A research team has investigated the importance of limestone quarries for wild bee conservation. Diverse landscapes with good connectivity between quarries and calcareous grasslands proved to be particularly valuable. Calcareous grasslands -- meaning grasslands on chalk or limestone soils -- are exceptionally rich in plant and animal species, making them valuable ecosystems. Quarries with a lot of shrub encroachment, on the other hand, had a lower species diversity. Endangered bee species were more common in large quarries.
12/04/2024 - 13:09
Mary Lawlor criticizes US’s failure to respond to concerns after Alex Connon and John Mark Rozendaal charges
A leading UN human rights expert has expressed dismay after the US government failed to respond to questions about the criminal crackdown on peaceful climate protesters.
Mary Lawlor, the UN special rapporteur on human rights defenders, on Tuesday published a letter sent to US authorities raising concerns about the potential violation of international human rights law after two climate activists, Alex Connon and John Mark Rozendaal, were charged with crimes that carried lengthy jail terms.
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12/04/2024 - 11:00
AI program GenCast performed better than ENS forecast at predicting day-to-day weather and paths of hurricanes and cyclones
For those who keep an eye on the elements, the outlook is bright: researchers have built an artificial intelligence-based weather forecast that makes faster and more accurate predictions than the best system available today.
GenCast, an AI weather program from Google DeepMind, performed up to 20% better than the ENS forecast from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), widely regarded as the world leader.
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12/04/2024 - 10:00
Native leaders ready for a fight as Trump calls ANWR, one of the last truly wild places on Earth, the US’s ‘biggest oil farm’
The Arctic national wildlife refuge (ANWR) is one of the earth’s last intact ecosystems. Vast and little-known, this 19m-acre expanse along Alaska’s north slope is home to some of the region’s last remaining polar bears, as well as musk oxen, wolves and wolverines. Millions of birds from around the world migrate to or through the region each year, and it serves as the calving grounds for the porcupine caribou.
Donald Trump has called the refuge the US’s “biggest oil farm”.
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12/04/2024 - 09:00
Testing found acute lead toxicosis as cause of death of two lorikeets, a honeyeater and three grey-headed flying foxes in Port Pirie
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Dozens of native birds and flying foxes have been killed by “acute” lead poisoning in the South Australian regional town of Port Pirie, with contamination fears in the town that is home to one of the world’s largest lead smelters.
Earlier this year locals in the 17,600-person town raised the alarm when they began to find dead native birds and flying foxes in large numbers in parks and green spaces, with subsequent testing of several animals showing they died from acute lead poisoning.
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12/04/2024 - 07:00
Research shows common air pollutants can be detrimental to egg, sperm and embryo development
Maternal and paternal exposure to common air pollutants may increase the risk of infertility because it can be detrimental to egg, sperm and embryo development, new research in the US finds.
Previous papers have established that air pollution exposure probably contributes to infertility, but it has been unclear whether the toxins affected men or women because both parents face similar exposures. That also made it difficult to establish when in the conception process damage occurred.
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12/03/2024 - 17:30
Exclusive: With Brazil’s politicians, agribusiness organisations and global traders piling on the pressure, the highly successful 2006 Soy Moratorium is under threat
One of the cornerstones of Amazon rainforest protection – the Soy Moratorium – is under unprecedented pressure from Brazilian agribusiness organisations, politicians, and global trading companies, the Guardian has learned.
Soy is one of the most widely grown crops in Brazil, and posed a huge deforestation threat to the Amazon rainforest until stakeholders voluntarily agreed to impose a moratorium and no longer source it from the region in 2006.
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12/03/2024 - 15:44
Plant species can fulfill different functions within an ecosystem, even if they are closely related to each other. This surprising conclusion was reached by a global analysis of around 1.7 million datasets on plant communities. The findings overturn previous assumptions in ecology.
12/03/2024 - 15:39
Bird wing shape -- a proxy for long-distance flying ability, or dispersal -- is a trait that influences biodiversity patterns on islands around the world, according to biologists.
12/03/2024 - 10:55
The Baku Cop29 talks were marked by division and self-interest, with rancorous meddling right until the end
Fiona Harvey is an environment editor at the Guardian
When I first visited Azerbaijan this spring, one fixture of the Baku skyline was unmissable. The bright orange of flaring – the product of the oil and gas extraction that makes up 90% of Azerbaijan’s export revenues – lit up the night sky, not far from the Olympic stadium, where nearly 200 nations would gather in November for the Cop29 climate summit.
Flaring burns methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, and is a major source of carbon emissions. If all the world’s flared gas were captured instead, it could power sub-Saharan Africa. But that entails installing new equipment, so producers don’t bother.
Fiona Harvey is an environment editor at the Guardian
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