All bird species have declined in number, after suffering habitat loss, pesticide use, climate breakdown and bird flu
Wild bird numbers in the UK are continuing to fall despite government promises to halt nature decline by 2030.
Data released by the government on Tuesday shows that over the past five years, all bird species have faced population decline after suffering from habitat loss, pesticide use, climate breakdown and bird flu. Overall, bird species have declined in number UK-wide by 2% and in England by 7% in the five years since 2018.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
11/12/2024 - 09:34
11/12/2024 - 07:14
Ofgem gives green light to five interconnectors capable of powering millions of homes
Business live – latest updates
Projects to lay five subsea power cables capable of powering millions of homes have been given the green light as Great Britain prepares to use its giant offshore windfarms to become a net exporter of green electricity in the 2030s.
The energy regulator, Ofgem, has approved three subsea cable projects linking Great Britain to power grids in Germany, Ireland and Northern Ireland to help share renewable electricity across borders.
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11/12/2024 - 05:00
Brexit, the cost of living and the climate crisis are all making farmers’ lives much more difficult. Taxing us is not the answer
Tom Fairfax farms Mindrum Farm in Northumberland
Last year, Keir Starmer looked farmers in the eye at the annual National Farmers’ Union (NFU) conference and said he knew what it meant to lose a farm. It is “not like losing any other business”, he said. “It can’t come back.” Since then, Labour has announced a number of new measures aimed at farmers, including dropping the inheritance tax exemption that many have enjoyed. This is a drastic shift for an already strained sector and has sparked heated debate among farmers I know. But one thing has been missing: an understanding of farming and the pressures it faces.
The modern UK farming industry has been shaped by decades of government policy aimed at ensuring we have enough food to survive. While agriculture isn’t directly state controlled, the government’s influence is felt through regulation and incentives. If you are old enough, you may remember rationing, which marked an era when governments prioritised access to cheap calories, driving the shift toward intensive farming. This focus, backed by successive governments, led to farmers ramping up production by using new technology and infrastructure, and chemicals such as DDT and glyphosate. But cheap food had vast environmental and social costs, posing a drastic threat to the sector’s sustainability and resilience in the long term, as soils were depleted and biodiverse habitats gave way to monocultures.
Tom Fairfax farms Mindrum Farm, a regenerative mixed farm in the Cheviot foothills in Northumberland
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11/12/2024 - 04:23
'2024 – a masterclass in climate destruction.' That is how the UN secretary general, António Guterres, started his address to world leaders at Cop29 on Tuesday. 'Families running for their lives before the next hurricane strikes; workers and pilgrims collapsing in insufferable heat; floods tearing through communities, and tearing down infrastructure; children going to bed hungry as droughts ravage crops. All these disasters, and more, are being supercharged by human-made climate change,' he said
Cop29: 2024 has been ‘masterclass in climate destruction’, says UN chief – live updates
Critics say approval of ‘climate credits’ rules on day one of Cop29 was rushed
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11/12/2024 - 02:56
Oil and gas company had challenged 2021 ruling that it must reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45% by 2030
Shell has won its appeal against a landmark climate judgment by a Dutch court, which in 2021 ordered the fossil fuel company to sharply reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.
A court of appeal ruled on Tuesday that, while Shell does have a “special responsibility” to cut its emissions as a big oil company, this would not be achieved by imposing a specific legal goal.
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11/12/2024 - 02:00
Odd-looking creatures called ciona are naturally rich in protein and one company aims to farm and process them for the table
At a seaside restaurant near the docks in Fredrikstad, Norway, there’s a selection of delicious looking entrees sitting in front of me. There is a cheesy lasagne, a savoury Mexican casserole, and a spicy chilli con carne. Biting in to each one in turn, I savour the familiar taste of ground beef. Or is it?
The dishes come from Pronofa Asa, a Scandinavian company whose purpose is to make new and sustainable protein sources. In 2022, it acquired the Swedish research company Marine Taste and expanded on its work turning ciona – or “sea squirts” to you and me – into mincemeat. The dishes in Fredrikstad were prototypes, but Pronofa plans to have its mincemeat on supermarket shelves in Norway and Sweden before the end of the year, it says, and will aim to expand throughout Europe in the coming years.
