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BRASILIA, Brazil (AFP) – Deforestation in the Amazon rainforest in northern Brazil soared 85 percent in 2019, compared with the previous year, official data showed Tuesday. The 9,166 square kilometers (3,539 square miles) cleared was the highest number in at least five years, according to Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research. In 2018, the deforested area was 4,946 square kilometers. The sharp increase overlapped the first year in office of President Jair Bolsonaro, a climate […]
by Patrick GALEY PARIS, France (AFP) — The world’s oceans were the hottest in recorded history in 2019, scientists said on Tuesday, as manmade emissions warmed seas at an ever-increasing rate with potentially disastrous impacts on Earth’s climate. Oceans absorb more than 90 percent of excess heat created by greenhouse gas emissions and quantifying how much they have warmed up in recent years gives scientists an accurate read on the rate of global warming. A […]
STRASBOURG, France (AFP) – Marine LAOUCHEZ Going green can be a costly business, as the EU’s executive body will make clear on Tuesday when it launches a one-trillion-euro plan to finance its goal of making the bloc carbon neutral by 2050. That figure represents a 10-year investment to be sourced from public funds and leveraged private sector money. It is part of Europe’s “Green Deal” — an ambitious rethinking of the economy, transport and energy […]
by Marlowe HOOD PARIS, France (AFP) — Thirty percent of Earth’s surface across land and sea should become protected areas by 2030 to ensure the viability of ecosystems essential to human wellbeing, according to a UN plan released Monday. The draft proposal to halt the degradation of Nature and the gathering pace of species loss will be vetted by nearly 200 countries gathering in October for a make-or-break biodiversity summit, the 15th since 1994. Up […]
BERLIN, Germany (AFP) – Siemens boss announced Sunday that the German conglomerate has decided to remain involved in a controversial Adani Carmichael coal mining project in Australia, despite massive environmental criticism as the country faces unprecedented bushfires. The contract for some 18 million euros ($20 million) calls for Siemens to supply rail infrastructure for the Carmichael mine in Queensland, near the Great Barrier Reef. “We have just finished our special meeting…. We have evaluated all […]
WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AFP) — Thousands of people have signed a petition for koalas to be introduced to New Zealand to escape Australia’s devastating bush fires, but the proposal has been given the thumbs down by officials. A group calling itself the Koala Relocation Society said koalas were “functionally extinct in Australia” but could thrive in New Zealand which has nearly 30,000 hectares planted in eucalypts. There have been estimates of up to a billion […]
by with Glenda Kwek in Sydney / Holly ROBERTSON Agence France Presse Massive bushfires in southeastern Australia still have a “long way to go”, authorities have warned, even as colder conditions brought some relief to exhausted firefighters and communities on Saturday. After a blustery night that saw a series of massive infernos in New South Wales and Victoria states merge into a mega-blaze four times the size of Greater London, temperatures dropped and rain fell […]
by Poornima WEERASEKARA HENAN, China (AFP) — Water has been a source of death as well as a source of life for a generation in Shenqiu, a region fed by a tributary of China’s heavily polluted Yangtze river and pockmarked with notorious “cancer villages”. Residents often faced a bitter choice: drink dirty, discolored water and risk sickness, or pay high prices for bottled water and risk poverty. But artist-turned-environmentalist Huo Yalun has been on a […]
by Johnny Lieu Agence France-Presse SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Tiger burns in Australia’s bushfires? It’s a 2012 photo from Indonesia. Young girl rescues koala? Actually an artist’s impression. Social media is packed with powerful images of Australia’s bushfires — but many are fake. As deadly blazes tear across southeastern Australia, false or deliberately misleading images and claims have proliferated online, in languages from Arabic to Hindi. AFP Fact Check works to debunk online misinformation. Here […]
by Holly ROBERTSON Agence France Presse SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Snipers took to helicopters in Australia on Wednesday to begin a mass cull of up to 10,000 camels as drought drives big herds of the feral animals to search for water closer to remote towns, endangering indigenous communities. Local officials in South Australia state said “extremely large” herds have been encroaching on rural communities — threatening scarce food and drinking water, damaging infrastructure, and […]
SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Australia’s bushfires have burned so intensely that they have hurled smoke as far away as Chile. They have also created their own weather systems, including deadly “firestorms” that produce dry lightning and cannot be contained. – How do firestorms happen? – Scientists are still trying to understand how firestorms are created although weather, terrain, vegetation and the characteristics of the fire itself all play a role. But the basics are […]
NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — No-frills US airline JetBlue will go carbon neutral for all domestic flights starting this summer, the company announced Monday. The carrier said it will be the first major US airline to do so in a bid to reduce its contributions to global warming. The company also said it would begin using “sustainable aviation fuel” on flights from San Francisco later this year. “We reduce where we can and offset where […]
