-
Hotter seas supercharge storms and destroy critical ecosystems such as kelp forests and coral reefs
The climate crisis has tripled the length of ocean heatwaves, a study has found, supercharging deadly storms and destroying critical ecosystems such as kelp forests and coral reefs.
Half of the marine heatwaves since 2000 would not have happened without global heating, which is caused by burning fossil fuels. The heatwaves have not only become more frequent but also more intense: 1C warmer on average, but much hotter in some places, the scientists said.
Continue reading...
-
Net zero and clean energy can actually help save the steel industry, experts point out
Ed Miliband and the UK’s net zero target are being falsely blamed for the UK’s steel crisis, experts have said.
On Saturday, parliament passed a law containing emergency powers to gain control of the last remaining maker of mass-produced virgin steel in England, based in Scunthrope, after its Chinese owner, Jingye, declined government support to keep the plant running over the next few weeks.
Continue reading...
-
Often dismissed as summertime sniffles, the condition that affects a quarter of UK adults can lead to serious and life-limiting health problems
Read more: Pollen peril: how heat, thunder and smog are creating deadly hay fever seasons
Sometimes the season starts as early as mid-April; other times it’s slower to get going. But for Lisa Ventura, June is consistently the cruellest month. “I might get lulled into a false sense of security: ‘Oh, it’s the end of May, it hasn’t started yet’,” she says in a heavy tone. “Then, as if on cue, it’s June the first – and bang.”
Ventura suffers from “debilitating” hay fever. For about three months from early May, she cannot be outside for more than a few minutes before she starts sniffing and sneezing. “When it’s really bad, my eyes look like I’ve gone 10 rounds with a boxer – they are that swollen,” says Ventura.
Continue reading...
-
At its AGM this week, the company will face not only the activist investor at its heels, but a global economy being changed from the White House
After Donald Trump’s “liberation day” on Wednesday last week, BP lost almost a quarter of its market value in a share price rout even deeper than the oil giant endured in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. The collapse in global oil prices in the wake of the US president’s tariff blitz may have wiped billions from its market value – but Trump isn’t BP’s only problem.
The oil company will face shareholders this week for the first time since it bowed to investor pressure to abandon its green energy ambitions in favour of a return to fossil fuels, and its chair, Helge Lund, agreed to step down from the board.
Continue reading...
-
It’s a delicacy in France and Spain, and springing up at the UK’s restaurants, but is the trend for dining on cuttlefish sustainable?
It can be braised low and slow or grilled in a hot flash, covered in sauce and canned or stirred through a paella. Cuttlefish, a cephalopod closely related to squid, is the seafood menu offering du jour.
In March a cuttlefish risotto was added to the menu at Rick Stein’s The Seafood Restaurant in Padstow, Cornwall. In Cardiff, at Heaneys, you can find a dish of pork belly, cuttlefish and borlotti beans. At Cycene in London’s Shoreditch, a goat ragu with cuttlefish noodles, while at Silo in Stratford, cuttlefish is fermented to dress leeks, alliums and padron peppers. In Glasgow, Celentano’s offers a linguine and cuttlefish ragu with black olives and tarragon.
Continue reading...
-
Turin and Genoa likely to be among worst hit, while central and eastern Europe could get early taste of summer
North-west Italy is braced for heavy rainfall and thunderstorms across the southern side of the Alps, particularly in Piedmont and Liguria.
Turin and Genoa are expected to be among the worst affected, with snowfall also likely on higher ground. The region has been forecast to receive 140-160mm of rainfall between Sunday and Friday this week.
Continue reading...
-
The country is the most deadly to be an environmental activist – and the brutal murders of Juan Bautista Silva and Juan Antonio Hernández are the latest in a long line of violent acts against defenders
At about 6pm on Wednesday 26 February, Ana Luiza Hernández Raudelez saw her partner, Juan Bautista Silva, 70, receive a phone call. A land defender who had spent more than 20 years working for the local environment, Silva was preparing to leave on a motorcycle trip to photograph illegal logging near Las Botijas, in Comayagua, central Honduras, to support a complaint to the prosecutor’s office.
As he was about to set off, Ana suggested he take their son, Juan Antonio Hernández, 20, with him, as his new mobile phone took better photos.
Continue reading...
-
The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical concepts
Do all wind turbines rotate in the same direction? If so, why? Rab Spence, by email
Post your answers (and new questions) below or send them tonq@theguardian.com. A selection will be published next Sunday.
Continue reading...
-
The governing ideology of the far right has become a monstrous, supremacist survivalism. Our task is to build a movement strong enough to stop them
The movement for corporate city states cannot believe its good luck. For years, it has been pushing the extreme notion that wealthy, tax-averse people should up and start their own high-tech fiefdoms, whether new countries on artificial islands in international waters (“seasteading”) or pro-business “freedom cities” such as Próspera, a glorified gated community combined with a wild west med spa on a Honduran island.
Yet despite backing from the heavy-hitter venture capitalists Peter Thiel and Marc Andreessen, their extreme libertarian dreams kept bogging down: it turns out most self-respecting rich people don’t actually want to live on floating oil rigs, even if it means lower taxes, and while Próspera might be nice for a holiday and some body “upgrades”, its extra-national status is currently being challenged in court.
Continue reading...
-
Almost as amazing as the knowledge we have gained in the past four decades is the fact that some people continue to deny the damage we are doing to our world
Earlier this year I received an email from a reader asking background questions about an article I had written more than four decades ago. Given the time gap, my recollection was hazy. To be honest, it was almost non-existent. So I was intrigued – and then astonished when I read the feature.
I had written about the British glaciologist John Mercer, author of a 1978Nature paper in which he warned that continuing increases in fossil fuel consumption would cause amounts of atmospheric carbon dioxide to soar. Global temperatures could rise by 2C by the mid-21st century, causing major ice loss at the poles and threatening a 5-metre rise in sea levels, he warned.
Continue reading...
