Cookies help us run our site more efficiently.

By clicking “Accept”, you agree to the storing of cookies on your device to enhance site navigation, analyze site usage, and assist in our marketing efforts. View our Privacy Policy for more information or to customize your cookie preferences.

Accept Deny

GoGreenNation News

Learn more about the issues presented in our films
Show Filters

Ukraine Seeking Solutions for Damaged Chernobyl Confinement Vessel, Minister Says

By Yurii KovalenkoCHORNOBYL, Ukraine (Reuters) - Ukraine is seeking solutions to repair the damage caused by a Russian drone attack to the...

CHORNOBYL, Ukraine (Reuters) - Ukraine is seeking solutions to repair the damage caused by a Russian drone attack to the confinement vessel at the stricken Chornobyl nuclear power plant, a government minister said on Saturday.Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources Svitlana Hrynchuk was speaking outside the decommissioned station during the inauguration of a 0.8-megawatt solar power facility ahead of two conferences due to discuss Chornobyl and other issues related to nuclear power operations.She said Ukraine was working together with experts to determine the best way to restore the proper functioning of the containment vessel, or arch, after the February 14 drone strike."Unfortunately, after the attack, the arch partially lost its functionality. And now, I think, already in May, we will have the results of the analysis that we are currently conducting ...," Hrynchuk said.Taking part in the analysis, she said, was the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, scientific institutions and companies involved in installing the arc in 2019 to cover the leaking "sarcophagus" underneath, hurriedly put in place in the weeks following the 1986 Chornobyl disaster."In a few weeks we will have the first results of this analysis," she said."We are actively working on this ... We, of course, need to restore the "arch" so that there are no leaks under any circumstances, because ensuring nuclear and radiation safety is the main task."Officials at the plant said the drone attack punched a large hole in the new containment structure's outer cover and exploded inside. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova at the time called the incident at Chornobyl "a provocation".The containment vessel was intended to cover the vast, and deteriorating, steel and concrete structure erected after the plant's fourth reactor exploded, sending radioactivity over much of Europe in the world's biggest nuclear accident.The plant lies within the 30-km (18-mile) exclusion zone set up after the accident, with abandoned high-rise apartment buildings and an amusement park still standing nearby.Hrynchuk said the solar power facility was important to maintain the power supply to the disused station and was also a start to plans to promote renewable energy in the area."We have been saying for many years that the exclusion zone needs to be transformed into a zone of renewal," she said. "And this territory, like no other in Ukraine, is suitable for developing renewable energy projects."(Reporting by Yurii Kovalenko, writing by Felix Hoske and Ron Popeski, editing by Sandra Maler)Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.Photos You Should See - Feb. 2025

Energy
Government
Resources

Scientists say they 'de-extincted' dire wolves. Experts at La Brea Tar Pits are skeptical

Colossal Biosciences, the company that made headlines years back for claims they wanted to revive the woolly mammoth, say they successfully "de-extincted" the dire wolf. Local experts are not so sure.

