Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Australia’s largest aluminium smelter to run on renewables by 2023 after Rio Tinto strikes $2.5bn taxpayer bailout deal

admin — Thu, 13 Aug 2026 05:00:25 +0000

Rio Tinto makes power supply deal with federal and NSW government to cut emissions and decarbonise, preventing potential closure

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Too smart to eat? Why octopus farms are such a slippery problem

admin — Thu, 13 Aug 2026 04:00:50 +0000

As a controversial Spanish plan for sustainable meat on an industrial scale is dropped, it has revived the ethical debate over farming these intelligent wild animals

In 2022 Nueva Pescanova, Spain’s largest fisheries business, announced it was investing €65m (£56m) in the world’s first industrial octopus farm and processing plant near the Canary Islands’ port of Las Palmas.

India fuels worldwide jump in planned coal production

admin — Thu, 13 Aug 2026 04:00:48 +0000

Rise in new mine proposals, mainly in states of Odisha and Jharkhand, comes despite plateau in global demand

Enough new coalmining projects were proposed last year to increase global supplies by 2.5bn tonnes a year, an increase of 11% from the year before, even as demand for coal plateaus, according to a new report.

Global Energy Monitor, an NGO, found that India ignited a rise in new coalmine proposals in 2025 despite a global slowdown in the number of mine openings because of falling demand for the fossil fuel.

Nurses fainting in ‘inhumane’ conditions due to extreme heat, union warns

admin — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 23:01:42 +0000

RCN calls for more air conditioners as Burnham faces pressure to recognise urgency of adaptation to climate crisis

Nurses are collapsing during shifts amid “inhumane and impossible” conditions caused by extreme heat, their union has warned, as Andy Burnham promised to grapple with “the bigger questions” of climate adaptation.

Amid growing pressure from Labour backbenches to fully acknowledge the urgency of adaptation measures as the climate crisis bites, Burnham said he was for now focusing on the immediate crises caused by an ongoing summer of extreme heat.

EJ Swift wins the 2026 Arthur C Clarke award for science fiction

admin — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 20:00:38 +0000

The writer – who was also shortlisted in 2023 – has won the prize for her book When There Are Wolves Again, a speculative work of eco-fiction set in near-future Britain

A novel about rewilding and climate activism in Britain has been named this year’s winner of the Arthur C Clarke award for science fiction.

When There Are Wolves Again by EJ Swift is an “ambitious study in the power of long-term hope in the face of climate breakdown”, said the award’s director, Tom Hunter.

Trump administration pulls support for annual Arctic environmental report

admin — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 18:17:51 +0000

Move by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is latest government rollback of climate science activity

Greenland forces Trump-linked US oil firm to delay drilling

admin — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 18:00:41 +0000

US envoy had claimed Americans could be extracting crude by as early as next year

Greenland authorities have forced a US oil company connected to Donald Trump to postpone drilling wells in the Arctic territory, defying claims by the US president’s envoy that Americans could be extracting crude by next year.

Coalition plan to scrap energy rules for new houses condemned as ‘cost-of-living timebomb’

admin — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 15:00:32 +0000

Proposal to cut building costs by scrapping the construction code would increase bills for the poorest households, critics say

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Burnham to consider ban on disposable barbecues as wildfires rage in UK

admin — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 14:20:10 +0000

PM to look at imposing restriction on devices in public spaces, though campaigners fear it does not go far enough

The government will look at banning disposable barbecues as wildfires continue to rage across the UK, Andy Burnham has said.

Disposable barbecues have been the cause of a number of serious fires over the last few years, but campaigners were critical of the prime minister’s failure to link those fires more broadly to the climate crisis.

Too many holes! Why badgers are digging up Britain’s lovingly maintained golf courses

admin — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 14:04:38 +0000

Thanks to the drought, these black-and-white beauties are struggling to catch worms in the rock-hard earth. But there’s still good foraging on well-watered fairways and greens

Name: Badgers.

Age: European badgers live for five to eight years in the wild. They have been in the UK, where this story is set, for half to three-quarters of a million years.