Breaking Waves: Ocean News

If more cities start regulating outdoor lighting, we humans could make the environment better for all living creatures Every night, I can turn off the lights in my room – but I can’t do anything about the outdoor lights in the walkway or parking lot that leak through the curtains. Living in Portland, where the night is still illuminated by street lights, porch lights and parking lot glare, I forgot what it actually feels like to sleep in darkness. I was excited when I realized my travels to a residency in south-east Oregon would show me a sky I hadn’t experienced in decades. In the Oregon outback, part of the International Dark Sky Places network, I would be surrounded by 2.5m acres of unpolluted night in every direction. Continue reading...

Food and Agriculture Organization urges governments to make forest restoration a national priority The world faces a “narrowing window” to restore forests essential for food security and resistance to the climate emergency, a United Nations report has warned. More than 489m hectares (1.2bn acres) of forests have been cleared since 1990, while an even greater area is degraded, the world body said in a call for governments to make forest restoration a national priority. Continue reading...

Decision from conservative justice comes before court hears case on whether fossil-fuel firms deceived US public Supreme court justice Samuel Alito recused himself on Monday from a major climate-change case after facing calls to step aside due to stock holdings in oil companies. A letter posted in the case did not specify a reason, but the conservative justice has previously recused himself from other cases involving companies where he holds stock. Continue reading...

Carbon Impacts Tracer can be used to estimate climate impact from emissions across eight different factors, including lost food production The biggest coal project before authorities in New South Wales, the HVO mine, will emit the equivalent of about 809m tonnes of climate-warming carbon dioxide if it wins approval. That number, for most people, will carry little meaning, as might the calculation that adding that amount of greenhouse gas to the atmosphere will cause an extra 0.00036C of global heating. But what if the public was instead told that that amount of carbon dioxide would expose almost half a million people to unprecedented heat, or kill nearly 15 million coral colonies on the Great Barrier Reef every time it bleaches? All those statistics come from a new tool that translates the emissions from burning fossil fuels into estimated real-world climate effects taken from peer-reviewed climate studies. “Small numbers in global warming can mean catastrophic impacts,” says prof Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick, a climate scientist at the Australian National University who is part of a team launching the Carbon Impacts Tracer. Continue reading...