When news that scientists in Texas had succesfully reintroduced the long-extinct dire wolf to the modern world, more people than just “Game of Thrones” fans took notice.Researchers at the Natural History Museum’s La Brea Tar Pits, where a wall is decorated with hundreds of dire wolf skulls, had questions.Namely, are they really dire wolves? Turns out, it depends on how you define it.“What they have created is basically a genetically engineered gray wolf that has been given genetic traits so they can express morphological or physical traits that more resemble dire wolves,” said Kayce Bell, a terrestrial mammal curator at the Natural History Museum. “The technology and the tools that they are developing with this work are incredible and very powerful, but the terms that are being used to discuss it, I think, are misleading.”Earlier this week, biotechnology company Colossal Biosciences in Dallas announced they had “de-extincted” the dire wolf, sharing the news of the births of three healthy pups. Over 18 months, experts there extracted and sequenced ancient DNA from two dire wolf fossils — a 13,000-year-old tooth from Sheridan Pit, Ohio, and a 72,000-year-old inner ear bone from American Falls, Idaho. With that ancient DNA, scientists identified gene variants specific to dire wolves and then performed multiplex gene editing with a genome from the gray wolf, dire wolves’ closest living relatives. They used domestic dogs as surrogate mothers to birth the three pups. This undated photo provided by Colossal Biosciences shows two pups that were genetically engineered with similarities to the extinct dire wolf. (Colossal Biosciences via Associated Press) Colossal’s chief science officer, Beth Shapiro, said she understands the scientific skepticism that came with the announcement. “I get it,” she said. “It’s frustrating when you work in paleontology and you feel like it’s not effective science communication, and I wish I’d done a bit better.”Though Southern California has a jackpot of dire wolf fossils relative to other sites, extracting DNA from the local samples is difficult. Shapiro said she’s been trying and unable to collect DNA from local samples for 20 years. Among the reasons it’s challenging to collect, experts say, is that L.A.’s urban landscape bakes in the sun, heating up the asphalt, which could degrade ancient DNA buried underneath.La Brea Tar Pits has the highest concentration of dire wolf fossils in the world, with remains from over 4,000 dire wolves found at the site. They lived in the region for at least 50,000 years, disappearing about 13,000 years ago.“There’s no other site on Earth that even comes close to that,” said Emily Lindsey, the associate curator and excavation site director at La Brea Tar Pits.Dire wolves, native to Southern California but not limited to the region, were highly adaptable and had a very wide range of environmental tolerances before the species went extinct about 10,000 years ago, Lindsey said. The three pups — Romulus and Remus, who were born in October, and Khaleesi, born in January — now live on an ecological preserve at an undisclosed location that spans over 2,000 acres and hosts 10 full-time staff members who care for and observe them. The preserve is certified by the American Humane Society and registered with the U.S. Department of Agriculture.Depending on how you look at it, that could be dire wolf territory now.In 2016, the International Union for Conservation of Nature published a report that focused on de-extinction and defined it as “bringing back a proxy of an extinct species that resembles it in some way, phenotypically, physiologically, ecologically,” Shapiro said.But in the end, she said she’s not really hung up on what the animals are called beyond their names, inspired by founders of Rome and the “Game of Thrones” show.“Call it a de-extinct dire wolf that abides by the definition that the scientific community agreed on 10 years ago. Call it Colossal’s dire wolf. Call it a gray wolf with 20 edits that looks and acts like a dire wolf and is a functional replacement for a dire wolf,” Shapiro said.Part of Colossal’s announcement this week included news that they had also successfully created four clones of the endangered red wolf using a new noninvasive cloning technology. Both Lindsey and Bell said they appreciated Colossal’s work on conserving endangered species, but think that focusing on conservation is a more productive use of resources. “There are potentially useful applications of some of these technologies, particularly for preventing highly endangered species from going extinct. I think that would be a far more efficient application of these technologies than trying to bring something resembling an extinct species back to life,” Lindsey said. “I’d hate to have to be trying to de-extinct wolves once they go extinct, right?”Colossal’s Chief Executive Ben Lamm said the company wants to pair their “de-extinction events” with work they’re doing to protect critically endangered species. The company’s other de-extinction hopes include reviving the woolly mammoth, the dodo, and the thylacine, or Tasmanian tiger. To Lamm and Shapiro, de-extinction and conservation can work in tandem.“Conservation and de-extinction are not at odds with each other. The de-extinction toolkit should be part of the increasing number of ways that we have at our fingertips to be able to help endangered species survive,” Shapiro said.Lamm, who held up drawings of dodos and other extinct animals children had sent to the Colossal team during a Zoom interview with The Times, said he thinks the milestone could also inspire more people to pursue careers in related fields.“The world needs a little hope right now, and I think the world needs more science. Hopefully, we’re providing a little bit of both,” he said.And yes, of course “Jurassic Park” quotes and references are tossed Lamm and Shapiro’s way with stunning frequency.“People actually say to us, ‘Don’t you know what happened in Jurassic Park?,’ equating it to, like, Chernobyl,” Lamm said. “ ‘Didn’t you see what happened there?’ Not, ‘Didn’t you watch the movie and learn anything about human hubris from the movie?’ They don’t say that.”Shapiro added: “People are yelling at us that these aren’t real dire wolves. But no one has ever questioned whether the dinosaurs in ‘Jurassic Park’ are real dinosaurs.”While the debate is still open, Lindsey said she invites anyone curious about the creatures to visit La Brea Tar Pits to see some of the “real dire wolves” that they have excavated at the site. “It’s a really cool opportunity — one that you don’t get in almost any other city in the world — to come and really see the incredible diversity of large animals that lived here until very recently,” Lindsey said.

Extinction
Science
Animals

Bad News for Man’s Best Friend: Dogs Are Environmental Villains

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Dogs have “extensive and multifarious” environmental impacts, disturbing wildlife, polluting waterways and contributing to carbon emissions, new research has found. An Australian review of existing studies has argued that “the environmental impact of owned dogs is far greater, more […]

