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The government has announced plans to introduce a new law to clamp down on illegal deforestation and protect rainforests by cleaning up the UK's supply chains.

The proposals, published on Tuesday, suggest the introduction of legislation to prohibit larger businesses operating in the UK from using products grown on land that was deforested illegally.

The businesses would also face fines if they fail to carry out due diligence on their supply chains by publishing information to show where key commodities - including rubber, soil and palm oil - come from and that they are produced in line with local laws protecting forests.

The government said the size of the fines would be set later.

Deforestation accounts for about 11% of global greenhouse gas emissions. The proposed legislation says illegally produced commodities have no place in the UK market, but Greenpeace has called the government's plans "seriously flawed".

A consultation on the proposed legislation will run for six weeks and seek views from UK and international stakeholders. It will consider potential impacts on businesses and other interests, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said.

The announcement follows the establishment of an independent taskforce, the Global Resource Initiative, which the government set up last year to consider how the UK could "green" international supply chains.

The UN's COP26 climate change conference was supposed to have been held in Glasgow in November, but has been postponed until next year.

The international environment minister, Zac Goldsmith, said: "The UK has a duty to lead the way in combating the biodiversity and nature crisis. We have all seen the devastating pictures of the world's most precious forests being cleared, often illegally, and we can't afford not to act as a country.

"There is a hugely important connection between the products we buy and their wider environmental footprint, which is why the government is consulting today on new measures that would make it illegal for businesses in the UK to use commodities that are not grown in accordance with local laws."

Elena Polisano, a forests campaigner at Greenpeace UK, said: "Defra's proposal to make it 'illegal for larger businesses to use products unless they comply with local laws to protect natural areas' is seriously flawed. We've all seen the way president [Jair] Bolsonaro has championed the expansion of agriculture in Brazil at the expense of the Amazon rainforest.

"There is also nothing to address the fact that some commodity producers may have one 'sustainable' line but continue to destroy forests elsewhere, which just shifts the problem into someone else's backyard.

"We will never solve this problem without tackling demand. Companies like Tesco, who sell more meat and dairy and so use more soya for animal feed than any other UK retailer, know what they need to do to reduce the impact they are having on deforestation in the Amazon and other crucial forests

"They must reduce the amount of meat and dairy they sell and drop forest destroyers from their supply chain immediately."

Mike Barrett, executive director of science and conservation at WWF-UK said: "It's clear businesses and consumers don't want imports that wreck the planet, drive deforestation in areas like the Amazon and lead to devastating fires. The government must now fast-track strong, effective laws that clean up our supply chains and show the UK can take the lead in tackling the global nature and climate crisis."
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UK sets out law to curb illegal deforestation and protect rainforests

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The government has announced plans to introduce a new law to clamp down on illegal deforestation and protect rainforests by cleaning up the UK's supply chains. The proposals, published on Tuesday, suggest the introduction of legislation to prohibit larger businesses operating in the UK from using products grown on land that was deforested illegally.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The government has announced plans to introduce a new law to clamp down on illegal deforestation and protect rainforests by cleaning up the UK's supply chains.

The proposals, published on Tuesday, suggest the introduction of legislation to prohibit larger businesses operating in the UK from using products grown on land that was deforested illegally.

The businesses would also face fines if they fail to carry out due diligence on their supply chains by publishing information to show where key commodities - including rubber, soil and palm oil - come from and that they are produced in line with local laws protecting forests.

The government said the size of the fines would be set later.

Deforestation accounts for about 11% of global greenhouse gas emissions. The proposed legislation says illegally produced commodities have no place in the UK market, but Greenpeace has called the government's plans "seriously flawed".

A consultation on the proposed legislation will run for six weeks and seek views from UK and international stakeholders. It will consider potential impacts on businesses and other interests, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said.

The announcement follows the establishment of an independent taskforce, the Global Resource Initiative, which the government set up last year to consider how the UK could "green" international supply chains.

The UN's COP26 climate change conference was supposed to have been held in Glasgow in November, but has been postponed until next year.

The international environment minister, Zac Goldsmith, said: "The UK has a duty to lead the way in combating the biodiversity and nature crisis. We have all seen the devastating pictures of the world's most precious forests being cleared, often illegally, and we can't afford not to act as a country.

"There is a hugely important connection between the products we buy and their wider environmental footprint, which is why the government is consulting today on new measures that would make it illegal for businesses in the UK to use commodities that are not grown in accordance with local laws."

Elena Polisano, a forests campaigner at Greenpeace UK, said: "Defra's proposal to make it 'illegal for larger businesses to use products unless they comply with local laws to protect natural areas' is seriously flawed. We've all seen the way president [Jair] Bolsonaro has championed the expansion of agriculture in Brazil at the expense of the Amazon rainforest.

"There is also nothing to address the fact that some commodity producers may have one 'sustainable' line but continue to destroy forests elsewhere, which just shifts the problem into someone else's backyard.

"We will never solve this problem without tackling demand. Companies like Tesco, who sell more meat and dairy and so use more soya for animal feed than any other UK retailer, know what they need to do to reduce the impact they are having on deforestation in the Amazon and other crucial forests

"They must reduce the amount of meat and dairy they sell and drop forest destroyers from their supply chain immediately."

Mike Barrett, executive director of science and conservation at WWF-UK said: "It's clear businesses and consumers don't want imports that wreck the planet, drive deforestation in areas like the Amazon and lead to devastating fires. The government must now fast-track strong, effective laws that clean up our supply chains and show the UK can take the lead in tackling the global nature and climate crisis."
Topics

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UK sets out law to curb illegal deforestation and protect rainforests

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The government has announced plans to introduce a new law to clamp down on illegal deforestation and protect rainforests by cleaning up the UK's supply chains. The proposals, published on Tuesday, suggest the introduction of legislation to prohibit larger businesses operating in the UK from using products grown on land that was deforested illegally.

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The UN's Global Goals 13 and 15 - for climate action and to defend life on land respectively - call for the world's rainforests to be protected. But deforestation, responsible for 11% of greenhouse gas emissions while destroying local biodiversity, threatens the progress of both. Join our movement and take environmental action here to stand up for the planet.
Remember the Australian wildfires that burned millions of acres in land and pushed koalas to the brink of extinction? That was in January this year.

An awful lot has happened since then. But amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the forests of the world continue to be felled, chipping away, trunk by trunk, at a vital line of defence against the climate crisis.

Britain is reportedly set to intervene with new legislation that will tackle illegal deforestation in UK supply chains to protect global rainforests. However, environmental activists have described the plans as "seriously flawed."

Large businesses in the UK would be banned from using products grown on land that was stripped of its forests illegally, according to an announcement made on Tuesday.

It would enforce the new rules by demanding those firms release information on where key commodities are sourced from and confirming that they're in line with the local legislation of the country it imported them from.

But if trees keep falling in the world's forests, and a local official is there to approve it, will the British government not make a sound?

That's the question posed by environmental activists critical of the plans - because deforestation is no less deadly for the planet when it's legally commissioned by a government.

Take Brazil, for example. In President Jair Bolsonaro, the country has a leader who has openly courted policies for deforestation in the Amazon rainforest in order to exploit its resources. Despite his own government recording 10,000 fires there in the first 10 days of August, an increase of 17% from 2019, he has insisted that the evidence was a "lie" - because, he said, wet forests couldn't catch fire.

Overall, there have been 20,000 fires in the Amazon in August so far, while deforestation alerts across the whole of 2020 have increased 33% from last year.

Would legislation banning companies from sourcing products like palm oil or cocoa from illegal deforestation mean it's totally fine to import from Brazil - where deforestation is rubber-stamped at the highest level of government?

"Defra's [the UK's Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs] proposal to make it 'illegal for larger businesses to use products unless they comply with local laws to protect natural areas' is seriously flawed," said Elena Polisano, a forests campaigner at Greenpeace UK. "We've all seen the way president [Jair] Bolsonaro has championed the expansion of agriculture in Brazil at the expense of the Amazon rainforest."

"There is also nothing to address the fact that some commodity producers may have one 'sustainable' line but continue to destroy forests elsewhere, which just shifts the problem into someone else's backyard," she added. "We will never solve this problem without tackling demand."

Under this proposed law UK companies would still be able to buy products if they comply with local laws.

We've all seen how Bolsonaro's govt has opened up the Amazon rainforest in Brazil to industry and the destruction that's followed.

Seriously flawed! https://t.co/XA2uV5SUHZ
- Greenpeace UK (@GreenpeaceUK) August 25, 2020

It's perhaps a personal passion project for UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

In the same way Theresa May purported to put modern slavery at the top of her agenda - she once said it was "the great human rights issue of our time" - Johnson has repeatedly, as prime minister and foreign secretary, heralded wildlife and bioversity as among his key global priorities.

Although the details of the fines the government would issue to companies who do not publish deforestation information are yet to be released, there is, however, a shared feeling that legislation is required to tackle an issue embedded in Britain's supply chains.

Deforestation is responsible for 11% of greenhouse gas emissions - while felling forests critically reduces the planet's capacity to store carbon, instead of releasing it into the atmosphere and contributing to global warming. There's power in your pocket: if deforestation is a tool to clear a path to production, then consumers hold the cards to stop it at its source.

Related Stories Brazil's President Is Making It Impossible to Fight Deforestation, Activists Say

And that power is best wielded by our elected representatives. It's a view supported by the general public: a new study from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) has found that 67% of UK consumers want the government to do more, while 81% believe there should be greater transparency about where UK products come from.

"The UK has a duty to lead the way in combating the biodiversity and nature crisis," said Zac Goldsmith, House of Lords peer and international environment minister. "We have all seen the devastating pictures of the world's most precious forests being cleared, often illegally, and we can't afford not to act as a country."

"There is a hugely important connection between the products we buy and their wider environmental footprint, which is why the government is consulting today on new measures that would make it illegal for businesses in the UK to use commodities that are not grown in accordance with local laws."

Help us stop #IllegalDeforestation.

We must take action to protect forests around the world and combat#ClimateChange.

Should it be illegal for UK businesses to use products that come from unlawful deforestation?

Share your views: https://t.co/uWhcWdeOxn pic.twitter.com/ify0n4tATo
- Defra UK (@DefraGovUK) August 25, 2020

But before the legislation is brought forward, it's being put to a public consultation for six weeks. You can share your views on the issue here.

