The Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment’s extensive facilities, in Richmond NSW, are dedicated to researching the impact of climate change on Australia’s precious land resources – native forest ecosystems, managed forests and agricultural lands. An Australian university has embarked upon an ambitious project – hailed as the first of its kind in the world – [...]

The Williams river was so languid and lovely last Saturday morning that it was almost impossible to imagine the violence with which it must have been running on 28 August 2011. Yet the evidence was all around: sand piled high on its banks, trees still scattered as if by a giant’s fist, and most obvious [...]

Low-tech experiment produces accurate data on threat to plant biodiversity and may also help with carbon The fresh snow covers the Aubonne valley overlooking Lake Geneva. Clumps of beech, maple and juniper trees cling to the slopes of the Jura highlands. Scientists from Lausanne Polytechnic (EPFL) and Switzerland’s Forest, Snow and Landscape Research Institute (WSL) [...]

We have no choice. High energy prices are here to stay and resource-frugality is our only hope for a sustainable future Much of our economic debate implies we must choose between going green or going for growth. That view may be the opposite of the truth. There is now hard evidence that the real choice [...]

As on that first Earth Day, we need millions of Americans to stand up and take action, risks and political scalps. As climate crusader Mohamed Nasheed, the deposed Maldives president, told The Nation recently, “You need to put a million people in the streets to show politicians you are serious.” Which means that environmentalists can [...]

Cold Response 2012 was conducted from March 12-21 primarily in Norway but also in Sweden with the participation of 16,300 troops from fifteen nations as part of full spectrum – air, sea, infantry and special forces – maneuvers against the backdrop of the past three years’ new scramble for the Arctic.

We can overcome the problems of delivering collective action on climate change by treating mining, deforestation, ocean degradation and more as violations of human rights Global climate-change talks often resemble the scene of a traffic accident. Multiple voices shout each other down in a bid to tell their own version of events. What is the [...]

“The world’s energy system is being pushed to breaking point,” Maria van der Hoeven, executive director of the International Energy Agency, writes in today’s Guardian. “Our addiction to fossil fuels grows stronger each year. Many clean energy technologies are available but they are not being deployed quickly enough to avert potentially disastrous consequences.” For more [...]

Windhoek-based facility to open in August after South Africa, Angola, Botswana, Zambia and Namibia commit to project Five countries in southern Africa have joined forces to launch a research centre that will work on combating climate change in the region. South Africa, Angola, Botswana, Zambia and Namibia signed a declaration on Wednesday to base the [...]

The relatively unknown American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) got a black eye recently when news stories revealed it was a prime mover of “Stand Your Ground” laws in Florida and 24 other states that temporarily shielded the man who shot 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. But the secretive group’s influence in statehouses goes a lot further than [...]