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Dogs have “extensive and multifarious” environmental impacts, disturbing wildlife, polluting waterways and contributing to carbon emissions, new research has found. An Australian review of existing studies has argued that “the environmental impact of owned dogs is far greater, more insidious, and more concerning than is generally recognised”. While the environmental impact of cats is well known, the comparative effect of pet dogs has been poorly acknowledged, the researchers said. The review, published in the journal Pacific Conservation Biology, highlighted the impacts of the world’s “commonest large carnivore” in killing and disturbing native wildlife, particularly shore birds. In Australia, attacks by unrestrained dogs on little penguins in Tasmania may contribute to colony collapse, modelling suggests, while a study of animals taken to the Australia Zoo wildlife hospital found that mortality was highest after dog attacks, which was the second most common reason for admission after car strikes. In the US, studies have found that deer, foxes and bobcats were less active in or avoid wilderness areas where dogs were allowed, while other research shows that insecticides from flea and tick medications kill aquatic invertebrates when they wash off into waterways. Dog feces can also leave scent traces and affect soil chemistry and plant growth. The carbon footprint of pets is also significant. A 2020 study found the dry pet food industry had an environmental footprint of around twice the land area of the UK, with greenhouse gas emissions—56 to 151 Mt CO2— equivalent to the 60th highest-emitting country. The review’s lead author, Prof Bill Bateman of Curtin University, said the research did not intend to be “censorious” but aimed to raise awareness of the environmental impacts of man’s best friend, with whom humans’ domestic relationship dates back several millennia. “To a certain extent we give a free pass to dogs because they are so important to us…not just as working dogs but also as companions.” “To a certain extent we give a free pass to dogs because they are so important to us… not just as working dogs but also as companions,” he said, pointing to the “huge benefits” dogs had on their owners’ mental and physical health. He also noted that dogs played vital roles in conservation work, such as in wildlife detection. “Although we’ve pointed out these issues with dogs in natural environments…there is that other balancing side, which is that people will probably go out and really enjoy the environment around them—and perhaps feel more protective about it—because they’re out there walking their dog in it.” Angelika von Sanden, a trauma therapist and the author of Sit Stay Grow: How Dogs Can Help You Worry Less and Walk into a Better Future, said she had observed that for many clients the companionship of a dog was often “literally the only reason to survive, to get up, to still keep going”. “It gives them a reason to get up, a reason to get out, a reason to move around and be in contact a little bit with the world outside,” she said. “Dog owners can get a bad name if they are not aware of the surroundings they are in and of other people around them.” In the review, the researchers attributed the extent of the environmental impacts to the sheer number of dogs globally, as well as “the lax or uninformed behavior of dog owners”. A simple way to mitigate against the worst impacts was to keep dogs leashed in areas where restrictions apply and to maintain a buffer distance from nesting or roosting shorebirds, the paper suggested. “A lot of what we’re talking about can be ameliorated by owners’ behavior,” Bateman said, pointing out that low compliance with leash laws was a problem. “Maybe, in some parts of the world, we actually need to consider some slightly more robust laws.” He suggested that dog exclusion zones might be more suitable in some areas. Bateman also raised sustainable dog food as an option to reduce a pet’s environmental paw print, noting however that “more sustainable dog food tends to cost more than the cheap dog food that we buy which has a higher carbon footprint.” “If nothing else, pick up your own dog shit,” he said.

Climate
Water
Conservation

You’re Not Imagining It: Your Pollen Allergies Are Lasting Longer

From our collaborating partner “Living on Earth,” public radio’s environmental news magazine, an interview by producer Aynsley O’Neill with Dr. Neelima Tummala, an ear, nose and throat physician at NYU Langone Health.  We are in the middle of sniffling season.  In the Southeast, the yellow mist of pollen might have peaked already. But for the […]

About 20 percent of Americans have pollen allergies, and the season for suffering is about three weeks longer now than it was 50 years ago due to (guess what?) climate change.Interview by Aynsley O’Neill, “Living on Earth”From our collaborating partner “Living on Earth,” public radio’s environmental news magazine, an interview by producer Aynsley O’Neill with Dr. Neelima Tummala, an ear, nose and throat physician at NYU Langone Health. 

Health
Climate

Renowned conservationist Jane Goodall urges Oregon students: ‘Choose what impact you make’

Famed conservationist Jane Goodall spoke about hope and personal impact at Lincoln High School in Portland, Oregon.

