With 80 percent of the world’s fossil fuel reserves needing to be left in the ground, it’s disturbing to discover that European nations are forking out 112 billion euros each year in fossil fuel subsidies, JOE WARE reports
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Religious values are often consistent with conservation efforts. So it’s not surprising that a variety of religious organisations and conservationists are working together to help mitigate the devastating effects of global climate change, writes CURTIS ABRAHAM
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The Queen Alexandra's Birdwing - or Ornithoptera alexandrae - is the world's largest and most spectacular butterfly. But it is under threat from encroaching agriculture and logging. BRENDAN MONTAGUE reports on a new initiative designed to save the beautiful insect from extinction
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We live in a throwaway society. Innovation in the tech industries mean ever more powerful products come to market. But the death of repair shops and a culture of reliance is not simply the result of shiny new things. Corporations, and capitalism itself, requires planned obsolesce, argues STEVEN GORELICK
Read More... Growing resilience: how daring to dream and time in nature make you stronger
Britain will lead global low carbon revolution, claims Labour shadow chancellor
David Attenborough: On climate change, optimism and Blue Planet II
The Vegan Society today launches its Plate up for the Planet to encourage people to abandon meat and dairy products, for their health, and for the health of the environment, reports LAURA BRIGGS.
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Labour party leader, Jeremy Corbyn - who said he'd never give up his allotment, whatever the outcome of the recent UK elections - knows it and so do the millions of gardeners, growers and allotmenteers who've found a deeper relationship with their own patch of land. HARRIET GRIFFEY discovers the healing power of that relationship as described in a beautifully written new memoir
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Got something to say about the environment and the way we do (or don't) care for it? Here's your chance to get what you think noticed and published....
Read More... Solar Irrigation Pump is Winner of the 2017 Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy and Water
Diners want the food industry to ‘clean up' its act and tell the truth about GMO ingredients
In 2016 the UK imported £26 million worth of fur, showing that the industry has gone global. Only by exposing the level of cruelty and showing people what lies behind the fashion will change ever come about writes LAURA BRIGGS
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Theresa May's Tory government pushes forward with its nuclear white elephants. But one Cumbria couple persist in exposing the dangers of new nukes and old. Now Martin Forwood and Janine Allis-Smith of Cumbrians Opposed to a Radioactive Environment have won the 2017 Nuclear-Free Future Award, reports LINDA PENTZ GUNTER
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The South Georgia Heritage Trust and the University of Dundee hosted 300 delegates from 43 countries to share a global picture of the world’s islands where ecosystems can hang in the balance, reports LAURA BRIGGS
Read More... Smart meter radiation and health - why are we neglecting non-toxic alternatives?
Poland's primeval forest is under serious attack
Sea Shepherd helps arrest 'sustainable' shrimp trawler for illegal fishing in Liberian waters
From child-soldier to Netflix star, the Congolese park ranger has won his award for stopping oil exploration in the Virunga National Park. He talks to SOPHIE MORLIN-YRON
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Meet the man securing justice for the Dongira tribe's sacred hills...in the first of her profiles of two of this year's winners, SOPHIE MORLIN-YRON interviews the recipient of the Goldman Environmental Prize for Asia
Read More... The ecology of war: imperial power, permanent conflict and disposable humans
Ivan Ivanovich Semeniuk: a returnee to the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone speaks
There is a growing global movement to recognise the rights of rivers, writes Debadityo Sinha. But rights alone are not enough. We must love and respect rivers, and even think like rivers to understand the vital functions they perform within landscapes and ecosystems, and so discover where their 'best interests' truly lie. And then we must be willing to act: protecting rivers and restoring them to health and wholeness.
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May this new collection of John Muir's writings reach us now and inspire another generation to fall in love with wild nature, to care for it, to know that wilderness is not optional but central to our survival in the centuries to come, writes Terry Tempest Williams - and remind us how to embrace this beautiful, broken world once again with an open heart. If we do approach the mountain, it is we who are moved.
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Recognising nature as a legal stakeholder with inalienable rights in environmental law proceedings is a powerful counterbalance to corporate dictatorship, writes Mumta Ito. It empowers people and governments to stand up for nature - the underlying basis of our economy and our lives. And it stands in contrast to feeble approaches based on the financialisation and commodification of nature, which may be twisted to justify more destruction.