"This consultation is a welcome first step in the fight to tackle the loss of our planet's irreplaceable natural wonders such as the Amazon and in the pursuit of supply chains free from products that contribute to deforestation," said Ruth Chambers, a senior parliamentary affairs associate at the Greener UK coalition, a group of 13 major environmental organisations with a combined public membership of over 8 million.

"The evidence linking deforestation with climate change, biodiversity loss and the spread of zoonotic diseases is compelling," she added. "A new law is an important part of the solution and is urgently needed."

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Britain Set to Clamp Down on Deforestation With New Law on UK Supply Chains

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The UN's Global Goals 13 and 15 - for climate action and to defend life on land respectively - call for the world's rainforests to be protected. But deforestation, responsible for 11% of greenhouse gas emissions while destroying local biodiversity, threatens the progress of both.

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Auf den Eispanzern bilden sich immer öfter riesige Schmelzwassertümpel und -seen, die das Eis zusätzlich destabilisieren.

Es geht schnell, aber keiner ahnt, wie schnell: Das Eis der Erde ist Sinnbild einer globalen Krise, die viele erst beim Reisen wahrnehmen. Die jüngsten Zahlen und Bilanzen der Polarforscher sind alarmierend.

Verrückte Sommer, auch im Eis: Anfang des Jahres, im südpolaren Sommer, waren 18,3 Grad auf der argentinischen Forschungsstation „Esperanza" gemessen worden, es war die höchste je gemessene Temperatur so nah am Südpol. Danach Rekordhitze auf der gegenüberliegenden Seite des Globus, im eigentlich gefrorenen Teil Sibiriens jenseits des nördlichen Polarkreises. Und mittlerweile bewegt sich auch die Kurve für das bis September schmelzende Packeis im Nordpolarmeer verdächtig nahe am Allzeitminimum. Kein Zweifel: Die Eisschmelze der letzten Monate spiegelt an vielen Stellen des Planeten wieder, was auch die weltweite Corona-Krise nur mühsam wird zudecken können. Die Erde bekommt immer schneller ein anderes Gesicht - weniger weiß und dafür mehr braun, blau und grau.

Die Kryosphäre der Erde ist mächtig unter Druck. Das ist der Teil auf der Erdoberfläche der schon sehr lange vereist und großteils von Eis bedeckt ist, und in dem ein Großteil der Süßwasservorräte unseres Planeten gespeichert sind. In diesen Wochen haben viele Polarforscher Bilanzen der Eisveränderungen vorgelegt, und sie weisen ausnahmslos alle in eine Richtung: Ins Minus, fast überall auf der Welt. Die Erderwärmung, die insbesondere an den Polen überdurchschnittlich schnell voran schreitet, fordert ihren Tribut.

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Globale Klimaerwärmung: Billionen Tonnen Eis sind einfach weg

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Auf den Eispanzern bilden sich immer öfter riesige Schmelzwassertümpel und -seen, die das Eis zusätzlich destabilisieren. Es geht schnell, aber keiner ahnt, wie schnell: Das Eis der Erde ist Sinnbild einer globalen Krise, die viele erst beim Reisen wahrnehmen. Die jüngsten Zahlen und Bilanzen der Polarforscher sind alarmierend.

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Sonnenstrahlen fallen in einen Mischwald in Niedersachsen.

Schnell wird es dem Wald nicht besser gehen. Der Umbau ist eine Mammutaufgabe, die Generationen beanspruchen wird. Wichtig wird die richtige Mischung der Bäume sein.

Der deutsche Wald leidet - mehr noch als im letzten Jahr. Zu gering waren vielerorts die Niederschlagsmengen, um den Wassermangel in den tiefen Bodenschichten zu lindern. Es ist nunmehr der dritte Dürresommer in Folge, der den Wald an seine Belastungsgrenze bringt. Die Stresssymptome häufen sich: lichte bis kahle Baumkronen, im Unterholz knackt und raschelt es. Schon 2019 wies laut Waldzustandsbericht nur rund ein Fünftel aller Bäume keine Schäden auf. So wenige gesunde Bäume gab es noch nie seit Beginn der Erhebung in den achtziger Jahren, als sich die Nation erstmals um ihren Wald sorgte.

Der Borkenkäfer tut sein Übriges, zu Milliarden schwärmt er durch die Wälder und stürzt sich vornehmlich auf geschwächte Fichten, denen ausreichend Wasser fehlt, um sich mit Harz gegen den Schädling zu wehren. Zwar ist es längst nicht nur die Fichte, die mit den Folgen der Trockenheit zu kämpfen hat. Doch mit ihr trifft es den „Brotbaum" der deutschen Forstwirtschaft. Fichtenholz lässt sich gut verarbeiten, und die Bäume wachsen verhältnismäßig schnell.

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Mammutaufgabe Aufforstung: Rettung für den deutschen Wald

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Sonnenstrahlen fallen in einen Mischwald in Niedersachsen. Schnell wird es dem Wald nicht besser gehen. Der Umbau ist eine Mammutaufgabe, die Generationen beanspruchen wird. Wichtig wird die richtige Mischung der Bäume sein. Der deutsche Wald leidet - mehr noch als im letzten Jahr.

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The impact of the climate crisis is all too visible. Bushfires have killed more than 20 people in south-eastern Australia and forced thousands more to flee their homes. Floods and storms have left hundreds dead and many more destitute in Argentina, Uruguay, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Malawi. And in the UK, record temperatures were seen last summer and this winter.

Last year, people across the world took to the streets to demand goverments act to slash greenhouse gas emissions. Did you watch and wonder what you could do to help the global climate movement?

If so, this year presents a remarkable opportunity. With the 26th Conference of the Parties UN climate conference taking place in Glasgow this November, there has never been a better time to add your voice to those calling for urgent action to end our reliance on fossil fuels, cut greenhouse gases and protect the planet from global heating.

At COP 26, world leaders will be under huge pressure to come up with an international, united and effective response to the climate emergency. Those involved in the recent wave of climate action believe much can be done beforehand to ensure nations take effective action. "There is no doubt 2020 is going to be a really big year," says Kim Bryan, of the US group 350.org."In Glasgow, nations will be expected to agree formal commitments to tackle climate change. And people pressure is really making a difference."

What group should I join?

A number of Scottish organisations are building their campaigns in the run-up to COP, including Stop Climate Chaos Scotland, a collection of more than 40 civil society organisations. But there have never been so many options for would-be activists, from traditional NGOs such as Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth, to more radical groups such as Extinction Rebellion (XR) and its youth section, the school strikes movement, run by the UK Student Climate Network, and grassroots organisations such as Onca in Brighton or Clean Air for Southall and Hayes. "There is going to be a mixture of mobilisation for the coming year, and hopefully a lot of it will be led by grassroots groups," says Guppi Bola of Wretched of the Earth, an activist coalition that supports the global south and people of colour seeking climate justice.

Do my choices as a consumer still matter?

With 40% of UK emissions coming from households, the independent Committee on Climate Change says what we do can play an important part in reducing emissions. From choosing renewable energy to heat their home, to improving household insulation and choosing an electric vehicle, individuals can cut their carbon footprint. Reducing your overall consumption - of clothes, household goods or toys - can also help reduce the UK's carbon emissions. The latest data reveals that in 2016 UK consumption represented 784m tonnes of CO2.

How can I campaign locally?

You could set up a local Friends of the Earth action group. The charity is supporting those who want to build community action groups to put pressure on councils to adopt climate action plans. The aim is to build upwards to push the government to adopt a national action plan that will put the UK on a path to net-zero emissions by 2045 by tackling transport, heating, energy and agriculture. "This will be the backbone of our campaigning this year," says Claire Norman of FOE.

Extinction Rebellion encourages anyone in an area without a local group to set one up. Creating a Facebook page or hosting a public meeting are ways to start off your group. "The basic idea is to inform and inspire new people and then get them into groups to take on roles and jobs so the whole mobilisation can grow quickly," says XR.

Which groups ensure BME and indigenous voices are heard?

Finding a group that embraces diversity may be hard. Craig Bennett, chief executive of Friends of the Earth, has warned of the environmental movement becoming stuck in "a white middle-class ghetto".

That said, Daze Aghaji of XR youth recommends her own organisation, "because we are extremely diverse. We have really worked on this because we know that XR was coming under criticism over lack of diversity. We are creating bonds with activists in the global south, and we are taking on topics that are hard to talk about, like mental health and climate change."

Bola, meanwhile, says that people of colour should join local groups where they feel comfortable doing so, and that many grassroots groups in metropolitan areas are more diverse and representative of society.

Clare Rodger of the UK Student Climate Network says: "There is more that we could be doing to make sure that everyone is equally valued and listened to. This includes encouraging more boys to get involved in the climate justice movement."

If you have a unionised workplace, ask your union to get involved. Petition or lobby your company to carry out an audit of its carbon footprint - from its energy emissions and transport to the staff canteen. Then push for it to commit to reducing its carbon emissions, moving to net zero.

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Hoofing it ... a horse-led Culture Declares Emergency procession in London in April 2019. Photograph: David Levene/The Guardian

Is physical protest the best way to fight the climate crisis?

There are many ways to show concern and to act, says Rodger. Some involve direct action and protest, others do not. "I think people should just do whatever they feel most comfortable doing, whether it is joining a school strike, or lobbying your MP or taking action to lobby your employer at work. What is important is to join the movement in whatever way you can."

How useful is getting arrested during a protest?

Taking direct action can lead to arrest. Mass arrests, such as those that took place during the XR protests last year, can also be used as a form of disruption. XR provides advice on how an activist can use the criminal justice process, from arrest to prosecution, to raise public and political awareness of the climate emergency. But arrest is not for everyone.

But there is so much else to do, away from direct action, that is not often seen

"It is an individual choice for some people, and we will support those people," said Aghaji. "But there is so much else to do, away from direct action, that is not often seen - for example, there is the education work we do to build the climate movement."

How helpful are online petitions?

Change.org says the ability of ordinary people to set up petitions helps to level the playing field. "You no longer need to be a politician or CEO to make change happen," says a spokesperson. "Anyone can start a petition on Change.org and raise awareness of an issue. Then the people who sign the petition become a community that work together to win the campaign."

