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Britain could reach its highest levels of UV radiation due to a lack of planes, coupled with clear blue skies and sweltering temperatures — a potent combination that increases the risk of skin cancer. Ultraviolet rays, which can also cause sunburn and cataracts, are expected to reach level 9 across parts of Devon and Cornwall on what is set to be the hottest day of the year in the UK so far. The mercury hit a sweltering 90.5°F (32.5°C) on Wednesday, while temperatures today could climb even further in the Midlands and Wales. West London is forecast to see temperatures...

The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs around 66 million years ago crashed into Earth at “the deadliest possible angle”, researchers have concluded. The giant impacter struck what is today Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula at around 60 degrees — maximizing the production of climate-altering greenhouse gases. The global disaster caused by the space rock — which was bigger than Mount Everest — was far worse than once thought, Imperial College London experts said. Previous studies had suggested the asteroid came in at an angle of around 30 degrees, while others concluded that it crashed almost straight down. However, the team’s computer...

Wood is the resource the world is relying on for its low carbon future. It’s touted as a replacement for concrete and steel, fossil fuels, power and plastics. But is there enough of it to go around? […] According to the latest figures from the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), global forest production hit record levels in 2018. Up 11% on the year before. “We see an increasing demand for almost all of our products,” says Göran Örlander, strategist at Södra, Sweden’s largest association of forest owners. “The most obvious demand is for biofuels at the moment. Everybody wants...

The world must “keep a close eye on climate protection” as it faces the economic fallout of the pandemic, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Wednesday, speaking remotely for the Petersberg Climate Dialogue. “We need a financial market that provides cheap capital for climate-friendly investments,” said Merkel, during an address for the annual event usually held in Berlin. Merkel also called for climate action to be included as part of economic reconstruction plans following the pandemic, including investments in future-oriented technologies such as renewable energy. In a video address following Merkel, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said the pandemic had “exposed...

Germany could be facing its second drought in just two years, a leading meteorologist has said, just as farmers struggle with strict measures imposed to tackle the coronavirus pandemic. “The past two years were unusually dry. The ground now needs rain,” forecaster and oceanographer Mojib Latif told German regional newspaper Rhein Neckar Zeitung (RNZ) on Saturday. Latif said the country’s network of reservoirs is only partly full, adding that if there is no heavy rain in the next two to three weeks then a failed harvest could threaten the agriculture industry. […] Rain is forecast in the coming weeks, according...

A new Climate Action Plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions seeks to keep the earth from becoming “a giant, raging fire ball floating atop a bubbling hot ocean of acid,” writes Gwendolyn Knapp for Houstonia magazine. Knapp praised the city of Houston for launching a Climate Action Plan, along with hundreds of other U.S. cities with “like-minded, science-backed, and community-driven strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” just in time for the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. “The city intends to meet the Paris Agreement’s goal of carbon neutrality by 2050, and lead the global energy transition,” Knapp declares. “It will...

Happy Anniversary EARTH DAY! Hard to believe it’s been 50 years since the first in 1970.Ever since that watershed event people have been looking for ways to shut down civilization and take us back to pre-industrial times when all the women were strong, all the men were good-looking, and all the children were above average. As long as it doesn’t impact the way they live too much that is.I remember the first Earth Day: I was in college, it was a beautiful spring day and celebrating Earth seemed like a great excuse to skip classes. I don’t remember exactly how...

Meat dishes are to be slashed by 20 percent in schools, universities and hospitals in a major move to cut greenhouse gases linked to livestock. Public sector caterers have vowed to hit the target as part of a pledge which also aims to boost people’s health by lowering consumption of animal products. The meals being reduced in canteens and kitchens across the UK are eaten by a quarter of the population. Hitting the 20 per cent target would remove nearly 20 million lbs of meat from plates every year — equivalent to 45,000 cows or 16 million chickens. Farmers’ livelihoods...

Every year, 150 climate scientists fly far into the wilderness and bore deep into Greenland’s largest glacier. Their work is complicated and important. The EastGRIP project is trying to understand how ice streams underneath the glacier are pushing vast amounts of ice into the ocean, and how this contributes to rising sea levels. But this year the drills will be silent. The ice streams will go unmeasured. The reason is the coronavirus. The fallout from measures to contain the outbreak have made the research impossible. Greenland is closed to foreigners. Its government is worried any outbreak could be particularly dangerous...

The coronavirus crisis calls for an urgent review of Germany's climate targets under goals set by the European Union, the leader of the economic council of the conservative Christian Democrat party (CDU) said on Saturday. The COVID-19 pandemic is "putting the German economy to the test," and the EU should consider a "deferment of climate policy targets," Wolfgang Steiger said in comments published in the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. Steiger said the fallout from the pandemic on the economy could amount to a new "de-industrialization" of Germany. Experts are predicting a global recession as a result of the business shutdown...

