Warnings of dramatically escalating extinctions in Australia over the next two decades seem to be falling on deaf ears Gregory Andrews was Australia’s first threatened species commissioner, appointed in 2013 by the then incoming Coalition environment minister Greg Hunt. He recently returned to the country, after serving as high commissioner to Ghana, and was disheartened... Continue Reading →
As floods follow fires, we need to hold our leaders’ feet to the flames – or, for that matter, to the water Environmentalists once saw abstraction as the biggest obstacle to climate action. How, they wondered, could one focus the public on the distant future? Today, we confront the opposite problem, with the very immediacy... Continue Reading →
Is battling back-to-back disasters distracting us from fighting the climate crisis?
Environmental lawsuits are nothing new but now lawyers are turning their attention to cases that address the loss of biodiversity. The Tagus estuary near Lisbon is Portugal’s largest wetland, a vital habitat and stopover for tens of thousands of migratory birds, including flamingos, black-tailed godwits and glossy ibis. It has also been earmarked as the... Continue Reading →
Legal eagles: how climate litigation is shaping ambitious cases for nature
How oil companies rebranded deceptive climate ads as ‘free speech’
n two dozen climate liability cases, companies are arguing that their public statements about climate change are not ‘deceptive’ so much as persuasive – and protected free speech On 24 October 2019, Maura Healey, the attorney general of Massachusetts, sued ExxonMobil for “deceptive advertising” and for “misleading Massachusetts investors about the risks to Exxon’s business... Continue Reading →
Climate crisis: Amazon rainforest tipping point is looming, data shows
The Amazon is approaching a tipping point, data shows, after which the rainforest would be lost with “profound” implications for the global climate and biodiversity. Computer models have previously indicated a mass dieback of the Amazon is possible but the new analysis is based on real-world satellite observations over the past three decades. Novel statistical... Continue Reading →
Democrats hope climate measures in Build Back Better will be resurrected amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – but green groups want Biden to go even further As Joe Biden ratchets up the pressure on Russia by banning imports of its oil, American drivers grumble about rising gasoline prices and the oil and gas industry clamors... Continue Reading →
‘Defining moment’: how can the US end its dependency on fossil fuels?
(We are posting this after the report came out, it becomes obvious why upon reading it...) Talks stretch past deadline as governments are accused of trying to water down findings The world must abandon fossil fuels as a matter of urgency, rather than entrusting the future climate to untried “techno-fixes” such as sucking carbon out... Continue Reading →
Scientists urge end to fossil fuel use as landmark IPCC report readied
As climate breakdown and worldwide conflict continue to place the food system at risk, seed banks from the Arctic to Lebanon try to safeguard biodiversity by Salomé Gómez-Upegui and Rita Liu As the risks from the climate crisis and global conflict increase, seed banks are increasingly considered a priceless resource that could one day prevent... Continue Reading →
Seed banks: the last line of defense against a threatening global food crisis
Growing numbers of young nonviolent climate protesters are willing to face jail. Dorian Lynskey followed them in the weeks leading up to last week’s action In a flat in east London, on the night of 31 March, two dozen people in their early 20s are packing sleeping bags and energy bars and discussing unorthodox toilet... Continue Reading →
Just Stop Oil: behind the scenes with the activists
I wanted to sound the alarm about oil exploration and the climate crisis, but Good Morning Britain just didn’t want to hear I hadn’t seen the 2021 satirical film Don’t Look Up when I went on Good Morning Britain on Tuesday. I was there on behalf of Just Stop Oil – a group that has... Continue Reading →
I went on TV to explain Just Stop Oil – and it became a parody of Don’t Look Up
Experts say criticism of oil and gas’s ‘climate-blocking activities’ cut from final draft, reflective of industry’s power and influence The fossil fuel industry and its influence over policy was the major elephant in the room looming over the release of the third and final report, out this week, from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change,... Continue Reading →
empowerment & inner transformation... 