Often petitions focus on a small area relating to climate change or the environment. "Some of the most successful petitions are 'little big things' - campaigns to change one tangible part of a wider problem. This paves the way for the public to make change on huge issues like stopping climate change, where it can be hard to know where to start," the spokesperson adds.

How can I find out a politician's record on environmental issues?

Try theyworkforyou.com, which takes data from the UK parliament to show you how your MP voted on issues such as the third runway at Heathrow, fracking, and carbon capture and storage.

The Guardian's polluters project also provides a handy guide to how MPs have voted on key environmental legislation. In the US, 350.org is running a "climate test" to show where presidential candidates stand on key issues.

Which issues could be solved by political action?

Building pressure to reduce UK emissions to net zero sooner than 2050 - the current government target - and pushing for a carbon tax are key campaign areas. In the UK, transport accounts for a third of all carbon emissions. So you could campaign for policies to reduce transport emissions - for example, through a much earlier ban on diesel and petrol vehicles than the current 2040 deadline, an end to the freeze on fuel duty, or cuts to rail fares. These are political decisions that could speed up change.

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Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg delivers a speech during the Friday for Future strike on climate emergency, in Turin in December. Photograph: Filippo Monteforte/AFP via Getty Images

How can I show solidarity with Greta Thunberg?

Fridays for Future is the schools strikes movement Thunberg inspired. According to 350.org, which works with the movement, joining in the school strikes is one of the best ways to support her. The next day of action is 14 February.

The global movement inspired in part by the school strikes helped give Thunberg the profile to speak at the UN, says Bryan. "Building this movement, growing it, making sure it has more profile and drives more action is important in the coming year."

A key month is April, when there will be three days of action across the world, including a global strike and a rebellion led by XR.
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One year to save the planet: a simple guide to fighting the climate crisis in 2020

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he impact of the climate crisis is all too visible. Bushfires have killed more than 20 people in south-eastern Australia and forced thousands more to flee their homes. Floods and storms have left hundreds dead and many more destitute in Argentina, Uruguay, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Malawi.

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50 simple ways to make your life greener

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Expert tips on how to be kinder to the planet – from cooking and cleaning to fashion and finance

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Our food makes up something like a quarter of our greenhouse gas footprint, and at the same time as cutting this we need to feed a growing population better than we are doing now, while rescuing our haemorrhaging biodiversity and avoiding an antibiotics crisis. There is no escaping the clear evidence that humans need to reduce their meat - especially beef and lamb - as well as dairy consumption. When we feed a soya bean to a cow, we get back only about 10% of the nutrition in beef, and it comes with a hefty dose of methane (a powerful greenhouse gas) and very likely some deforestation.

Our food makes up something like a quarter of our greenhouse gas footprint, and at the same time as cutting this we need to feed a growing population better than we are doing now, while rescuing our haemorrhaging biodiversity and avoiding an antibiotics crisis. There is no escaping the clear evidence that humans need to reduce their meat - especially beef and lamb - as well as dairy consumption. When we feed a soya bean to a cow, we get back only about 10% of the nutrition in beef, and it comes with a hefty dose of methane (a powerful greenhouse gas) and very likely some deforestation.

But there is no requirement for us to go all the way to either vegetarianism or veganism - it is all about the proportions. We do not even need to make all the changes overnight. We just need to start chipping away so that the proportions in our diets change radically over the next 10 or so years. And most of us can use this as an opportunity to eat more healthily.

Is it OK to fly?

Here is an inconvenient reality: a long-distance plane will typically burn though about 100 tonnes of fuel, turning it into almost four times that weight in carbon dioxide. Because of some complex high-altitude effects, the climate change impact of this is perhaps double what it would be if we burned that fuel on the runway. There are three options: biofuel (but the strain on our land is huge), synthetic fuels generated using solar power (but we already need all the solar power we can get), and fossil fuel counterbalanced with a mechanism for taking carbon back out of the air (but we do not yet know how to do this properly, and when we find out, we will already need to be doing this as fast as we can to mitigate non-flying climate impacts).

Short-distance electric flights are almost becoming feasible but the need to save weight means that at the moment liquid hydrocarbons are the only suitable fuel for a long-haul flight. So, a bit of flying is still OK, but not as much.

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The UK's energy mix will be more complex, blending solar, wind and tidal. Photograph: Paul Glendell/Alamy

Is it realistic to transform our energy supply?

Today's global energy supply is only one seven-thousandth of the energy from the sun that lands on the planet. An area of solar panels 228 sq miles in a sunny part of the world could harness our entire global energy supply. Neither the cost nor the resource use is prohibitive. There are issues of distribution and storage, but the solutions to these problems are also coming along nicely.

The precise energy mix - plenty of solar with significant bits of wind, hydro and tidal - will vary from place to place. Australia has 200 times more sunlight per person than the UK, which is the fifth worst major country in the world on the sunlight per person stakes (ahead of Bangladesh, Belgium, the Netherlands and Rwanda). But the UK has better wind and tidal potential than most, so its energy mix will be more complex. To summarise, the transition is technically feasible if we invest enough, cap fossil fuels and moderate our energy consumption.

With the right investment (made possible through redistribution from fossil fuels, and through a carbon tax, say) it is totally feasible to replace our energy supply over the next three decades.

Would a 'green tax' work?

Somehow the world's fossil fuel needs to stay in the ground. For that to happen it needs to be too expensive to extract. That requires a carbon price. I think the simplest way to achieve that is a carbon tax, although I would be happy with a cap and trade arrangement too - they have the same effect.

A tax could be administered at the point of extraction, but it is also possible to levy it at the point of consumption - such as the household meter and the petrol station. What we are talking about is the creation of a huge pot of money that would fund the new green energy infrastructure, assist the countries and individuals that would otherwise stand to be losers in the transition to the low-carbon world, as well as support a suite of social and environmental goods.

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Is it bad to have kids? No. But you might want to consider how many to have. Photograph: Roger Bamber/Alamy

Should I have fewer children?

Twelve billion careful people could live well together on our wonderful planet. One billion careless people can trash the place in no time. It is not just about the number of people, it is about how they live. It takes about 500 Malawians to clock up the carbon footprint of just one person in the UK. Every additional birth increases the need for everyone else to be slightly more careful.

So is it bad to have kids? No. Is it responsible to have a big family? Perhaps not any more. Does it matter what lifestyle my children have? Absolutely.

Is there really anything I can do as an individual?

There are two aspects to the way people can make a difference. The first is to personally embark on more traditional low-carbon and sustainable living. It is still as important as ever because it brings integrity to everything else we do, it demonstrates commitment and, if done well, it makes it easier for everyone else to do likewise.

The second is to push for the cultural and political change that we need, in every situation: how we influence our politicians (not just through our votes), and the things we say and do at work, at leisure and perhaps most challenging of all, at home. Grassroots pressure can change politics - the youth organisation Sunrise Movement has had remarkable success in pushing for the proposal of a Green New Deal in the US, forcing every Democratic hopeful to speak out on the climate. And two decades ago, the Jubilee 2000 campaign was widely credited with the cancelling of debt in developing countries.

Is it time for more people to take to the streets?

After decades of talk and negotiation on climate change, years of personal actions and corporate targets, a mass of rhetoric, greenwash and, to be fair, occasional flashes of sincere action from the business world, there has been no dent whatsoever in the rising global carbon curve. Nothing at all.

Talking about it has not been enough. Asking for it has not worked. Somehow, we have to insist. I think it needs to be thoughtfully done. The tone needs to be constructive: it is a better world we are pushing for and certainly not a violent one. How and where to take to the streets must be a deeply personal decision. But given where we have got to, and I do not write this lightly, it has to be one that each of us carefully asks.

Mike Berners-Lee is the author of There is No Planet B. He is a professor at Lancaster University and the director of Small World Consulting.
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Don't know how to save the planet? This is what you can do

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Our food makes up something like a quarter of our greenhouse gas footprint, and at the same time as cutting this we need to feed a growing population better than we are doing now, while rescuing our haemorrhaging biodiversity and avoiding an antibiotics crisis.

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Philip Aiken has received more than 1.4m likes on the video-sharing app TikTok. But his videos don't feature cute animals and there are no celebrities to be seen. Aiken's posts are about soil restoration.

The 27-year-old is one of a growing number of TikTok users discussing the benefits of boosting biodiversity in green spaces and gardens against a backdrop of viral sounds."I see it as like planting seeds, and hopefully that germinates and that person wants to learn more," says Aiken, known as Phil the Fixer on TikTok.

Millennials and Generation Z are increasingly engaging with environmental issues by creating and sharing memes on social media.The hashtags "moss", "biodiversity" and "native biodiversity" have 84.3 million, 12.6 million and nearly 800,000 views respectively on TikTok.

The most-viewed biodiversity TikToks poke fun at monoculture lawns, praise the qualities of moss, provide explainers, support indigenous practices and warn of mass extinction. TikTok has around 800m active users worldwide and is particularly popular with Generation Z: an estimated 60% of users were born after the mid-90s. The images and clips go on to reach new audiences when reposted on Twitter and Facebook.

A subculture known as "grass TikTok" - which has gathered nearly 380 million views - has also emerged on the app. Its community interacts with content about plant species. Top creator Evan Phillips, who has more than half a million followers, rates different types of grass andposts pictures of fans' gardens; he has even brought out grass-themed merchandise.

Aiken downloaded the app in October 2019 after interviewing a group of youth climate activists -who were all talking about TikTok - for his podcast just to save the world.

He regularly receives messages asking about gardening, sustainability and university degree choices, while others exchange resource recommendations in his comments section. Aiken, who is based in the US but studied for a master's in renewable energy in New Zealand, hopes to become a teacher. "It's been cool being able to influence the younger generation in that way," he says.During lockdown, Aiken also co-founded EcoTok, a collective of young creators aiming to become the environmental "Hype House" (a group of the biggest stars on the app who live and film in a mansion in Los Angeles), as well as the Intersectional Environmentalist Instagram account, which was initially set up after a post by environmental activist Leah Thomas in response to the killing of George Floyd went viral. The Intersectional Environmentalist, which campaigns for an inclusive version of environmentalism, highlighting injustices experienced by marginalised communities, has now gained 121,000 followers, with an audience mainly made up of millennials.