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The political events of the last year are cause for sorrow, for reflection, and for reorientation. But they're also cause for a Green reboot. And fortunately, the UK's upcoming election on June 8th gives us just such an opportunity, writes RUPERT READ
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Who are the best guardians of forests and other wild places? Governments? Conservation NGOs? Corporations? No, writes Prakash Kashwan, it's the indigenous peoples who have lived in harmony with their environment for millennia. But to be able do so, they must first be accorded rights to their historic lands and resources, both in law and in practice. Among the countries leading the way, Mexico. Among the laggards, Kenya and India.
Read More... Bovine TB summit: science-based policy, or policy-based science?
Cellphones, wifi and cancer: Will Trump's budget cuts zap vital ‘electrosmog' research?
EDF facing bankruptcy as decommissioning time for France's ageing nuclear fleet nears
How do you solve the problem of ‘retired' mine pits aka huge abandoned holes in the ground? Turning them into lakes is a popular solution but maybe not the best one says ANICA NIEPRASCK who should know since she grew up in the Lausitz region of Germany in a community surrounded by these massive, dangerous and polluting land holes
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Everyone is talking about rewilding at the moment. The debate around it is shaking up the conservation sector and public interest in it is huge, with a growing movement of people advocating the restoration of our degraded ecosystems. But what does it really mean to rewild? And how would you go about doing it if you actually have some land?
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Ecologist Arts Editor, GARY COOK, visits a new exhibition showcasing the plight of the British bee - those species already sadly lost and those on the verge of extinction
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In search of stillness and silence, our Nature Editor, Elizabeth Wainwright, spent a night under the stars in the wilderness (Devon's Dartmoor) which left her feeling reflective about the price we are all paying - humans and Nature - for increasing noise pollution
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In its purist form, drawing is marking down the junctions of observed lines. The Ecology Movement does the same thing - joining up the dots of our under-strain, but interlinked environment to create forceful arguments, writes Ecologist Arts Editor, GARY COOK
Read More... How planting bioenergy crops could help stop Britain's brown hare from becoming extinct
Chelsea Flower Show - using garden spaces to tackle the challenges of climate change
Clive Hamilton unravels preconceived ideas around the Anthropocene and notions of human domination over the Earth. In contrast he foresees an Earth that is increasingly hostile and alien, on which humans will struggle to survive.
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Britain has 2,000 ancient yew trees yet there are only about 100 left in mainland Europe. England is home to more than 100 great oaks - trees aged over 800 years - more than the entire region from Calais to Cadiz. Author PETER FIENNES reflects on why so many old British trees have been saved from the axe
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Slowly the incidence of bTB in Cumbria has increased without any real outcry from the agricultural lobby. Why then, at the beginning of this month (August), has all of this information suddenly become news asks LESLEY DOCKSEY
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Brexit is part of a corporate campaign to remove, undermine and attack European Union regulations and increase the rate of growth and profit. But these very regulations are necessary for the protection of the environment - and life itself. PROFESSOR JOHN McMURTRY, author of The Cancer Stage of Capitalism: from Crisis to Cure, raises the alarm.
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Environmental law professor, ROBERT PERCIVAL, who has worked for both the Federal Government and a leading green nonprofit group, says despite the Trump administration's assault on America's environment laws they will survive... and may even be stronger for the attack
Read More... The future is bright for green energy and business
Why environmental communications can't just talk about the environment
G20 summit showed international climate action really is 'Trump- proof'
We need rights of nature legislation now to protect our home planet
Space for Giants works with philanthropists, lobbies African governments, educates prosecutors and collars elephants as part of its conservation work. But the approach to conservation in Africa itself has been a matter of passionate debate. Here DR MAX GRAHAM, CEO of Space for Giants explains how the team works
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Dynamic power pricing that responds to supply and demand could transform the way we manage our electricity systems, writes Claire Maugham, opening the door to the mass integration of renewables like wind and solar. But smart meters are essential to making that happen.
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ReWild might not give you a deep awareness of a wilder world but it could much increase our appreciation of the world and the life around you, argues MARTIN SPRAY
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The Shock of the Anthropocene has been translated from French into English and published by Verso. NATALIE BENNETT, the former Green Party leader, explains how it is an important, informative and interesting book which all ecologists should read.
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Dr Mordecai Ogada, a professional conservationist, and John Mbaria, his fellow Kenyan and journalist, present a powerful challenge to the prevailing conservation narrative, argues LEWIS EVANS
Read More... Spiritual Ecology: 10 Practices to Reawaken the Sacred in Everyday Life
Wendell Berry - poet, essayist, farmer, activist, rural philosopher
They organise, research and protest: a new generation of climate activists around the world is prepared to do everything they can to protect the climate. The Ecologist has talked to young climate activist around the world. These are the top ten young climate activities working to stop Donald Trump.
