Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Sydney passes 30C on Friday while Brisbane expected to reach mid-30s during weekend Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast Sydney has recorded its hottest August day since 1995 as parts of Australia swelter through a warm and windy end to winter, and what is almost certain to be the country’s hottest August on record. The city’s official weather station at Observatory Hill recorded a maximum of 30.3C at 2.48pm. The city’s overall record August temperature set in 1995 was 31.3C. Continue reading...

Researchers predict that 12.7% of marine teleost fish species are at risk of extinction, up fivefold from the International Union for Conservation of Nature's prior estimate of 2.5%. Their report includes nearly 5,000 species that did not receive an IUCN conservation status due to insufficient data.

Before biomass firm is promised a penny extra from billpayers, Ed Miliband should commission a review of its business model A finding that you submitted dodgy data to the regulator on where your wood pellets come from sounds like very bad news if, like the biomass power generator Drax, you are the lucky recipient of £500m-plus of subsidies every year and are trying to keep the handouts flowing beyond their scheduled end date of 2027. But shares in Drax did not collapse on Thursday. City analysts judged that the end of Ofgem’s investigation represented an excellent development for the company – “a clear positive”, said RBC, and “a positive read-across” for the chances of getting a new contract with the government, thought Jefferies. Continue reading...

Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim Walz sat down with CNN’s Dana Bash in a pre-recorded interview that airs Thursday night. Plus: peacocks in Scotland Don’t already get First Thing in your inbox? Sign up here Good morning. Tonight, the US vice-president, Kamala Harris, will give her first major interview since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee. The pre-recorded interview, which was scheduled after some criticism of Harris’s reluctance to expose herself to media scrutiny, will be with CNN’s Dana Bash and will include Harris’s running mate, Tim Walz. What should we expect from this interview? This will be a big test of Harris’s credibility after a prolonged honeymoon that has seen her surge ahead of Donald Trump in opinion polls. “This is the first time she is going to take questions,” said David Chalian, CNN’s political director. “Now is the opportunity to hear her ruminate aloud, with Dana asking her about her policy positions, her plans for the future, her plans for the country, in an unscripted setting.” Are Republicans happy with this setup? Republicans have long called for Harris, who has had a variable performance in past televised one-on-ones, to take questions live from the press. Some are mocking the setup of the interview, accusing Harris of being unwilling to risk a high-profile grilling without the protective presence of Walz. What do the Arlington officials say happened? Arlington said in a statement that one of its representatives was “verbally abused” and pushed aside after telling two Trump staffers that only cemetery representatives were allowed to take video and photographs in section 60, an area where recent US casualties, mostly from Iraq and Afghanistan, are buried. “Federal law prohibits political campaign or election-related activities within army national military cemeteries,” the statement said. How has the Trump team responded? JD Vance, Trump’s running mate, dismissed the row as media exaggeration over “a little disagreement”. He later accused the media of “acting like Donald Trump filmed a TV commercial at a gravesite”. Continue reading...