Young-Woong Kee, a 16-year-old Hawaiian high school student, is a keen follower of biodiversity TikToks: "Seeing them and talking about them with my friends has definitely impacted us and made us want to look more into it."

He has acquired a collection of succulentsand hopes other viewers will look more deeply into wider environmental issues. Kee, who has also started watching National Geographic's YouTube videos and the Netflix documentary series Our Planet, cited coral bleaching, deforestation and overhunting as key issues.

A recent survey of Generation Z and millennials by Deloitte found climate change and protecting the environment was a top concern, both before and during the coronavirus pandemic. This follows the rise to prominence of Greta Thunberg and the growth of Fridays for Future, Zero Hour and Extinction Rebellion over recent years.

A carnival float depicts Greta Thunberg and the Friday for Future school strikes during a carnival parade in Dusseldorf, Germany. Photograph: Martin Meissner/AP

Another EcoTok creator, Casey Shultis, 18, believes lockdown has further increased engagement."People are sitting at home and now have the time to learn more about biodiversity and the environmental crisis," he says. "I encourage people to understand the importance of planting native biodiversity while also seeing the beauty that comes along with it."

Shultis, who is about to start an environmental studies degree in the US, previously called his62,300TikTokfollowers the Greta Gang and hopes one day to have as much impact as Thunberg.

An Xiao Mina, author of the book Memes to Movements, says the full extent of the influence of these platforms will only become apparent by tracking the digital content over time. She highlighted the influence of, for example, #BlackLivesMatter and the Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong. "Often, the most visible thing is the meme," says Mina. "What may not be apparent is the networks that are being built, the narratives being shaped and the organisational structures that ultimately might help us yield effective change."

Educators have also been using biodiversity memes to get their messages across in the classroom and lecture halls, while environmental organisations have been attempting to inspire younger audiences on social media, which can ensure the accuracy of information shared. The Royal Horticultural Society's (RHS) Instagram followinggrew from 99,500 to 125,000 between April and June. Prof Alistair Griffiths, RHS Director of Science and Collections, says: "It would be wonderful if there were a way for RHS scientific content to be co-created with the key environmental influencers of TikTok."

However, the potential ban on TikTok in the US over national security concerns looms over creators, and could result in a loss of biodiversity engagement online.

"It would be really unfortunate because TikTok is such a unique platform," says Aiken. "People are genuinely learning things they never learned in school or from their communities." But he remains optimistic. "There's something different about Gen Z. I don't necessarily think that's gonna go away with TikTok."
Find more age of extinction coverage here, and follow biodiversity reporters Phoebe Weston and Patrick Greenfield on Twitter for all the latest news and features

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Green teen memes: how TikTok could save the planet

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Philip Aiken has received more than 1.4m likes on the video-sharing app TikTok. But his videos don't feature cute animals and there are no celebrities to be seen. Aiken's posts are about soil restoration.

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Trailer to Al Gore's second film on evironmental issues

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Trailer to Al Gore's second film on evironmental issues

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An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth To Power (2017) - Official Trailer - Paramount Pictures

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„Mehr als zwei Meter werden die Meerespegel bis zum Ende des Jahrhunderts nicht steigen, das scheint sicher." So kommentiert Anders Levermann vom Potsdam-Institut für Klimafolgenforschung, einer der Hauptautoren des Weltklimarates IPCC, zwei neue Studien von Kollegen, die in der Zeitschrift „Nature" über die Rolle der beiden größten Eisreservoire der Welt - Grönland und die Antarktis - für Wetter und Klima berichten. Zwischen den Zeilen erfährt man damit auch, wie groß die Unsicherheit bei den Gletscherforschern und Ozeanographen heute ist.

In den beiden neuen Veröffentlichungen geht es nicht nur um die für alle Küstenplaner und Küstenbewohner brennende Frage, wie sich das mittlerweile stark beschleunigte Abschmelzen des „ewigen Eises" auf den globalen Meeresspiegel auswirkt. Es geht auch um jene geophysikalischen Prozesse, die die Atmosphäre und damit unser Wetter in den nächsten hundert Jahren entscheidend beeinflussen könnten.

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Klimawandel und Wetter: Das Chaos wird größer, wenn die Pole schmelzen

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„Mehr als zwei Meter werden die Meerespegel bis zum Ende des Jahrhunderts nicht steigen, das scheint sicher." So kommentiert Anders Levermann vom Potsdam-Institut für Klimafolgenforschung, einer der Hauptautoren des Weltklimarates IPCC, zwei neue Studien von Kollegen, die in der Zeitschrift „Nature" über die Rolle der beiden größten Eisreservoire der Welt - Grönland und die Antarktis - für Wetter und Klima berichten.

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Bis zum Ende dieses Jahrhunderts sind jährlich bis zu fünf zusätzliche Hitzewellen in Norddeutschland und bis zu 30 in Süddeutschland zu erwarten, wenn wir mit dem Ausstoß von Treibhausgasen so weitermachen wie bisher. Damit einhergehender Hitzestress und hohe bodennahe Ozonkonzentrationen können schwerwiegende Folgen für die menschliche Gesundheit haben. Dazu zählen unter anderem Hitzschlag, Herzinfarkt und akutes Nierenversagen aufgrund von Flüssigkeitsmangel. Am stärksten gefährdet sind ältere Menschen, Säuglinge, Patienten mit chronischen Erkrankungen sowie Personen, die schwere körperliche Arbeit im Freien verrichten, etwa Bauarbeiter.

Zu diesen Ergebnissen kommt ein heute veröffentlichter Forschungsbericht der renommierten medizinischen Fachzeitschrift „The Lancet". Dieser ist Teil des internationalen Forschungsprojekts „The Lancet Countdown on Health and Climate Change". Zum ersten Mal wird dieses Jahr auch ein Deutschland-Bericht (Policy Brief) des Lancet Countdown vorgestellt. Kooperationspartner des Projektes sind die Bundesärztekammer, die Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, das Helmholtz Zentrum München, das Potsdam-Institut für Klimafolgenforschung sowie die Hertie School.

Nach dem Forschungsbericht nimmt auch die Gefährdung durch Infektionskrankheiten aufgrund des Klimawandels zu. Dies betrifft durch Zecken und Mücken übertragbare Infektionen, die es in Teilen Deutschlands schon heute gibt, wie zum Beispiel FSME und Borreliose, aber auch neue Infektionskrankheiten, wie Dengue, Zika und Chikungunya. Dieses Jahr gab es erstmals Mücken-assoziierte West-Nil-Fieber Fälle bei Menschen in Deutschland. Außerdem vermehren sich bei höheren Temperaturen Blaualgen und Vibrio-Bakterien in Seen und in der Ostsee, was beim Baden Gesundheitsprobleme verursachen kann.

„Der Bericht belegt eindrücklich, dass die gesundheitlichen Auswirkungen des Klimawandels nicht irgendwann in weit entfernten Weltgegenden spürbar werden, sondern hier und heute", sagte Bundesärztekammer-Präsident Dr. Klaus Reinhardt. Die Politik müsse geeignete Rahmenbedingungen schaffen, um Risiken für die Gesundheit abzuwenden. So müssten Gesundheitseinrichtungen durch ausreichend Personal und räumliche Ressourcen auf Extremwetterereignisse vorbereitet werden. „Neben einem nationalen Hitzeschutzplan sind konkrete Maßnahmenpläne für Kliniken, Not- und Rettungsdienste sowie Pflegeeinrichtungen zur Vorbereitung auf Hitzeereignisse notwendig", betonte Reinhardt.

Annette Peters, Direktorin des Instituts für Epidemiologie am Helmholtz Zentrum München, untersucht in der Nako-Gesundheitsstudie bei 200.000 Erwachsenen die körperlichen Reaktionen auf extreme Wetterereignisse und wie sie durch den Klimawandel verschärft werden: „Wir gehen davon aus, dass die Auswirkungen von Hitze viel weitreichender sind, als dies gegenwärtig durch Studien dokumentiert ist. Mit Hilfe der Nako Gesundheitsstudie können wir die Auswirkungen von Hitze auf chronisch kranke Personen, wie zum Beispiel Diabetiker untersuchen." Sabine Gabrysch, Ärztin und Professorin für Klimawandel und Gesundheit an der Charité und dem Potsdam-Institut für Klimafolgenforschung, betonte die enormen Chancen für unsere Gesundheit durch sogenannte Win-win-Lösungen: „Wenn wir Kohlekraftwerke abschalten und unsere Städte fahrradfreundlicher gestalten und dadurch der Autoverkehr abnimmt, nützt das nicht nur dem Klima.

Diese Maßnahmen helfen auch gegen Luftverschmutzung und führen zu mehr Bewegung. Beides ist ein direkter Gewinn für unsere Gesundheit durch weniger Herz-Kreislauf- und Atemwegserkrankungen. Vorsorge ist besser als Nachsorge, und die beste Vorsorge bei Klima und Gesundheit ist die rasche Verringerung unseres Ausstoßes von Treibhausgasen."

Nach der Präsentation des Forschungsberichts vor der Bundespressekonferenz in Berlin werden die Ergebnisse am Nachmittag auf einer Tagung in der Hertie-School diskutiert. „Das Monitoring dient nicht nur dazu, die Dynamik der Wechselbeziehungen zwischen Gesundheit und Klimawandel abzubilden. Wir wollen auch eine verlässliche Grundlage für politische Entscheidungen liefern", sagte vor der Tagung Slava Jankin, Professor für „Data Science and Public Policy" an der Berliner Hertie School und als Autor an den Arbeiten des Lancet Countdown beteiligt.

Auch Bundesärztekammer-Vorstandsmitglied Peter Bobbert wird auf der Tagung sprechen. Er betonte im Vorfeld die Notwendigkeit, die Forschung zu den Auswirkungen der Klimaerwärmung auf die Gesundheit des Einzelnen sowie auf die globale Gesundheit zu intensivieren. Bobbert verwies darauf, dass sich im nächsten Jahr der Deutsche Ärztetag intensiv mit den gesundheitlichen Folgen des Klimawandels beschäftigen wird.

