their first try with a swift break down the left but just as the ball was recycled back infield, Pieter-Steph du Toit intercepted and then unleashed Kriel who ran the length of the field to slide between the poles. The Principality crowd is renowned for its vocal support but all you could hear was the ebullient cheers from a sizable South African contingent. Bloodthirsty calls of “Bokke. Bokke. Bokke” shook the foundations. Even before the clock reached the hour mark, Du Toit scored off the back of a rolling maul and Moodie’s blistering line speed helped him snaffle an intercept try of his own. The half-century was raised on 68 minutes when Manie Libbok spiralled a delicious flat ball to the replacement Damian Willemse, who skipped round a defender. Libbok had a poor game off the kicking tee but this was proof of the magic he can produce when playing from the front foot. Willemse was sent to the sin-bin for a head-to-head shot on Dyer and with the man advantage Sam Parry burrowed around a ruck from short range to register Wales’s only try with eight minutes to play. The replacement hooker came up roaring with the ball. If that gets him on a plane to France, the score will be quickly forgotten. | ['sport/rugby-union', 'sport/wales-rugby-union-team', 'sport/south-africa-rugby-team', 'campaign/email/the-breakdown', 'sport/sport', 'type/article', 'tone/matchreports', 'profile/daniel-gallan', 'publication/theobserver', 'theobserver/sport', 'theobserver/sport/news', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-sport'] | sport/wales-rugby-union-team | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE | 2023-08-19T16:40:04Z | true | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE |
australia-news/2020/feb/16/trent-zimmerman-backs-net-zero-emissions-target-but-foresees-more-coalition-in-fighting | Trent Zimmerman backs net zero emissions target but foresees more Coalition infighting | The Liberal MP Trent Zimmerman says the Morrison government should work towards adopting a target of net zero emissions by 2050 to bring itself into line with commitments Australia made under the Paris agreement, and to align Canberra’s policy with emissions reduction targets adopted by the states. In an interview with Guardian Australia’s politics podcast, Zimmerman said it was reasonable for the prime minister to want to do due diligence on what net zero would cost, and to consider what a policy roadmap would look like, “but this is something that we should be looking very seriously at”. He said the Paris agreement required Australia to move to net carbon neutrality in the second half of the century, and to take measures to help keep temperature rises to between 1.5C and 2C. Zimmerman – who is one of the backbench moderates pushing for the government to step up the level of ambition on climate action – predicted the 2050 target would trigger more infighting within the government. But he said the best way to persuade colleagues to accept a pivot was to explain to them, and to their communities, that the transition to low emissions energy in Australia was “not going to be a disaster”. “Not only will this not be a disaster, there will be opportunity.” Zimmerman said he wasn’t sure whether those arguments would ultimately succeed, but “we have to give it a go”. He said Australia had “lost half a decade because of the debate about what we needed to do” and expressed hope that a durable solution could be reached in this parliament. “I think the challenge of climate change is so real and so serious that if there can be some kind of consensus, that would be a positive outcome.” Zimmerman confirmed he had spoken to the independent MP Zali Steggall – who took the neighbouring electorate of Warringah from the government at the last election on a climate change platform – about a bill she wants to pursue in parliament that would impose the net zero target. “I’ve spoken to Zali and I’m open to having a conversation when we come back [to Canberra] in a couple of weeks’ time. “It is watch this space on that front.” Zimmerman said Steggall wanted to bring on the bill in March, but that timetable was too compressed to allow the government to resolve its own stance on the 2050 target. “I think the government should be given the opportunity to do a due diligence process on the 2050 target before the parliament is expected to sign up to that.” He said the leadership was very unlikely to grant MPs a conscience vote, and there was an open question about whether the bill would ever come on for debate. But he wanted to have the conversation “out of respect for Zali”. “For me, the important thing is the goal. Zali’s bill may not be the only way to achieve that goal.” The MP repeated comments he made last week that governments should not be in the business of bankrolling coal projects that the private sector will not finance. While Queensland Nationals are pushing assertively for a new taxpayer-backed coal plant at Collinsville, a number of Liberals are concerned about sending a negative signal in parts of the country where their constituents are worried about a lack of climate action, and about the fiscal exposure. Despite the government’s partisan criticism of Labor’s electric vehicles policy at the last election, including hyperbole that emissions standards were a “war on the weekend”, Zimmerman argued the Coalition needed to be at the forefront of managing the transition to electric vehicles, because “the global car market is only heading in one direction”. He said the states needed to look at consumer incentives, such as concessions on registration fees and rebates on toll roads for drivers of electric cars. At the commonwealth level, Zimmerman said, “the charging network will be really crucial”. The MP said an electric vehicle strategy would work best with the public if the focus in the first phase was on carrots rather than sticks, and once the transition was under way, regulatory options could come into play, such as emissions standards to drive faster take-up as prices came down. | ['australia-news/australian-politics', 'australia-news/coalition', 'australia-news/liberal-party', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'environment/carbon-emissions', 'environment/electric-cars', 'environment/environment', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/katharine-murphy', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/carbon-emissions | EMISSIONS | 2020-02-15T19:00:08Z | true | EMISSIONS |
money/2021/sep/28/virgin-medias-recycling-promise-gets-zero-marks | Virgin Media’s recycling promise gets zero marks | Last year I upgraded my Virgin Media TV package, and, as result, ended up with two set-top boxes I needed to dispose of. One, sent in error, was new and unused. Despite my repeated attempts, Virgin refuses to take them back. Its website advises customers to take boxes to a local recycling facility, but my local council is not listed as one that accepts this kind of waste. When I eventually got to speak to a real person, he advised me to stick them on Facebook Marketplace and, failing that, just put them in the bin. This cannot be acceptable in 2021. Virgin appears to be abdicating its responsibility in terms of end-of-life disposal of this e-waste. SF, by email In May, Virgin Media claimed it had achieved zero waste to landfill operations for the first time, but your letter suggests that it has more to do in this area. Large numbers of set-top boxes and routers are stacking up in people’s homes. It is particularly concerning that the company did not seem to want the new, unused box back. It has told me that you had been given the wrong information and has since apologised and collected the items. Virgin Media says it has committed to net-zero-carbon and zero-waste operations by the end of 2025. “In 2020, we refurbished and reused 1.3m items, including set-top boxes. Customers can return equipment using our prepaid service which is available on our website, and we will reuse items where possible,” it says. “For products that cannot be reused, we encourage customers to recycle them using local facilities, which can also be found on our website.” We welcome letters but cannot answer individually. Email us at consumer.champions@theguardian.com or write to Consumer Champions, Money, the Guardian, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU. Please include a daytime phone number. Submission and publication of all letters is subject to our terms and conditions | ['money/series/bachelor-and-brignall-consumer-champions', 'money/consumer-rights-money', 'money/consumer-affairs', 'money/money', 'environment/recycling', 'media/virginmedia', 'environment/environment', 'environment/ethical-living', 'uk/uk', 'type/article', 'tone/features', 'profile/milesbrignall', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-money'] | environment/recycling | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2021-09-28T06:00:02Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
technology/2019/dec/05/evil-corp-hack-us-feds-charge-russian-hackers | US charges Russian 'Evil Corp' hackers with $100m banking scheme | US prosecutors have charged two members of a Russia-based hacking group that calls itself Evil Corp with masterminding a global banking fraud scheme that netted the unsubtly named gang more than $100m. Two leading members of Evil Corp, Maksim Yakubets of Moscow and Igor Turashev from the Russian city Yoshkar-Ola, were charged with bank fraud and also sanctioned by the treasury department for developing and distributing the Dridex malware which stole swiped banking credentials from more than 40 countries. In a statement, US treasury officials called Evil Corp “one of the biggest hacking groups ever”. British authorities described the 32-year-old Yakubets as a supercar-lover who customized his Lamborghini license plate to read “thief” in Russian and ran his operation from the basements of Moscow cafes. The US also entered Evil Corp, which also called itself the “Dridex Gang”, into its Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List. The Dridex malware developed by the group was spread through a massive phishing operation, where targets were infected after clicking on internet links. “Treasury is sanctioning Evil Corp as part of a sweeping action against one of the world’s most prolific cybercriminal organizations,” said Steven Mnuchin, the US treasury secretary, in a statement. “Our goal is to shut down Evil Corp, deter the distribution of Dridex, target the ‘money mule’ network used to transfer stolen funds, and ultimately to protect our citizens from the group’s criminal activities.” US authorities worked in coordination with Britain’s National Crime Agency, which published a series of photographs and video of the hacker’s lavish lifestyle, including images of his camouflaged car streaked with fluorescent yellow. The director general of the British agency, Lynne Owens, said that Yakubets and Evil Corp “represent the most significant cybercrime threat to the UK”. Yakubets, originally from Ukraine, and Turashev are both still at large. Another 15 people tied to the hacking group have also been sanctioned by the treasury department. Many were believed to be living in Moscow. “What are the chances this guy is going to face trial in the United States?” asked John Shier, an expert at UK-based cybersecurity company Sophos. “Probably next to zero.” The US treasury department also announced a $5m bounty for information “leading to the capture or conviction of Evil Corp’s leader”. In court documents, Yakubets is described as the leader of the group. Computer attacks attributed to the two men targeted victims in 11 states, including a bank and a school district in Pennsylvania, where the criminal charges against them were brought. US news outlets also said that treasury officials believed that Yakubets had committed other cybercrimes on behalf of the Russian government, as part of a scheme where Russian intelligence agencies recruit criminal hackers in order to target entities related to national security. | ['technology/hacking', 'world/russia', 'world/europe-news', 'technology/technology', 'world/world', 'technology/malware', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/roth-andrew', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/international', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-foreign'] | technology/hacking | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE | 2019-12-05T17:15:06Z | true | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE |
world/2004/dec/30/indonesia.tsunami2004 | Tsunami death toll could reach 100,000 | As many as 80,000 people may have died in the Indonesian province of Aceh alone, it emerged yesterday as the death toll across the Indian Ocean rim continued to rise. The western coast of the northern province was devastated by a combination of tsunamis and the earthquake which triggered the waves. No village was untouched and, in many areas, every building was razed. All that survives of the region's fishing fleets are the odd upturned boat and piles of wreckage. Asked how many people had died in Aceh, Michael Elmquist, the UN's humanitarian affairs coordinator in Indonesia, said: "I would say we are probably talking about somewhere in the order of 50,000 to 80,000 people." The official death toll in Indonesia stood at more than 45,000 last night. Across the region it had reached 77,000. But this figure is expected to continue to rise as information comes in from areas which have been cut off, such as India's Andaman and Nicobar islands. Peter Rees, operations support chief for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, said: "I would not be surprised if we are over 100,000 dead." The British death toll was also expected to increase. The Foreign Office put the official figure at 26 - 20 in Thailand, three in Sri Lanka, and three in the Maldives. But officials in Thailand said up to 43 Britons had died there. The overall toll in Thailand rose to 1,657, with at least 1,500 missing - but that figure, too, could rise. Thousands of local people are thought to have been killed when their bamboo homes were destroyed and many remote fishing villages are yet to be reached, though reports indicate severe damage. In Sri Lanka, reports of measles and diarrhoea were beginning to reach health authorities, causing concern of an epidemic. Clean drinking water was in short supply on the island, where more than 22,000 people have died. Logistics remained a nightmare, with the government and rebels who control regions in the north and east accusing one another of failing to do enough. The UN has warned that as many people could be killed by diseases as perished in Sunday's disaster. Yesterday, it said up to 5m people in the region had been left without basic essentials. Five days after the disaster, there was still confusion over how many people had died on the Andaman and Nicobar islands. Indian officials said 3,000 had "gone missing" and were presumed dead. So far, though, they had recovered only 306 bodies. Aceh province in Sumatra was the most severely affected area. A military spokesman, Major General Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin, said navy ships full of emergency supplies were heading towards Meulaboh, where a third of the population - about 40,000 people - was feared dead. He said: "We have very sketchy information about how many died there and the extent of the devastation. We're having extraordinary problems communicating there." About 3,400 people have been buried in the town, but there were still many corpses littering the streets. In Banda Aceh, burying the dead began in earnest yesterday. More than 1,000 bodies were buried unidentified in mass graves. "We have to do this because of the smell and the health concern," the acting Aceh governor, Azwar Abu Bakar, said. Survivors told harrowing tales of the moment the tsunami, up to 10 metres (33 feet) high, struck towns and resorts, sucking people into the sea, surging through buildings, sweeping cars from roads and smashing a train off its rails. "The water was just too strong," said Surya Darmar, lying on an army cot outside the emergency ward of a military hospital in Banda Aceh yesterday, covered in cuts and with a broken leg. "I held my children for as long as I could, but they were swept away." Long queues for petrol started to form in the town as people tried to leave. "We are afraid of more earthquakes and tsunamis and catching disease," Muhammed Fachri told the Guardian. "And there's practically noth ing here to eat, so there's no reason to stay. The situation is really bad." Aid has started arriving in Aceh in larger quantities. Six Indonesian Hercules transport aircraft and three from the Australian military yesterday shuttled non-stop between Aceh and the city of Medan, 450 miles to the south. Little of the aid is reaching those who need it, however, because the necessary distribution systems are not in place, a foreign aid worker said. "The coordination needs to be improved - and quickly." Strong aftershocks continue to rock southeast Asia, with five earth tremors of a magnitude 5.6 or greater in the past 24 hours, the US Geological Survey said yesterday. In the UK, the emergency helpline bureau has received about 40,000 calls a day. At its peak, it received more than 17,000 calls an hour. The foreign secretary, Jack Straw, said the number of people manning the call centre had been rapidly increased. But he added: "I don't think anybody, when the news first came through, had any idea of the total scale of the casualties." | ['world/world', 'world/indonesia', 'world/tsunami2004', 'world/banda-aceh', 'type/article', 'profile/jamiewilson', 'profile/johnaglionby', 'profile/stevenmorris'] | world/tsunami2004 | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2004-12-30T02:00:16Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
us-news/article/2024/jul/16/tornado-chicago-airport-storms | Tornado reported at Chicago airport as storms blow through midwest | A tornado apparently touched down outside Chicago’s O’Hare airport on Monday as storms spawned multiple reports of twisters blowing through Illinois, Iowa and Indiana. The turbulent weather knocked down trees and power poles, cutting electricity to more than 460,000 customers and businesses. A woman in Indiana died after a tree fell on to a home, authorities said. The 44-year-old woman died on Monday night in Cedar Lake, Indiana, the local coroner’s office said. There were some tornado reports, but damaging winds in Iowa, Illinois and Indiana were the main concern, said Roger Edwards, the lead forecaster with the National Weather Service’s (NWS) storm prediction center. There were numerous wind gusts in the 75mph (120 km/h) to 90mph (145km/h) range and a report of a 101mph (162km/h) wind gust in Ogle county, Illinois, Edwards said. The NWS confirmed a tornado hit Des Moines, Iowa, as storms rolled through Monday afternoon and into the night. Des Moines police were responding to calls about utility poles that had apparently snapped in two. The storms then moved east into northern Illinois, including Chicago, which saw multiple tornado warnings, wind and drenching rain. In Chicago, O’Hare airport travelers went on social media and described how winds rocked the planes in which they were sitting back and forth, as the New York Times reported. O’Hare had reported 81 flight cancellations as of Tuesday morning. The city’s Midway airport reported eight cancellations. Multiple tornadoes were reported along the line of storms that moved through the city, according to the NWS, which planned to survey a number of areas following the reports. The NWS in Chicago had to take cover for a time and later reported extensive damage in the city. The agency reported wind speeds in the region of up to 75mph (120km/h). A flash flood warning also was issued in the Chicago area into early Tuesday. No major flooding damage was reported through Tuesday morning. Nearly 390,000 customers were left without power in northern Illinois alone, according to poweroutage.us. “There are numerous reports of power lines down throughout the city as a result of this evening’s storm,” the police department in Joliet, Illinois, posted online on Monday night. “Many roadways are partially or completely blocked by trees or tree branches.” The city is about 35 miles (56km) south-west of Chicago. The Associated Press contributed reporting | ['us-news/chicago', 'world/tornadoes', 'us-news/us-weather', 'us-news/us-news', 'us-news/illinois', 'us-news/indiana', 'us-news/iowa', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-news'] | world/tornadoes | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2024-07-16T12:55:30Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/2017/oct/18/government-set-to-face-fresh-legal-challenge-over-air-pollution-crisis | Government set to face fresh legal challenge over air pollution crisis | Environmental campaigners are set to take the government back to court over what they say are ministers’ repeated failings to deal with the UK’s air pollution crisis. ClientEarth, which has already won two court battles against the government, has written a legal letter demanding that the environment secretary Michael Gove sets out a range of new measures to address air pollution which contributes to the deaths of 40,000 people across the UK each year. If the government fails to comply with this “letter before action”, as it is known, ClientEarth will issue new proceedings and ministers are likely to face a third judicial review. The courts forced the government to produce its latest air quality plan in July but the document was was widely criticised as inadequate by environmentalists and clean air campaigners. ClientEarth lawyer Alan Andrews, announcing the new legal proceedings, said the government’s proposal had “simply passed the buck to local authorities who will have little option but to impose charges on diesel vehicles”. He added: “It is high time that the government kept up its end of the bargain and helped ordinary people and small businesses make the shift away from diesel towards cleaner forms of transport.” The renewed legal pressure on the government comes as new figures show the number of local authority areas in the UK which are breaching their air quality targets reached a seven-year high in 2016. Government statistics show a total of 278 of the 391 local authorities (71%) missed their air quality targets last year, up from 258 in 2010. Andrews said the figures were rising despite the government being ordered by both the supreme court and high court to clean up the country’s illegal air pollution “in the shortest possible time”. “These new figures show that this is a national problem that requires a national solution,” he said. Client Earth first successfully challenged the government in 2015 when the supreme court ruled ministers must draw up plans to meet EU pollution rules by the end of that year. Eighteen months later, following a second judicial review, the high court judged these new proposals were illegally inadequate. ClientEarth then challenged the government’s draft proposals that were released in May but this new legal action is likely to lead to the third judicial review of the government’s policy in the past five years. In its legal letter, ClientEarth points out that under the government’s existing plans 45 local authorities are not being required to take action on air quality, despite being forecast to breach air pollution limits for years to come. It criticised the government’s lack of progress on key national policies such as changes to the tax system to favour cleaner vehicles; a targeted diesel scrappage scheme and a “clean air fund” to help local authorities tackle pollution. The letter also calls on the secretary of state to introduce specific measures and a “concrete timetable” to address these failings. The government has until Friday to respond. The prospect of legal action comes amid growing concern about the scale of the UK’s air pollution crisis. Earlier this month it emerged that as well as illegal levels of diesel pollution, every person in the capital is breathing air that exceeds global guidelines for dangerous tiny toxic particles known as PM2.5. Last month the UN’s special rapporteur on human rights related to toxic waste said the UK government was “flouting” its duty to protect the lives and health of its citizens from illegal and dangerous levels of air pollution. And a new study published on Tuesday found that people are increasingly feeling the impact of toxic air. The survey by London Councils revealed that almost half of those surveyed felt their health had been adversely effected, 40% said it had an impact on where they chose to live and a quarter said it was a factor in which school they wanted their children to go to. Dr Penny Woods, chief executive of the British Lung Foundation, said the findings were further evidence that air pollution was taking its toll on people’s day-to-day lives. “Air pollution effects everyone, hitting the most vulnerable the hardest, including the elderly, children and people with lung conditions. We need strong national policies to support local authorities.” A spokesperson for the Department for Food and Rural Affairs said the government had “put in place a £3bn plan to improve air quality and reduce harmful emissions”. “We will also end the sale of new diesel and petrol cars by 2040, and next year we will publish a comprehensive clean air strategy which will set out further steps to tackle air pollution.” | ['environment/air-pollution', 'environment/pollution', 'society/health', 'cities/cities', 'uk/uk', 'politics/michaelgove', 'environment/environment', 'politics/politics', 'society/society', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/matthewtaylor', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/air-pollution | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2017-10-18T05:01:00Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
