Enviro

By Ricardo Muniz  |  Agência FAPESP – The number of active fires recorded in the Brazilian Amazon in August-September 2022 was the highest since 2010, according to an article published in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution. Besides the record number of fires (74,398), the researchers found they were due not to extreme drought, as in 2010, […]

The number of unprovoked shark attacks worldwide decreased last year, tying with 2020 for the fewest number of reported incidents in the last 10 years. According to the University of Florida’s International Shark Attack File, there were a total of 57 unprovoked bites in 2022, most of which occurred in the United States and Australia. Of […]

WASHINGTON, February 2, 2023 — Conservation and wildlife advocacy groups are celebrating the 50th anniversary of the passage of the Endangered Species Act this year, commemorating five decades of effective and crucial protection for imperiled animals and plants. Passed nearly unanimously by Congress and signed into law by Richard Nixon on Dec. 28, 1973, the […]

The new research, published in Pacific Conservation Biology, examined the environmental toll of firework displays by reviewing the ecological effects of Diwali festivities in India, Fourth of July celebrations across the United States of America, and other events in New Zealand and parts of Europe. Examples included fireworks in Spanish festivals impacting the breeding success of […]

Findings from a new paper published in Cat News have identified the first ever report of Pallas’s cat on Mount Everest, in the Sagarmatha National Park in Nepal. This groundbreaking finding is a result of the 2019 National Geographic and Rolex Perpetual Planet Everest Expedition, the most comprehensive single scientific expedition to the mountain in history.  From April 7 […]

January 26, 2023 – While the Amazon rainforest and the Tibetan Plateau sit on different sides of the globe, scientists now discovered that changes in the South American ecosystem can trigger changes in the vicinity of the Himalayas. Both are tipping elements, hence large-scale elements of the planetary machinery that are sensitive to global warming […]

Satellite imagery confirms an enormous iceberg, around five times the size of Malta, has finally calved from Antarctica’s Brunt Ice Shelf. The new berg, estimated to be around 1550 sq km and around 150 m thick, calved when the crack known as Chasm-1 fully extended northwards severing the west part of the ice shelf. This […]

January 23, 2023 – Over the last year, the world’s energy market has been highly volatile. The warmer-than-average winter in Europe helped avoid a gas crisis this year, but the forecast for the next winter is unclear as instabilities persist. More than 20% of global liquefied natural gas exports originate from a single port in […]

January 20, 2023 – In order to meet climate protection goals, renewable energies are booming – often wind power. More than 30,000 turbines have already been installed on the German mainland so far, and the industry is currently scrambling to locate increasingly rare suitable sites. Thus, forests are coming into focus as potential sites. A […]

January 18, 2023 – At high elevations of the Greenland Ice Sheet, the years 2001 to 2011 were 1.5 °C warmer than in the 20th century and represent the warmest decade in the last thousand years. A temperature reconstruction from ice cores of the past 1,000 years reveals that today’s warming in central-north Greenland is surprisingly […]

Cambridge, MA, January 12, 2023 — Climate projections reported by ExxonMobil scientists between 1977 and 2003 were accurate and skillful in predicting subsequent global warming and contradicted the company’s public claims, a new Harvard study shows. In the first ever systematic assessment of the fossil fuel industry’s climate projections, researchers at Harvard University and the Potsdam Institute […]

January 9, 2023 – Tropical forests that are recovering from having trees removed were thought to be carbon absorbers, as the new trees grow quickly. A new study, led by Imperial College London researchers, turns this on its head, showing that the carbon released by soil and rotting wood outpaces the carbon absorbed by new […]

January 10, 2023 – In many ways, Madagascar is a biologist’s dream, a real-life experiment in how isolation on an island can spark evolution. About 90% of the plants and animals there are found nowhere else on Earth. But these plants and animals are in major trouble, thanks to habitat loss, over-hunting, and climate change. […]

DENVER/NAIROBI/GENEVA, 9 January 2023 – The ozone layer is on track to recover within four decades, with the global phaseout of ozone-depleting chemicals already benefitting efforts to mitigate climate change. This is the conclusion of a UN-backed panel of experts, presented today at the American Meteorological Society’s 103rd annual meeting. Examining novel technologies such as […]

December 13, 2022 – As the United Nations’ 15th summit on biodiversity in Montreal, Québec enters its last week of negotiations for global targets, Canadian mining company Belo Sun has once again demonstrated the perils of investing in the destruction of the Amazon, as its share prices have dropped precipitously following protests and advocacy from […]

WASHINGTON, December 12, 2022— The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service protected the Dolphin and Union caribou today as endangered under the Endangered Species Act. This specific population of barren-ground caribou (Rangifer tarandus groenlandicus) — also known as reindeer — inhabits the Arctic regions of Canada’s northern territories. The endangered listing restricts trade in Dolphin and Union caribou […]

December 12, 2022 – Droughts may increase the rate of suicide in the United States, according to new research being presented at AGU’s Fall Meeting on 13 December in Chicago and online. The health impacts of drought are less understood than impacts from other types of natural disasters due to their slower nature compared to hurricanes, tornadoes […]

Americans are leaving many of the U.S. counties hit hardest by hurricanes and heatwaves—and moving towards dangerous wildfires and warmer temperatures, finds one of the largest studies of U.S. migration and natural hazards.   The ten-year national study reveals troubling public health patterns, with Americans flocking to regions with the greatest risk of wildfires and significant […]

WASHINGTON, November 29, 2022 — For thousands of kilometers along the western coasts of the Americas, low-oxygen waters known as oxygen minimum zones stretch out into the Pacific. In part due to climate change, this oxygen-starved region is likely to get wider and deeper, expanding by millions of cubic kilometers by the end of the […]

‘Otus bikegila’, the new species of owl discovered in Central Africa. Martim Melo, Author provided Bárbara Freitas, Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales (MNCN-CSIC); Angelica Crottini, Universidade do Porto, and Martim Melo, Universidade do Porto As part of an international team of scientists we have confirmed a new species of owl after decades of speculation that […]