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Klimawandel und Gesundheit: „Die Folgen tragen wir nicht irgendwo oder irgendwann"

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Bis zum Ende dieses Jahrhunderts sind jährlich bis zu fünf zusätzliche Hitzewellen in Norddeutschland und bis zu 30 in Süddeutschland zu erwarten, wenn wir mit dem Ausstoß von Treibhausgasen so weitermachen wie bisher. Damit einhergehender Hitzestress und hohe bodennahe Ozonkonzentrationen können schwerwiegende Folgen für die menschliche Gesundheit haben.

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In June, Simukai Chigudu stepped up on a plinth in front of thousands of people blocking the streets outside Oriel College in Oxford. The associate professor of African politics addressed the crowds inspired by Black Lives Matter and the anti-racism protests sweeping across the UK and around the world, catalysed by the killing of yet another black man at the hands of police in the US.

Chigudu told the crowds that, yes, he was angry - how could he not be? He is one of just an estimated seven black professors employed by the University of Oxford, an institution that has faced years of questioning over diversity and its treatment of students and staff of colour.
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As a postdoc student five years ago, he was one of the founding members of Rhodes Must Fall in Oxford, a major student-led protest arguing for the decolonisation of Oxford and calling for the removal of the statue of Victorian imperialist Cecil Rhodes, which stands outside Oriel College.

In early June, the world watched as protesters in Bristol knocked down the statue of slave trader Edward Colston. The energy spread to Oxford, sparking a resurgence of the campaign to bring down Rhodes.

"When I stood up to speak and I was surveying the crowd, I could see the different eyes being cast on me. I saw a lot of people who didn't have much to do with the university. It felt like there was this convergence of people, that an anti-racism project has to be far-reaching," he says.

Yet five years prior, the Rhodes Must Fall in Oxford campaign had felt like a movement that would never spread past the city's limestone walls. The activists who launched a campaign to decolonise the university's curriculum and challenge its racist iconography, inspired by the University of Cape Town's original Rhodes Must Fall campaign, were continuously challenged on their views.

Yet the pervasiveness of racism at the university was made startlingly apparent when, not long after the campaign began, the bar at an Oxford Union debate on the British Empire sold a cocktail named the "colonial comeback", accompanied by images of black hands in chains.

After a leaked document in January 2016 warned the college would lose about £100m in donor gifts if Rhodes did fall, the movement lost momentum.

Yet though under the same name, this summer's protest felt different. There was a realisation, Chigudu says, that "it felt like a city having a reckoning, rather than a closed matter for the university".

This summer's tsunami of activism has added weight to the role of students in protests and campaigns that go beyond the campus. Malaika Gangooly is starting her second year of journalism at City University of London, another institution that recently bowed to student pressure to remove the name of John Cass - the 18th-century merchant linked to the slave trade - from its business school.

She led the Black Lives Matter protests in her hometown of Chingford, and now plans to run for diversity officer at the students' union. "People thought I was maybe too young to start in protests, and too heavily involved. But the younger you are, the better it is to get involved, and the more important it is. If it's not worked in generations before us, then we're the generation that has to try and make it work."

These same arguments have been reproduced in the youth climate movement in the past two years. The urgency of the disaster has been pushed by young people, many of whom are university students. Their campus activism has led to radical divestment from fossil fuel campaigns, while students have played major roles in local branches of Extinction Rebellion or the youth climate strikes. In 2018, for example, two students at Sussex University were claimants on a significant climate change lawsuit against the UK government.

"So much of the change that's happening now is people my age at university. If we take it into our own hands then no one can complain about it," says Gangooly.

Something in the atmosphere has changed. For Gangooly's generation, it's obvious that issues affecting students are mirrored in society: it is young people who will bear the brunt of the climate catastrophe; there is institutional racism at the universities that breed our future leaders.

"[Recently] there's been the circulation of many more ideas about how we might change society and how we deal with questions of equality, but also what that means in terms of a world in which there's so much economic insecurity, in which there's a looming climate catastrophe, and so on," says Chigudu. "That's partly contributed to the willingness of people to really rally around and protest, and for people to see the interconnections between racism, capitalism and climate catastrophe."

This idea of students questioning their future on a mass scale echoes back to post-financial crisis Britain. In November, it will be a decade since tens of thousands of students occupied streets across the UK, protesting a steep rise in university fees and cuts to the Education Maintenance Allowance. Britain's press was overrun with images of students occupying Millbank, clashes with police and placards repeating the slogan "No Future".
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It was one of the biggest mass movements of young people in British history, and "the first of a series of major mass movements to characterise the next five years, not just in Britain but around the world," says Matthew Myers, a graduate student of History at the University of Oxford, pointing to movements such as Occupy and the Arab Spring that followed.

Though often discussed as a campaign against fee hikes, the student protests of 2010 addressed issues of austerity and inequality. "It was a very specific moment in time where young people were at the forefront. There was a sense of generational injustice," says Myers, who participated in the 2010 protests and is the author of Student Revolt.

"A whole generation in 2010 were very motivated by slogans of 'no future'. They felt the future that they'd been promised - if they worked hard, got a good job, then they'd be able to achieve the level of economic stability and success which their parents had been promised - was no longer possible," says Myers. "Students were simply the first in a long line of groups who were going to have to pay for the crisis, and pay for austerity."

A decade on, it seems students are once again realising they will pay for other injustices, and they are now asking what their role is to make changes - particularly with race, climate and inequality.

But this resurgence of student activism will reverberate far beyond their own lives. "[It has] almost become more profound," says Myers. "The student climate strikers are speaking as much as students as they are as human beings who are going to have to live on a planet which is entering climate catastrophe."
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'People thought I was too young to protest': the rise of student activism

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n June, Simukai Chigudu stepped up on a plinth in front of thousands of people blocking the streets outside Oriel College in Oxford. The associate professor of African politics addressed the crowds inspired by Black Lives Matter and the anti-racism protests sweeping across the UK and around the world, catalysed by the killing of yet another black man at the hands of police in the US.

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Meet the doomers: why some young US voters have given up hope on climate

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Politically active young people are often championed as the Earth’s great hope to reverse the climate crisis – but many believe we’ve already passed the tipping point

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onight, Channel 4 will host the first ever election debate on the climate crisis. All of the major party leaders have confirmed their attendance, save for Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage. The Brexit party doesn't have a climate platform, so that squares, but Johnson would be a curious absence. The Conservative government recently passed a commitment to reach net-zero emissions by 2050; the party's manifesto repeats that pledge, and includes new spending for environment and climate policies. Until now, the Tories haven't seemed afraid to talk climate.

This distinguishes them from other rightwing parties in the English-speaking world. The US and Australia especially seem doomed to forever re-fight the climate denial battles of the mid-00s - witness Donald Trump's tweets about cold weather contradicting "global warming", or the now Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, triumphantly brandishing a chunk of coal in parliament.

New denialism isn't anti-science specifically - it's a reactionary project, which seeks to uphold or re-assert the status- quo

But in the UK, since they overwhelmingly supported the 2008 Climate Change Act, the Tories seem to have come around and fully accepted the science. No one in the party openly questions the link between carbon emissions and warming, or the need for action. Its once-vocal science denier fringe has been almost entirely silenced, or, like former minister Ann Widdecombe, decamped to the Brexit party.

But it should be clear to us now that it is possible for leaders to accept the scientific consensus, attend the meetings, meet the activists, nod gravely, sign the pledges and then effectively do nothing. It's time to ask whether this approach is really a marked improvement on denying the climate crisis altogether. There is a term currently floating around activist circles, "new denialism". This is attached to ways of thinking that acknowledge the reality of climate change, but don't lead to what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change calls the "rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society" needed to avoid 1.5C warming.

New denialism accepts the basic atmospheric science, but rejects the immense volume of further scientific work suggesting that we can change things - either because it would be too disruptive to our current way of life, or to the way we've organised our economy. It can seem like a vague category: it encompasses over-cautious incremental policies and tepid market-based solutions; insistence that some not-yet-existing technology will emerge to wipe out our carbon debts; and even arguments that we're too far gone, and should focus our efforts on adaptation. These all acknowledge the problem, but reject the solutions that scientists insist on: immediate, radical reductions in carbon emissions.

This seems markedly less evil than the cartoon-villain propaganda of climate science deniers. And at close range it is. But any future moral accounting of the climate crisis is unlikely to distinguish bad faith from good intentions; rather it will be weighed in megatonnes of carbon, which hit another all-time high this year. As the academics Philip Mirowski, Jeremy Walker and Antoinette Abboud noted in 2013, the thinktanks behind climate denial never thought they would win the war of ideas with academic science - they simply wanted to stall for as long as they could anything that would threaten the interests of the fossil fuel industry.

Seen this way, new denialism isn't anti-science specifically - it's a reactionary project, which seeks to uphold or reassert the status quo. And if denialism is about stopping action, then anything that needlessly obstructs action is denial. Ultimately, then, there's no fundamental difference between outright denialism and new denialism. New denialism is visible in the gaps between words and actions: oil companies claiming to decarbonise while approving enough fossil fuel production to shoot us well past 2C; governments promising emission reductions with no credible plan to do so. Two weeks ago the UN called the majority of existing climate policies " totally inadequate ".

The truth is, the Tories are fine with that. Johnson won't talk climate today because Labour and the Liberal Democrats have unveiled transformative multi-billion pound infrastructure programs and regulatory measures that would actually address the climate crisis, while the Conservative manifesto commits more spending to potholes than to electric vehicles. It's the same bait and switch that has kept climate action stalled for decades: promise, then don't deliver. Johnson's purported commitment to a 2050 target won't stand up to scrutiny from the public, or from the other parties - but it's still there in the manifesto, a grand signpost pointing absolutely nowhere.

The Tories have got credit over the years for their rhetoric on climate - from supporting the Climate Change Act to David Cameron's " greenest government ever". The reality has been less impressive: they have failed to enact any major policy and outright killed promising programmes such as zero carbon homes.

And yet, they've avoided major condemnation as long as discussions inched along, committing to new targets without plans to achieve them, the rhetorical consensus intact. The other parties have broken that, thankfully, by promising bold action that acknowledge the true demands of the crisis. We say a person who won't accept tough realities is in denial. We shouldn't be scared to extend that label to Johnson and his party.