business/2024/mar/07/uk-green-power-industry-pledge-natpower-battery-storage | UK’s green power industry receives surprise £10bn pledge | Britain’s under-pressure green power industry has received a surprise fillip after a renewables developer pledged to plough £10bn into what would become the largest portfolio of battery storage projects in the country. NatPower, a UK startup that is part of a larger European energy group, is poised to submit planning applications for three “gigaparks”, with a further 10 to follow next year. Battery storage projects are seen as a key part of the jigsaw to decarbonise Britain’s power grid, allowing electricity generated by wind turbines and solar panels to be stored for use when weather conditions are still or not sunny. The NatPower investment would lead to the construction of 60 gigawatt hours of battery storage, with solar and wind projects also in the pipeline. The two gigaparks would be located in the north of England, with a further site in the west of the country planned later this year. The projects would be built on industrial land, and also through leasing deals with farmers. The potential investment would mark a bright spot in a troubled landscape for the renewables industry. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 exacerbated a squeeze in gas markets and accelerated countries’ drives towards renewable power. However, the resulting surge in demand and global inflation has put pressure on supply chains and forced companies to rein in their ambitions. In his budget speech on Wednesday, the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, announced £120m to support the expansion of “low carbon manufacturing supply chains”. A record £1bn will be set aside for an upcoming auction to support offshore windfarm projects after an auction in September failed to attract any bidders. Hunt also said £160m would be paid to Japan’s Hitachi for two sites earmarked for nuclear power stations – the Wylfa facility on the island of Anglesey or Ynys Môn in north Wales, and the Oldbury site on the banks of the river Severn in South Gloucestershire. Efforts to decarbonise the electricity grid in Great Britain have also been undermined by waiting lists of up to 15 years for new projects, such as wind- and solar farms, to connect. Energy officials have embarked on a drive to kick out so-called zombie projects from a connections waiting list. NatPower, which plans to finance, own and in some cases operate its projects, said it had also set aside £600m to invest in new substations. Stefano Sommadossi, the chief executive of NatPower UK, said: “To solve the bottlenecks that are slowing the shift to clean energy, we will drive investment into the grid itself, collaborating with grid operators to deliver more than 20% of the new substations required. “By investing in substations and focusing on energy storage first, we will enable the next phase of the energy transition and bring down the cost of energy for consumers.” Battery storage projects could also help significantly reduce curtailment – a process in which wind and solar projects receive payments to stop generating power when supply exceeds demand. Without upgrades to the grid, these costs could reach £3.5bn a year by 2030, according to the thinktank Carbon Tracker. Britain’s battery storage industry remains fragmented but includes projects of all sizes, including a £750m development at the Trafford low carbon energy park in Greater Manchester and a string of projects devised by the co-founder of the collapsed energy supplier Bulb. NatPower UK, which launched in the UK in 2022, is part of a specialist Luxembourg-headquartered European energy group, which is backed by its management team and Tyrus Capital, a private equity firm. It scouts for land, obtains permits and typically sells projects on when they are ready to build. The group is raising the money to carry out its UK ambitions through private companies and pension funds. An announcement on securing further investment is expected within weeks. The government has set a target to generate power entirely from renewable sources by 2035, while Labour has pledged to achieve this by 2030. Industry sources believe this is ambitious, amid concerns that Britain could struggle to meet the increase in demand for electricity for everything from electric vehicles to heat pumps while efforts to build new power projects falter. | ['business/energy-industry', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'environment/energy', 'environment/environment', 'environment/windpower', 'environment/solarpower', 'business/business', 'uk-news/north-of-england', 'uk/uk', 'campaign/email/business-today', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/alex-lawson', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/financial3', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-business'] | environment/solarpower | ENERGY | 2024-03-07T06:00:04Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/2016/jun/18/curiosity-rewarded-new-forest-clearing-country-diary | Curiosity rewarded in a New Forest clearing | We crossed the ditch together into the clear-felled area of this inclosure. At once, she dropped at my feet and disappeared into the heather. She didn’t budge as I gently pulled the stems apart to find her, and no doubt would have been more active on a warmer and less overcast day. The common heath moth Ematurga atomaria atomaria comes in a variety of colours. This female is the dark form; her wings, barely two centimetres in span, are crossed by ragged black lines set against a weave of tawny scales. No doubt her pheromones are already wafting on the breeze, inviting suitors to come and mate. This clearance was done so long ago that many of the stumps dotting the area are punctured with holes made by wood-boring larvae. Some have been ripped open as woodpeckers have drilled into the timber in search of them. I ease apart a loose piece of bark and am surprised to find a toad looking up at me. The criss-crossing ditches that drain the conifer plantation are mostly dry, but a few still hold enough water for keeled skimmer dragonflies Orthetrum coerulescens to be breeding. In this species the males are powder-blue, the females golden. The male circles and loops in attendance, while she lays eggs in the water. Further on, a patch of pinkish flowers on slender stalks catches my eye. They rise from mucus-covered olive-green leaves that curl inwards towards the central purplish vein. This too is a surprise, for, though it’s not rare locally, I’m not familiar with pale butterwort Pinguicula lusitanica. It is a mini version of its two butterwort relatives that I do know. Like them, it is an insect catcher, through which it gains some of the nourishment that this acidic habitat fails to provide. That’s a need shared by the oblong-leaved sundew Drosera intermedia, a flourishing colony of which sparkles by the side of the sandy track I take to head back. Curiosity drew me here. It was a visit that did not disappoint. Follow Country diary on Twitter: @gdncountrydiary | ['environment/forests', 'environment/series/country-diary', 'uk/uk', 'uk/ruralaffairs', 'environment/summer', 'environment/butterflies', 'environment/wildlife', 'environment/conservation', 'environment/insects', 'environment/plants', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/features', 'profile/grahamlong', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/weather2', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-weather'] | environment/forests | BIODIVERSITY | 2016-06-18T04:30:01Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
environment/2022/jul/08/access-to-nature-england-landowners-payments-conservation-jake-fiennes-norfolk-holkham | Access to nature ‘should be a factor’ in payments to England’s landowners | The government should factor in access to nature in its new payments strategy for farmers and other landowners in England, a leading land manager has said. Jake Fiennes, who sits on the board for Natural England’s national nature reserves, has advised the government to incentivise farmers to put better paths in place and educate the public about what they grow, and what nature lives on their land. Fiennes, the conservation manager for Holkham estate in Norfolk, runs its nature reserve, which includes one of the UK’s most popular beaches. He has estimated the site gets about 1 million visitors a year. He manages the land for the Earl and Countess of Leicester, and it is one of the country’s only privately owned national nature reserves. The estate is also home to incredibly fragile ecosystems including sand dunes, where rare groundnesting birds including little terns and oystercatchers lay their eggs. Fiennes says he has managed to allow an increase of visitors – and also an increase in breeding success of these birds – with a mixture of education and enforcement, and says this could be a model for the government to adopt. The government is deciding how to replace post-Brexit farming subsidies. Some landowners have asked to be paid for improving access to their land for the general public, but it is unclear whether the government will adopt this, after pushback from other landowners. “We will know what has been successful in the landscape scale recovery applications in coming weeks,” Fiennes, the author of a new book on nature-friendly farming called Land Healer, told the Guardian. “I would love to see [access to nature] in local nature recovery, or an option for farmers to take up this to allow greater access into the countryside, but through a mechanism that allows farmers and food growers and nature reserves to have the ability to have greater engagement with the public.” But the government has not prioritised access to nature, and in fact squashed a review into expanding it, with a then minister arguing the countryside was a “place of business”. Kate Ashbrook, general secretary of the Open Spaces Society, said: “The new agricultural payments scheme is so far a missed opportunity for public access. Farmers and landowners could be rewarded for improving existing public paths across farmland, mowing wide routes whether they run around or across fields, making them easy to find and use; they could replace awkward stiles with gates or even gaps; they could provide better waymarking. All these would give people the confidence to exercise their rights to enjoy the countryside, which is good for their appreciation of nature, and for their health and wellbeing, and will boost the local economy.” Fiennes thinks that his model at Holkham could be used by the government to show how huge volumes of visitors can be balanced with protecting fragile ecosystems. “When the hundreds of thousands of cars descend on Holkham, people get out and they are surrounded by nature,” he said. “There’s a simple fence line, which means you can have lapwing nesting within 10 metres of a parked car. Nature becomes accustomed to these strange people in these strange vehicles moving up and down. The wigeon happily graze within five feet of the cars.” He also has the power to ban people who let their dogs off the lead in restricted areas from using the facilities, taking down their numberplates and stopping them from coming to the car parks. “So we have about 20% of the beaches with restricted access to dogs or no access to dogs, specifically through the bird-breeding season. It has actually has been a success. We have seen an increase in breeding productivity since we implemented this two years ago.” The public had largely been accepting of this, he said. “If people know why they need to do this, they do the right thing. We have a nice chirpy chap who comes with his dog on a lead and tells them the reason we have these areas roped off is because of these birds which have travelled halfway round the globe to come and nest here, and they have a really fragile existence. Then people understand, and they do the right thing.” While many who oppose greater access to the countryside worry that it will amount to hordes of people trampling productive farmland and fragile ecosystems, Fiennes thinks there is a simple solution: good fencing and pathways, which he says people use if you put them there. He thinks the government should pay farmers and other landowners to put these in place, so people can enjoy the countryside without damaging it. “If you provide easy access, the vast majority of people make use of it,” Fiennes said. “If Holkham is an example of this, we should look at opportunities to engage the public with the farm landscape or private land ownership. “We have to think about how we can get the public to connect with nature without having to go down a busy country road, or impacting productive farmland, but actually some farm tracks have the ability to be wonderful access routes that currently have no public access, but don’t impact food production. Most farms have farm tracks that don’t have public access – let’s look at those.” | ['environment/conservation', 'environment/access-to-green-space', 'environment/environment', 'environment/land-rights', 'uk/ruralaffairs', 'uk-news/norfolk', 'uk/uk', 'uk-news/england', 'environment/farming', 'environment/birds', 'environment/wildlife', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/helena-horton', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/environmentnews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/wildlife | BIODIVERSITY | 2022-07-08T10:53:18Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
environment/2021/oct/14/congress-hearing-oil-exxon-bp-shell-chevron | Big tobacco got caught in a lie by Congress. Now it’s the oil industry’s turn | Mark Hertsgaard | Two weeks from today, Darren Woods will face a potential doomsday moment before the US Congress. As the CEO of ExxonMobil, Woods was paid $15.6m last year to run the richest, most powerful private oil company in history. But his earnings and influence will be on the line when he appears before the House Committee on Oversight and Reform on 28 October. His testimony could mark the beginning of the end of big oil escaping legal and financial responsibility for the climate crisis. Joining Woods, assuming that they all show up without being compelled by subpoenas, will be the heads of three other giant oil companies: Michael Wirth of Chevron, David Lawler of BP and Gretchen Watkins of Shell Oil. The Big Oil 4, let’s call them, will be questioned about what members of Congress call a “long-running, industry-wide campaign to spread disinformation about the role of fossil fuels in causing global warming”. For the Big Oil 4 and their public relations advisers, the nightmare scenario is that 28 October will mirror the infamous congressional hearing that led to the downfall of big tobacco. On 14 April 1994, the top executives of the seven biggest tobacco companies in the US appeared before the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health and the Environment, chaired by Henry Waxman of California. Each executive solemnly testified that, no, they did not think that nicotine is addictive. CNN and C-Span carried the hearing live, and big tobacco became a national laughingstock – and legal target – overnight. A photo of the CEOs of Phillip Morris, R J Reynolds and their counterparts, right hands raised as they were sworn in, ran on the front page of the next day’s New York Times, sparking further media coverage. Here’s the part that today’s big oil chieftains particularly don’t want to see repeated: five weeks after that hearing, the first lawsuit was filed in what became an avalanche of litigation that resulted in a $206bn judgment against big tobacco and a permanent sullying of its public image. The parallels with big oil today are uncanny. The big tobacco lawsuit was “premised on a simple notion”, said Mike Moore, the attorney general of Mississippi, who initiated the case: “You caused the health crisis – you pay for it” by reimbursing states for the extra costs that smoking imposed on their public health systems. Replace “the health crisis” with “the climate crisis” and you have the very same argument that New York, Massachusetts, Minnesota and dozens of other state and local governments have made in their pending lawsuits against oil companies. And just as tobacco companies lied for 40 years about the dangers of smoking, so too have the oil companies lied for decades about the dangers of burning fossil fuels. They saw today’s climate crisis coming – their own scientists repeatedly warned top executives about it – and decided, bring it on. Given the stakes, it’s odd that the CEOs of ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron and Shell aren’t better known. As much as anyone, they are driving the earth’s climate into chaos, yet most of us don’t even know their names. The climate conversation usually focuses on governments and the politicians who run them, while the companies whose products cause the problem – and the executives who get paid astronomical sums for doing it – remain in the background. Which is doubtless how they like it. So, let’s remember the names of the Big Oil 4 – Darren Woods of ExxonMobil, Michael Wirth of Chevron, David Lawler of BP and Gretchen Watkins of Shell Oil – and pay heed to what they say, or don’t say, at the 28 October hearing. If we’re lucky, C-Span and other cable networks will carry the hearing live. Watching the Big Oil 4 twist themselves into knots to avoid a repeat of big tobacco’s debacle would be high entertainment, not to mention a bracing lesson in how elected officials can hold amoral corporations accountable. The big tobacco hearing made history with one simple question: do you think that nicotine is addictive? Here’s the question for the Big Oil 4: will you apologize, here today, for your company’s decades of lying about climate change? This story is published as part of Covering Climate Now, a global collaboration of news outlets strengthening coverage of the climate story. Mark Hertsgaard is Covering Climate Now’s executive director | ['environment/series/climate-crimes', 'business/oilandgascompanies', 'business/oil', 'business/commodities', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/mark-hertsgaard', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-special-projects'] | environment/series/climate-crimes | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM | 2021-10-14T10:00:47Z | true | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM |
business/2019/dec/19/pork-producers-swine-flu-china-trade-deal | Windfall for US pork producers shows one man's crisis is another's opportunity | Gene Marks | There are more than 60,000 large and small pork farmers in the United States, according to Successful Farming, an industry trade publication. These farmers have an output of about $23.4bn a year and supply about 2.2m metric tons of pork products to customers outside of the US. It could be more. Unfortunately, it’s been a frustrating couple of years for these farmers, mostly due to the Trump administration’s tariffs that have hindered sales to their largest external customer, China. But things are about to change, and these same pork farmers who have been held back are now about to profit. Big time. That’s because many are expecting that the “phase one” part of the administration’s new trade deal with China will lift the high tariffs on pork products sold from the US which will in turn make the price of American pork products more attractive – and more competitive – than ever. And the agreement could not have come at a better time. The Chinese pork industry has recently become the victim of an unchecked spread of African swine fever which has devastated its pork supplies by as much as half, according to some estimates. The result of this misfortune has been rising prices amid a serious shortage of supply. So much so that Chinese officials are increasingly worried that the lack of meat – a staple among many of its citizens – could cause food shortages. Countries that rely on pork purchases from China are also concerned. “The epidemic could have broad and deep economic impacts at the global level,” Boubaker Ben Belhassen, the director of trade and markets at the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome told the New York Times. “We don’t think there’s enough pork in the world to offset China’s shortfall.” You would think that this potential worldwide supply shortage would be a huge opportunity for American pork producers. It is. But with the Trump administration’s ongoing trade disputes, many in the industry have been losing sales to cheaper competitors elsewhere in South America and Europe. Not that things have been that bad for pork farmers in the US. Even in the midst of the higher tariffs brought about by the US-China trade dispute, sales of pork to China and Hong Kong have soared 47% this past year, according to Reuters. But the potential trade compromise is expected to bring about even more sales. “China has already taken a lot of product,” said Steve Meyer, economist for Kerns and Associates. “They’re going to take more and more.” The new “phase one” trade deal agreed by the US and China includes a commitment for the Chinese to increase their purchases of US farm products to $40bn over the next two years. Many are expecting these additional purchases to include a significant amount of pork, and that’s good news for American pork producers – particularly smaller farmers – who have been struggling to compete during the past few years. While other small farmers have seen their businesses pushed to the brink of extinction as a result of the Trump administration’s tariffs, the US pork farming industry actually caught a lucky break during this period, thanks to the significant price jumps and supply shortages caused by the African swine flu outbreak in China. Now comes another break for the industry – a new trade deal that will allow US pork farmers to further increase their sales to a country desperate for their products. Ultimately, the situation will resolve itself and China will recover. But the story is a reminder of how reliant our businesses are on factors beyond our control. And that one man’s crisis is another man’s opportunity – as long as governments don’t get in the way. | ['business/us-small-business', 'world/china', 'environment/farming', 'us-news/us-news', 'us-news/trump-administration', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/gene-marks', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-business'] | environment/farming | BIODIVERSITY | 2019-12-19T11:00:47Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
environment/2020/jul/02/uk-gives-go-ahead-to-giant-windfarm-project-off-norfolk-coast-vanguard | UK gives go-ahead to giant windfarm project off Norfolk coast | The construction of two giant offshore windfarms is poised to go ahead off the Norfolk coast in what the renewable energy industry claims could provide a “huge boost” to the UK economy. The business secretary, Alok Sharma, gave the green light on Wednesday evening to the Norfolk Vanguard project and said he was “minded to approve” the Hornsea 3 proposal later this year. The 1.8GW Norfolk Vanguard windfarm will be more than 40 miles off the Bacton coast by the Swedish energy group Vattenfall. The 2.4GW Hornsea 3 windfarm, which is being proposed by the Danish company Orsted, would extend the Hornsea 1 and 2 projects further into the North Sea. Together the two new projects would generate enough clean electricity to power almost 4m UK homes, as well as providing a boost to the economy, according to Renewable UK. “Investments in major clean energy projects like these are great examples of how we can get the economy moving again,” said Hugh McNeal, the chief executive of the industry body. “These projects will help us to maintain our global lead in offshore wind, as well as building up our UK supply chain. “Large scale offshore wind power is good for our environment and our economy, by tackling climate change will boosting productivity and creating thousands of jobs in the process.” The government faces growing calls to invest in the UK’s green industries to help bolster the economy following the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. Gunnar Groebler, the head of Vattenfall’s wind power business, said the decision to approve the Vanguard project justified “the confidence that we have in the offshore wind sector in Britain”. “Today’s news sends a strong signal that the UK is serious about its climate ambitions and is open for business to power a green economic recovery,” he said. The greenlight from Sharma comes weeks after the government pushed back a decision deadline for another offshore Vattenfall windfarm, the 1.8GW Norfolk Boreas project, by up to five months. At the time the company described the move as regrettable” and said it could “send the wrong signal” to the renewables industry. The government expects to make a decision on the Boreas project before the end of October, and on the Hornsea 3 project by the end of September subject to further information, which is required from Orsted. An Orsted spokesman said that although the company was disappointed by the delay, it was confident that it would be able to provide the necessary evidence within the government’s timeframe. “Hornsea 3 is a major infrastructure project which responds directly to the urgent need for low-carbon generation at scale in the UK and can contribute to a green economic recovery,” he said. | ['environment/windpower', 'business/energy-industry', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'environment/energy', 'environment/environment', 'business/business', 'uk/uk', 'environment/green-economy', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/jillian-ambrose', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/financial3', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-business'] | environment/renewableenergy | ENERGY | 2020-07-02T13:19:46Z | true | ENERGY |
global-development/2020/jan/20/the-river-is-our-home-bangladeshi-boatmen-mourn-their-receding-waters | 'The river is our home': Bangladeshi boatmen mourn their receding waters | Holding his downturned palm level with his waist, Musana Robi Das indicates how tall he was when he started working on Bangladesh’s rivers. As a child he helped his father ferry villagers across local waterways. Now a tall and spindly 50-year-old, he has had to abandon that life as a boatman. The waters now sit so low that his services are unnecessary. So the past decade has instead been spent repairing shoes inside a dimly lit wooden booth in the village market. Bangladesh has 700 rivers integral to the country’s culture, but many of them are dying. Driven by changing weather patterns and the country’s relentless push towards development, the crisis has become so critical that in July 2019 the supreme court declared all the country’s rivers to be “living entities”, with anyone damaging them subject to punishment. But for many of the communities whose lives depend on the waterways, the change of law has come too late. “I used to love just rowing the boat, being on the river. Nowadays I have very little work,” says Robi Das. “The river was so much higher before. Now you see there are fields by the bank, but they used to all be part of the river.” Only a month since the end of Bangladesh’s rainy season, the river sits at less than half the level it did when it was a healthy tributary of the Surma, part of an extensive river system that stretches from India, breaking off and joining other rivers on the path southwards to the Bay of Bengal. Robi Das is part of a small Hindu community in Bangladesh’s northern Sylhet district, in the town of Biswanath near the border with India, which has always been connected to the river. “The river is our home. We are always going down to it, we do everything there,” said his neighbour, fisherman Lilon Chandra Das, 47. “Our lives were more comfortable before, we could live from the river. Today I have a net with me in my boat but I don’t have much confidence that I will catch anything. In the past it was guaranteed.” Both people and goods were traditionally transported along Bangladesh’s extensive river network. Floating markets still exist in parts of the country, and communities like the Choonati (named after the paste chewed with betel nut, made from grinding the shells of snails found on the river bed) found specialised work on the water. “They are the biggest losers. First of all, fishermen. Hundreds of fishing communities have been destroyed. Then the boatmen,” said Sheikh Rokon, founder of the Riverine People network of environmental activists. He said the death of Bangladesh’s rivers has been caused by encroachment, erosion, pollution and sand mining. All of these problems stem, he claimed, from decreased water flows that, while due in part to internal land barriers, are largely a result of restrictions on the flow by Bangladesh’s neighbours, especially India. The two countries share several major rivers, but Bangladeshi communities complain that they suffer from India’s dams depriving them of water during dry spells and inundating them in the rainy season. In October 2019, Bangladesh’s state news agency reported that 78,000 people were affected by flooding in the country’s north-west soon after India opened the floodgates of its Farakka barrage, 20km from the border. Reviving the rivers Since independence from Pakistan in 1971, Bangladesh has forged a path towards development that has focused on rapidly building its economy. The changes have been visible. Instead of rivers, transportation is concentrated on roads that even in rural areas are now congested. Dhaka, once a small capital, is now one of the most populous cities in the world, growing by an estimated half a million people every year. Dhaka’s water bodies have shrunk by two-thirds over the past 20 years, according to a recent study by the Bangladesh Institute of Planners, and hundreds of factories and tanneries pollute the city’s Buriganga river, according to activists. Bangladesh’s progress has seen the country neglect its rivers in pursuit of resources, according to Rokon. “We have 38 rivers which are severely polluted and encroached. We have more than 80 rivers that are [suffering] under the sand-mining situation,” he said. “The modern monster is sand-mining. It is cruelly killing our rivers.” Sylhet has suffered because the sand and stone collected from its river beds, washed down from the hills in India, are used in roads and construction. The often illegal and excessive collection has diverted the flow of rivers, according to the government’s forestry department. As one of the activists who campaigned for Bangladesh to recognise the legal rights of rivers, Rokon welcomed the supreme court’s July ruling, but he is also sceptical that action will be taken. Aside from the challenge of taking on businesses that profit from mining the rivers or building around them, Rokon says there needs to be a cultural change in Bangladesh, where the traditional link to rivers has been forgotten. “People became detached culturally from the rivers. We have to revive the utility of the rivers,” he said. In Biswanath, the local administration has been exploring ways to reroute their dying river with the hope of increasing its flow for fishermen like Chandra Das, and to revive a tradition of transporting people and goods along the waterways, which could prove quicker and cheaper than Bangladesh’s clogged roads. Robi Das is less optimistic about the changes, however. The death of local rivers has already forced him to search for a new livelihood and he expects his children will do the same. “I have moved on now, even if they revive the rivers there won’t be much chance of us returning to it. My children study and they will try to use that for their lives,” he said. | ['global-development/environmental-sustainability', 'global-development/employment', 'global-development/global-development', 'environment/rivers', 'environment/sustainable-development', 'environment/environment', 'world/bangladesh', 'world/south-and-central-asia', 'world/world', 'type/article', 'tone/features', 'profile/kaamil-ahmed', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/global-development'] | environment/sustainable-development | CLIMATE_POLICY | 2020-01-20T11:00:24Z | true | CLIMATE_POLICY |
australia-news/2019/jun/06/china-behind-massive-australian-national-university-hack-intelligence-officials-say | China behind massive Australian National University hack, intelligence officials say | Intelligence officials believe China may have been behind a massive data breach which compromised the personal details of thousands of Australian National University students and staff. The Sydney Morning Herald reports that senior intelligence officials have pointed the finger at China as one of only a few countries capable of pulling off the hack, which compromised up to 19 years’ worth of personal data from students and staff. The ANU revealed the breach on Tuesday, with vice-chancellor Brian Schmidt saying the university had detected an “unauthorised access to significant amounts” of data including the bank numbers, tax details, academic records and passport details of students and staff dating back almost two decades. The Australian Signals Directorate said the hack appeared to be the work of a sophisticated actor, and now intelligence officials are reportedly pointing the finger at China. The ANU, based in Canberra, has graduates throughout the public service, including in Australia’s intelligence and security agencies. Quoting senior intelligence officials on Thursday, the Herald reported fears the data will be used to recruit students or ANU alumni as informants. The university is also home to the influential School of Strategic and Defence Studies and the Crawford School of Public Policy, which hold close links with government departments and agencies. It followed similar attempts to breach the university’s computer systems in July last year. Those attacks were also attributed to Chinese hackers at the time. Schmidt said the university had upgraded its systems to better protect data, however he admitted the breach was detected only a fortnight ago even though it began late last year. “Following the incident reported last year, we undertook a range of upgrades to our systems to better protect our data. Had it not been for those upgrades, we would not have detected this incident,” Schmidt said. The hack is one of the most significant breaches in Australia recently. In February there was an attack on the federal parliament’s computer system, in which a “sophisticated state actor” attempted to access data held by Australia’s three major political parties. Following ANU’s disclosure of the breach the Australian Cyber Security Centre confirmed it was helping the university to secure the networks, protect users and investigate the full extent of the compromise. “This compromise is a salient reminder that the cyber threat is real and that the methods used by malicious actors are constantly evolving,” a spokesman said. “Unfortunately, a malicious actor with sufficient capability, time and resources will almost always be able to compromise an internet-connected computer network.” | ['australia-news/australian-security-and-counter-terrorism', 'australia-news/australian-universities', 'technology/cybercrime', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'australia-news/australian-education', 'world/china', 'technology/technology', 'australia-news/canberra', 'world/privacy', 'australia-news/australian-capital-territory-act', 'technology/hacking', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/michael-mcgowan', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | technology/hacking | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE | 2019-06-06T00:16:20Z | true | UNRELATED_TO_CLIMATE |
environment/2022/mar/22/young-global-climate-strike-2022-share-your-photos-and-stories | Young global climate strike 2022: share your photos and stories | Youth protesters will be taking part in a global climate strike on Friday which is expected to take place in more than 600 locations. We would like to hear from young people about why they think it’s important to take part, who they will be attending with, and where. We are also interested in hearing if you have taken part in a strike before. Share your experiences You can get in touch by filling in the form below or contact us via WhatsApp by clicking here or adding +44(0)7766780300. Your responses are secure as the form is encrypted and only the Guardian has access to your contributions. Please do see a permission from a parent or guardian, if you’re under the age of 17. One of our journalists will be in contact before we publish, so please do leave contact details. If you’re having trouble using the form, click here. Read terms of service here and privacy policy here. | ['environment/school-climate-strikes', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/callout', 'profile/guardian-community-team', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-communities-and-social'] | environment/school-climate-strikes | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM | 2022-03-22T16:26:23Z | true | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM |
uk/undercover-with-paul-lewis-and-rob-evans/2011/dec/19/legal-action-against-undercover-policemen | Former girlfriends of undercover policemen | Rob Evans | Over the weekend came news which may unsettle police chiefs during their festive breaks. Eight women announced that they have started legal action against police chiefs. The eight say they were "deliberately and knowingly deceived" into forming long-term intimate relationships with undercover policemen. The deception caused them huge emotional trauma and pain, they say in their legal argument. Articles on this news can be found here and here, along with the statement drawn up by the eight women. The women appear to be a strong position. It seems probable that the case will never actually go to court. The question is - would police chiefs really be happy to fight a case in court where the eight women tell heart-breaking stories of how they were deceived by the undercover policemen for years and years? These stories would be recounted day after day for the public to hear. To say the least, it would not be flattering to the police's reputation. To take just one example, the women point out in their statement that the long-term relationships ended when the men suddenly vanished, pleading a variety of excuses - they were depressed, they needed to "sort their heads out", they were on the run from the police and the such like. But in reality, say the women, the men were being recalled from their undercover deployment on the orders of their superiors. The eight say :"After the women formed loving relationships with these men, they disappeared when their posting ended, leaving the women to cope with the trauma of not knowing whether or not the person they were in love with would return, not knowing if they should be worried or angry and trying to discover what was real and what was not." Aside from the personal aspects of the case, police chiefs would almost certainly have to disclose documents describing the clandestine work of the undercover policemen - what instructions their superiors gave them, what information were they collecting, why they were taken off their undercover deployments and so on. Police chiefs are surely unwilling to allow the inner workings of such a secret operation to be aired in a courtroom. They have not even admitted officially the existence of one of the covert units, the Special Demonstration Squad which was set up in 1968 and operated for many years. They are also pretty secretive about the existing covert unit, the National Public Order Intelligence unit. So police chiefs face the classic question - do they want all their dirty linen to be produced in a courtroom for all to see? Odds on, they won't. The alternative is to offer an out-of-court settlement to each of the eight. The women would surely be offered favourable terms if that did happen. So far the police have said little, other than they are considering the contents of a letter from the eight's lawyer, Harriet Wistrich of London law firm Birnberg Peirce. Jim Boyling, the undercover police officer who infilltrated animal rights and environmental groups, has denied any wrongdoing, adding that – as the lawyers for the women "have indicated they intend to bring an action against the Metropolitan police – the proper venue to determine whether there is any truth in the allegations is the court and not the media". Over the weekend, one activist blogger paid tribute to the "bravery and dignity" of the women. The blogger, in the blog known as Bristling Badger, wrote that "they have not hired publicity agents to splash them across the press for money, nor are they going for their specific cops individually." "Instead, by going anonymously they emphasise the way police invaded their personal lives; by going collectively they demolish the lie that relationships were forbidden and Mark Kennedy was one rogue officer; and by suing the Met as an institution they go for the real villains and give the best chance of bringing the workings of this murky corruption out into the light." As part of any settlement, the eight want an end to this kind of conduct. They say :"We are bringing this case because we want to see an end to the sexual and psychological abuse of campaigners and others by undercover police officers. It is unacceptable that state agents can cultivate intimate and long lasting relationships with political activists in order to gain so called intelligence on those political movements." | ['uk/undercover-with-paul-lewis-and-rob-evans', 'tone/blog', 'uk/mark-kennedy', 'environment/activism', 'law/law', 'uk/metropolitan-police', 'uk/ukcrime', 'world/surveillance', 'law/uk-civil-liberties', 'lifeandstyle/women', 'politics/women', 'type/article', 'profile/robevans'] | environment/activism | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM | 2011-12-19T15:27:29Z | true | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM |
environment/2016/jun/21/great-barrier-reef-tourists-will-go-elsewhere-if-bleaching-continues-poll | Great Barrier Reef: tourists will go elsewhere if bleaching continues – poll | If the bleaching continues on the Great Barrier Reef, tourists say they will pack their bags and go elsewhere, taking with them an estimated $1bn a year and costing 10,000 jobs in regional Queensland, according to a new poll. The majority of Chinese tourists, and about a third of UK and US tourists, said if severe bleaching continues, and “some of the reef dies completely,” they would be more likely to visit somewhere other than Australia, according to the online polling of more than 4,000 people commissioned by the Australia Institute If they did visit Australia, 63% of Chinese, 42% of US and 37% of UK tourists said they’d visit somewhere other than the Great Barrier Reef. Similarly, 37% of Australian tourists said the same thing. Among the international tourists, 63% said they had heard about the bleaching but most still thought the reef was in good shape. While 53% of Australians thought the reef was in poor or very poor condition, only 14% of Chinese tourists did. Meanwhile, 33% of US and 43% of UK tourists thought the reef was in poor or very poor condition. If bleaching continued, and the surveys accurately reflected what tourists would do, the Australia Institute calculated it would mean the regions adjacent to the reef would miss out on more than one million tourists a year – almost a third of the total numbers. This could mean losses of $931m, leading to 10,0000 job losses, the report authors found. “While there has been lots of talk about the potential tourism impacts of coral bleaching, this is the first time anyone has gone to our key tourism markets and asked them what they might do if we aren’t able to better protect the reef,” said the executive director of the Australia Institute, Ben Oquist. “The Chinese market is particularly sensitive, with 55% more likely to visit another country. Among Chinese people who travel regularly, this rate is even higher, up to 65%. Chinese tourists are attracted by Australia’s relatively clean environment, so they respond strongly to changes in that perception.” In 2016, 93% of individual reefs along the Great Barrier Reef experienced bleaching and 22% of the coral died. It was the worst bleaching event in the reef’s history. Scientists found it was virtually impossible without climate change, and the conditions that caused it would be average within 20 years. The Guardian revealed in May that the Australian government was so concerned about how climate change’s impact the reef could hit tourism that it intervened to have every mention of Australia and the reef scrubbed from a Unesco report. Similarly, when the government agencies revealed that 22% of the reef had died, they released the figures with a press release that focused on dispelling perceived exaggerations of the damage, and on the ability of coral to recover, rather than on the magnitude of the environmental disaster. Oquist said the government needed to take serious action on climate change and stop new coalmines if it want to protect the reef. “Fortunately, the Queensland economy is modern and diverse,” Oquist said. “Four in five people work in service industries, while only 1% work in the coal industry. Policies such as a moratorium on new coalmines can be implemented with a minimal effect on the Queensland economy.” | ['environment/great-barrier-reef', 'australia-news/queensland', 'environment/marine-life', 'environment/coral', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'environment/environment', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/michael-slezak', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/great-barrier-reef | BIODIVERSITY | 2016-06-20T20:07:53Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
business/2011/feb/03/viewpoint-mining | Mining is hotter than oil | Thought Shell's cash flows were impressive? Wait until you see what the miners are doing. The price of copper touched $10,000 a tonne today. The cost of production for the likes of BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto is about $2,500. Similarly, some iron ore can be dug up at a cost of $20 a tonne in Australia. Freight costs are about $10 to China, where customers pay $160. Right now, mining is even hotter than oil. | ['business/series/viewpointcolumn', 'business/business', 'tone/comment', 'environment/mining', 'business/rio-tinto', 'business/mining', 'business/bhpbilliton', 'business/oil', 'business/commodities', 'type/article', 'profile/nilspratley'] | environment/mining | ENERGY | 2011-02-03T20:18:11Z | true | ENERGY |
world/2021/may/27/oman-plans-to-build-worlds-largest-green-hydrogen-plant | Oman plans to build world’s largest green hydrogen plant | Oman is planning to build one of the largest green hydrogen plants in the world in a move to make the oil-producing nation a leader in renewable energy technology. Construction is scheduled to start in 2028 in Al Wusta governorate on the Arabian Sea. It will be built in stages, with the aim to be at full capacity by 2038, powered by 25 gigawatts of wind and solar energy. The consortium of companies behind the $30bn (£21bn) project includes the state-owned oil and gas company OQ, the Hong Kong-based renewable hydrogen developer InterContinental Energy and the Kuwait-based energy investor Enertech. Once online, the plant will use renewable energy to split water in an electrolyser to produce green hydrogen, which is able to replace fossil fuels without producing carbon emissions. Most will be exported to Europe and Asia, said Alicia Eastman, the co-founder and president of InterContinental Energy, either as hydrogen or converted into green ammonia, which is easier to ship and store. The facility aims to produce 1.8m tonnes of green hydrogen and up to 10m tonnes of green ammonia a year. Oman currently relies heavily on fossil fuels, generating up to 85% of its GDP from oil and gas, but its fossil fuel reserves are dwindling and becoming increasingly costly to extract. In December 2020, the country published its Oman Vision 2040 strategy, a plan to diversify the economy away from fossil fuels and increase investment in renewables. Green hydrogen could play an important role, said Eastman, thanks to the Oman’s combination of plentiful daytime sun and strong winds at night. “Oman is one of the places in the world that I’ve called the ‘future renewable superpowers’,” said Michael Liebreich, the founder of BloombergNEF, “because what you really want [to produce green hydrogen] is very cheap solar and very cheap wind.” While electrification is the most efficient way of decarbonising most sectors, it’s limited when it comes to energy-intensive industries such as steel, chemicals, aviation and shipping. Green hydrogen will be vital to help fill these gaps, said the International Energy Agency in its report published this week, which called for an end to fossil fuel investments if governments are serious about climate commitments. A wave of net zero-emissions pledges has already led to a slew of hydrogen strategies, including from the European Commission in 2020, which predicted the share of hydrogen in the EU’s energy mix would rise from 2% to 14% by 2050. Yet green hydrogen currently makes up less than 1% of global hydrogen production. The majority is still produced using fossil fuels such as gas and coal, in a process that emits about 830m tonnes of carbon annually, equivalent to the emissions of the UK and Indonesia combined. “Blue hydrogen” is a cleaner version, as emissions are captured and stored, but it is still produced using gas – and is seen by some oil companies as a way to keep using fossil fuels. One of the stumbling blocks for green hydrogen has been cost, partly because of the huge amounts of energy required. But as renewables and electrolysers become cheaper, and fossil fuel prices rise, costs could fall by up to 64% by 2030, according to research from the consultancy Wood Mackenzie. “Most green hydrogen products will not be competitive for at least another decade,” said Falko Ueckerdt, a senior scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, who sees the Oman project as “a sign that investors anticipate large future demands for hydrogen-based fuels after 2030”. Oman’s proposed plant is just one in a slate of green hydrogen mega projects planned globally. Eastman said InterContinental Energy has a number of other plants in the works, including a 26GW wind and solar green hydrogen plant in the Pilbara, Western Australia. If constructed, this $36bn (£25.5bn) plant would be the world’s biggest energy project. The first phase is expected to be online by 2028. In March, the renewables company Enegix Energy announced the construction of a green hydrogen plan in Ceará state, north-eastern Brazil. Once built, which the company estimates will take about four years, the plant would produce more than 600,000 tonnes of green hydrogen per year from 3.4GW of wind and solar power. “People are upping the gigawatts, and they should,” said Eastman, “there’s so much room in the market.” | ['world/oman', 'environment/hydrogen-power', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'environment/energy', 'environment/environment', 'world/middleeast', 'world/world', 'environment/windpower', 'environment/solarpower', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/laura-paddison', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/solarpower | ENERGY | 2021-05-27T08:51:07Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/2015/mar/04/fairies-woodland-homes-face-planning-control | Fairies' woodland homes face planning control | The first fairy door appeared more than a decade ago, a beautifully handcrafted work of art with a working handle, hinges and a little bed tucked behind it. But since then so many tiny doors have been fixed to trees in one Somerset wood that the custodians of this slice of sylvan paradise are having to bring in planning controls. “The problem is there are just too many of them – and some are a little bit garish, they don’t fit in,” said Stuart Le Fevre, a trustee for Wayford woods, near Crewkerne. He said doors were being screwed into living trees, which could be damaging. “And some have been added to trees far away from the paths so children have been trampling over the bluebells. We don’t want to discourage children and we certainly are not anti-fairy – but we have to take some sort of action.” Most of the fairy doors are fixed to nooks and crannies in the mossy bases of trees. Visiting children are convinced that fairies live behind the doors and often leave notes, snacks or presents for the tiny creatures. One child was recently persuaded to leave a cherished dummy in a crevice. Sometimes excited youngsters find notes addressed to them behind the closed doors. No one has counted exactly how many doors there are but at the peak there may have been as many as 200. Many of the doors are as tasteful as the first one to appear. They’ve been built in all shapes, sizes and colours, some adorned with names and numbers. One or two builders have gone for grandeur – the architect of Grand Hollow Hall boasts a door with clear Gothic influences. Others have opted for a more homely style, installing the sort of cosy door that might have appealed to Bilbo Baggins. However, some trees have proved just too tempting a target for developers and trunks have acquired up to 10 doors apiece. There have been comments about the proliferation of pinks, bright blues, even tinsel, jarring with the lovely greenery. A “low-point” came when someone installed a mini fairy playground (which was swiftly removed). Le Fevre admitted that the more garish doors had started to vanish. He won’t say who is removing them. “I think it’s the goblins,” he said. “Our goblins have very good taste.” Reluctantly, the trustees are planning to set up signs requesting restraint when it comes to fairy doors and are wondering whether to limit them to a particular area of the 12-hectare (30-acre) site, which features a stream, meadow, ornamental lake and snowdrops, bluebells and rhododendrons. There was sympathy for the trustees from fans of the woods and doors. Jake Birkett, who visited the woods with his sons, said: “It is a magical place. My children loved running around and finding the doors. But I understand that the wood needs to be protected.” Phaedra Perry, a regional manager for a charity, who said she often visited the woods with her young niece and nephew (who, aged six and four, are keen on fairies), agreed the doors were getting too numerous. “My niece and nephew love them. There are more and more every time we go. The woods are lovely – and I think it’s right to limit the number.” | ['environment/forests', 'books/fairytales', 'environment/conservation', 'society/children', 'uk/uk', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/stevenmorris', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews'] | environment/forests | BIODIVERSITY | 2015-03-04T20:07:24Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
tv-and-radio/2017/sep/04/grand-designs-presenter-kevin-mccloud-seeks-to-raise-50m-to-build-600-homes-a-year | Grand Designs' Kevin McCloud seeks to raise £50m to build 600 homes a year | Grand Designs presenter Kevin McCloud is seeking to raise up to £50m to build about 600 “beautiful and sustainable” houses a year in a challenge to the soulless, identikit estates built by conventional developers. McCloud’s firm, HAB (Happiness, Architecture, Beauty) is hoping to raise the money through a bond for private investors, promising a return of 4.8% a year over a five-year period. The money will be used to buy land and start construction on houses, mostly in the south-west of England, that McCloud promises will be “a pleasure to live in”. The bond issue marks a big step-up in housing development by McCloud, now filming his 18th series of the homebuilding and renovation television programme. Until now, McCloud has been behind several small projects, with 42 homes built in Swindon, 78 in Stroud and 50 in Winchester. The £50m will help to finance a tenfold increase in development, with sites for 675 homes identified around Bristol, Oxfordshire, Somerset and Wiltshire with a gross value of about £170m. McCloud’s investment scheme comes with a lengthy list of wealth warnings. The bond is not covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, so investors could lose all their money. The money is locked away for five years, and investors will not find it easy to transfer or sell their holdings during that period. The HAB Bond will be quoted on the Gibraltar stock exchange, which, although governed by EU regulations, means it can be sold only to sophisticated investors, with the minimum investment set at £10,000. McCloud said he had spent a decade evolving the concepts his TV viewers are familiar with – green and sustainable homes, individually designed, from the grand to the sometimes eccentric – and translating them into homes for a much broader market. “I sincerely believe grand designs are not the preserve of the one-off or that you have to use straw bales in their construction. The challenge of the next 30 years is for us to build new, and retro-fit old, homes in a socially and environmentally responsible way. We can only do that with critical mass.” He said all his schemes would include social housing and designed to have shared public amenities and social spaces. Homes would have “high thermal mass” so they do not lose heat easily, and estates would include electricity micro-generators, he said. McCloud added that he had learned from the small-scale developments built by HAB so far. “I’ve learned that as much as you can be ambitious and wave the flag for sharing and sustainability, the reality is that most people lead very busy lives. It’s important to put in place professional management and keep it modest.” He said there would be no “McCloud premium” on the price of the planned homes, although every scheme so far had been a sellout and “unlike other developers we have never had to discount our homes”. The first £10m of the cash raised by McCloud will finance the construction of Elderberry Walk in Southmead, Bristol, which is scheduled to begin later this year. It will consist of a range of homes from one-bedroom flats to four-bedroom houses designed around a central, 20-metre-wide “green street” linking the surrounding housing to the neighbouring park. HAB aims to turn a derelict city site into a sought-after residential location, with more than 30% of the homes earmarked as affordable to those on lower incomes. This is not McCloud’s first fundraising exercise. In 2013, HAB raised £1.9m of equity crowdfunding from 649 investors, and in January this year picked up another £2.4m with a ”mini-bond” offering a much higher rate of interest, at 8%. Investors may wonder why HAB is returning to investors so soon after the earlier bond. “Whilst the HAB Land mini-bond was a great success and raised around £2.4m, the potential new sites require a significant increase in funding,” he said. | ['tv-and-radio/kevin-mccloud', 'tv-and-radio/tv-and-radio', 'business/construction', 'tv-and-radio/homes-tv', 'business/business', 'culture/television', 'business/investing', 'business/housingmarket', 'society/housing', 'environment/sustainable-development', 'uk/uk', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/patrickcollinson', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/financial3', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-business'] | environment/sustainable-development | CLIMATE_POLICY | 2017-09-04T06:00:05Z | true | CLIMATE_POLICY |
world/2022/jul/26/yosemite-visitors-undeterred-california-forest-fires | ‘Parks are wild by nature’: Yosemite visitors undeterred by raging forest fires | Yosemite national park’s dramatic vistas were shrouded by a thick grey haze on Monday afternoon, as smoke from the fiercely burning Oak fire hung over its granite peaks. Along the road winding toward the valley, skeletal trees told the story of the Washburn fire that tore through just weeks earlier. The blazes – the two largest to ignite in California so far this year – have besieged Yosemite during one of its busiest months, causing entrance closures, cancellations, and cloaking the landmark in hazardous air. But many visitors, some of whom have travelled to see the sights from across the US and around the world, were determined not to let the conditions slow them down. On Monday afternoon, as the air quality index (AQI) pushed past 250, a level categorised as very unhealthy, cars zigzagged through the park carrying bikes and inner tubes, ready for the day. Under a fiery-orange glow, visitors could be seen picnicking, trekking, and floating in the river despite the strong scorched scent that filled the air as ash danced in the breeze. Tents still lined campgrounds throughout the valley, bikes crisscrossed through the paths alongside emergency vehicles, and people piled on to the shuttle. Mark and Victoria, aged 12 and seven, who had travelled all the way from Finland, managed to get one swim in the river before calling it a day because of the declining air quality. “We have still had a great day today – better than expected,” their father, Rami Madanad, said as he watched them from the shore alongside his wife, Marina. They had only planned for one day in the park and were trying to make the most of it, but everyone’s eyes had begun to burn. Others, however, were wavering on whether they would brave the harsh conditions. Darren Stehle brought his family down from Oregon. They had already had to cancel plans to go to one national park this year due to natural disaster, when Yellowstone was hit by record-breaking floods. “And then we decided to do this,” he said, shaking his head and laughing as he peered out over Tunnel View vantage point, now completely clouded in smoke. “If the kids want to get out we will get out – even though we have a reservation for two nights,” Mike Dyangko, who was there with Stehle, said of his grandchildren. “It’s not worth them getting sick.” Yosemite, which typically has more than half a million visitors each July, has been hammered by fire this month. National Park Service (NPS) officials and hospitality representatives with Aramark, the company that handles the park’s reservations, recreation and restaurants, say they closely monitor hazards and work with local health officials to determine if closures are essential. But often the park remains open even when risks are present. “For a lot of folks this is their visit,” said the Yosemite spokesperson Scott Gediman, noting that the NPS does what it can to keep the park open. “The health and safety of the firefighters and visitors is our paramount concern,” he added. But, with air quality fluctuating throughout the day, he said Yosemite provided information and options to guests and expected them to make up their own minds using good judgment. The park would not close, he said, “unless the air quality becomes consistently dangerous for everybody”. The park does offer more leniency with cancellations as the air quality deteriorates and enables more sensitive groups to opt out without penalty. Facilitated outdoor activities, such as bike rentals and pool access, also shut down when AQI spikes above 150 – a level considered unhealthy for sensitive groups. Clean air stations are open for staff around the clock and officials said decisions are adapted as conditions change. “Fires, floods, rock-falls – these are natural processes, and that’s what a national park is all about,” Gediman said. But officials still do all they can to mitigate disasters, and these fires are being attacked for full suppression. “National parks like Yosemite are wild by nature,” he added. “People understand that and people are for the most part making good decisions.” In recent years, however, these hard decisions have had to be made more often. Fuelled by the climate crisis, disasters are on the rise. Fires are burning more ferociously, especially in parched, overgrown landscapes across California’s Sierra Nevada. The constant threat of catastrophe – or even just uncomfortable conditions – is enough to drive some to give up on the park. “There’s so much fire damage,” Aaron Ford said, leaning on his car loaded up with bikes. “We’d never been to Yosemite so our plan was to just get out and hike around,” his wife, Kim, added. “But now we are planning to skip the hiking.” The Ford family, who were visiting from Malibu, California, do not plan on trying again soon. Even after reserving passes, they decided to cruise through quickly, heading to the clearer skies in Mammoth farther east. “It’s hard because it feels like there’s a fire here every year,” Kim said. “If you want to book anything you have to book a year in advance,” she added. “The chances are high that there’s going to be something like this.” | ['world/wildfires', 'environment/environment', 'environment/national-parks', 'world/americas', 'world/world', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'us-news/california', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'tone/features', 'profile/gabrielle-canon', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/west-coast-news'] | world/wildfires | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2022-07-26T12:16:51Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/2022/feb/16/us-universities-fossil-fuel-divestment-students-legal-complaint | Yale, Stanford and MIT’s fossil fuel investments are illegal, students say | Students at five leading universities have filed legal complaints accusing their colleges of breaking a little-known law by investing in the fossil fuel companies responsible for the climate emergency. The students from Yale, MIT, Princeton, Stanford and Vanderbilt wrote to the attorneys general of their respective