I could be swimmin' with da fishes for this

There are 42 posts tagged: environment

Swiss miss: 9 April 2024; Under the headline European court rules human rights violated by climate inaction, Georgina Rannard reports that the European Court of Human Rights has ruled that the Swiss government violated the human rights of a group of elderly Swiss women. It did so by failing to act quickly enough to address climate change. This is, apparently, the first time the ECHR has ruled on global warming.
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Arboreal art: 20 March 2024; Banksy, the gheyly-named street artist; sociopolitical commentator; and all-round enigma, struck again in north London over the weekend, when he painted a mural that returned a recently-pollarded tree to leafy splendour. It must have come as some relief to the locals, who're more accustomed to looking down while navigating Britain's dogshit-strewn pavements, because Islington Council spent taxpayers' money to install a protective fence, and further plan to install CCTV. It's gotta be a great life, living in Islington with so much public money sloshing around. (rolleyes)
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Rain stops play: 18 March 2024; The headline says it all. The Welsh Harp, a reservoir in north-west London which acts as part of the capital's flood defences, has been drained for maintenance work. But the work's taking longer than anticipated, since the unusually wet weather—I'm not sure what that means for Britain in late winter, because it's usually pissing down—keeps refilling it.
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What makes a tree a tree?: 9 March 2024; Last year, vandals cut down a sycamore tree sited at a gap in Hadrian's Wall, imaginatively known as Sycamore Gap. It is, or at least was, a renowned beauty spot and tourist attraction, famed for its starring role in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.
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Souperlative: 28 January 2024; There must be something about artworks mounted behind protective glass that stirs the passions of environmental protesters into throwing things. Do you really have to be a cynic to think that they're only after publicity without risk of causing any actual damage to the works themselves, and thereby to their cause? A cheap, low-energy, low-stakes publicity grab, as it were.
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The hair, the mic, the world: 25 January 2024; This thumbnail from a YouTube short offers an unfortunate reflection on everyone's favourite Swedish vinegar-swigger. (hitler)
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Cobalt revolt: 2 December 2023; Children on TikTok are quitting vaping in support of the people of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Sorry, that's a lot of of thes right there, but ne'ermind.
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The final straw: 7 November 2023; In Plastic or paper? The truth about drinking straws, Ally Hirschlag wrestles with the conundrum of substitutes for plastic straws. Everyone knows that for every plastic straw used, a baby turtle dies; so they're being replaced with environmentally-friendly alternatives made from paper or bamboo.
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The wetter forecast (rain): 27 August 2023; Crikey! Not only an extreme rain warning, but a severe rain warning to boot! (eek)
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Parisian walkways: 3 April 2023; Life in Paris just got a little better, as long as you overlook the festering waste in the streets. For Parisians have voted, by an overwhelming 90% majority, to ban commercial e-scooters.
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Vertically challenged: 15 January 2023; On behalf of BBC Future Planet, William Park poses a question that I suspect few have pondered: How far can vertical farming go?
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Pet cemetery: 19 July 2022; I never thought I'd say that I like the idea of life in Iran, but I like the idea of life in Iran.*
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Elections: the outcome is all a matter of perspective: 22 May 2022; Anthony Albanese will head Australia's first Labor government in almost a decade, as voters jumped ship from Scott Morrison's Liberal-National Coalition. Although all the votes have yet to be counted, Morrison has conceded defeat, and world leaders, as well as BoJo, have acknowledged the Labor Party's victory.*
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A grave matter: 5 May 2022; The National Trust, which manages Freshwater West beach in Pembrokeshire, Wales, has commissioned a survey to decide whether a grave paying tribute to Dobby, the house elf who died in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1, should be moved from the beach where his death was filmed.
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Dietary habits of the twig children: 3 May 2022; BBC Future does science. Except, it doesn't really.
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Moving goalposts: 24 March 2022; Just Stop Oil is a youth activist organisation mobilised against the exploitation of all fossil fuels, not just oil, in the UK. Another one.
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Pyles: 17 March 2022; So, you're the world's most trusted international news broadcaster™, and you have a ground-breaking story on the rejuvenation of the UK's electricity distribution network. At least in terms of the design of that part keeping the cables off the ground.
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Old king coal: 15 March 2022; The UK's Office of National Statistics has revealed changes to the list of consumer items—the shopping basket—used to monitor the cost of living in BoJo's playpit. In come meat-free sausages and pet collars, out go men's suits and domestic coal…w-w-w-WHAT? (shock)
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Whatever grits you through the night: 7 January 2022; Traffic Scotland hosts the Trunk Road Gritter Tracker, a handy-dandy, at-a-glance overview of where its gritter and de-icing trucks are working. Each truck is colour-coded, depending on whether it's currently deployed or in depot. This is the sort of information that the public needs! (thumbup)
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Green sky thinking: 2 January 2022; Following COP26, now is the time for politicians to make bold pledges; irrespective of achievability. Because grand, but empty, gestures are just what the world needs. Forget the implementation and actual impact, we'll fix that in post. Or not. (rolleyes)
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5G or 0G(enes): 18 December 2021; Necklaces and accessories that are claimed to protect against 5G, which isn't harmful to health, have been found to be radioactive, which is. Hmmm. (thinking)
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Yippy, not yippee: 19 November 2021; I don't hate dogs. But I do have a passionate dislike of some dog owners.