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11/12/2024 - 01:31
Climate scientists and advisers back new UK commitment but warn that there is still work to be done
In the halls of Cop29, activists from Oil Change International gathered around a computer to watch a Dutch court’s ruling on a major ruling.
In this morning’s verdict, the Dutch appeals court struck down a 2021 ruling ordering oil and gas giant Shell to cut emissions by 45% by 2030 from 2019 levels. The activists were devastated.
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11/07/2024 - 00:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 07 November 2024; doi:10.1038/s44183-024-00094-2
Urbanizing river deltas are highly susceptible to sea level rise and extreme weather events such as floods and droughts. Water-related disasters are already happening more often due to climate change, rapid urbanization, unsustainable land use and aging infrastructure threatening a large fraction of human and natural environments in these low lying and sinking areas around the globe. As stress levels of climate change are accelerating, societal and physical transformations are essential for adapting our deltas to climate change. In the Netherlands, imagination and evidence by design in the form of a long-term spatial vision, played a pivotal role in the past century to set, share and accomplish a new direction to overcome flood disasters by altering the coastlines and riverbeds of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta. The unprecedented rainfall in July 2021 and the storm in December 2021 which hit Western Europe revealed the effectiveness of this new direction. We therefore plea for a prominent role of design in climate science and delta management to imagine, analyse and communicate future perspectives for climate adaptation in urbanizing deltas.
World Ocean Explorer Wins Gold Medal Serious Simulation Award from Serious Play Annual International Competition
10/26/2023 - 14:35
For Immediate Release October 19, 2023
Sedgwick, Maine USA World Ocean Explorer, a 3D virtual aquarium and educational simulation, was recently cited for excellence, winning a Gold Medal Award in the 2023 International Serious Play Awards Program.
World Ocean Explorer is an innovative 3D virtual aquarium designed for educational exploration of the world’s oceans. With interactive exhibits and a lobby space, visitors can immerse themselves in realistic marine environments, including a DEEP SEA exhibit funded by Schmidt Ocean Institute, showcasing unprecedented deep-sea discoveries off Australia. Targeted at 3rd graders and beyond, this immersive experience offers a range of perspectives on the ocean environment and can be explored through guided tours or user-controlled interfaces. Visit DEEP SEA at worldoceanexplorer.org/deep-sea-aquarium.html.
Serious Play Conference brings together professionals who are exploring the use of game-based learning, sharing their experience, and working together to shape the future of training and education. For more information on Serious Play Award Program visit seriousplayconf.com/international-serious-play-award-programs.
World Ocean Explorer is a transformative virtual aquarium designed to deepen understanding of the world ocean and amplify connection for young people worldwide. Organized around the principles of Ocean Literacy and the Next Gen Science Standards, World Ocean Explorer brings the wonder and knowledge of ocean species and systems to students in formal and informal classrooms, absolutely free to anyone with a good Internet connection. As an advocate for the ocean through communications, World Ocean Observatory believes there is no better investment in the future of the sustainable ocean than through a new approach to educational engagement that excites, informs, and motivates students to explore the wonders of our marine world and to understand the pervasive connection and implication for our future, inherent in the protection and conservation of all aspects of our ocean world.
World Ocean Explorer presents an astonishing 3-dimensional simulated aquarium visit, organized to reveal the wonders of undersea life, with layers of detailed data and information to augment the emotional connection made to the astonishing beauty and complexity of the dynamic ocean. Within each of the virtual exhibits, students visit exemplary theme-based sites with myriad opportunities to understand the larger perspectives of scientific knowledge as organized and visualized to dramatize the impact and change on ocean life as a result of natural and human-generated events. Through immersion among displays, mixed media and 3D models, the experience of an aquarium visit will be brought into classrooms or home school environments as a free, accessible, always available opportunity for teaching and learning. All of this will be available to a world audience without physical limitation or cost. World Ocean Explorer, a project of the World Ocean Observatory, receives support from the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, Visual Solutions Lab, the Climate Change Institute, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, and The Fram Museum Oslo. To learn more about the current and future exhibits of World Ocean Explorer, visit worldoceanexplorer.org.
media contact
Trisha Badger, Managing Director, World Ocean Observatory | director@thew2o.net +12077011069
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