states on Wednesday asking authorities to investigate breaches of the Uniform Prudent Management of Institutional Funds Act, which requires universities to invest in a manner consistent with their “charitable purposes”. The novel legal strategy, developed with lawyers from the Climate Defense Project, argues that the law imposes a legal duty to put the public interest first and that their universities, among the wealthiest and most prestigious colleges in the country, are failing to do so by investing in fossil fuel companies that cause damage to the environment and health. In addition, the complaints say that investments in coal, oil and gas are not financially responsible, as required by the law, because the industries have an uncertain future. The five universities together have total endowment funds of about $150bn, although only a small part is invested in fossil fuel companies. In their letter to Tennessee’s attorney general, Herbert Slatery, students, faculty and alumni at Vanderbilt University accused the college’s board of trustees of breaching its duties with investments from its $10bn endowment. “We ask that you investigate this conduct and use your enforcement powers to bring the Board of Trust’s investment practices into compliance with its fiduciary obligations,” the letter said. Hannah Reynolds, an anthropology student and co-coordinator of Divest Princeton, said the group filed the complaint after her university failed to act on earlier proposals to shed investments in fossil fuel companies. “There’s been nine years of fossil fuel divestment organising at Princeton and no commitment or action by Princeton. We’ve exercised every option, we’ve made every argument that we can, and Princeton hasn’t taken it seriously,” she said. Reynolds accused the university of stalling by having various panels and committees review divestment proposals, only to see them recommend contradictory actions that limit the scale of action. Last year, Princeton’s board of trustees announced it would divest from coal and tar sands but not oil and gas. Aaditi Lele, an organiser of the divestment campaign at Vanderbilt University, said students there faced a similar struggle. “Every time we ask them about fossil fuel divestment, they refer back to other actions that they’re taking to make the campus itself greener, such as carbon offsets, but they fail to address actual divestment. A lot of what they do is just greenwashing through mentioning those other actions and then using that as justification to pretend that that’s enough,” she said. Students at the five universities coordinated their action following similar initiatives Harvard and Cornell, which both subsequently announced they would shed fossil fuel investments. “We’ve seen other schools, specifically Harvard and Cornell, take the same approach,” said Reynolds. “Within months, both of those schools have divested. So our hope is that by taking this action, that maybe this will finally be taken seriously.” The students are also seeking to put pressure on their universities by drawing public attention to their continued financial involvement with the coal, oil and gas industries. Asked why the student groups asked state attorneys general to investigate instead of pursuing direct legal action, Reynolds said it was a question of resources. “Princeton is a university with a $39bn endowment, so they really have a lot of resources that we don’t have. I’m sure that they would be able to hire the lawyers to defend them in a way that would be much more difficult for us. We don’t have any funding or anything. It’s a bunch of volunteers in our campaign,” she said. Four of the universities are in states with Democratic attorneys general and their students expect at least a sympathetic hearing. Vanderbilt is in Tennessee, where Slatery is a Republican. But campaigners note that he declined to join 27 other states in a lawsuit against President Barack Obama’s policies to mitigate the climate crisis. Lele said the environmental crisis had not passed Tennessee by. The state was hit by catastrophic flash flooding last year that killed 20 people and damaged hundreds of homes. “Environmental degradation and its impacts have really been at the forefront of the conversation. So we’re hopeful that the political affiliations of the state don’t impede their understandings of the gravity of the situation,” she said. | ['environment/series/climate-crimes', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'environment/environment', 'us-news/us-universities', 'us-news/us-news', 'environment/fossil-fuel-divestment', 'world/activism', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/chrismcgreal', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-news', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-special-projects'] | environment/fossil-fuel-divestment | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM | 2022-02-16T14:23:36Z | true | CLIMATE_ACTIVISM |
business/2022/feb/04/waitrose-lidl-eco-friendly-supermarkets-which-plastic-waste | Waitrose and Lidl top list of eco-friendly supermarkets | Waitrose and Lidl are the most sustainable supermarkets, according to a Which?’s eco-friendly grocer ranking. Iceland finished last, according to the research, which tracked supermarket policies on: plastic waste and food waste, which shoppers have reported are the biggest issues for them; and greenhouse gas emissions, which most experts say poses the greatest environmental threat. In its first such ranking, the consumer magazine pointed out that supermarkets respond to customer demand, so if shoppers make eco-friendly choices and demand sustainable options, this can influence shops to improve. Harry Rose, editor of Which?, said: “We know that consumers increasingly want to shop sustainably and our in-depth analysis of three key areas shows that all the big supermarkets could be looking to make some improvements. “The good news is shoppers can make a big difference themselves by adopting more sustainable habits, such as buying loose fruit and vegetables, buying seasonal local produce, eating less meat and dairy and limiting their own food waste.” Lidl performed above its rivals on greenhouse gas emissions but fell short on food waste, though it said this is because it serves more fresh food in-store than many other comparable shops. Waitrose has strong policies on plastic and food waste compared with other supermarkets, and scored reasonably for greenhouse gas emissions. Iceland fell short because it was unable to report how much of its own-brand plastic is recyclable, so scored zero points. It also faces disadvantages as a frozen food specialist, as this made it the worst performer on operational greenhouse gas emissions due to its energy-draining in-store freezers. However, it does buy 100% renewable electricity for its UK sites. Marks & Spencer was found to use a lot of plastic compared with other supermarkets. It was also the only one unable to provide its food waste data in a comparable format, so scored zero points for this, and was in the bottom half of Which?’s table for emissions. For plastic use, the Co-op did best, while Ocado was the frontrunner in terms of food waste, as it redistributes almost all surplus food, leaving just 0.04% as waste. Which?’s ranking of supermarkets’ green measures 1. Lidl – 74% 1. Waitrose – 74% 3. Asda – 71% 3. Sainsbury’s – 71% 5. Tesco – 69% 6. Morrisons – 68% 7. Aldi – 66% 8. Co-op – 65% 9. Ocado – 63% 10. Marks & Spencer – 48% 11. Iceland – 29% | ['business/supermarkets', 'business/waitrose', 'business/lidl', 'environment/ethical-living', 'environment/waste', 'environment/food-waste', 'money/consumer-affairs', 'business/business', 'business/retail', 'business/packaging', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'uk/uk', 'business-to-business/sustainable-food-supply', 'tone/news', 'profile/helena-horton', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/waste | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2022-02-04T06:00:20Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
us-news/2024/oct/15/deaths-new-mexico-border-immigration | More than 100 people died near the New Mexico border in 2024 – a tenfold increase in two years | Ten times as many migrants died in New Mexico near the US-Mexico border in each of the last two years compared with just five years ago. During the first eight months of 2024, the bodies of 108 presumed migrants, mostly from Mexico and Central America, were found near the border in New Mexico, according to the most recent data. Many of the bodies were discovered less than 10 miles (16km) from El Paso. In 2023, the remains of 113 presumed migrants were found near the state’s border with Mexico. In 2020, nine bodies of were found. In 2019, there were 10. It is not clear exactly why so many more people are succumbing in that area, but many experts say smugglers are treating migrants more harshly and bringing them on paths that could be more dangerous in extreme summer temperatures. The influx has taxed the University of New Mexico’s medical investigator office, which identifies the dead and conducts autopsies. Almost all of the deaths show the cause is heat-related, the office said. “Our reaction was sadness, horror and surprise because it had been very consistently low for as long as anyone can remember,” said Heather Edgar, a forensic anthropologist with the office. Serving the entire state, the office over two years has added deputy medical investigators to handle the extra deaths on top of the usual 2,500 forensic cases. “We’d always had three deputies down in that area, and I think we have nine or 10 now,” Edgar said of New Mexico’s eastern migration corridor. Immigration and border security are among voters’ top concerns heading into the 5 November presidential election, but the candidates have focused on keeping migrants out of the US and deporting those already here. But the rising deaths pose a severe humanitarian concern. “People are dying close to urban areas, in some cases just 1,000ft from roads,” noted Adam Isacson, an analyst for the non-governmental Washington Office on Latin America. He said water stations, improved telecommunications and more rescue efforts could help. Officials say they are targeting human-smuggling networks. US Customs and Border Protection added a surveillance blimp to monitor the migration corridor near its office in Santa Teresa, in New Mexico’s Doña Ana county. And it relies on movable 33ft (10-meter) radar towers to scan the area. US officials in recent years have added 30 more push-button beacons that summon emergency medical workers along remote stretches of the border at New Mexico and western Texas. And they have set up more than 500 placards with location coordinates and instructions to call 911 for help. This summer, the border patrol expanded search and rescue efforts, dispatching more patrols with medical specialists and surveillance equipment. The agency moved some beacons closer to the border, where more people have been found dead or in distress. Border patrol says it rescued nearly 1,000 migrants near the US border in New Mexico and western Texas over the past 12 months – up from about 600 the previous 12 months. Civilians organizations are ramping up their efforts, too. Dylan Corbett, executive director of the faith-based Hope Border Institute in El Paso, said 10-member church teams recently started dropping water bottles for those in the deadly New Mexico corridor alongside fluttering blue flags. “Part of the problem is that organized crime has become very systematic in the area,” Corbett said of the increased deaths. But Corbett also blamed heightened border enforcement in Texas and new US asylum restrictions introduced by Joe Biden in June and tightened last month. New Mexico’s rising deaths come as the human-caused climate crisis increases the likelihood of heatwaves. This year, the El Paso area had its hottest June ever, with an average temperature of 89.4F (32C). 12 and 13 June saw daily record highs of 109F. Those high temperatures can be deadly for people who have been on strenuous journeys. Some smugglers lead migrants on longer routes into gullies or by the towering Mount Cristo Rey statue of Jesus Christ that casts a shadow over neighboring Mexico. Juan Bernal, the El Paso sector’s interim deputy chief border patrol agent, said migrants were weak when they arrive at the border after weeks or months without adequate food and water in houses smugglers keep in Mexico. “They’re expected to walk, sometimes for hours or days, to get to their destination where they’re going to be picked up,” he said. Nearly half of those who died in New Mexico this year were women, with women aged 20 to 29 making up the largest segment of these deaths. Adding concern is that the deaths have continued even as migration has fallen along the entire border following Biden’s major asylum restrictions. New Mexico’s migrant death numbers now rival those in Arizona’s even hotter Sonoran desert, where the remains of 114 presumed border crossers were discovered during the first eight months of 2024, according to a mapping project by the non-profit Humane Borders and the Pima county medical examiner’s office in Tucson. “It should not be a death sentence to come to the United States,” Maj Jon Day of Doña Ana county sheriff’s office, told a recent community gathering. “And when we push them into the desert areas here, they’re coming across and they’re dying.” | ['us-news/newmexico', 'us-news/usimmigration', 'us-news/us-mexico-border', 'us-news/us-news', 'world/mexico', 'world/americas', 'environment/extreme-heat', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'campaign/email/the-stakes-us-election-edition', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/west-coast-news'] | environment/extreme-heat | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2024-10-15T15:50:15Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/2021/feb/08/spooning-poo-how-five-eiffel-towers-worth-of-sea-cucumber-poo-could-save-a-queensland-reef | 'Spooning poo': how five Eiffel Towers' worth of sea cucumber poo helps sustain a Queensland reef | “In the wee hours of the morning … we weren’t too excited to be spooning poo,” reef ecologist Dr Vincent Raoult says. But that’s exactly what he and a team of researchers did to calculate out how much poop was excreted by an estimated 3 million sea cucumbers on the 20 sq km Heron Island coral reef in Queensland. The answer? Some 64,000 metric tonnes a year – slightly more than the mass of five Eiffel Towers. Vincent, from the University of Newcastle in New South Wales, has been studying the “burnt-sausage-looking animals” – that in other parts of the world are being fished to towards extinction – to better understand the vital role they play in the health of coral reefs. “Sea cucumbers are not a charismatic animal,” he told Guardian Australia. “Initially, people wouldn’t think they do much at all, and there has not been much research on the importance of these animals and their faeces in our reef systems.” Raoult, along with holothurian expert Jane Williamson and remote sensing experts Karen Joyce and Stephanie Duce, co-authored a recent study into sea cucumber poop and its critical role in marine ecosystems. The researchers, from Australia’s James Cook, Macquarie and Newcastle universities, wanted to quantify their role as bioturbators. Similar to an earthworm, they suck up sediment, eat the micro-organisms living on the sand and then poop it out. The faeces aerates the upper surface of marine sediment, creating a safe habitat for other organisms like crustaceans. It also releases nutrients such as nitrogen, which fertilises the water to assist the growth of organisms like algae, which are eaten by other animals. And, critically, it releases calcium carbonate, which helps coral skeletons grow. “With the coral reef under threat from climate change, that calcium is so important,” Raoult said. Previously, researchers manually counted sea cucumbers, either from a boat or by snorkelling “in approximately straight lines and manually recording every sea cucumber that is seen”. That has limited the size of studies. “That’s where the drones come in,” Raoult said. “With drone and satellite data, we are able to map out large sections of the reef, quickly, and with high accuracy.” The researchers used drones to map and count cucumbers across nearly 30,000 sq metres of Heron Island, in the southern Great Barrier Reef, and extrapolated there would be 770,000 sea cucumbers on the outer reef and 2.3 million on the inner reef. Then the study moved to experiment tanks – and that’s where the spoons come in. Over 24 hours, Raoult and the team, which was led by Williamson, measured the volume of faeces produced by individual sea cucumbers. “Every hour we would sit there, and take a spoon, and collect the little faecal pellets these sea cucumbers would produce,” he said. Once the researchers knew how much poo was released by a sea cucumber in a day, they estimated the total bioturbation across the reef. “Total bioturbation from holothurians at Heron Reef was estimated at over 64,000 metric tonnes per year,” the study found. Asked where the Eiffel Tower comparison came from, Raoult noted: “I’m French, so I’m a bit biased.” In Asia, East Africa and elsewhere, sea cucumbers are fished for the luxury food trade – fetching $80 a kilo - which has caused their numbers to decline. Seven species are endangered and nine are in the vulnerable category. Some reefs in these regions as a consequence are now covered in blue-green algae and the sediment is turning black. “Our reefs are already under threat from climate change,” Raoult said. “If we want to have healthier reefs, we can’t just ignore the fact that sea cucumbers are disappearing and focus solely on climate change, even though that is the major threat to coral reefs. We have to make sure that we address other issues such as overfishing as well.” | ['environment/marine-life', 'environment/great-barrier-reef', 'environment/wildlife', 'environment/environment', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/rafqa-touma', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-news'] | environment/marine-life | BIODIVERSITY | 2021-02-08T11:15:58Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
environment/blog/2013/oct/28/jeremy-paxman-litterbugs | Should you challenge litterbugs like Jeremy Paxman does? | Jeremy Paxman has revealed that he routinely challenges litter louts in the street. And the Newsnight inquisitor says that in "nine times out of 10" a rebuke makes people apologise and pick up what they dropped. "I have found when you confront people and say 'excuse me, you just dropped this', nine times out of 10, you might be unlucky on the 10th one, but nine times out of 10 they will say 'oh, sorry,' and they will take it away," he says. "It's a beautiful country and I just don't understand why people want to make it full of shit," the presenter says during a BBC One Panorama programme on rubbish called Our Dirty Nation, which is due to be broadcast on Monday night. Some might suggest that telling people off in the street is a more successful tactic if you are an instantly recognisable TV personality with a bulldog reputation for tearing strips of miscreant politicians – but it is a theme Paxman has warmed to before. In a piece for the Guardian in 2007 he wrote: "It tells us something about the sort of nation we have become. People, like animals, do not generally foul their own nests. But they feel free to throw rubbish around for much the same reason morons feel entitled to vandalise bus shelters, smash park benches or use telephone boxes as urinals: they do not feel the public realm is theirs." He warned that the UK is "sliding downhill into a country that increasingly resembles some vast municipal landfill site … Right now, Britain looks pretty vile in many places. Wait five years and see how it looks." We're now six years on. Have things got worse or better? And what should we do about it? Do you challenge people in the street when they drop litter? And if so what sort of reaction do you get? Is it our civic duty to ask people to pick up their rubbish? | ['environment/blog', 'environment/waste', 'environment/environment', 'tone/blog', 'media/jeremy-paxman', 'type/article', 'profile/environmenteditor'] | environment/waste | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2013-10-28T11:08:36Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
