Breaking Waves: Ocean News

10/09/2024 - 11:24
Brown bear 128 Glazer defeated male bear that killed her cub this summer in Katmai national park For the second year in a row, a brown bear named 128 Grazer won the Fat Bear Contest at Alaska’s Katmai national park and preserve – she also got her revenge. This summer a behemoth male killed her cub. On Tuesday, Grazer beat the bear, who is named Chunk, by more than 40,000 votes cast by fans watching live cameras at explore.org of the preserve. Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 09:51
Climate disasters risk pulling society apart. To survive we need solidarity – and only one ticket in the US election offers that Even as the good people of Florida’s west coast pulled the soggy mattresses from Helene out to the curb, Milton appeared on the horizon this week – a double blast of destruction from the Gulf of Mexico that’s a reminder that physics takes no time off, not even in the weeks before a crucial election. My sense is that those storms will help turn the voting on 5 November into a climate election of sorts, even if – as is likely – neither Kamala Harris nor Donald Trump spend much time in the next 25 days talking about CO2 or solar power. That’s because these storms show not only the power of global heating (Helene’s record rains, and Milton’s almost unprecedented intensification, were reminders of what it means to have extremely hot ocean temperatures). More, they show what we’re going to need to survive the now inevitable train of such disasters. Which is solidarity. Which is something only one ticket offers. Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 09:23
Prof Pedro Arrojo-Agudo says regulator Ofwat ‘complacent’ about water firms putting their shareholders before public The privatised English water system has been singled out for criticism by the UN special rapporteur on the human right to clean water. Prof Pedro Arrojo-Agudo said water systems should be managed as a publicly owned service, rather than run by private companies set up to benefit shareholders. Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 08:48
The mining tycoon says his iron ore business will stop using fossil fuels by the end of the decade without carbon offsets or carbon capture and storage Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast About $45tn of global business revenue is covered by corporate “net zero emissions” pledges but the iron ore billionaire Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest thinks the whole net zero thing is “fantasy”. “Now is the time to walk away from net zero 2050, that hasn’t been anything really but a con to maintain fossil fuels,” Forrest said last week. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 05:00
Once a champion of initiatives to protect nature, the EU is now giving in to pressure from farmers and the far right When diplomats struck a deal to save nature in 2022, pledging to halt biodiversity loss by the end of the decade, Europe was seen as a credible leader in fraught negotiations. The EU cajoled others into stepping up their game as it championed a target to protect 30% of the land and sea by 2030. But two years later, as delegates meet in wildlife-rich Colombia for Cop16 – the international summit to save nature – Europe’s own enthusiasm for saving species appears to be endangered. Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 04:37
Government criticised over list of potential countries for sourcing biomass, which also includes Afghanistan A plan by the British government to burn biomass imported from countries including North Korea and Afghanistan has been described as “bonkers”, with critics saying it undermines the credibility of the UK’s climate strategy. A bioenergy resource model, published in late summer, calculates that only a big expansion in the import of energy crops and wood from a surprising list of nations would satisfy the UK’s plan to meet net zero. Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 02:02
Superpower Institute says analysis of Queensland, NSW and Victorian sites shows need for independent reporting of greenhouse gas emissions Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast Australia’s coalmines and gasfields may be emitting twice as much methane as they currently declare, underscoring the need to introduce independent reporting of the potent greenhouse gas, an energy thinktank has warned. The Superpower Institute’s Open Methane tool used satellites and ground-based verification to identify 20 “sites of concern” – all involving coal and gas operations – that are releasing “around double” the amount of methane reported. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 01:00
Analysis shows Gulf’s heat that worsened Helene 200-500 times more likely because of human-caused global heating As Hurricane Milton bears down on Florida, fueled by a record-hot Gulf of Mexico, a new analysis has shown how the Gulf’s heat that worsened last month’s Hurricane Helene was 200 to 500 times more likely because of human-caused global heating. Helene, one of the deadliest storms in US history, gathered pace over the Gulf before crashing ashore with 140mph (225km/h) winds. Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 01:00
Selected from a record-breaking 59,228 entries from 117 countries and territories, the winners of the Natural History Museum’s prestigious wildlife photographer of the year competition have been announced, with an exhibition opening on Friday 11 October. The Canadian marine conservation photojournalist Shane Gross was awarded wildlife photographer of the year 2024 for his image of tadpoles, The Swarm of Life, captured while snorkelling through lily pads in Cedar Lake on Vancouver Island, British Columbia Continue reading...
10/09/2024 - 00:53
Ahahahah oh this is gold Sign up here to get an email whenever First Dog cartoons are published Get all your needs met at the First Dog shop if what you need is First Dog merchandise and prints Continue reading...