The 30ft-high wall between the US and Mexico will cut through one of the last unbroken grasslands in the west, leaving residents alarmed over the potential impact on wildlife and water use
On a late summer day in September, the sound of cicadas pierced the profound silence in the sprawling grasslands and gently rolling hills of the San Rafael Valley in southern Arizona. But before long, the shrill buzzing gave way to the rumble of heavy machinery sculpting an unpaved road leading to the US-Mexico border.
In the distance, a deer darted across the road and disappeared into a thicket of oak trees. A few miles later, a fenced-in worker camp came into view, next to a construction site full of trucks, bulldozers and cranes.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
10/01/2025 - 09:00
10/01/2025 - 08:00
An alum of Noma in Copenhagen, Dan Giusti is on a mission to transform institutional cooking – but getting fellow chefs to buy in hasn’t been easy
At the Dream Mott Haven charter school this summer, more than a hundred food-service professionals lined up in the cafeteria to enjoy a school lunch prepared by the culinary team from Brigaid.
Some attendees giggled like schoolchildren as they carried fire-engine-red trays filled with plates of scratch-made pernil, fried plantains and arroz con gandules through the lunchroom, taking seats at the long cafeteria tables and commiserating with strangers like the first day of school. A kale caesar side salad and diced fresh watermelon ensured that the meal met US Department of Agriculture nutrition guidelines; according to a panel discussion before lunch, it also met strict budgetary guidelines – with ingredients totaling a mere $2.71 per meal.
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10/01/2025 - 07:32
Ed Miliband announces government will speed up plans to ban controversial practice supported by Nigel Farage
Ed Miliband has announced that the government is to speed up its plans to permanently ban fracking in the UK, in order to counter the Reform party’s promises to bring back the controversial practice.
The energy secretary said he would put forward legislation as part of the North Sea transition plan which is to be published this autumn. This means that in order to allow fracking, a future government would have to repeal the legislation with a parliamentary vote.
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10/01/2025 - 04:33
Lucy Powell and Bridget Phillipson put their cases to party members at Labour’s conference on Wednesday
At the Labour conference Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, has just started his speech.
Responding to the news that he will announce a total ban on fracking (see 9.19am), Asad Rehman, chief executive of Friends of the Earth, said:
By providing a clear vision for our energy future based on helping people, not on ignoring the science, the energy secretary has sent an important message that the government is listening to communities.
Fracking is and always has been unpopular, both with people facing it off locally and the wider public. The government must now translate its plans to ban fracking permanently into policy, alongside closing a loophole in planning law that still allows it to happen by the backdoor.
Andy Burnham is doing a fantastic job as the mayor of Manchester. I actually worked closely with him. We’ve reset that relationship between Westminster and our mayors, and we’re working well together. So I’ve got no personal issue with Andy in the slightest.
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10/01/2025 - 01:00
Investigation shows extent of green land lost across UK and mainland Europe to development from 2018 to 2023
The Santa Claus effect: how expanding tourism ate into Lapland’s green space
Europe is losing green space that once harboured wildlife, captured carbon and supplied food at the rate of 600 football pitches a day, an investigation by the Guardian and partners has revealed.
Analysis of satellite imagery across the UK and mainland Europe over a five-year period shows the speed and scale with which green land is turning grey, consumed by tarmac for roads, bricks and mortar for luxury golf courses and housing developments.
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09/30/2025 - 22:27
Crisafulli government wants coal plants to run longer – reversing previous Queensland Labor government’s plans to end reliance on coal power by 2035
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The co-owner of Queensland’s biggest coal-fired power station in Gladstone has said it could close the plant in March 2029 – six years earlier than expected.
The power station – one of the least reliable in the national electricity market – is seen as a critical part of the region’s heavy industry, providing power to Rio Tinto’s own aluminium smelter, as well as alumina refineries and LNG and cement plants in the region.
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09/30/2025 - 21:34
Brown bear’s nearly 100,000 votes leads him to victory despite suffering for most of season with broken jaw
“The merely chubby have been winnowed away,” a naturalist intoned. “We are left with a clash of titans.”
After a record-breaking week of public voting, Katmai national park and preserve in Alaska has announced the winner of its “biggest Fat Bear Week yet”.
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09/30/2025 - 21:01
Anthony Albanese pledges to continue talks with rival, as sources say previous climate summits have been co-hosted
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Australia could split hosting rights for the Cop31 climate summit under a potential compromise being considered with Turkey, as Anthony Albanese concedes Ankara is determined to stay in the race, even risking both countries’ claims on the 2026 event.
Returning home from the UN general assembly and visits to the UK and the Middle East on Wednesday, Albanese told Guardian Australia he wished host countries were not decided using consensus rules, but pledged to continue diplomatic talks with the government of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
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09/30/2025 - 21:00
The National Climate Risk Assessment is attacked in the Daily Telegraph, while wind turbines became a frightening obstacle for firefighting planes and solar panels a source of mountains of landfill waste
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On the front page of the Daily Telegraph, Australia’s first comprehensive assessment of the risks from climate change became “SCIENCE FICTION”.
In other leading stories, wind turbines became a frightening obstacle for firefighting planes and solar panels were a source of mountains of landfill waste.
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09/30/2025 - 19:37
Ukrainian president says Russian shelling is preventing work to restore links to grid and that one of the plant’s diesel generators has failed
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Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Tuesday said the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant has been off the grid for seven straight days, warning of the potential threat of a “critical” situation.
It is the longest outage at Zaporizhzhia since Russia invaded and seized the nuclear plant, Europe’s largest.
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