environment/2022/jan/28/green-energy-measures-saving-households-money-analysis-shows | Green energy measures saving households £1,000 a year – analysis | Energy efficiency measures have already saved the average British household about £1,000 a year in energy bills, and further insulation and home improvements could halve future bills, analysis has shown. But the future savings are unlikely to be realised unless the government focuses swiftly on insulation, as the savings to date have come largely from efficiency improvements in electrical appliances and boilers, which will not be repeated. The energy price cap is forecast to rise to £2,000 for a typical household in April, owing to the gas crisis, from about £1,300 today. But average household energy bills would be £3,000 a year if it were not for a range of regulatory measures that have brought down energy use in the last two decades, according to the Regulatory Assistance Project (RAP), an analyst organisation. Jan Rosenow, director of European programmes at RAP, said the analysis showed the failures of the government in the past decade to take action that would have staved off much of the current energy price crisis. “If the government had acted, we could have had a properly funded programme that would have reduced greenhouse gases and energy bills,” he said. Electrical appliances such as lightbulbs, fridges and washing machines now use much less power than 20 years ago, owing to EU directives. A 2005 UK government regulation mandating the use of condensing boilers has brought down average gas use significantly. Energy consumption overall has declined by 16% since 2000 despite a 15% increase in the number of homes, the average home being 10% larger and the rise in appliance ownership, the RAP said. Insulation, double glazing and similar home upgrades have also somewhat reduced energy use, Rosenow said, but by far less than could have been possible, as the UK has fallen behind on such improvements. Insulation rates have plummeted in the past decade, after successive government schemes have been scrapped and not replaced. At least 14m households have missed out on insulation because of the abandonment of the green deal scheme, which was set up in 2013 and stopped in 2015, with only about 15,000 homes upgraded. A further 47,500 were improved in the most recent successor scheme, the green homes grant, instead of the 600,000 promised, when the scheme was scrapped after only six months. The “stop-start” nature of the government’s insulation efforts has also stifled the growth of the insulation industry, which requires skilled workers and a broad network of suppliers, Rosenow added. Thousands of jobs have been lost in the industry over the past decade. The RAP analysis suggested it would be a mistake to cut the energy company obligation (ECO), which the government is considering. The £1bn a year programme, the cost of which is added to energy bills, channels funding to insulation for people on low incomes. Cutting ECO “would slow down the much-needed transformation of our housing stock and leave more people exposed to rising energy prices in the future”, RAP said. The RAP findings tally with separate estimates from Carbon Brief that cutting insulation programmes in the past 10 years has added about £1bn a year to the UK’s energy bills. Rosenow said the failure to keep up consistent action on insulation was a massive missed opportunity, but that action now could still reduce bills in future years. Some analysts have forecast high gas prices for at least the next two years, as the world recovers from the coronavirus pandemic and economic shocks. “Gas boilers are now about as efficient as they can be. The big area for improvement is insulation,” said Rosenow. “You can’t get to net zero without insulation. It’s impossible, it would be far too expensive and impractical.” Some Conservative MPs and rightwing commentators have argued that the net zero target should be reconsidered in light of the energy crisis, and have called for more oil and gas exploration. However, analysts have shown that renewable power has reduced the cost of electricity generation, and that overreliance on gas is the leading cause of high prices. “Green” Tories have also stepped up their defence of the net zero targets in recent days. Alok Sharma, president of the Cop26 climate summit, in a speech to the Chatham House thinktank said: “Clean is competitive, and the global race to supply the technologies and solutions a net zero world needs is on. The train is pulling out of the station and countries and companies that want to remain competitive need to leap on now.” Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, told the Bright Blue thinktank: “People who are sceptical about net zero worry that it’s going to add to the cost of energy bills … [But] this is all about taking a lead, jobs and exports. We can steal a march on the world by learning how to decarbonise. For decarbonisation, we want to be the pilots, not the passengers.” A government spokesperson said: “We welcome this research and have always said energy efficiency is key to cutting bills. That’s why we are investing over £6.6bn to decarbonise homes and buildings, and bringing in higher minimum performance standards to help reduce energy bills and tackle climate change. “Government plans for the energy company obligation include increasing the value of the scheme to £1bn per annum and extending it from 2022 to 2026, as set out in our fuel poverty strategy.” | ['environment/energy', 'environment/green-economy', 'uk/uk', 'environment/insulate-britain', 'environment/environment', 'tone/news', 'politics/politics', 'money/energy', 'money/household-bills', 'money/consumer-affairs', 'type/article', 'profile/fiona-harvey', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/environmentnews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/energy | ENERGY | 2022-01-28T11:11:22Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/2023/may/29/country-diary-the-blackcap-seems-shy-about-the-beauty-of-its-song | Country diary: The blackcap seems shy about the beauty of its song | Mary Montague | The steep sides of the ravine amplify the dawn chorus above the rush of the Crumlin River, which tumbles over black basalt from its source on Divis Mountain to its mouth at Lough Neagh. I look up at the first hesitant trills of a blackcap. His stutter climbs to a few clear notes, then babbles to a halt, as if the bird were suddenly shy of the liquid beauty of his own song. I stop to listen for more. At first there’s only silence – then another outburst. It could be the same bird, gaining confidence; or it might be his neighbour, anxious to remind him of their territorial boundary. Either way, the voice is directly along this riverside path. I go on. Sylvia atricapilla, the species’ Latin name, is a more evocative appellation than the rather deadpan “blackcap”. While atricapilla – referring to the male’s black crown – means “black-haired”, Sylvia means “woodland sprite”. There is definitely an impish quality to the bird’s movements as his chuckling song teases me through sunlit foliage. I pass a weir, a relic of the days when the river powered mills. Now that they are gone, the glen has rewilded into this liminal refuge of deciduous woodland. My gaze scans in vain for the blackcap. As I get closer, he falls quiet again. I wait. He resumes just a little further ahead. That song. It dances like sunlight through a wind-stirred canopy and froths like a stream in spate. Its musicality reflects that it is largely adapted for transmission in an environment full of obstacles – pure tones are less distorted when they bounce off leaf and bark. The opening bars (known as the warble part) may sound as if a blackcap is just clearing his throat for the gorgeous second half (the whistle part). However, there is meaning attached to both parts of the song. Like a postcode, the pattern of notes in the whistle part is shared between a bird and its neighbours. The less audible warble notes are more idiosyncratic. They suggest more private information, possibly including a blackcap’s identity. I stare blindly up into the leaves. Could I be eavesdropping on a bird that is whispering his own name? • Country diary is on Twitter at @gdncountrydiary | ['environment/series/country-diary', 'environment/birds', 'environment/environment', 'uk/ruralaffairs', 'uk/uk', 'environment/wildlife', 'travel/northern-ireland', 'type/article', 'tone/features', 'profile/mary-montague', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/journal', 'theguardian/journal/letters', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-letters-and-leader-writers'] | environment/wildlife | BIODIVERSITY | 2023-05-29T04:30:08Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
business/article/2024/jul/14/thames-water-owner-to-liquidate-solar-energy-subsidiary-amid-debt-crisis | Thames Water owner to liquidate solar energy subsidiary amid debt crisis | A solar energy project developer linked to Thames Water is to be liquidated and its staff made redundant as the crisis engulfing the debt-laden water supplier puts strain on its complex corporate structure. Trinzic Operations Ltd, which is ultimately owned by Thames’s parent company Kemble Water Holdings, is to be voluntarily shut down, the Guardian can reveal. Sources said Trinzic, which is based in London, is subject to a members’ voluntary liquidation – when a solvent company is shut down – and Kemble is attempting to recoup more than £25m from the business. A filing with the Insolvency Service shows that 37 employees will be made redundant at the company, which was set up to develop floating solar projects on Thames sites to boost the company’s renewable energy generation. The job losses start at the end of the month. Some employees may be given roles at Thames. It is understood Thames told Trinzic it did not plan to transfer any assets to Trinzic or enter any further commercial arrangements with it after a U-turn by investors on £500m of pledged funding in March. Despite efforts to find further investment, Trinzic will now be wound down. A source close to Thames said that Kemble was “urgently” attempting to recover funds from Trinzic, as consultants at Alvarez & Marsal work with Kemble to assess its options. It is unclear whether, after the cash needed for restructuring is spent, any funds recovered from Trinzic will be distributed to external shareholders. Senior executives at Trinzic are understood to be in line for large payouts – in excess of 12 months’ salary. The majority of staff are expected to leave with redundancy payments worth at least three months’ pay. Thames Water is laden with £15.2bn of debt and said last week that it only has sufficient funding to run its operations until June next year. If it collapses, it is expected to be temporarily nationalised. Regulator Ofwat has put Thames into a form of special measures. The Guardian revealed in April that a development company that sells off land no longer needed by Thames, Kennet Properties, paid out a £14.5m dividend in the year to 31 March 2023 despite the difficulties faced by the wider group. At the time, sources close to Kemble said the Kennet dividend had ultimately reached Trinzic. In Thames’s complex structure, both companies sit outside the ringfenced operating company, which is regulated by Ofwat. The transfer of funds between the group’s web of companies have been under the spotlight as Thames struggles and the legacy of previous owners, who extracted huge dividends over a number of years, is examined. Ofwat is studying two sets of dividends, of £37.5m and £158m, approved in October and March. Trinzic was set up as Thames Water Ventures in 2021 under the stewardship of Tony Vasishta, a former executive at the telecoms company Liberty Global where he ran its real estate arm. The aim was to develop land no longer needed by the household water supplier to build projects generating solar power, storing energy and harnessing heat from the waste network to provide clean energy. The electricity generated would be sold back to Thames – a significant energy user with a £220m energy bill – at an agreed rate, cutting its costs and carbon emissions in the process. However, documents seen by the Guardian from April show that Thames believed Trinzic’s progress is “significantly behind” its original forecast. The venture was supposed to produce nearly 4,000 megawatt hours of electricity by June 2024, but it was on track to produce less than 1,000MWh by that point, the document said. Thames had already scrapped a target to hit net zero by 2030. An initial seven project sites were due to be transferred between 2020 and 2025, funded by the regulated Thames Water Utilities Ltd “with a view to sell to Trinzic upon completion”, documents said. However, they said that a contractor had “raised concerns about TW’s financial position”, causing delays. Delays were expected to sites in Little Marlow, Iver South and Swindon, it said. Sources said that executives at Thames and Trinzic had struggled to find a commercial model which benefited both parties, with Thames concerned it was taking on too much risk as they attempted to agree a 25-year power deal. Kemble declined to comment. | ['business/thames-water', 'environment/solarpower', 'business/business', 'campaign/email/business-today', 'environment/energy', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'uk/london', 'business/water-industry', 'uk/uk', 'business/utilities', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/alex-lawson', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-business'] | environment/solarpower | ENERGY | 2024-07-14T16:30:35Z | true | ENERGY |
australia-news/2022/aug/01/home-buyback-scheme-receives-443-applications-from-flood-hit-queensland-property-owners | Home buyback scheme receives 443 applications from flood-hit Queensland property owners | About 2,000 homes remain uninhabitable months after one of Queensland’s worst flood seasons, with the state government considering applications to buy back 443 properties and turn them into public space. Severe weather during the 2021-22 disaster season affected about 9,000 properties, peaking when Brisbane recorded its highest six-day rainfall total on record in February. Two-thirds of the affected properties have now been repaired or have works under way. On Monday, Queensland Reconstruction Authority chief executive, Brendan Moon, described the number of major inundations as unprecedented. “We cannot remember a time where this has happened,” he said. Those worst affected have been offered options to either repair, retrofit or sell their homes through a government buyback scheme. The results of more than 3,000 surveys being undertaken will tell homeowners how high flood waters rose, and how high they could go in the future. “We have started talking to those 400 homeowners that have indicated they wish to be part of the voluntary house buyback and we expect the initial evaluations of properties to commence in the next three weeks,” Moon said. Of those seeking to have their homes bought-back, 70% are in the Ipswich and Brisbane areas, with Goodna East given priority due to the severity of flooding in the Ipswich suburb. Last week the government released a Deloitte report into the south-east Queensland floods that estimated damages of $7.7bn to the state in social, financial and economic losses. But the common thread of all these events is the toll they have on people’s mental health, State Recovery coordinator, Maj Gen Jake Ellwood, said. He told the story of an Ipswich man who had lived in the same property that had flooded a number of times in the past 30 years. “When I spoke to him on the 15th of March he was sure he had this cracked, he was going to build back [and] he knew how he was going to do it,” he said. “Then I went back in June and it was a different story. He was very vulnerable, and he just didn’t know what he was going to do.” “None of this is simple – and it affects people.” The state’s disaster response was first tested in November, when heavy rainfall resulted in flooding in southern and western parts of the state, a recovery and resilience plan released on Monday said. In January, areas around Maryborough and Gympie suffered major inundation associated with Ex-Tropical Cyclone Seth. There was more unseasonable rain after the Brisbane floods, with some areas being hit for a fourth time in May. Sign up to receive an email with the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning The plan also identified a knowledge gap of creek systems and their impact on catchment flooding. Heavy rainfall over small areas can cause rapid localised flooding that often catches people off guard, it said. “It was clear to me going out to different communities that there was a feeling that there could have been more warning,” Ellwood said. “We have an opportunity now I think with technology to actually improve what we have.” Ellwood said that response would need to improve as the climate crisis escalates. “As the threat we face evolves, in terms of magnitude and frequency, it’s going to be vitally important that our response evolves as well,” he said. Emergency Management Inspector General, Alistair Dawson, is also undertaking a separate review into the state’s emergency alert systems, preparation and disaster response. | ['australia-news/queensland', 'environment/flooding', 'australia-news/australia-east-coast-floods-2022', 'australia-news/housing', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/joe-hinchliffe', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/australia-state-news'] | australia-news/australia-east-coast-floods-2022 | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2022-08-01T10:25:29Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
business/2024/may/01/keir-starmer-must-flush-away-the-stinking-turd-of-thatchers-water-privatisation | Keir Starmer must flush away the stinking turd of Thatcher’s water privatisation | Letters | George Monbiot is, as always, spot-on with his analysis of the brutal outcomes of water privatisation (How the overseas owners of England’s water companies clean up by polluting our rivers, 26 April). We, the people, were robbed by Margaret Thatcher’s heist, never consulted or asked if we wanted to sell our prized publicly owned assets. Water and the other utilities were hoovered up by new owners slavering at the prospect of extracting all the cash from the companies – “leveraging” to give it a technical term, straightforward legalised money laundering in popular parlance. The post-Brexit sewage crisis highlighted by people like Monbiot and Feargal Sharkey is the most visible result of the great stinking turd of water privatisation. Ofwat is pointless, just going through the regulatory motions while allowing the pollution to continue. Thatcher achieved privatisation with the stroke of a pen and a large majority. Keir Starmer will have the same circumstances to rectify this miscarriage after the election. I hope he has the guts to do it. Peter Timberlake Chichester • George Monbiot’s indignation about the water industry in England and Wales can’t be faulted. However, I would caution against rushing to bring water companies into public ownership. There are many models for their ownership and operation, whether public, private or mixed. It is possible to find good and bad examples of each. Ultimately all are monopolies, and a core need is for much more effective regulation to protect consumers and the environment from private-sector greed or a parsimonious public sector – both of which lead to underinvestment in assets, resulting in their declining condition and performance. It’s time to start a broader debate about sectoral reform, covering a full range of institutional, technical, financial and regulatory issues. This might include reconsidering the size of the companies, which are based on an outdated model of integrated river basin management. Regardless, public ownership alone is not going to help us. Bill Kingdom Oxford • Have an opinion on anything you’ve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section. | ['business/water-industry', 'environment/pollution', 'environment/environment', 'politics/margaretthatcher', 'politics/keir-starmer', 'politics/labour', 'politics/politics', 'uk/uk', 'politics/privatisation', 'type/article', 'tone/letters', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/journal', 'theguardian/journal/letters', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-letters-and-leader-writers'] | environment/pollution | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE | 2024-05-01T16:53:30Z | true | POLLUTION_AND_WASTE |
environment/2014/feb/19/uk-flooding-victims-council-tax-rebates-david-cameron | UK flooding victims will get council tax rebates, David Cameron promises | Thousands of people forced out of their homes because of the floods will get refunds on their council tax, David Cameron has said. The prime minister made the announcement just minutes after Labour called for flood victims to be exempted from the charge while repairs were being carried out. About £4m will be set aside to compensate local authorities for waiving council tax. Speaking on a visit to Pembrokeshire in Wales, Cameron promised a "vast national effort helped and co-ordinated by the British government" to help those affected. "That's why we bring together all the local authorities, the emergency services, the volunteers. That's why funding has been made available in terms of supporting local authorities," he said. More than 6,000 homes have been flooded in several spates of severe storms and rainfall that started in mid-December. Many properties need substantial repairs that could take months to fix. Cameron's announcement comes after many communities criticised the government for not doing enough to help flood victims, some of whose homes have been underwater since Christmas.There have been almost daily meetings of Whitehall's emergency Cobra committee, but some community organisers accused the government of abandoning flood-hit areas and being too slow to send in military help. During the height of criticism over the bad weather last week, Cameron cancelled a trip to the Middle East and suspended other work to focus on visiting the affected areas. He said he would be happy to discuss extra cash from Westminster to help those affected in Wales and urged insurers to deal with claims as quickly as possibly, as ministers gathered for a summit with business leaders about how they would help people get back on their feet. Hilary Benn, the shadow communities secretary, said it had been a mistake for the government to change the law to take away council tax rebates for people forced to leave their homes because of flooding. "The government should admit that it was a mistake to have changed the law to take away the former provisions giving automatic council tax exemptions when properties are empty and require repairs to make them habitable in cases of flooding," he said. "In 2007, Labour provided additional funding to help provide council tax exemptions for those households forced to leave their homes for over a year." The prime minister's promise last week that money would not be an object in terms of dealing with the floods has been undermined by Patrick McLoughlin, the transport secretary, who said there would be no blank cheque. Cameron has also promised a tax deferral scheme to help businesses hit by flooding and up to £10m in new funding is being found to support farmers. Grants for homeowners and businesses will be available to improve flood defences. | ['environment/flooding', 'world/natural-disasters', 'environment/environment', 'politics/davidcameron', 'politics/politics', 'money/insurance', 'money/money', 'money/counciltax', 'money/tax', 'money/family-finances', 'society/localgovernment', 'uk/uk', 'society/society', 'politics/conservatives', 'type/article', 'profile/rowena-mason', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews'] | environment/flooding | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2014-02-19T14:59:37Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
