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Thinktank says solar has been fastest-growing energy source for last 20 years, but remains dwarfed by hydro power
The world used clean power sources to meet more than 40% of its electricity demand last year for the first time since the 1940s, figures show.
A report by the energy thinktank Ember said the milestone was powered by a boom in solar power capacity, which has doubled in the last three years.
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A three-yearly environmental update issues stark warning over biodiversity – and reports air pollution has improved in some areas
A major new report on New Zealand’s environment has revealed a worrying outlook for its unique species and highlighted declining water health, while also noting some improvements in air quality.
The ministry of the environment’s three-yearly update, Our Environment 2025, collates statistics, data and research across five domains – air, atmosphere and climate, freshwater, land, and marine – to paint a picture of the state of New Zealand’s environment.
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In Ulaanbaatar, coal fires heat almost every home. But as extreme weather drives families off the Mongolian steppes into the city the air is becoming more deadly
The eldest child was away training for the army when his family died in their sleep. All six of them, two adults and four children, were poisoned by carbon monoxide gas seeping out from their coal-fired stove into their home in Ulaanbaatar in January, the coldest month in the world’s coldest capital city.
Mongolians were touched by the tragedy but there was anger a month later when, during a two-day parliamentary hearing forced by a public petition against pollution levels, the government released figures showing there had been 779 deaths from carbon monoxide poisoning in the country in the past seven years. By 19 February, when a couple in their 40s were found lifeless in their bed, that number had risen to 811.
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Letchworth Garden City, Hertfordshire:I’m watching one prepare her nest, daubing and filling every gap with whatever claggy muck she can get her bill on
The bowling club car park is almost deserted. Above my car, three wood pigeons peck at ash flowers that hang like clusters of tiny fists, while I watch the trees through my binoculars from the driver’s seat, hoping I’ve arrived in time to catch a “mud‑dabber” in action for the third consecutive spring.
A rapid “Hwit-hwit-hwit” call gives the nuthatch (Sitta europaea) away. But it isn’t until she lands upside down on the trunk of a nearby oak that I can admire her blue-grey back, soft cinnamon belly and black go-faster eye stripe. As with all nuthatch pairs, the female is in charge of nest-building, and she’s already started plastering the entrance to an old cavity in the trunk using pellets of mud. The wound callus around the hole is lined with what looks like cob walling, peppered with shallow depressions made by her bill.
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Charity crowdfunding initial sum to build £750,000 facility on Bodmin Moor to study overlooked but biodiverse natural habitat
Europe’s first research station for the study of Atlantic temperate rainforest is set to be built beside an ancient wood in Cornwall.
The Thousand Year Trust charity is crowdfunding an initial amount to build the £750,000 facility, which will enable students and academics to study this historically overlooked but biodiverse natural habitat.
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By learning to live with its ursine neighbours, mountainous Pettorano sul Gizio has drawn tourists and new residents, bucking a trend of rural decline
Pettorano sul Gizio is a medieval mountain town full of alleys, watchful cats and wooden doors locked sometime in the last century. In the lower parts of town, rustic charm turns into abandonment – branches grow out of walls and roofs have fallen in. The only bar closed at Christmas, after the owner died. Some “For Sale” signs have been up so long the phone number is illegible.
The town, with its faded ochre and orange hues, is listed as one of Italy’s I Borghi più belli (an association of historic towns). In 1920, about 5,000 people lived here, now the population is 390. It resembles many others in Italy’s south-central Abruzzo region, home to a shrinking, ageing population. One nearby town has been almost completely abandoned, and is home to just 12 people.
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Black-tailed godwits’ scientific name means ‘muddy muddy’, a moniker that doesn’t do justice to their elegance
When the tide is out on my Somerset coastal patch, there’s so much mud it looks as if you could walk all the way across the bay to Wales.
That seemed apt when I came across a flock of black-tailed godwits, whose scientific name, Limosa limosa, literally means “muddy muddy”. The name seems inappropriate for such an elegant bird, although their long legs do allow them to feed in the muddiest places.
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Guardian Australia is highlighting the plight of our endangered native species during an election campaign that is ignoring broken environment laws and rapidly declining ecosystems
The bogong moth was once so abundant it was mistaken for weather. During Sydney’s Olympic Games in 2000, a swarm of bogong moths attracted by stadium lights was so huge that meteorologists mistook it for a rain cloud.
But the species known as “deberra” in Taungurung language – an insect with deep cultural and ecological importance, but which is smaller and lighter than a paperclip – has not returned to those numbers since the population collapsed by up to 99.5% in the two years before 2019.
Get Guardian Australia environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as an email
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More than 900 young people tell Guardian Australia they worry about money, housing and healthcare – and feel a sense of dread about the climate emergency, social cohesion and rise of the far right
“There is a general sense – it sounds melodramatic – of, well, the world is ending, we have no way to deal with that, so we are just going to get on with life,” Axel says.
The 25-year-old is describing a feeling shared by his friends in their mid-20s.
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From planning ahead and avoiding freezer burn to creating flavour bombs in ice trays, here are some expert tips
Preparing meals in advance and portioning out meat, fruit and vegetables to be frozen can save money, avoid waste and cut the time you spend cooking.
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