* Stephen Buranyi is a writer in London

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There's a new 'climate denialism' out there. Conservatives are very good at it | Stephen Buranyi

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onight, Channel 4 will host the first ever election debate on the climate crisis. All of the major party leaders have confirmed their attendance, save for Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage. The Brexit party doesn't have a climate platform, so that squares, but Johnson would be a curious absence.

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Die Autorin war federführende Redakteurin des 1980 im Verlag Zweitausendeins in Frankfurt am Main erschienenen Bild-Textbandes „Republik Freies Wendland. Eine Dokumentation", herausgegeben von dem Fotografen Günter Zint.
Am 3. Mai 1980 strömten mehrere Hundert junger Leute zu einem Wäldchen im Landkreis Lüchow-Dannenberg an der Elbe. Kinder und Hunde hatten sie dabei, Zeltplanen, Bretter, Latten und Stangen, Decken, Kochkessel, Obstkisten voller Proviant, Streichhölzer, Taschenmesser.

Auch der vorgezimmerte Bausatz für ein „Freundschaftshaus" gehörte dazu, ein alternatives Fertighaus, das nur noch aufgerichtet werden musste.

Denn hier sollte das Hüttendorf der „Freien Republik Wendland" entstehen, eine utopische Waldsiedlung der Protestierenden, geschmückt mit Transparenten, auf Bettlaken gemalten Sprüchen im schönsten Szenesound: „Gemeinsam werden wir es schaffen, daß es endlich alle raffen".

Solange die Aktivistinnen und Aktivisten hier siedelten, konnte der unterirdische Salzstock nicht erkundet werden, den „die da oben" zum Lager für radioaktiven Atommüll umwidmen wollten. Anfang 1977 hatte Niedersachsens Ministerpräsident Ernst Albrecht erklärt, Gorleben werde vorläufiger Standort für ein „nukleares Entsorgungszentrum", geplant seien eine Wiederaufarbeitungsanlage und ein Endlager für Atommüll.

Dieser Entsorgung galt die brennende Sorge vieler in der Bevölkerung. Nicht nur junge Leute aus der Stadt, auch Landwirte organisierten den Protest und zogen mit Traktor-Konvois los.

Eine ungewöhnliche Koalition des Widerstands

Und Andreas Graf Bernstorff, Eigentümer eines Teilgebiets über dem Salzstock Gorleben, weigerte sich, sein Land an die Deutsche Gesellschaft zur Wiederaufbereitung von Kernbrennstoffen zu verkaufen. 26 Millionen Mark waren geboten worden, damit die Brennelementelager Gorleben GmbH (BLG) zum Zuge käme.

Gorleben, das Wendland, der Salzstock, die Probebohrungen, die Castor-Tonnen - so lauteten die Reizworte der regionalen Bewegung gegen Atomkraft, die bundesweit und darüber hinaus politische Wirkung entfaltete. Alternative Ökos, grüne Bürger, wütende Bauern und aufgebrachter Adel fanden im Widerstand zeitweise zueinander.

Eine der Protagonistinnen war die Bäckersfrau und fünffache Mutter Lieselotte „Lilo" Wollny, geboren 1926. Sie trug Brot und Semmeln ins Hüttendorf und wurde Jahre später parteilose Abgeordnete der Grünen im Bundestag. Was Wollny, die 2019 starb, nun nicht mehr miterlebt, ist das Ende der atomaren Castor-Kartenhauses, zumindest in Gorleben.

Akzeptanz für Atomkraftwerke ist gegen Null gesunken

Seit Montag steht offiziell fest: Gorlebens Salzstöcke gelten als nicht geeignet, Castor-Behälter voller Atommüll sicher zu bergen, so sprach die Bundesgesellschaft für Endlagerung. Demnächst müssen also auch die derzeit zwischengelagerten 113 Behälter mit hochradioaktivem Abfall aus dem Salzstock gehievt und fortgeschafft werden.

Die einen sahen in der Atomspaltung und der ungeheuren Energie, die aus ihr gewonnen werden kann, eine triumphale Errungenschaft. Die anderen beargwöhnten genau diesen Fortschritt als destruktiv und dämonisch.
[Wenn Sie aktuelle Nachrichten aus Berlin, Deutschland und der Welt live auf Ihr Handy haben wollen, empfehlen wir Ihnen unsere App, die Sie hier für Apple- und Android-Geräteherunterladen können]
Inzwischen ist, nach den atomaren Desastern von Tschernobyl und Fukushima, die Akzeptanz für Atomkraftwerke gegen Null gesunken. Deutschland hat unter Kanzlerin Merkel den Ausstieg aus der risikoreichen Technologie beschlossen. Doch wer Atomkraftwerke hat, der hat auch Atommüll. Und wer Atommüll hat, der hat ein Problem.

So harren noch 1900 Castor-Behälter ihrer Entsorgung. Nuklearer Abfall kann über eine Zeitdauer weiterstrahlen, die jedes menschliche Denkvermögen übersteht. Wegen der Halbwertszeiten radioaktiver Substanzen fordert das Gesetz sichere Lagerung - über eine Million Jahre. Auch die Halbwertszeit des schneller zerfallenden Plutonium-239 beträgt immerhin 24 000 Jahre.

"Gorleben soll leben" dichtete Wolf Biermann

Neunzig neue mögliche Standorte im Land gebe es, so wird den enttäuschten Entsorgern jetzt versichert, was erneut Bürger besorgt und verunsichert. 2031 soll Baubeginn für ein strahlendes Endlager sein, 2050 soll Betriebsbeginn sein, in einem Irgendwo. Noch gibt es keinen Ort. Zu erwarten ist, dass ganz gleich wo, neuer Protest und Aufruhr folgen wird.

Utopie leitet sich ab aus dem Griechischen „ou topos", kein Ort. Für das wendländische Hüttendorf besaß Utopie damals doppelte Bedeutung: Hier sollte kein Ort für Atommüll entstehen, und zugleich ein utopischer Ort des Zusammenhalts, eine konkrete Demonstration solidarischen, ökologischen Lebens. „Gorleben soll leben!" dichtete Wolf Biermann und sang zu Gitarre und Rasselklingen: „Auf, Chauvis und Emanzen, kommt mit uns paar Bäume pflanzen!"
[Behalten Sie den Überblick: Jeden Morgen ab 6 Uhr berichten Chefredakteur Lorenz Maroldt und sein Team im Tagesspiegel-Newsletter Checkpoint über die aktuellsten Entwicklungen rund um das Coronavirus. Jetzt kostenlos anmelden: checkpoint.tagesspiegel.de]
Er bebilderte seine Vision „gegen den atomaren Wahnsinn" mit idyllischen Szenen von Tanz, Liebespaaren und gutem Leben, „ein Wein aus der Flasche, ein Stück Käse aus der Tasche!"

Utopische Siedlungen jenseits der Stadt, Landkommunen, hatten Vorläufer bereits um die Wende vom 19. zum 20. Jahrhundert, etwa auf dem Monte Verità bei Ascona.

Dort versammelten sich Vegetarier, Anarchisten und Lebensreformer im Protest gegen Ausbeutung und Entfremdung im Kapitalismus. Noch die Landkommune der Band Ton, Steine, Scherben, die ihr Refugium in Fresenhagen in Nordfriesland suchte, knüpfte dort zeithistorisch an.

Mikrokosmos mit Modellcharakter

Einen Monat lang wimmelte und wuselte es im Httendorf der Atomgegner, bis die Buden mit Baggern, Planierwalzen und zehntausend behelmten Polizisten abgeräumt wurden. In ihrer Sonderausgabe zu Gorleben schrieb die „taz" damals, Innenminister Gerhart Baum und Kanzler Helmut Schmidt hätten sich alle halbe Stunde vom Lagezentrum der Polizei über den Fortgang des Abrisses informieren lassen, über das Ende der „Freien Republik Wendland". Vorbild für das Hüttendorf sei eine Platzbesetzung des geplanten Standorts für das Atomkraftwerk im süddeutschen Wyhl gewesen sein.

Doch die selbsternannte Freie Republik sollte mehr sein, ein Mikrokosmos mit Modellcharakter. „Der Widerstand gegen Gorleben ist ein Gesamtkunstwerk", erklärt daher die Bürgerinitiative Lüchow-Dannenberg auf ihrer Homepage.

Die Formen des Protests, dessen ikonographischen Programme, Zeichen, Symbole, die Codes und Memes der damaligen Aktionen waren nicht nur identitätsstiftend für einen großen Teil der Gesellschaft, der sich heute im grünen Spektrum der Gesellschaft findet. Strahlkraft bekamen Facetten des Widerstands gegen strahlenden Müll und Atomkraftwerke.

Utopische Projekte sind immer widersprüchlich

Damals zuckelten Traktor-Konvois über die Landstraßen bei Gorleben mit Aufschriften wie „Unser Zorn ist gewaltig" vor der Kühlerhaube. Heute organisieren Landwirte der ganzen Republik Sternfahrten vor das Kanzleramt, sei es für, sei es gegen ökologische Reformen.

Hüttendörfer, damals Ballungsräume der frühen, grünen Szene, werden inzwischen in Zweit- und Drittversionen neu aufgelegt von den Kindern und Enkeln der ersten Protestgeneration, wie beim Widerstand gegen die Abholzungen des Hambacher Forsts.

Ad hoc entstehende Protestcamps als Zeltlager in Städten waren eine Ausdrucksform der Kapitalismusgegner von Attac. Nachmachen wollte ihnen das unlängst eine Phalanx aus Gegnern der Maßnahmen zum Schutz vor Corona, darunter verirrte Rechte, echte Neonazis, esoterische Paranoiker, autonome Szenetypen sowie verzweifelte Gewerbetreibende.

In einer pervertierenden Volte der autonomen Landkommunen-Bewegung imitieren heute Reichsbürger die einstigen Vorhaben, und gründen rassistische Dörfer für Arier, wie Jamel in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

Utopische Projekte sind und waren fast immer durchzogen von inneren Widersprüchen. Auf dem Monte Verità hatte ein Radikalökologe um 1900 seinen eisernen Ofen im Boden verscharrt, da er das Erz der Erde zurückgeben wollte.