environment/2015/jul/23/australians-fear-being-climate-change-lifters-while-others-are-leaners | Australians fear being climate change 'lifters' while others are 'leaners' | Australians’ biggest fear in tackling climate change is that they are doing the “lifting” while other countries do the “leaning”, the former head of the United Nations agency tasked with leading the global response to climate change has said. Yvo de Boer, who headed the UN framework convention on climate change (UNFCCC), told Guardian Australia that the country’s political leaders must help people understand that all countries are doing what they can to cut emissions. “[Leaders must] give people confidence that we’re all lifters, but that we must respect that each shoulder is not able to shoulder the same amount,” de Boer said, referring to former prime minister Robert Menzies’s description of “lifters and leaners”, often cited by current prime minister Tony Abbott. “It is essential to give people confidence that everyone is doing their fair share,” de Boer said. De Boer, who now heads up the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), said developing countries will “leapfrog” richer nations when it comes to the use of renewable energy. He points to countries like India which are addressing shortfalls in energy infrastructure in poorer communities by providing self-sufficient green energy like rooftop solar panels. That is in contrast to Abbott’s statements last year that coal is “good for humanity” because it is “vital for the energy needs of the world”. De Boer said: “It is very important to think about the demands of the future and not the demands of the past.” “You can say that windmills are ugly, but at the end of the day, it is the validity of that argument that wins people,” he said, referring to Australian frontbenchers saying turbines are an eyesore. “I’m not sure that it really changes people’s minds.” De Boer has warned that constantly changing domestic policies on clean energy makes it difficult for the clean energy industry to flourish. “The biggest barrier around the world is inconsistency in government policy,” he said. “It makes it very difficult for an investor to assess risk properly.” That risk is posing an “uphill struggle” for renewable energy projects to get funding in the current marketplace, a problem that the GGGI hopes to help redress through a focus on getting bankable green energy projects up and running in developing nations. De Boer’s comments come just ahead of an expected announcement by opposition leader Bill Shorten that Labor will increase the target for renewable energy to 50%, setting up a point of difference with the government, which insists increased renewables will drive up consumers’ energy costs. De Boer said that arguments that renewables are expensive and fossil fuels are cheap are false because they fail to take into account the health costs of burning fossil fuels, and the cost of maintaining ageing infrastructure. The use of renewables in cutting carbon emissions is likely to be a hot topic at the Paris climate conference later this year. Australia has yet to announce what post-202o commitment it will put forward at the high-profile UN meeting. De Boer was executive secretary of the UNFCCC for nearly four years until 2010, but resigned shortly after the 2009 Copenhagen climate conference, an event heavily criticised for its failure to set strong targets. | ['environment/yvo-de-boer', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'australia-news/australia-news', 'environment/environment', 'world/world', 'environment/cop-21-un-climate-change-conference-paris', 'world/unitednations', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/shalailah-medhora'] | environment/cop-21-un-climate-change-conference-paris | CLIMATE_POLICY | 2015-07-23T07:24:18Z | true | CLIMATE_POLICY |
environment/2010/jul/14/bp-delay-valves-well-cap | BP delays drilling on Gulf of Mexico oil spill relief well | BP today halted drilling on a relief well meant to permanently plug the Gulf of Mexico oil leak as it prepared to test a temporary cap on the well. Kent Wells, a senior BP vice-president, said the company was delaying drilling by up to 48 hours on the well, which is supposed to reach the broken one underground and plug it with mud and cement. Wells said the move was a precaution being taken in order not to interfere with the test. It was another delay for BP, which postponed the testing of a new cap on top of the well by 24 hours late yesterday. The cap is a stopgap measure designed to keep the oil in the well or funnel it to ships until the relief well work is done. Thad Allen, who is overseeing the US response to the crisis, said "additional analysis" was needed before the tests could start. BP confirmed that analysis was getting under way, saying in a statement: "Consequently, the well integrity test did not start." "It's an incredibly big concern," Don Van Nieuwenhuise, the director of professional geoscience programmes at the University of Houston, said. "They need to get a scan of where things are – that way, when they do pressure testing they know to look out for ruptures or changes." The newly-installed "capping stack" has a better seal than the last cap placed on the well and aims to stop oil from spewing out of the failed blowout preventer. Experts said stopping the oil too quickly could blow the cap off or cause further damage to the well. BP has said the only way to permanently stop the leak is by drilling two relief wells to intercept the ruptured one. The first is expected to intercept the oil leak by the end of this month and plug it with drilling mud and cement by mid-August. Before the decision to postpone the tests, preliminary steps – including mapping the seabed – were completed. Engineers spent hours on a seismic survey, creating a map of the rock under the seabed to pinpoint potential dangers such as gas pockets. It can be compared with later surveys during and after the test to see whether the pressure on the well is causing underground problems. Experts have said an unstable area around the well could create bigger problems if the leak continued elsewhere when the cap valves were shut. It was unclear whether something in the results of the mapping had prompted officials to delay the tests. Earlier, Wells said he had not yet heard what the results were but felt "comfortable that they were good". Allen met energy officials and the head of the US Geological Survey, as well as BP officials and other scientists, after the mapping was completed. "As a result of these discussions, we decided that the process may benefit from additional analysis," he said, but did not specify what type of analysis would be carried out. If the cap testing goes ahead, engineers can finally begin to shut the openings in the stack of pipes and valves one at a time while watching pressure gauges to see whether the cap holds or any new leaks erupt. The operation could last up to 48 hours. If the cap works, it will enable BP to stop the oil from gushing into the sea, either by holding all the oil inside the well machinery like a stopper or, if the pressure is too great, channelling some through pipes to up to four collection ships. If the cap cannot handle the pressure, or leaks are found, BP will have to reopen the valves and let some of the oil out. If that happens, the company is prepared to collect the crude by piping it to ships. Along the Gulf coast, where the spill has heavily damaged the region's vital tourism and fishing industries, people anxiously awaited the outcome of the painstakingly slow work. "I don't know what's taking them so long. I just hope they take care of it," said Lanette Eder, a nutritionist from Hoschton, Georgia.. The leak began after the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling platform exploded on 20 April, killing 11 workers. Since then, between 90.4m and 178.6m gallons of oil have spewed into the Gulf. | ['environment/bp-oil-spill', 'business/bp', 'business/oil', 'environment/oil', 'business/oilandgascompanies', 'environment/oil-spills', 'environment/environment', 'business/business', 'world/world', 'us-news/us-news', 'type/article', 'profile/matthewweaver'] | environment/oil | ENERGY | 2010-07-14T13:54:00Z | true | ENERGY |
commentisfree/2022/dec/17/dont-bank-on-nuclear-fusion-to-save-the-world-from-a-climate-catastrophe-i-have-seen-it-all-before | Despite the hype, we shouldn’t bank on nuclear fusion to save the world from climate catastrophe | Robin McKie | The revelation that researchers had succeeded in creating a nuclear fusion reaction that generated more energy than it consumed made reassuring reading last week. For almost half a century, I have reported on scientific issues and no decade has been complete without two or three announcements by scientists claiming their work would soon allow science to recreate the processes that drive the sun. The end result would be the generation of clean, cheap nuclear fusion that would transform our lives. Such announcements have been rare recently, so it gave me a warm glow to realise that standards may be returning to normal. By deploying a set of 192 lasers to bombard pellets of the hydrogen isotopes deuterium and tritium, researchers at the US National Ignition Facility (NIF) in Livermore, California, were able to generate temperatures only found in stars and thermonuclear bombs. The isotopes then fused into helium, releasing excess energy, they reported. It was a milestone event but not a major one, although this did not stop the US government and swaths of the world’s media indulging in a widespread hyping jamboree over the laboratory’s accomplishment. Researchers had “overcome a major barrier” to reaching fusion, the BBC gushed, while the Wall Street Journal described the achievement as a breakthrough that could herald an era of clean, cheap energy. It is certainly true that nuclear fusion would have a beneficial impact on our planet by liberating vast amounts of energy without generating high levels of carbon emissions and would be an undoubted boost in the battle against climate change. The trouble is that we have been presented with such visions many times before. In 1958, Sir John Cockcroft claimed his Zeta fusion project would supply the world with “an inexhaustible supply of fuel”. It didn’t. In 1989, Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons announced they had achieved fusion using simple laboratory equipment, work that made global headlines but which has never been replicated. To this list you can also add the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (Iter), a huge facility being built in Saint-Paul-lès-Durance in Provence, France, that was supposed to achieve fusion by 2023 but which is over 10 years behind schedule and tens of billions of dollars over budget. In each case, it was predicted that the construction of the first commercially viable nuclear fusion plants was only a decade or two away and would transform our lives. Those hopes never materialised and have led to a weary cynicism spreading among hacks and scientists. As they now joke: “Fusion is 30 years away – and always will be.” It was odd for Jennifer Granholm, the US energy secretary, to argue that the NIF’s achievement was “one of the most impressive scientific feats of the 21st century”. This is a hard claim to justify for a century that has already witnessed the discovery of the Higgs boson, the creation of Covid-19 vaccines, the launch of the James Webb telescope and the unravelling of the human genome. By comparison, the ignition event at the NIF is second-division stuff. Most scientists have been careful in their responses to the over-hyping of the NIF “breakthrough”. They accept that a key step has been taking towards commercial fusion power but insist such plants remain distant goals. They should not be seen as likely saviours that will extract us from the desperate energy crisis we now face – despite all the claims that were made last week. Humanity has brought itself to a point where its terrible dependence on fossil fuels threatens to trigger a 2C jump in global temperatures compared with our pre-industrial past. The consequences will include flooding, fires, worsening storms, rising sea levels, spreading diseases and melting ice caps. Here, scientists are clear. Fusion power will not arrive in time to save the world. “We are still a way off commercial fusion and it cannot help us with the climate crisis now,” said Aneeqa Khan, a research fellow in nuclear fusion at Manchester University. This view was backed by Tony Roulstone, a nuclear energy researcher at Cambridge University. “This result from NIF is a success for science, but it is still a long way from providing useful, abundant clean energy.” At present, there are two main routes to nuclear fusion. One involves confining searing hot plasma in a powerful magnetic field. The Iter reactor follows such an approach. The other – adopted at the NIF facility – uses lasers to blast deuterium-tritium pellets causing them to collapse and fuse into helium. In both cases, reactions occur at more than 100 million C and involve major technological headaches in controlling them. Fusion therefore remains a long-term technology, although many new investors and entrepreneurs – including Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos – have recently turned their attention to the field, raising hopes that a fresh commercial impetus could reinvigorate the development of commercial plants. This input is to be welcomed but we should be emphatic: fusion will not arrive in time to save the planet from climate change. Electricity plants powered by renewable sources or nuclear fission offer the only short-term alternatives to those that burn fossil fuels. We need to pin our hopes on these power sources. Fusion may earn its place later in the century but it would be highly irresponsible to rely on an energy source that will take at least a further two decades to materialise – at best. • Robin McKie is the Observer’s science and environment editor | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'tone/comment', 'science/energy', 'science/physics', 'science/science', 'technology/energy', 'environment/nuclearpower', 'environment/energy', 'environment/environment', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'type/article', 'profile/robinmckie', 'publication/theobserver', 'theobserver/news', 'theobserver/news/comment', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/observer-comment'] | environment/nuclearpower | ENERGY | 2022-12-17T19:16:00Z | true | ENERGY |
books/2023/dec/06/murdered-journalist-dom-phillips-unfinished-book-to-be-published-in-2025 | Murdered journalist Dom Phillips’ unfinished book to be published in 2025 | A book begun by Dom Phillips, a foreign correspondent and Guardian contributor who was killed in the Amazon in June last year while researching the project, will be published in April 2025. The book, titled How to Save the Amazon: Ask the People Who Know, is being completed by writers and environmentalists. On Wednesday, the authors were awarded a Whiting creative nonfiction grant, marking the first time the $40,000 (£32,000) award has been given to a collaborative project. The judges of the Whiting foundation grant said that Phillips’ reporting on “ecological depredations in the Amazon, completed before his murder in the field, demonstrates impressive levels of access and a deep moral curiosity. “It’s rare to encounter travel writing that truly shows the reader something they haven’t seen before; the sense of discovery – and, inevitably, peril – is palpable,” they added. Phillips was murdered alongside Bruno Pereira, a Brazilian Indigenous expert, who prosecutors said was targeted for helping Indigenous activists defend land from illegal fishing and mining gangs. In October, a judge ruled that three fishermen accused of murdering the pair would face trial by jury. Earlier this year, Phillips’ family, friends and colleagues announced plans for his work to be completed, contingent on receiving funding for reporting trips to the Amazon. More than £24,000 was raised via an online fundraiser. The book will be published by Manilla Press, an imprint of Bonnier Books UK, and will celebrate the Amazon’s diversity and explore solutions for conserving its ecosystem by drawing on the voices of those who live there. Those involved in completing the work include Jonathan Watts, the Guardian’s global environment editor, Tom Phillips, Latin America correspondent for the Guardian, Kátia Brasil, the founder of Amazônia Real, and Andrew Fishman, president and co-founder of the Intercept Brasil. “We were thrilled to acquire Dom’s book and received dispatches from the Amazon as and when he could write them, and we could see the important book this was shaping up to be – immersing us in this incredible landscape, highlighting to us the work done by the peoples who live there, offering us new ways in which we can help restore this vital ecosystem,” said Justine Taylor, editorial manager at Bonnier. “It was such a shock to learn of Dom and Bruno’s deaths – and an immeasurable loss for their families – but we are so glad and proud that Dom’s work will be continued by Jonathan Watts and his team of contributors.” | ['books/books', 'culture/culture', 'world/dom-phillips-and-bruno-pereira', 'books/publishing', 'environment/amazon-rainforest', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/ella-creamer', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-culture'] | environment/amazon-rainforest | BIODIVERSITY | 2023-12-06T13:04:11Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
us-news/2019/oct/11/california-wildfire-latest-power-shutoffs | California wildfire spreads as fears mount over further power shutoffs | Wildfire danger spread from northern California to the south of the state, as a blaze swept through the San Fernando Valley’s northern foothills and concerns rose that a utility company could order further power shutoffs. Southern California Edison turned off electricity to about 20,000 people in Los Angeles, Ventura, San Bernardino and Kern counties on Friday but warned that thousands more could lose service as Santa Ana winds gained strength. A wildfire fueled by Santa Ana winds broke out in Los Angeles, forcing the closure of several highways because of heavy smoke. The so-called Saddleridge fire, which started in Sylmar, had consumed more than 7,500 acres by 5pm local time Friday, prompting California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, to declare a state of emergency. Officials said a middle-aged man died near where the fire was burning after he went into cardiac arrest and that a firefighter suffered an eye injury. Authorities also ordered mandatory evacuations of about 100,000 people in the Granada Hills, Porter Ranch and Oakridge Estates neighborhoods. Several homes were seen burning in Granada Hills, and the Los Angeles fire department said an “unknown number” of homes were potentially threatened. A blaze also ripped through a mobile home park in Calimesa, a city about 65 miles (104km) east of Los Angeles, destroying dozens of residences. The fire started when trash being hauled caught fire and the driver dumped the load beside a road, according to Riverside county officials. An 89-year-old woman, Lois Arvickson, died while on the phone with her son. In northern California, the utility company PG&E started restoring power to some of the communities that were cut off on Wednesday and Thursday. PG&E had shut off power to an estimated 2 million people in northern California over fears its equipment could spark wildfires amid high winds. Red flag fire warnings are expected to continue in southern California through Saturday. Newsom criticized PG&E on Thursday, and customers complained about the inconveniences caused by the unprecedented blackouts that began midweek. Newsom told reporters PG&E’s decision to cut power should not be blamed on the climate crisis. Instead, he said he believed the blackouts were the result of mismanagement, “greed and neglect” by the nation’s largest investor-owned utility. “What has occurred in the last 48 hours is unacceptable,” Newsom said, listing problems such as school closures and people who “can’t even access water or medical supplies”. “Northern California is not a third world country,” the San Jose Mercury News said in an editorial. “It’s unacceptable that the region is being forced to endure this level of disruption as the long-term strategy for dealing with the threat of wildfires.” PG&E suggested it was already seeing the wisdom of its decision borne out as gusts topping 77mph (122km/h) raked the San Francisco Bay Area amid a bout of dry, windy weather. “We have found multiple cases of damage or hazards” caused by heavy winds, including fallen branches that came in contact with overhead lines, said Sumeet Singh, a vice-president for the utility. “If they were energized, they could’ve ignited.” PG&E began practicing preventive shutoffs this year during red flag fire weather conditions – high winds and low humidity – after investigators found it at fault in two of the deadliest wildfires in California’s history, both within the past two years. Some of the wildfires started because of trees falling on power lines – trees that should have been cleared by PG&E because of their proximity to the lines. In the 2018 Camp fire, the utility’s outdated infrastructure was implicated. The Camp fire, which killed 85 and virtually incinerated the town of Paradise, was blamed on PG&E transmission lines. PG&E’s CEO, Bill Johnson, promised the utility will “do better” when it comes to communicating with customers during future shutoffs. It was unacceptable that its websites crashed, maps were inconsistent and call centers were overloaded, Johnson said. “We were not adequately prepared,” he said. Faced with customer anger, PG&E put up barricades around its San Francisco headquarters. A customer threw eggs at a PG&E office in Oroville. And a PG&E truck was hit by a bullet, though authorities could not immediately say whether it was targeted. | ['us-news/california', 'world/wildfires', 'us-news/us-news', 'world/natural-disasters', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/us-news'] | world/wildfires | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS | 2019-10-11T15:47:42Z | true | EXTREME_CLIMATE_IMPACTS |
