Campaigners say the publication of key KPMG report must be a condition to MPs extending subsidies scheme
The owner of the Drax wood-burning power station should be forced to disclose full details of its tree consumption, campaigners have argued, as MPs review the billions in renewables subsidies the North Yorkshire plant receives.
A delegated legislation committee will decide on Monday whether to pass the government’s plans to extend billpayer-funded subsidies to the country’s biomass power generators, of which Drax is by far the biggest.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
06/02/2025 - 00:00
Make UK tells government that prices threaten to derail industrial strategy as Energy UK calls for charges to be ‘rebalanced’
The UK government is being pressed to wipe billions from the energy costs facing households and heavy industry by reforming the high taxes levied on electricity bills.
These policy levies mean the UK pays some of the highest energy bills in the world, and are simultaneously disadvantaging British industry and stifling the efforts of households to transition to lower-carbon heating systems, according to industry trade groups.
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06/01/2025 - 23:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 02 June 2025; doi:10.1038/s44183-025-00130-9
Rethinking maritime security from the bottom up: Four principles to broaden perspectives and centre humans and ecosystems
06/01/2025 - 07:33
‘The memories preserved in countless books, photo albums, documentation – everything is gone,’ says village’s mayor
For weeks the weight had sat above the village, nine million tonnes of rock precariously resting on an ancient slab of ice. A chunk of Kleines Nesthorn mountain’s peak had crumbled, and its rubble hung over the silent, empty streets of Blatten, held back only by the glacier. The ice groaned beneath the pressure.
On Wednesday afternoon, in an instant, it gave way. The ice cracked, then crumbled. The entire mass descended into the valley below, obliterating the village that had been there for more than 800 years.
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Natural disasters cost Australia’s economy $2.2bn in first half of 2025, new Treasury analysis shows
06/01/2025 - 07:30
Wild weather, including Cyclone Alfred and floods in NSW and Queensland, significantly slowed retail trade and household spending
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Six months of natural disasters in 2025 have cost the economy $2.2bn, largely in slower retail and household spending, according to new federal Treasury analysis.
Wild weather has repeatedly battered the Australian east coast this year.
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06/01/2025 - 05:55
As cities heat up, reflective roofs could lower energy bills and help the climate. But dark-roofing manufacturers are waging a quiet campaign to block new rules
This story is co-published with Floodlight
It began with a lobbyist’s pitch.
The Tennessee representative Rusty Grills says the lobbyist proposed a simple idea: repeal the state’s requirement for reflective roofs on many commercial buildings.
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05/31/2025 - 20:24
Leadbeater’s possum spotted in NSW at Kosciuszko national park, at least 250km away from the nearest sighting in Victoria
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A critically endangered possum species thought to be isolated to Victoria has been found in a New South Wales alpine national park.
Previously thought to be extinct in the state, a leadbeater’s possum has been found in Kosciuszko national park, at least 250km away from the nearest sighting in Victoria.
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05/31/2025 - 15:00
Exclusive: Colin Simpfendorfer’s resignation from working group comes as conservationists lash expansion of lethal program they say ‘does nothing to improve beach safety’
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One of Australia’s leading shark researchers has resigned from his position of almost eight years advising the Queensland shark control program, as members of that scientific working group say they were “shocked” and sidelined by the state government’s decision to expand the lethal control of sharks.
Announcing an $88m shark management plan overhaul which would see shark nets and baited drum lines designed to kill target shark species rolled out at more beaches, and existing drum lines used more intensely, the primary industries minister, Tony Perrett, claimed this week that the Liberal National party’s strategy was backed by research.
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05/31/2025 - 05:00
Visitors lament ‘tremendous shame’ as notice withdrawing public access appears after £30m sale of Bridehead Estate
For decades the lake and waterfall on the Bridehead Estate in Dorset have brought joy to visitors who used the permissive path to access a scene of pastoral loveliness that could have come straight from the pages of a Thomas Hardy novel.
But there was melancholy – and anger – among the hundreds, possibly thousands, who made final pilgrimages to the village of Littlebredy this week after it was announced that access to the public was being halted from 2 June.
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05/31/2025 - 00:00
Politicians reviled environmental minister Marina Silva in the senate this week, but new legislation is fuelling the fire
Political bullying is rarely as brutal as it was in Brazil this week when the environment minister Marina Silva was ambushed in a senate meeting. Her thuggish tormentors – all white male politicians on the infrastructure committee – took turns to publicly belittle the 67-year-old black woman, who has done more than anyone to protect the natural wealth of the country – the Amazon rainforest, Pantanal wetlands, Cerrado savannah and other biomes – from rapacious abuse.
One by one, they lined up to attack her for these globally important efforts. Decorum gave way to name-calling and sneering: “Know your place,” roared the committee head, Marcos Rogério, a Bolsonarist who cut Silva’s microphone as she tried to respond. The leader of the centre-rightPSDB, Plínio Valério, told her she did not deserve respect as a minister. The Amazonas senator Omar Aziz – from the Centrão party and a supporter of president Lula – talked over her repeatedly.
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