Als es im Winter bitterkalt wurde, grub er ihn reumütig wieder aus. Dass allerdings die Atomkraft nochmal ausgegraben wird, um Energie zu liefern, scheint kaum noch denkbar. Es bleibt der Müll ihrer Geschichte.

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Wie die Protestkultur von Gorleben heute weiterlebt

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Die Autorin war federführende Redakteurin des 1980 im Verlag Zweitausendeins in Frankfurt am Main erschienenen Bild-Textbandes „Republik Freies Wendland. Eine Dokumentation", herausgegeben von dem Fotografen Günter Zint. Am 3. Mai 1980 strömten mehrere Hundert junger Leute zu einem Wäldchen im Landkreis Lüchow-Dannenberg an der Elbe.

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‘Plastic recycling is a myth’: what really happens to your rubbish?

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You sort your recycling, leave it to be collected – and then what? From councils burning the lot to foreign landfill sites overflowing with British rubbish, Oliver Franklin-Wallis reports on a global waste crisis

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A mutant bacterial enzyme that breaks down plastic bottles for recycling in hours has been created by scientists.

The enzyme, originally discovered in a compost heap of leaves, reduced the bottles to chemical building blocks that were then used to make high-quality new bottles. Existing recycling technologies usually produce plastic only good enough for clothing and carpets.

The company behind the breakthrough, Carbios, said it was aiming for industrial-scale recycling within five years. It has partnered with major companies including Pepsi and L'Oréal to accelerate development. Independent experts called the new enzyme a major advance.

Billions of tonnes of plastic waste have polluted the planet, from the Arctic to the deepest ocean trench, and pose a particular risk to sea life. Campaigners say reducing the use of plastic is key, but the company said the strong, lightweight material was very useful and that true recycling was part of the solution.

The new enzyme was revealed in research published on Wednesday in the journal Nature. The work began with the screening of 100,000 micro-organisms for promising candidates, including the leaf compost bug, which was first discovered in 2012.

"It had been completely forgotten, but it turned out to be the best," said Prof Alain Marty at the Université de Toulouse, France, the chief science officer at Carbios.

The scientists analysed the enzyme and introduced mutations to improve its ability to break down the PET plastic from which drinks bottles are made. They also made it stable at 72C, close to the perfect temperature for fast degradation.

The team used the optimised enzyme to break down a tonne of waste plastic bottles, which were 90% degraded within 10 hours. The scientists then used the material to create new food-grade plastic bottles.

Carbios has a deal with the biotechnology company Novozymes to produce the new enzyme at scale using fungi. It said the cost of the enzyme was just 4% of the cost of virgin plastic made from oil.

Waste bottles also have to be ground up and heated before the enzyme is added, so the recycled PET will be more expensive than virgin plastic. But Martin Stephan, the deputy chief executive at Carbios, said existing lower-quality recycled plastic sells at a premium due to a shortage of supply.

"We are the first company to bring this technology on the market," said Stephan. "Our goal is to be up and running by 2024, 2025, at large industrial scale."

He said a reduction in plastic use was one part of solving the waste problem. "But we all know that plastic brings a lot of value to society, in food, medical care, transportation. The problem is plastic waste." Increasing the collection of plastic waste was key, Stephan said, with about half of all plastic ending up in the environment or in landfill.

Another team of scientists revealed in 2018 that they had accidentally created an enzyme that breaks down plastic drinks bottles. One of the team behind this advance, Prof John McGeehan, the director of the Centre for Enzyme Innovation at the University of Portsmouth, said Carbios was the leading company engineering enzymes to break down PET at large scale and that the new work was a major advance.

"It makes the possibility of true industrial-scale biological recycling of PET a possibility. This is a very large advance in terms of speed, efficiency and heat tolerance," McGeehan said. "It represents a significant step forward for true circular recycling of PET and has the potential to reduce our reliance on oil, cut carbon emissions and energy use, and incentivise the collection and recycling of waste plastic."

Scientists are also making progress in finding biological ways to break down other major types of plastic. In March, German researchers revealed a bug that feasts on toxic polyurethane, while earlier work has shown that wax moth larvae - usually bred as fish bait - can eat up polythene bags.

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Scientists create mutant enzyme that recycles plastic bottles in hours

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A mutant bacterial enzyme that breaks down plastic bottles for recycling in hours has been created by scientists. The enzyme, originally discovered in a compost heap of leaves, reduced the bottles to chemical building blocks that were then used to make high-quality new bottles.

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Dual-flush toilets ‘wasting more water than they save’

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Thames Water says design is more likely to leak as Waterwise warns 400m litres are being lost from UK toilets a day

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https://we.tl/t-TJoq1vgdle

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lOicQ2dL_SfmhX1c0chKkzqfNJmy8z2z/view?usp=sharing

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Germany's greenhouse gas emissions and energy transition targets

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In case a target is missed or overshot, the law states that the difference will be spread out evenly over the remaining annual emissions budgets of the sector until 2030 and beyond, with further targets set for 2040 and 2045. The ambition of Germany's national climate targets can be raised but not lowered.

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Plastic pollution is a major concern to our oceans, wildlife, and planet.

Cities, states, and entire countries are starting a movement to ban the use of single-use plastic.

We have put together a list of must-know facts about plastic pollution to frame how dire the problem is.

What is Plastic Pollution?

Plastic pollution is simply any piece of plastic in a place that it should not be. A majority of plastic pollution ends up in the ocean, but this is not the only place plastic pollution can be found. That said, almost 2/3rds of our plastic ends up in the ocean which equates to about 8 million pieces of plastic a year.

How Does it Get In The Ocean?

60% of all plastic pollution in the ocean is estimated to come from land-based pollution. Beaches, rivers and water runoffs, mismanaged landfills, corporate spills, and sewage make up a majority of the plastic pollution in the oceans. The other 40% comes from sea-based pollution including fishing nets, commercial fishing pollution, containers and storage bins lost in sea transit.

Why Is Plastic Pollution So Much Worse Than Other Types of Pollution?

As we all know, plastic is a strong and durable material. The reason why we produce so much of it because it is a cheap and durable solution. The problem is when plastic is improperly thrown away it takes a long time to break down naturally.

Most plastics will last 450 years in most environments and they don't really ever disappear completely. Instead, they break apart into smaller and smaller pieces until microscopic. Those microscopic pieces never fully disintegrate and ultimately end up in the sand, the ocean, and wildlife's bellies.

Plastic Pollution Facts

Plastic pollution is harmful to humans too

If you're a fish eater, you're going to want to pay attention to this. If animals such as fish are consuming plastic, and then we consume the animal, in this case, fish, guess what? We are eating plastic! About one in three fish that are caught for human consumption contain plastic.

Sure, it may be small, negligible amounts, but if you're a seafood lover, you have to begin to ask yourself just how much plastic we are consuming and how harmful it is for you.

Plastic has the ability to absorb chemicals that have been linked to endocrine disruption and even some cancers. By polluting our waters, we are polluting a source of our food, and ultimately, polluting ourselves. Talk about a vicious cycle.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is growing

In case you haven't heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, it's an area in the North Pacific where a slow swirling whirlpool of ocean currents collects plastic debris. Charles Moore, an oceanographer who discovered this phenomenon, estimates that the patch will grow to double its size within the next ten years.

This might not mean much at face value, so to put things in perspective, the patch is currently twice the size of France. This isn't an easy cleanup, considering the plastic is fragmented, broken, and floating around a massive body of water. It has been estimated that it would take at least 67 ships one year to collect just 1% of the plastic waste in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

Since 1950, it is estimated that around 8.8 billion tons of plastic have been produced worldwide

This number might not seem significant, but in reality that is equivalent to the weight of over 800,000 Eiffel Towers. Can you imagine what 800,000 Eiffel Towers would even look like? Sadly, only about 9% of this plastic has been recycled. It is estimated that between 1.1 and 8.8 metric tons of plastic enter our oceans from coastal communities each year.

Like we mentioned before, most of the plastic that gets into the ocean is not picked up or recycled. A piece of plastic as small and lightweight as a plastic bag can take 100-300 years to degrade.

To put this into perspective for you, about 2 million plastic bags are used every minute, which puts us at an estimated 500 billion to 1 trillion plastic bags being used each year. Think of how much we can reduce by simply switching to reusable cloth bags.

Our plastic consumption is growing exponentially

In 1950, the world's population was around 2.5 billion. At that time, about 1.5 million tons of plastic has been produced. Today, our population sits at about 7 billion and we have produced over 320 million tons of plastic. If we don't start making conscious changes, this number is set to double by the year 2034. That's only about 35 years from now (based on current publication of this article).

A plastic bag is only used for about 12 minutes on average

Since we're using so much plastic, it might seem like something super important. After all, why consume so much of this material if we're not in need of it and we know it is causing pollution? Well, you may be surprised to know that most plastic really just ends up going to waste.

A lot of the plastic that we use is for quick and easy use. Plastic is thought of as very disposable material. Think about the last barbecue you had. You could have easily served your guests with silverware and glass plates/cups.

However, because of the convenience and the quick clean up, you opted for plastic utensils, cups, and plates. These items are used once, for a few minutes while you eat, and then you get rid of them forever. It is because of our dependency on ease of use that we create most of our plastic pollution problem.

All plastic produced never really goes away

Now you may be wondering what we're talking about here since we did mention plastic recycling programs and both proper and improper disposal. We even talked about the time it would take for plastic to degrade.

Well, yes, over time, plastic does fragment into smaller and smaller pieces, even if it takes significantly longer than most other recyclable materials. A plastic bottle can take up to 450 years to degrade in a marine environment. Plastic will continue to fragment until it is broken down to just microscopic pieces.

While not visible to us, these microscopic pieces of plastic never completely disappear. Instead, this is what we know to be microplastics. We are still co-existing (in some form) with every bit of plastic that has ever been produced.

Some states in the US have made unnecessary plastic use illegal

Many states that are trying to do their part in the fight against polluting our planet have started passing legislation that bans unnecessary plastic. California became the first state in the US to impose a statewide ban on single-use plastic bags in retail stores.

There was also a 10 cent minimum charge for the use of recycled paper bags and other compostable bags. While the bill was enacted in 2014, it was not until the 2016 election, where the issue was on the ballot, that the ban was approved.

