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Biodiversity

Meet The Modern-Day Captain Ahab Held In Jail

September 4, 2024 James Rothwell, Captain Paul Watson Foundation. , , ,
With his long silver locks and rugged beard, Paul Watson resembles a modern-day Captain Ahab, the fictional whaler in Herman Melville’s novel Moby Dick. But he’s trying to save whales, not destroy them. For decades, the US-Canadian has waged a sea campaign against the bloody business of whalers, notorious for their use of explosive harpoons to maim and kill their prey. At one point Mr Watson’s antics were so popular that he was the star of a fly-on-the-wall documentary, Whale Wars, which followed his Sea Shepherd crew as they used guerilla-style tactics to block and harass whaling ships. But a new twist in an ongoing legal battle between Mr Watson and the Japanese whaling industry could mean that he never sets sail again.

Judge Orders Increased Protection Of Marine Species From Oil Drilling

August 22, 2024 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, EcoWatch. , , , ,
At the urging of Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth and other green groups, a United States federal judge has thrown out a National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) assessment governing how threatened and endangered marine species like whales and sea turtles ought to be protected from oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. The Maryland district court struck down the assessment — known under the Endangered Species Act as a “biological opinion” — which was required to ensure that endangered and threatened species would not be jeopardized by exploration and drilling for fossil fuels in the Gulf, a press release from Sierra Club said.

The Messy Middle Paths Through Climate Breakdown

August 7, 2024 Jamie Bristow and Rosie Bell, DeSmog. , , , ,
In the escalating drama of climate breakdown — especially as we navigate the apparent crossing of the 1.5C warming threshold — a binary is emerging that wastes a huge amount of time, energy and passion, needlessly limiting our vision to confront and adapt to our situation at all levels of society: Are we (optimist) solutionists or (realist) doomers? As “optimists” we’re committed to the idea that it’s not too late to fix things (think ever steeper net zero pathways dependant on direct air capture). As “realists,” we’re committed to telling “the truth” of just how bad things are already (think cascading tipping points and trajectories towards Hothouse Earth).

Cry, The Beloved World

August 5, 2024 Gus Speth, Resilience. , , ,
Here is a topic miles away from the 2024 elections, though it should not be. Its political salience is just about zero, but it concerns the future of life on Earth. I could be referring to the recent surge in spending on nuclear weapons, but the devastation I will write about is slower yet no less problematic. If you are of a certain age, you may remember the children’s book, The Wump World. It first appeared in 1970, the year of the first Earth Day. Its message was clear. The bountiful, bucolic world of the Wumps, with its lovely bumbershoot trees and plentiful grasses for grazing, was denuded and impoverished by the Pollutians, who had colonized the Wump’s planet because they had destroyed their own.

World’s Oceans Face ‘Triple Threat’, Study Finds

June 6, 2024 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, EcoWatch. , , , ,
A new study has found that the planet’s oceans are experiencing a “triple threat” of oxygen loss, extreme heat and acidification. The researchers discovered that, as global heating has worsened, increasing stress has been placed on marine species, with as much as 20 percent of the world’s oceans affected by these threats. “The global ocean is becoming warmer, more acidic, and losing oxygen due to climate change. On top of this trend, sudden increases in temperature, or drops in pH or oxygen adversely affect marine organisms when they cannot quickly adapt to these extreme conditions,” the study said.

Cities, Roads, And The Sixth Extinction Event

April 4, 2024 Nick King, Resilience. , , ,
Earth’s biosphere entered the stage of large, complex, multicellular life (following an extended – approximately three billion year – period of dominance by unicellular life) starting approximately 650 million years ago.  This ‘metazoan’ stage saw the tree of life proliferate and complexify, and has expanded into a huge variety of niches across the planet through to the present day.  A key phenomenon over this period has been extinction events; this describes periods of rapidly changing environmental conditions which have resulted in species die-offs and restructuring of ecosystems at different scales. 

Thacker Pass Protectors File First-Ever ‘Biodiversity Necessity Defense’

March 27, 2024 Max Wilbert, Last Real Indians. , , , , , ,
Winnemuca, Nevada — In a first for the American legal system, the lawyers for six people sued by Lithium Nevada Corporation for protesting the Thacker Pass mine are arguing a ‘biodiversity necessity defense.’ The necessity defense is a legal argument used to justify breaking the law when a greater harm is being prevented; for example, breaking a car window to save an infant locked inside on a stifling hot day, or breaking down a door to help someone screaming inside a locked home. In these cases, trespassing is justified to save a life.

