Free-roaming animals reintroduced in Romania’s Țarcu mountains are stimulating plant growth and securing carbon stored in the soil while grazing
A herd of 170 bison reintroduced to Romania’s Țarcu mountains could help store CO2 emissions equivalent to removing almost 2m cars from the road for a year, research has found, demonstrating how the animals help mitigate the worst effects of the climate crisis.
European bison disappeared from Romania more than 200 years ago, but Rewilding Europe and WWF Romania reintroduced the species to the southern Carpathian mountains in 2014. Since then, more than 100 bison have been given new homes in the Țarcu mountains, growing to more than 170 animals today, one of the largest free-roaming populations in Europe. The landscape holds the potential for 350-450 bison.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
05/15/2024 - 05:00
05/15/2024 - 05:00
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington ‘taking very serious look’ at whether Mar-a-Lago meeting justifies legal action
A powerful watchdog group that has been at the forefront of efforts to hold Donald Trump accountable for constitutional violations is investigating whether his Mar-a-Lago meeting with oil company executives last month merits legal action.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (Crew) has told the Guardian that it is investigating the dinner at Trump’s club with more than 20 oil and gas company executives. Trump asked them for a $1bn presidential campaign contribution, while at the same time vowing to undo Joe Biden’s restrictions on natural gas export permits, oil drilling and car pollution, the Washington Post reported.
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05/15/2024 - 00:00
Cross-party group of 50 calls on prime minister to appoint climate envoy and back Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance
A cross-party group of MPs and peers has urged Rishi Sunak to make a U-turn on his oil and gas extraction plans as part of a broader plea to increase efforts to address the climate crisis.
The 50 politicians, including three Conservatives, wrote to the prime minister calling for the UK to regain its international leadership on the crisis by ending the licensing of new oil and gas fields, appointing a climate envoy, and backing the Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance.
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05/14/2024 - 19:53
Michigan factory making battery components for electric cars may offer an economic lifeline, but for some residents there’s a problem: the parent company is in China
Set among green rolling hills and tall pines, Lori Brock’s storybook farm encapsulates northern Michigan. A five-day-old mare bucks around a pen, while small black pigs roam through a barn and donkeys graze in fields bordered by white fences.
It is a bucolic way of life in Green Township, but one that Brock and many of her neighbours believe could be threatened by an unlikely adversary – China’s Communist party.
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05/14/2024 - 16:00
Human-caused climate crisis brought soaring temperatures across Asia, from Gaza to Delhi to Manila
The record-breaking heatwave that scorched the Philippines in April would have been impossible without the climate crisis, scientists have found. Searing heat above 40C (104F) struck across Asia in April, causing deaths, water shortages, crop losses and widespread school closures.
The extreme heat was made 45 times more likely in India and five times more likely in Israel and Palestine, the study found. The scientists said the high temperatures compounded the already dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where displaced people are living in overcrowded shelters with little access to water.
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05/14/2024 - 14:16
Democrats on the House oversight committee sent letters to oil executives asking about alleged $1bn quid pro quo offer
House Democrats have launched an investigation into a meeting between oil company executives and Donald Trump at his Mar-a-Lago home and club last month, following reports that the former president offered to dismantle Biden’s environmental rules and requested $1bn in contributions to his presidential campaign.
Democrats on the House oversight committee late on Monday evening sent letters to nine oil executives requesting information on their companies’ participation in the meeting.
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05/14/2024 - 13:14
Grassland provides many services for humans, animals and nature, such as feed production, carbon storage and recreation. Researchers spent two years investigating permanent grassland, its utilization, soils and plant communities in order to quantify the resulting ecosystem services. Grassland performs best when different types of use such as meadows, pastures and unfertilized extensive grassland exist together in a mosaic landscape.
05/14/2024 - 12:37
Experts say changing climate is ‘threat multiplier’ and that US and Germany already include it in planning
The US, Germany and other countries are putting the climate crisis at the heart of their national security plans but the UK is failing to do likewise, experts have told the government.
Extreme weather and heat are killing increasing numbers of people, damaging economies and forcing millions around the world to flee their homes, adding to an already unstable geopolitical situation, MPs were told on Tuesday at a select committee hearing.
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05/14/2024 - 12:30
National Farmers’ Union president warns food production is likely to drop next year and says farmers need help right now
Rishi Sunak’s plan to improve the UK’s food security will not help build farmer’s confidence in the short-term, the head of the country’s biggest farming body has said.
Food production was likely to drop next year, said Tom Bradshaw, the president of the National Farmers’ Union, who warned that the prime minister’s plan, published during the UK’s second annual Farm to Fork summit, failed to give farmers the solutions they needed.
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05/14/2024 - 11:48
Extra 270 million adults aged 69 or over will suffer dangerous heat levels of 37.5C amid global heating and ageing populations
The heat exposure of older people will at least double in all continents by 2050, according to a study that highlights the combined risk posed by a heating world and an ageing population.
Compared with today, there will be up to an extra 250 million people aged 69 or above who are exposed to dangerous levels of heat, defined as 37.5C. The paper warned this is likely to create biological and social vulnerability hotspots with increasing concentrations of older adults and high temperature extremes.
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