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London-listed copper giant Antofagasta has been entangled in scandals in Chile involving water depletion, dangers to local communities, corruption of national politics and environmental contamination, write Ali Maeve & Liam Barrington-Bush. Yet the London Stock Exchange remains silent. Following the company's AGM last week, a new London Mining Network report puts their actions and operations into the spotlight.
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The University of Buckingham and IPEN are hosting a conference to discuss how best to prepare young people for the demands of the 21st century. Key speakers including Ruby Wax and Nicky Morgan will cover topics ranging from mindfulness and mental health to Education Policy and research.
Read More...Need to lift your spirits, and together give time to the things that matter most in the world? The fifth Festival of Wellbeing takes place at at St James’s Church, Piccadilly, London on Saturday 23 September from 10am-6pm.
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If you've got the 'Back to School' bug this week then check out these brand new online courses from the prestigious Yale University's School of Forestry and Environmental studies - the courses are based on the award-winning Journey of the Universe film and book
Read More...As a society, we are strangely disconnected from the Earth, writes Stephan Harding. It's as if we were aliens placed here to prod and poke with our scientific instruments whilst feeling no sense of meaning, belonging or closeness to her ancient crumpled surface or rich, teeming biodiversity - a state of mind that a forthcoming course at Schumacher College aims to reverse.
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The women said they had travelled from Leeds for fear of impact on water supplies and treatment after discovering that waste water from the Cuadrilla site would be travelling to the Knostrop treatment works in Leeds.
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For over 40 years, Sea Watch Foundation scientists as well as volunteer observers all around the UK’s coast have been reporting on whales, dolphins and porpoises –collectively known as cetaceans – to inform Sea Watch’s huge database of records.
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Impunity reigns in the Amazon, write Joe Sandler Clarke & Sam Cowie, and the indigenous peoples of the forest are the big losers as they suffer repeated killings and land grabs. Big cuts to Funai, the agency meant to protect Brazil's indigenous tribes, have encouraged land barons to expand their land holdings into indigenous territories and murder any who resist.
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As we wait to learn whether (later today) Trump will pull the US out of the Paris Agreement, Remo Bebié of Finance Dialogue shares his briefing report of the what is being seen as growing demands that oil companies incorporate the international deal in their business models
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Ecuador is the latest country to tear up 'free trade' agreements that have so far cost the country $21 billion in damages awarded to foreign companies by 'corporate courts', and yielded next to nothing in return, writes Nick Dearden. So the outgoing President Correa did the only sensible thing: in one of his final executive acts this month, he scrapped 16 toxic trade and investment treaties.
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When Prime Minister Theresa May went to Brussels to hand in her 'Article 50' Brexit notice, she was also pursuing a separate, covert objective, writes Zachary Davies Boren. Leaked papers show that the UK was lobbying to gut new EU rules and targets on renewable energy and energy efficiency - even though they will only come into force after Brexit.
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Prime Minister Theresa May has made several serious mistakes in her election campaign, but her biggest 'unforced error' of all could be her public support for foxhunting, opposed by 17 in 20 voters. Now a huge march to her Downing Street residence is planned for next Monday to 'Make Hunting History!'
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With the major party manifestos all published it's not just the Greens that oppose fracking, writes Mat Hope. It's also Labour and the Libdems. So who's left? The Tories of course, who are holding fast to the fracking faith, and even want to create a new special purpose regulator for the industry. Oh yes, and UKIP, which is also committed to abolishing the Climate Change Act.
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Natural disasters like flood and drought have cost the Australian government more than A$12 billion since 2009, write Tayanah O'Donnel & Josephine Mummery, with even harsher weather events predicted for coming decades. Clearly, it's just the time for Australia to eliminate funding for research on adapting to climate change.
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With oil prices remaining low, the world's oil industry is facing bleak years ahead, writes Paul Brown. The global push to decarbonise the economy, combined with surging renewable energy and the trend to more efficient and electric vehicles, is denting investor confidence and pointing to the shrinking away of a once mighty and profitable industry.
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A huge raft of environmental reforms is promised in the Labour Party's draft manifesto, writes Oliver Tickell. Among the highlights: a ban on fracking; a clean energy policy based on renewables and efficiency; no commitment to new nuclear power; to meet our Paris Agreement obligations on climate; to give companies a legal obligation to protect the environment; to retain all EU environment laws post-Brexit; and multilateral nuclear disarmament.
Read More... Brazil: Amazon's Indians, rainforest under attack
Monsanto's new 'glyphosate-free' Roundup is vinegar!
Brazil: Government to abandon tribes to 'genocide' by loggers and ranchers