Greenpeace Calls For Bold High Seas Ocean Protection Of Galapagos

March 12, 2024 The Canary. , , , , ,
On Monday 12 March, Greenpeace called for new marine protections for the ocean surrounding the Galapagos – a vital biodiversity hotspot. Specifically, the environmental campaign group pushed for governments to create a high seas marine protected zone under a new UN treaty to secure a much wider area around Ecuador’s archipelago. The islands sit some 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) off the mainland of Ecuador, and have flora and fauna found nowhere else in the world. The islands unique diversity of life famously inspired British scientist Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution.

Treat Climate And Biodiversity Crises As One Global Health Emergency

October 28, 2023 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, EcoWatch. , , ,
A new editorial published in more than 200 health journals challenges health professionals and world leaders to look at global biodiversity loss and climate change as “one indivisible crisis” that must be confronted as a whole. The authors of the editorial call separating the two emergencies a “dangerous mistake,” and encourage the World Health Organization (WHO) to declare a global health emergency, a press release from The BMJ said. “The climate crisis and loss of biodiversity both damage human health, and they are interlinked. That’s why we must consider them together and declare a global health emergency.

Deforestation From Rubber Worse Than Previously Thought

October 22, 2023 The Canary. , , ,
A new study has found that deforestation for rubber cultivation has been “substantially underestimated” with devastating consequences for the biodiversity crisis. Crucially, it identified that forest destruction is two-to-three-times higher than generally assumed. The new study was released on Wednesday 18 October in the journal Nature. It suggested that corporations and smallholders have deforested more than four million hectares since 1993 for rubber plantations. Moreover, it revealed that they have planted rubber in areas that are key for biodiversity.

Leaders From 185 Countries Launch Biodiversity Protection Fund

August 27, 2023 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, EcoWatch. , , ,
In a meeting of the Global Environment Facility (GEF)’s Seventh Assembly in Vancouver, Canada on Thursday, representatives from 185 countries agreed to launch a new global conservation fund, with Canada pledging 200 million Canadian dollars and the United Kingdom contributing 10 million pounds. The United Nations is seeking contributions for the protection of 30 percent of terrestrial and coastal areas by 2030. “The new Global Biodiversity Framework Fund (GBFF) has been designed to mobilize and accelerate investment in the conservation and sustainability of wild species and ecosystems, whose health is under threat from wildfires, flooding, extreme weather, and human activity including urban sprawl,” a press release from the Global Environment Facility said.

Deep-Sea Mining Could Cause 25x The Biodiversity Loss Of Land-Based Mining

June 30, 2023 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, EcoWatch. , , ,
Rising demand for metals like nickel, cobalt, copper and manganese to make batteries used in smartphones and electric vehicles, along with depleting land-based deposits, has led to increased interest in deep-sea mining. But research suggests that the process of extracting mineral deposits from the ocean floor could destroy habitats and decimate species. According to a new report from British nonprofit financial think tank Planet Tracker, mining the ocean’s depths could cause as much as 25 times more biodiversity loss than terrestrial mining, reported Reuters. And the financial cost of repairing that damage would be twice as much as extracting it.

Sudden Heat Increase In North Atlantic Seas Could Have Devastating Effects

June 21, 2023 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, EcoWatch. , , , ,
Scientists have warned that an extreme marine heat wave off the UK and Ireland coasts is posing a major threat to marine species. According to the official blog of the UK’s Met Office, the global sea surface temperatures for April and May of this year were the highest since records began in 1850. Last month was the warmest May on record in the North Atlantic, with temperatures about 1.25 degrees Celsius higher than average over the 1961 to 1990 reference period. “The extreme and unprecedented temperatures show the power of the combination of human-induced warming and natural climate variability like El Niño,” said Daniela Schmidt, a professor of earth sciences at the University of Bristol.

Is Kelp The Next Ocean Hero?

June 11, 2023 Tara Lohan, Resilience. , , ,
New research shows we’ve long underestimated the environmental benefits from kelp forests. Now these important ecosystems are threatened. Floridians are bracing for an unwanted visitor this summer: sargassum. A 5,000-mile-long island of this rootless seaweed is floating around the Atlantic, and large swathes of it are expected to wash ashore in Florida and other states in the coming months. Smaller amounts have already arrived, and the rotting clumps of algae on the beach release hydrogen sulfide, giving off the smell of rotten eggs. A large landfall will be a health hazard — and a deterrent for tourists and nesting sea turtles alike.

Study: Nearly Half Of Earth’s Animal Species Are In Decline

May 31, 2023 Paige Bennett, EcoWatch. , , ,
In a study on more than 71,000 animal species around the world, researchers discovered that about 48% are declining. The research, led by Queen’s University Belfast, is one of the most comprehensive and alarming studies on biodiversity loss. The researchers analyzed population data on mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds, fish and insects. The study differs from the IUCN’s Red List, which found 28% of over 150,000 species studied to be threatened with extinction. But the authors explained that the data uncovered with their methods shows that the issue is much worse. According to the study, 33% of species designated non-threatened by IUCN were in decline.
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