Jane Fonda claims she received preferential treatment when she was arrested during a climate change protest because she is white and famous. The 82-year-old actress was detained four times last year during weekly demonstrations in Washington. She revealed that on one occasion she spent a night in jail and used her £700 red wool coat to bed down. […] “I’m white and I’m famous and I think orders came down from the attorney general to handle me with kid gloves,” Miss Fonda told Elle USA. […] “There was a woman who was very cold and I loaned her my coat....

Climate law rollbacks in the US and Australia have origins in libertarian think tanks that trade in climate denial. Investigative journalists have exposed how one is now trying to strip climate protections in Germany.“The Trump administration frequently asked us for advice,” James Taylor, chief strategist at US libertarian and climate-skeptic think tank, The Heartland Institute, told two journalists posing as PR consultants representing German car and coal companies in late 2019. “What can we get for €500,000?” one of the bogus young PRs asked, offering an anonymous donation to Heartland on behalf of a large German automotive client. Taylor soon...

An Italian politician on Wednesday gave 17-year-old Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg some fatherly advice to go back to school. Pietro Fiocchi, a member of the European Parliament, said Thunberg should consider going back to school during a meeting of the Environment Council at the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium. The Italian politician began by thanking Thunberg for her “important role in raising public awareness on this fundamental topic.” “At the same time, I would like to give an advice as a father gives an advice to a daughter — go back to school and go back to a normal...

At the Place de la Bourse/Beursplein in central Brussels, tourists and commuters pick their way around coils of plastic tubing, bright green construction barriers and piles of paving stones that have been ripped up in the name of urban improvement. A few blocks north, the transformation is complete. What was once a busy boulevard clogged with traffic is now a car-free zone given over to pedestrians, bicycles, scooters and cafes taking advantage of the expanded sidewalk to offer alfresco dining. The area’s redevelopment began in 2017, and, weather permitting, will be finished by the end of 2020. But that’s just...

Australia’s conservative coalition government will put jobs and the economy ahead of any U.N. demands for it to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Finance Minister Mathias Cormann said Sunday. Cormann said Australia’s government will work to set new long-term plans addressing greenhouse gas emissions ahead of yet another global climate summit in Glasgow year, however it won’t pursue any net-zero emissions policies that hurt workers in key economic areas.

Author Margaret Atwood has claimed that women's rights and the climate crisis are 'very connected'. The Handmaid's Tale writer, 80, from Ottawa, Canada, insisted that action around climate change is 'very important' and credited Greta Thunberg with leading momentum around this subject. [snip] 'That and the rights of women are very connected. So the people who want to suppress women, also want to pretend there is no climate crisis. 'So if you suppress women, you suppress also some very strong voices about the climate crisis.'

The EU’s post-Brexit budget meeting erupted into rows with poorer countries demanding more aid while their “frugal” peers were determined to rein in spending. Brexit left the EU short of around £62 billion when Britain left the bloc last month. On Friday — after nearly 30 hours of discussions — the 27 remaining EU countries failed to agree on the overall size of the bloc’s 2021 to 2027 budget or how to spend it. Speaking after the talks in the EU’s Brussels hub, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said: “We have to acknowledge that the differences are too big still to...

Extreme blasts of freezing weather hitting Europe and the USA in recent years aren’t caused by a warming Arctic changing the jet stream, as previously thought. Research by the University of Exeter disputes earlier studies suggesting a warming Arctic was creating a “wavier” jet stream and linked to climate change. They found it’s more likely the other way around with random fluctuations in the jet stream warming up the Arctic over decades. […] It was assumed there was a long term trend towards a wavier stream that was causing extreme weather conditions to strike mainland Europe and the USA. Dr....

The Prince of Wales has issued a stark warning that humans have just ten years left to save the planet. “We really do have to pull our fingers out now because the theory is we have got this decade left,” he declared. Prince Charles was marking the 50th anniversary of a landmark speech he made on the environment by calling for nature to be put back at the center of modern life. In 1970, he had warned about the problems of plastic waste, chemicals being discharged into rivers and air pollution caused by factories, cars and planes. This was regarded...

For the second year in a row, the number of passengers on German domestic flights has declined, according to data from the German Airports Association (ADV), as reported by the news service Tagesschau on Saturday. The number of domestic passengers in 2019 fell by 1.9% from the year before to 47.1 million. In 2018, passenger figures fell by 0.8% Figures have dropped continually since August last year, the association said. The number of passengers on domestic flights in 2019 was just 1% greater than the figure from a decade ago. […] The ADV said the drop in passengers was not...