Though not officially recognized by law, many counties in Hawaii also have bans on single-use plastics and paper bags that are not made of at least 40% recycled materials.

In 2009, D.C. also enacted a single-use plastic and paper bag ban where users would have to pay a 5 cent charge for each bag. In 2019, New York is the third state to ban plastic bags. The ban is set to take effect in March of 2020.

Small lifestyle changes will make a difference

While yes, we can make efforts to clean up the plastic pollution that currently exists, that doesn't address the long term problem: the continued use of unnecessary plastic.

Plastic is an important material and should be used. It is a key part of items such as computers, disposable syringes, and even construction hard hats. However, we don't need plastic straws and we don't need to use plastic utensils during our backyard cookout.

There is a lot of pollution that we will never be able to reach, especially at the bottom of the oceans and microplastics. What we can do now is to reduce our use. We can look for alternative packaging for disposable items and bring a reusable water bottle with us from now on.

These small changes may not seem like much, but if you replaced your daily plastic lunch fork with silverware from home, in one year, that plastic adds up. Reducing our use of unnecessary plastic will reduce pollution in the ocean and the microplastics in the air we breathe.

Quick Hitting Plastic Pollution Facts

We use more than 500 million plastic straws each day.

Because of how small straws are they are hard to recycle and very rarely make it to the recycling centers.

Plastic straws are one of the top polluters on our beaches and can be harmful to animals.

Feminine product single-use plastic wrappers and applicators cannot be recycled and end up in landfills or the ocean.

Balloons made 5 Gyres requested ban list for plastic products. It does not matter if the balloons are latex or mylar balloons are very harmful to our environment and almost never get recycled.

Cigarette butts are made from non-biodegradable cellulose acetate (a form of plastic). Cigarette butts are the #1 most common form of pollution on beaches as most users just put out cigarette butts in the sand and bury them.

Cigarette butt pollution leeches toxic chemicals into the sand and water of our beaches that remain polluted for as many as 10 years.

Each day, about 8 million pieces of plastic pollution end up in our oceans.

100,000 marine mammals and turtles and 1 million seabirds are killed by plastic pollution annually.

Since the 1950s, about 8.3 billion tons of plastic have been produced worldwide.

In some parts of the world, the use of plastic is illegal. In Kenya, if you are caught producing, selling, or even using a plastic bag, this is punishable by imprisonment of up to 4 years and fines of $40,000.

About 2 million plastic bags are used per minute, worldwide. New Yorkers alone use about 23 billion plastic bags each year.

The average person eats 70,000 microplastics each year.

A plastic bag is only used for an average of about 12 minutes. They can take up to thousands of years to completely decompose.

World plastic production has doubled over the past 50 years.

Drink companies produce over 500 billion single-use plastic bottles annually.

Tens of billions of plastic bags of chips are produced each year.

All plastic produced never really goes away. It breaks down and fragments into smaller and smaller pieces over time, reducing to microplastics that still exist in the air we breathe.

California became the first state in the US to impose a statewide ban on single-use plastic bags in retail stores. There was also a 10 cent minimum charge for the use of recycled paper bags and other compostable bags.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an area in the North Pacific where a slow swirling whirlpool of ocean currents collects plastic debris, is growing. It is currently twice the size of France.

Henderson Island in the South Pacific is the most plastic polluted of any island recorded to date.

Wrap-Up

As you can see plastic pollution is a major issue that needs our attention. At ecopliant we offer paper straws to replace single-use plastic straws. There are so many other ways you can help with plastic pollution and we want to hear from you.

Bonus Fact

Just one plastic teabag can release billions of tiny plastic particles into tea. Steeping a single, empty plastic teabag at 95 degree Celsius releases around 11.6 billion microplastics and 3.1 billion plastic nanoparticles into the water

Comment below on how you are helping limit plastic pollution or share your favorite plastic pollution facts we might have missed!

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Compostable Packaging & Supplies | eco-pliant

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Since 1950, it is estimated that around 8.8 billion tons of plastic have been produced worldwide. This number might not seem significant, but in reality that is equivalent to the weight of over 800,000 Eiffel Towers. For more mind blowing facts about pollution, click to learn more

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#73: Ob Fleischverzicht das Klima retten hilft

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The Greta effect? Why businesses are more committed to climate action in 2020

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There's growing appetite among company leaders for stronger action on sustainability - and the Swedish activist Greta Thunberg is a key inspiration, according to a new report.

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Global renewable electricity installation will hit a record level in 2020, according to the International Energy Agency, in sharp contrast with the declines caused by the coronavirus pandemic in the fossil fuel sectors.

The IEA report published on Tuesday says almost 90% of new electricity generation in 2020 will be renewable, with just 10% powered by gas and coal. The trend puts green electricity on track to become the largest power source in 2025, displacing coal, which has dominated for the past 50 years.

Growing acceptance of the need to tackle the climate crisis by cutting carbon emissions has made renewable energy increasingly attractive to investors. The IEA reports that shares in renewable equipment makers and project developers have outperformed most major stock market indices and that the value of shares in solar companies has more than doubled since December 2019.

The US is one of the world's biggest markets for renewables and the IEA suggests deployment could accelerate even faster if the policies of the president-elect, Joe Biden, are implemented.

"Renewable power is defying the difficulties caused by the pandemic, showing robust growth while others fuels struggle," said Fatih Birol, the IEA's executive director. "The resilience and positive prospects of the sector are clearly reflected by continued strong appetite from investors." Fossil fuels have had a turbulent time in 2020 as Covid-related measures caused demand from transport and other sectors to plunge.

"In 2025, renewables are set to become the largest source of electricity generation worldwide, ending coal's five decades as the top power provider," Birol said. "By that time, renewables are expected to supply one-third of the world's electricity."

Solar power capacity has increased by 18 times since 2010 and wind power by four times, according to IEA data. In October, Birol said: "I see solar becoming the new king of the world's electricity markets."

Hydropower provided 77% of green power in 2010, but that has fallen to 45% in 2020. However, electricity is only about one-fifth of all energy use, with the burning of fuels in transport, industry and heating making up the bulk of energy emissions.

The IEA forecasts that new renewable capacity around the world will increase by a record 200 gigawatts in 2020, driven by China and the US where developers are rushing to take advantage of expiring incentive schemes.

There is even stronger growth to come in 2021, the IEA said, when India and the European Union will be the driving forces. But growth could decline slightly in 2022 under current policies, the IEA warned.

"Renewables are resilient to the Covid crisis but not to policy uncertainties," Birol said. "Governments can tackle these issues to help bring about a sustainable recovery and accelerate clean energy transitions.

"In the US, for instance, if the proposed clean electricity policies of the next US administration are implemented, they could lead to a much more rapid deployment of solar PV and wind."

Analysis for the Guardian, published on Monday, showed that far more of the coronavirus recovery funds being spent by governments was going to fossil fuels sectors than green projects.

"The natural environment and climate change have not been a core part of the thinking in the bulk of recovery plans," said Jason Eis, the chief executive of Vivid Economics. "In the majority of countries we are not seeing a green recovery coming through at all."

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Renewable energy defies Covid-19 to hit record growth in 2020

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Global renewable electricity installation will hit a record level in 2020, according to the International Energy Agency, in sharp contrast with the declines caused by the coronavirus pandemic in the fossil fuel sectors. The IEA report published on Tuesday says almost 90% of new electricity generation in 2020 will be renewable, with just 10% powered by gas and coal.

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Working in the area of dissemination you can see how people are becoming ever more aware of the terms 'plastic litter', 'microplastics' and 'nanoplastics'. There are plenty of blogs out there discussing plastics and images showing their increasing presence on the landscape from people who are passionate about wanting to help curtail the ever increasing pressure we are putting on our ecosystems and in particular our waterways.

I recently came across some very effective short videos: Plastic-Free Waterways Video Series aimed at getting the message out there about plastic litter. With all of this exposure ' Why isn't anything being done?'

There actually is lots being done in the background!

Research and more research!! You may not be aware of the investment in the funding of research projects such as this one to explore the sources and pathways of microplastics. To me it makes sense that the more scientific information available, the more informed a decision the government can make, which can result in a more effective action/approach being taken. With this in mind our Government each year invests money to help "identify pressures, inform policy and develop solutions to environmental challenges through the provision of strong evidence-based scientific knowledge" through state agencies such as the EPA, SFI, the Marine Institute and Teagasc. Believe me when I say this is not a plug for our government as I will be one of the first in line to apply pressure to act once we have sufficient information - mmhh sounds like a cop out. When is sufficient enough? I do think that it is all the little things collectively that will curb the plastic tide i.e.every research report and paper, all the media coverage and on line blogs.

This blog will follow some of the scientists on this project to get an insight into life as a plastics researcher, the highs and lows of sampling, the trials and tribulations of processing the plastic samples once collected, interesting facts they uncover along the way and whether they believe that their part will make a difference in the scale of the plastic litter problem being uncovered.

Image by Boomerang Alliance

Blog Disclaimer

Any views or opinions represented in this blog are personal to the researcher talking and belong solely to the blog owner and do not represent those of people, institutions or organizations that the owner may or may not be associated with in professional or personal capacity, unless explicitly stated. Any views or opinions are not intended to malign any religion, ethnic group, club, organization, company, or individual.

All content provided on this blog is for informational purposes only. The owner of this blog makes no representations as to the accuracy or completeness of any information on this site or found by following any link on this site. The owner will not be liable for any errors or omissions in this information nor for the availability of this information. The owner will not be liable for any losses, injuries, or damages from the display or use of this information.

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Working in the area of dissemination you can see how people are becoming ever more aware of the terms 'plastic litter', 'microplastics' and 'nanoplastics'. There are plenty of blogs out there discussing plastics and images showing their increasing presence on the landscape from people who are passionate about wanting to help curtail the ever increasing...

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How Young Climate Crisis Activists Changed the World | NowThis

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The Lasting Impact of the Trump Admin’s Environmental Policies | NowThis

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https://www.dropbox.com/s/i16jkwrrle60hm8/EnglishVideoconsumption.MOV?dl=0

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8CzRwAhAFE&feature=youtu.be

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My green Life project, focus: mobility
by Coco

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