politics/2021/sep/21/boris-johnson-on-the-back-foot-at-the-un-but-at-least-hes-not-in-london | Boris on the back foot at the UN – but at least he’s not in London | If Boris Johnson had a little more self-awareness he might have reshuffled himself last week. The trip to the United Nations general assembly in New York was supposed to be the fun part of the job. A chance for the prime minister to do the things he likes best – rubbing shoulders and making crap gags with other world leaders – while his juniors were left back home trying to maintain the energy supply and offer vague reassurance that Christmas would not be cancelled. Yet instead he found himself repeatedly on the back foot, sounding as downbeat as all those ministers he had sacked for not showing enough mindless, Tiggerish enthusiasm. To make matters worse, most of the damage was self-inflicted. Trying to drum up global support for the Cop26 summit by reminding everyone he had written several articles 20 years ago that had been sceptical of climate change wasn’t the brightest idea he had ever had. It just made him look like the untrustworthy chancer most people thought him to be. Nor did his excuse that when the facts changed he changed, help greatly. No one could remember the facts about climate science having changed that much over the last two decades. After that, things went steadily downhill. First he admitted there was only a 60% chance of getting countries to stump up the £100bn to fight climate change, Then he effectively conceded the UK was at the back of the queue for a trade deal with the US, having previously insisted the it would have a deal in next to no time and that those who claimed otherwise were in the grip of “project fear”. This was the kind of careless talk that cost other people their jobs. Tuesday didn’t start a great deal better with a short interview with Savannah Guthrie on NBC’s Today programme. Boris had wanted to focus on climate change – apparently Joe Biden was so onboard with cutting carbon dioxide emissions that UK meat production was now under threat – but Guthrie mainly wanted to talk about Afghanistan. How had the prime minister felt about the chaotic scenes in Kabul during and after the withdrawal of US troops? Johnson’s attempts at diplomacy just made him look out of the loop as he tried to maintain the evacuation of Afghanistan had been a logistical success. Guthrie looked amazed. No one had told her she was dealing with a halfwit. God knows what a failure would have looked like. The interview ended with Boris fessing up for the first time that he had six children. Or, to be strictly accurate, six children he was prepared to acknowledge – with another on the way. He didn’t say whether there might be more he had forgotten about. Or if he could remember all their names. Still, on the plus side for Johnson, he was 3,000 miles away from the UK, where Jennifer Arcuri was giving evidence via video link from Florida to the Greater London assembly’s oversight committee about how having had an alleged affair with Boris while he was London mayor in no way helped her to get on trade missions or to hoover up £126,000 in grants from the public purse. In the space of 90 minutes, Arcuri made a telling case that their’s was a transactional match made in heaven. Both she and Boris appear to share the belief that they were doing the other one a favour. Arcuri’s recollection of events was crystal clear. She had been doing an MBA in 2012 and in the space of a couple of years had become the centre of London’s tech industry. She was the Bill Gates of Shoreditch who didn’t take no for an answer and would demand that people find another way to say yes to her. Without her, Bloomberg would never have moved to London. Even though the company had done so years before she came on the scene. And as for the trade trips she may or may not have been on – Arcuri made it sound like nothing more than a coincidence that she would happen to turn up in the same cities at the same time as Boris and his delegations – there was no conflict of interest. If anything she had been the one who had been doing Johnson the favour just by being there. It had been she who had advised Boris not to bullshit the bullshitters and never to use public wifi. The kind of advice that money just can’t buy. Besides, she couldn’t help it if he had a crush on her. After all, it wasn’t as if it was a secret. Everyone knew. This at least had the ring of truth. For someone so keen to parade her brilliance as an entrepreneur, both she and the committee were surprisingly reluctant to talk about her financial results. A quick glance in the register at Company House reveals that Hacker House, the UK company for which she is still a director, has assets of £93,000 and liabilities of £1.3m. Still, it sounds as if it was fun while it lasted. I guess you had to be there. | ['politics/series/the-politics-sketch', 'world/unitednations', 'politics/politics', 'world/world', 'politics/boris-johnson', 'uk/uk', 'politics/foreignpolicy', 'environment/green-politics', 'environment/cop26-glasgow-climate-change-conference-2021', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/johncrace', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/topstories', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-home-news'] | environment/green-politics | CLIMATE_POLICY | 2021-09-21T19:33:24Z | true | CLIMATE_POLICY |
environment/2018/jan/30/communicating-the-science-is-a-much-needed-step-for-un-climate-panel | Communicating the science is the next step in the evolution of the UN climate panel | Adam Corner | The remit of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is one of the more complicated jigsaw puzzles in the world. Since 1988, it has overseen thousands of scientists pulling together tens of thousands of academic papers on atmospheric physics, meteorology, geography, marine science, economics, land-use and much more. A multi-layered process of expert assessment takes place every six or seven years where a set of carefully worded statements is approved by representatives of 120 of the world’s governments, specifying what we know about the defining challenge of the 21st century: climate change. It is an incredible, perhaps unprecedented undertaking – but until recently, it has been woefully underserved on the crucial issue of communicating its findings beyond specialist scientific and policy circles. And partly as a result of this, the organisation has historically been saddled with a reputation for being dry, bureaucratic and secretive. But things are changing – which is good news for the climate. The IPCC has now recognised that it should take the same approach to communications as it does to science: go with the evidence base. In a handbook commissioned by the IPCC (Working Group 1, Technical Support Unit) and released on Tuesday, my colleagues and I at Climate Outreach provide social science-based guidance for IPCC scientists to use in their communication and public engagement. This is the first time advice like this has been produced for the world’s most prestigious climate science organisation, and it represents a timely and welcome shift. The IPCC’s next report will set out in greater clarity than ever before if – and how – we can avoid a rise of more than 1.5C in global temperatures above pre-industrial levels. Communicating effectively around this crucial publication is essential, and our handbook sets out six well-established principles to achieve this, including the importance of ensuring the powerful human stories buried deep in the IPCC assessments are not swamped by the “big numbers” that define the science-policy discourse. Although they are the go-to metrics for scientists and politicians, global temperature targets or atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases are unlikely to be understood or seen as personally relevant by a majority of the public. Starting with the everyday things that climate change is now profoundly influencing – tourism, health, important places – is a better approach, providing a solid grounding in shared values and local interests. There’s also a big focus in the handbook on showing the “human face behind the science”. By and large, scientists are highly trusted because of their independence, specialist expertise, and credibility. But trust is also about speaking authentically, as a relatable individual, with personal experiences and perspectives (not just a compelling grasp of the data). Who are the IPCC scientists? What are their stories? What is involved in an IPCC process at a human level? Another exciting development is that the social science of human behaviour is now increasingly making its way into the IPCC assessments themselves, addressing a long-standing blind spot in the long list of topics included in the IPCC’s remit. The more social sciences can be integrated into assessments of the causes and consequences of climate change, the better – because one of the biggest uncertainties in any climate model is human behaviour. To properly understand how the climate is changing, and how likely we are to keep its most dangerous effects in check, we need to understand it as a social and cultural challenge as much as a scientific one. There will no doubt be a small group of hardliners who object to the very idea of scientists being more effective communicators, or including social science research in the assessment reports. But their argument that scientists should refrain from speaking about the societal implications of their vital research is an outmoded and increasingly discredited position. The science of climate change communication is a much-needed addition to the IPCC’s canon – and an essential next step in the evolution of this unique organisation. | ['environment/ipcc', 'environment/climate-crisis', 'science/scienceofclimatechange', 'science/science', 'environment/environment', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/adam-corner', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/ipcc | CLIMATE_POLICY | 2018-01-30T11:00:18Z | true | CLIMATE_POLICY |
commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/sep/21/creation-film-us-science-evolution | Charles Darwin, too hot for the US | Steven Guess | On the heels of a February 2009 Gallup poll showing that only 39% of Americans believe the theory of evolution, a new British film about Darwin has had difficulty finding US distributors, apparently because the topic was deemed too controversial for American audiences. It's a remarkably low degree of support, even in a nation that flirted with the idea of vice-president Sarah Palin. After all, America has often been seen as an innovator, at the forefront of technological and scientific change. Perhaps America's distrust of a major scientific theory could be dismissed as part of the country's quirky charm, with no real consequences because the story of creation has little to do with our practical, day-to-day lives. As long as that 39% of disbelievers are making our microchips and producing swine flu vaccine, who cares? But sadly, such mistrust of science is not limited to the story of creation, but extends to stem cell research, climate change and cloning. The Gallup poll did not capture a scientific debate. It captured another front in the same culture war that is blocking a cap on carbon emissions. Political and religious opponents of scientific theories try to win not by way of careful comparisons of each side's ideas, a method that would require a great deal of study and knowledge, but by muddying the debate and demonising opponents. It's a tactic utilised to great effect in the US by sceptics of global warming. The faithful can sleep easy knowing that there's a little evidence over here for our side and a little over there for the other side. As a result, who needs to do any serious thinking or change behaviours? Frankly, what people believe in the comfort of their own homes is not much cause for national concern, even if those ideas are irrational. But if those attitudes are warming our oceans and forestalling medical breakthroughs, it becomes everyone's problem. To be sure, evolution and climate change are merely theories. But so are relativity and quantum mechanics – ideas that led to the creation of the modern computer and satellites. The search is on for a grand unified theory of physics, which may one day put Albert Einstein in his place. But in the meantime, do we pretend to know better about gravity? There is indeed a debate over certain aspects of evolution, but the geological and biological evidence is sufficient to reach a consensus about the general principles for the overwhelming majority of scientists who study the issue. Until scientists come up with a better explanation for the origins of life as we understand it, it is the prevailing view in our institutions of higher learning. One might look at this approach and say: How is such fidelity to science different from a literal, unquestioning reading of the gospel? It's about the same, except science can change over time as we gather new evidence. If scientists are wrong, there are mechanisms to correct those mistakes. But the creationist view comes from an eternal source which, for it to mean anything, cannot change over time. It is far more dangerous to trust our unchanging traditions in forming our scientific beliefs than the scientific method. And so in its endless pursuit of winning the culture wars, America finds itself "exceptional" once again on the world stage, captured by Gallup in an unflattering pose. Our nation's professed greatness, ravaged by a deep recession, has received yet another wound by way of its reactionary attitude toward science. It may be that this is merely a phase, which we will pass through like so many others. But if we do not change our ways and embrace science, we will let our desire to protect our own mythologies undermine our national interests on a wide range of pressing social and political issues. | ['commentisfree/commentisfree', 'science/evolution', 'science/charles-darwin', 'film/film', 'science/science', 'environment/climate-change-scepticism', 'us-news/sarahpalin', 'us-news/us-news', 'world/world', 'tone/comment', 'world/religion', 'commentisfree/belief', 'commentisfree/series/thread-of-the-day', 'science/history-science', 'film/creation', 'type/article', 'profile/stevenguess'] | environment/climate-change-scepticism | CLIMATE_DENIAL | 2009-09-21T13:00:00Z | true | CLIMATE_DENIAL |
business/nils-pratley-on-finance/2015/jul/09/george-osborne-is-saving-green-pennies-but-spending-nuclear-pounds | George Osborne is saving green pennies, but spending nuclear pounds | In the world of renewable energy, they are still reeling from the budget shocker – the removal of the climate change levy exemption, a source of revenue that had seemed secure for at least another half-decade. To see the value of these exception certificates, look at the effect on the share price of Drax, which qualified by virtue of converting two of its six units to burn biomass rather than coal: down 28% on the day, followed by a rebound of only 7% on Thursday. The company calculates that the change will cost it £60m next year, prompting analysts to cut their profit forecasts by about a quarter. “We are surprised and disappointed at this retrospective change to a support regime which has been in place since 2001 specifically to encourage green energy and support renewable investment,” said Dorothy Thompson, the Drax chief executive. She’s not the only one to feel that way. “We are disappointed by the several recent changes to the regulatory framework which will disincentivise long-term investment in the build-out of new energy infrastructure in the UK,” said Eric Machiels, boss of Infinis, which is big in onshore wind and suffered a Drax-style share price fall. Why did George Osborne do it? The official answer is to stop “taxpayer money benefiting electricity generation abroad”. Well, OK, but the share prices show he is also stopping a benefit to companies that very definitely generate in the UK. However it’s dressed up, it seems to be an old-fashioned grab designed to keep a lid on the government’s projected bill for encouraging renewables. But if cost is the worry, the chancellor ought to look elsewhere. How on earth does Hinkley Point, the £24bn nuclear power station planned for Somerset, continue to escape the Treasury’s scrutiny? When up and running, Hinkley Point will generate 3.2GW of energy. For £24bn, you could build enough gas-fired stations to produce 50GW, calculates Peter Atherton, analyst at Jefferies. The economics of Hinkley Point only make sense if the oil price is somewhere around $200 a barrel, as opposed to $60 currently. And, if the chancellor really has an objection to paying foreign generators, he should reflect that, while Hinkley Point is on British soil, the biggest financial winners from the generous inflation-linked contracts underwritten by UK taxpayers will be EdF, part-owned by the French state, and its Chinese partners. Hinkley Point may good for security of energy supply, but, in financial terms, the chancellor is pinching pennies from conventional renewables while squandering pounds on nuclear. The government should look again at Hinkley Point. Magic McFarlane? John McFarlane, the new Barclays chairman and its even-newer stand-in chief executive, is an ambitious chap. He told staff this week that he is aiming to double the share price in the next few years. That implies getting back to 520p, last seen in late 2007, just after the fall of Northern Rock. The quickest way to put a rocket under the shares would be to sell the investment bank for a princely sum. Investors don’t trust the division and it is dragging down Barclays’ share price. But that’s not the plan. McFarlane told the FT he’s committed to having a strong investment bank and will unveil his ideas soon. In other words, he wants to take another crack at making the numbers work. Good luck, but almost nobody is making consistently strong returns in investment banking these days – apart from the bankers themselves, of course, which is half the problem. Another problem is that UK regulators – understandably – are more suspicious of investment banking than their US counterparts. Clawback rules on bonuses, we are constantly told, are stricter here, creating recruitment headaches when Wall Street banks are on the prowl. If McFarlane thinks he has discovered a magic formula, we’re all ears. Just don’t expect shareholders to applaud instantly a strategy of being less conservative. Wasn’t that how it all went wrong for Barclays in the first place? HSBC hotseat Thank goodness somebody in parliament has remembered that there is unfinished business with Stephen Green. Lord Green of Hurstpierpoint, chief executive and then chairman of HSBC from 2003 to 2010, will give evidence to the House of Lords economic affairs committee next Tuesday and, let’s hope, will be asked questions that should have been posed in the last parliament. For example: why did HSBC seemingly ignore warnings from US authorities that its operations in Mexico, acquired in 2002, were a hotbed of money laundering by local drug cartels? HSBC eventually paid a fine of $1.9bn in 2012 and agreed a five-year deferred prosecution agreement with the US Department of Justice. And how much scrutiny did Green, as the boss, apply to the Swiss unit? Did he think he had any direct responsibility for ensuring that customers were paying their tax bills and complying with money-laundering regulations? And did HSBC bosses ever have any hope of knowing what was happening in their empire? In 1998 the bank had 25m customers; by 2003 it had 110m. If the place was too big to manage, why did Green say in 2009 that rivals had “profoundly damaged the industry’s reputation” when he couldn’t be sure HSBC’s record was clean? The advance notice from the economics affairs committee suggests that all these subjects will be covered. Don’t hold back, Lord Hollick, committee chairman. | ['business/business', 'business/energy-industry', 'environment/nuclearpower', 'environment/energy', 'environment/renewableenergy', 'politics/georgeosborne', 'uk-news/budget-2015-july', 'politics/politics', 'uk/uk', 'business/nils-pratley-on-finance', 'uk/budget', 'business/barclay', 'business/banking', 'business/draxgroup', 'type/article', 'tone/comment', 'profile/nilspratley', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/financial3'] | environment/nuclearpower | ENERGY | 2015-07-09T19:30:40Z | true | ENERGY |
environment/article/2024/aug/22/uk-ancient-oak-trees-woodland-trust-tree-of-the-year | ‘Ingrained in our heritage’: UK’s ancient oaks showcased in Tree of the Year contest | An oak tree shaped like an elephant and the oak with the widest girth in the UK have been shortlisted for the annual Tree of the Year competition. The Woodland Trust runs the annual competition to raise awareness of the UK’s ancient and at-risk trees. With its 2024 contest, the charity is campaigning to ensure more robust legal protection for the country’s most precious trees, and is showcasing ancient oaks as they are a beloved species and often live for more than 1,500 years. Oaks, the trust says, support 2,300 different species of wildlife, and the UK has more ancient oaks than the rest of western Europe combined. Last year, a 480-year-old sweet chestnut in Wrexham that has withstood storms, firewood collectors and, increasingly, parties and picnics beneath its boughs won the accolade. Sadly, some past winners have been destroyed: the Sycamore Gap tree (2016) beside Hadrian’s Wall was felled last year, and the Cubbington pear in Warwickshire (2015) was chopped down to make way for the HS2 railway line. This year’s list contains the Marton oak in Cheshire, which boasts a gigantic 14.02-metre girth, thought to be the widest in the UK. While 11 of the trees on the list were chosen by an expert panel, there is one public nomination: the Elephant oak at the Old Sloden inclosure in the New Forest. This tree takes its name from its unusual shape, and was nominated by a supporter, Claire Sheppard, who said: “This is my favourite oak tree to photograph at Old Sloden inclosure, New Forest. It’s a pollard oak known as the Elephant oak due to its massive trunk. I hike for around 5km from Abbotswell car park to get there and back, and this wood always gives me goose bumps. It’s not the easiest place to reach and hence it’s always very quiet; I get a real sense of peace and solitude here.” Dr Kate Lewthwaite, the citizen science manager at the Woodland Trust, said: “We chose the iconic oak because it captures people’s imaginations – from their leaves to their acorns, these trees are ingrained in our heritage – and the ancients are so impressive in terms of their sheer size and age. Some oaks that are alive today were already centuries old at the time of Queen Elizabeth I, or Charles Darwin. “It’s humbling to think how many events these trees have lived through, and that reaching full maturity they can stand for hundreds of years as ancient trees – all the while continuing to provide vital habitat as they hollow and produce dead wood. Each individual oak is like a unique, miniature nature reserve. There are so many species that live and rely on them, and have evolved alongside them, it is incredible.” Voting for the Woodland Trust’s 2024 Tree of the Year is open until 21 October via the Woodland Trust website, with a winner announced on 29 October. Take a bough: the tree shortlist Marton oak, Cheshire Sessile oak (quercus petraea) / Approximate age: 1,200 years / Girth: 14.02 metres. Bowthorpe oak, Lincolnshire English oak (quercus robur) / Estimated age: 1000 years / Girth: 13.38 metres. Gregynog oak, Powys Estimated age: 500 years / Girth: 9 metres. Queen Elizabeth oak, West Sussex Sessile oak (quercus petraea) / Estimated age: 800-1,000 years / Girth: 13.18 metres. Skipinnish oak, Lochaber, Scottish Highlands Sessile oak (quercus petraea) / Estimated age: unknown. The Michael, Midlothian Estimated age: 1,000+ years / Girth: 10.32 metres. Tea Party oak, Suffolk English oak (quercus robur) / Estimated age: unknown / Girth: 12.80 metres. King John oak, Somerset Estimated age: 1,000 years / Girth: 10.74 metres. Darwin oak, Shrewsbury, Shropshire Estimated age: 550 years / Girth: 7 metres. Capon tree, Scottish Borders English oak (quercus robur) / Estimated age: 700-1,000 years / Girth: 9.40 metres. Castle Archdale Oak, County Fermanagh Sessile oak (quercus petraea) / Estimated age: unknown / Girth: 7.68 metres. Public wildcard nomination: Elephant oak, Old Sloden inclosure, Hampshire Estimated age: unknown. | ['environment/forests', 'environment/conservation', 'environment/wildlife', 'uk/uk', 'environment/environment', 'uk-news/cheshire', 'type/article', 'tone/news', 'profile/helena-horton', 'publication/theguardian', 'theguardian/mainsection', 'theguardian/mainsection/uknews', 'tracking/commissioningdesk/uk-environment'] | environment/forests | BIODIVERSITY | 2024-08-21T23:01:21Z | true | BIODIVERSITY |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.