It is the most extracted solid material on Earth – but this extraction can threaten ecosystems and livelihoods
Malé is one of the world’s most overcrowded cities, but it faces double pressure. As well as a growing population, the capital of the Maldives is also threatened by rising sea levels. Owing to climate breakdown, its living space is shrinking.
So the justification for a land reclamation project seemed clear. Take sand from elsewhere in the archipelago and use it to build up the land available for Malé’s people. What could go wrong? After all, it’s only sand, right?
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
05/12/2026 - 05:00
05/12/2026 - 04:59
With some long-awaited sanity on housing and taxes, including CGT and negative gearing changes, it’s one of the most important for good – but will still leave some out in the cold
Federal budget 2026 LIVE updates: Australia government budget announcement and speech – latest news
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This year’s budget is an odd affair. So much had been leaked and dropped to the media that there are barely any surprises. But that does not mean it does not live up to the billing of being ambitious – basically killing off the capital gains tax 50% discount is a huge deal.
The lack of changes on gas tax, an absence of increased assistance for the unemployed and renters, and cuts to the NDIS, however, show that this is still a government where ambition is not in surplus.
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05/12/2026 - 04:00
Cockrow Bridge in Surrey will open in the coming weeks to provide wildlife, including lizards and insects, with the ability to move between fragmented habitats
When James Herd moved near to Wisley Common 17 years ago, the heathland nature reserve was teeming with wildlife. “I’d take the dog around the common in spring and summer, and every few hundred metres I’d hear the rustle of a lizard in the undergrowth – and I’d see adders,” he says.
But over the past decade, the Surrey Wildlife Trust’s director of reserves management, who oversees the internationally important habitat, has seen that wildlife become depleted.
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05/12/2026 - 00:16
State and federal energy ministers say investments in new renewable energy and storage should ‘fully offset’ new datacentres’ energy needs
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Power hungry datacentres that are growing to meet the demands of artificial intelligence could be forced to invest in enough new solar and wind generation to completely cover their electricity needs.
State and federal energy ministers agreed at a meeting last week that datacentres across the country should “fully offset” their electricity demand through investments in new renewable generation and energy storage.
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05/11/2026 - 23:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s44183-026-00200-6
Deep differences: expanding the marine social sciences and humanities into the deep ocean
05/11/2026 - 19:50
Move comes as administration seeks to boost drilling, logging, mining and grazing on taxpayer-owned land
The interior department is canceling a rule that put conservation on equal footing with development, as Donald Trump’s administration eases restrictions on industries and seeks to boost drilling, logging, mining and grazing on taxpayer-owned land.
The 2024 rule adopted under former president Joe Biden was meant to refocus the interior department’s Bureau of Land Management, which oversees about 10% of land in the US. It allowed public property to be leased for restoration in the same way that oil companies lease land for drilling.
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05/11/2026 - 10:08
Survey of 27,000 Australian supermarket items found some products boasting environmental benefits had significantly higher emissions than unlabelled counterparts
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Foods in supermarkets boasting environmental terms such as “natural” or “sustainable” are mostly just using marketing speak, rather than verified claims, Australian researchers have found.
More than 27,000 packaged foods sold at Coles, Woolworths, Aldi, IGA and Harris Farm supermarkets in Sydney were assessed by researchers from the George Institute for Global Health.
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05/11/2026 - 08:00
Data from missions showing critically low snowpack on mountains across the west raises alarm among experts
High above the jagged peaks of California’s Sierra Nevada, the view from the cockpit is breathtaking. At first glance, the mountains appear draped in a pristine white blanket. But as the flight crew gears up for a high-stakes mission, the sensors onboard this specialized aircraft prove that looks can be deceiving.
“This is a distinct dry year,” says Tom Painter, CEO of Airborne Snow Observatories.
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05/11/2026 - 07:00
Levels of Pfas in northern gannet eggs in Canada fell up to 74% over 55-year period of study
Levels of some of the most dangerous Pfas compounds have dramatically fallen in Canadian seabird eggs, which the authors of a new peer-reviewed study say illustrates how regulations are effective.
Researchers looked at Pfas levels in the eggs of northern gannets in the St Lawrence Seaway basin over a 55-year period. Pfas levels shot up from the 1960s through the peak of the chemicals’ use in the late 1990s and early aughts, then fell.
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05/11/2026 - 07:00
Opponents say administration’s plan prioritizes big agriculture at expense of wildlife and protected species
New legal action aims to head off a Trump administration plan to open up to 24m acres of federal lands to cattle grazing, which opponents characterized as a gift to big agriculture and said could cause a spike in deaths among already imperiled wolves, grizzlies, steelhead salmon and other wildlife.
The plan also calls for opening up parts of Grand Canyon national park, and other sensitive landscapes. Cattle destroy critical habitats for wildlife because they strip land bare of essential vegetation and pollute streams with feces, urine, sediment and carcasses. Meanwhile, park rangers and ranchers often kill grizzly bears and other predators who prey on cattle, despite that ranchers and the government pushed the cattle into the predators’ home range.
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