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NAP26: 3 November 2021; Because we've all been there, haven't we?
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Batty: 1 November 2021; The pekapeka, or long-tailed bat (Chalinolobus tuberculatus (North Island)), has won the title of New Zealand's bird of the year. The victory has upset some people, who unironically took to Twitter—hohoho!—to complain. Nevertheless, the organisers of the poll, Forest & Bird, remain unrepentant.
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Take me home, racist roads: 10 August 2021; Thus opens Tara McKelvey's report on Biden's unlikely plan to use roads to fight racism. Note the quotes that she uses around the word racist. Could it be that she's using someone else's description, but it's one that she herself is sceptical about? If so, good for her, she might just be a critical thinker, and therefore a cut above the average BBC News mouth-breather.
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Bangladeaths: 5 August 2021; Seventeen people from a Bangladeshi wedding party have been killed, and another fourteen injured, as several bolts of lightning hit the group while they were disembarking from a boat.
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When lightning strikes: 12 July 2021; According to the Indian Meteorological Department, deaths from lightning strikes during the monsoon period have doubled since the 1960s. One of the reasons to which they attribute this is the climate crisis.
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E or H₂?: 11 June 2021; The BBC's chief environment correspondent, Justin Rowlatt, tells us Why it's the end of the road for petrol stations.
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The great divide: 7 June 2021; Writing for BBC Travel, Richard Collett explores the Tamar River's divide, separating Cornwall from the rest of Britain. It's a fairly trite piece, but a couple of points got me thinking, which is always at best uncomfortable, if not outright dangerous.
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At one with nature: 31 May 2021; Children in Blackpool don't have enough access to nature, at least according to teachers at Westminster Primary Academy. They have cited a nine-year-old who had never seen the sea, despite living in a seaside town, and a ten-year-old who didn't know what a duck was.
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Flight to nowhere: 23 April 2021; Writing for BBC Worklife, Mark Johanson examines The creative experiences indulging our nostalgia for planes. It seems that there are people who actually enjoy spending their time in airport departures. Weirdos!
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My statistics are better than yours: 2 April 2021; How prophetic. Within a couple of days of Greenpeace and Possible mithering over frequent flyers, comes news that India has ridiculed long-term targets for net zero greenhouse gas emissions as pie in the sky.
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Come fly with me: 31 March 2021; From the Bonkers Institute comes an analysis, concluding that A small minority of frequent flyers dominate air travel. No shit! I guess that must be why they're called frequent flyers then. Well, at least that little mystery's been cleared up. (rolleyes)
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Puntastic!: 14 January 2021; This YouTube clip from the BBC's QI panel show is entitled What Begins With A, Has Six Cs and No Bs?
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You aren't what you eat: 25 October 2020; BBC Food asks: How can changing your food shop help biodiversity? The foodie droid starts with a little foreshadowing, before going into the deep dive on the dangers of your sustenance to the planet. You thoughtless bastard!
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The times they are a'changin': 19 July 2020; David Shukman, the BBC's science editor, asks whether climate change could mean that Summers could become too hot for humans. Except he doesn't really complete the article by answering the question. To be fair, like a lot of these future-gazing fluff pieces, it's pretty unaswerable except in the broadest terms.
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It's a gas: 16 July 2020; We all recognise the dangers of global warming and climate change. Or, at least, those of us who're not Donald Trump.
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In space, no one can hear...the sound of rain running down the windscreen: 5 April 2018; Michael FichtenFoo Fichtenmayer presents a tutorial on weathering a 1:72 scale model of the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars. In it, he refers to rust, following…where gravity would put the streaks on a normal…real-life vehicle, and for flat parts…that don't have gravity, rain, weathering, whatever dragging it downward.
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Eco-Ferrari: 24 September 2012; For those who've wanted a supercar but were concerned about the environmental impact, fret no more! Ferrari have reduced their cars' CO₂ emissions over the 2007-2012 period by 30%. The emissions of the Ferrari California are now only threefold higher than the average family car.
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Snow leopards love squirrels: 3 August 2012; A snow leopard catches and eats a squirrel in front of a little boy, while daddy cries oh no over and over. Mind you, daddy did describe the leopard as a tiger, so he's clearly an idiot.
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Otters!: 18 August 2011; England, I love you! Otters are now present in every English county, which is splendid! (otter) (heart)
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Plant a tree, save a child: 15 June 2010; Okay, not quite, but I liked this story nonetheless.
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