Conservation icon Jane Goodall made a stop in Portland on Friday to encourage students and other Oregonians to make a positive impact on the planet through daily actions and community projects. ”We can choose what impact we make,” Goodall told an auditorium brimming with students, teachers and others at Lincoln High School. The event was organized by Roots & Shoots, the youth-action program of the Jane Goodall Institute founded by Goodall. Portland is one of a half-dozen basecamps for Roots & Shoots, serving as a local hub in support of community-led projects throughout the state that help people, other animals and the environment. A dozen Roots &Shoots and other environmental clubs from throughout Oregon presented their projects and research to Goodall, who turned 91 earlier this month and spends most of her time traveling around the world to inspire people young and old. Students from Heritage School in Salem told Goodall about setting up bird feeders and boxes and successfully bringing back bluebirds to their school. Fir Grove Elementary students from Beaverton recounted partnering with Urban Gleaners to rescue discarded food that would otherwise go to waste and holding a free food market for their local community. Students at Jane Goodall Environmental Middle School in Salem shared projects that included installing bird feeders, collecting bikes for people who can’t afford them and growing indigenous foods in a greenhouse, among others. And the Corvallis-based Franklin Middle School’s sustainability club told Goodall about planting native plants for pollinators, improving the school’s recycling and composting programs and moving to reusable lunch trays. Other schools presented science research projects and told of their experiences testifying in front of legislators in Salem on environmental issues. Goodall praised the students and said they were among thousands around the world who are doing similar work to make the world a better place. Roots & Shoots is active in 75 countries and all 50 U.S. states, she said. “Young people are my greatest reason for hope,” she told them, “because you’re learning about the importance of respecting the environment and each other.”Goodall received loud applause throughout the speech and a standing ovation from the students. “She represents hope and that we can all change the world even if on a small scale,” said Ella Schaffner, an eighth grader at Jane Goodall Environmental Middle School. Goodall, who is best known for studying the chimpanzees of Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania, has visited Oregon numerous times over the past few decades. She also befriended three chimpanzees at the Oregon Zoo years ago when the animals were still young (two are still alive) and helped the zoo find funding for a large outdoor area to house the chimps.During her speech at Lincoln, Goodall also introduced several stuffed toys to the students that she carries with her throughout the world to connect people with animals. The stuffies sat on the lectern by the microphone as Goodall spoke and she later told their stories as examples of animal intelligence. Jane Goodall spoke at Lincoln High School's auditorium on Friday, April 11th, 2025.Allison Barr/The OregonianRatty represents the African giant pouched rats that are trained to sniff out landmines from past armed conflicts across the globe, she said. The rats also are now being trained to find rhino horns, elephant tusks and other illegally smuggled items at airports, Goodall said. A piglet stuffy “told” the story of PigCasso, a pig rescued from slaughter by an artist in South Africa. When the artist gave the pig a brush and set it before an easel, the animal began to paint, Goodall told the crowd. Its paintings have since sold for thousands of dollars. Octavia the octopus, another of the stuffed toys, represented an octopus that Goodall said stealthily stole some fish from a tank, carefully closing the lid so that no one would notice. Goodall also used a cow stuffy to tell the children that the world’s growing meat consumption has led to massive swaths of land cleared to grow feed for cattle. The cows also burp methane, a powerful greenhouse gas that warms the planet, Goodall said. But dairy and eggs are also a problem, the conservationist said, because dairy cows – which have a deep connection with their calves, just like humans with their babies – are immediately separated from their calves after birth and most chickens are kept in cages or amassed in large warehouses with little room to roam. That’s why, Goodall said, she is a vegan.But most of all, Goodall encouraged the audience to take responsibility for their own acts and get involved in conservation and community-building efforts in their town or city. Those efforts can make a real difference, she told the crowd, due to the resilience of nature. “Nature, if you give her a chance, time and maybe some help, she will come back,” Goodall said. That comeback may include animals and plants on the brink of extinction, she said. Goodall also praised the human intellect – “if only we use it wisely” – and said efforts to develop solar, wind and other renewable energy are a good start. In the end, she added, it’s “the indomitable human spirit” that makes her believe “we will come through the dark times.”“Every single one of us has that spirit, all of us, but some of us are afraid to make it shine,” she said. “Just know, you matter as an individual, you make a difference every day. Just carry on.” — Gosia Wozniacka covers environmental justice, climate change, the clean energy transition and other environmental issues. Reach her at gwozniacka@oregonian.com or 971-421-3154.Our journalism needs your support. Subscribe today to OregonLive.com.

Conservation
Animals
Energy

Oregon wolf population grows slightly but illegal killings still a concern

Oregon’s wolf population increased last year, with the animals continuing to expand their habitat westward, according to a new state report.

Oregon’s wolf population increased last year after four years of nearly flat growth, with the animals continuing to expand their habitat westward, according to a new state report.The population grew by 15% to 204 wolves, up from 178 in both 2023 and 2022, according to the annual wolf report released Friday by the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife. The number of wolf packs – four or more wolves traveling together in the winter – also went up. A total of 25 packs were documented in 2024, up from 22 packs in 2023. Seventeen of the packs met the criteria as breeding pairs, up by two from the previous year, state wildlife officials said.The annual count is done each winter and based on verified wolf evidence, including visual observations, tracks and remote camera photographs. It represents the minimum number of wolves in Oregon. Some wolves may not be found during the count, so the actual number of wolves in Oregon is likely higher than the count, officials said. Most of the known Oregon wolves – 76% – live in eastern Oregon, primarily in the Wallowa mountains, the report shows. But wolves continued to expand westward last year, with five new packs counted west of The Dalles and Bend. courtesy of ODFWIn Oregon, wolves are considered a “special status game mammal” and protected by law throughout the state. Oregon does not allow sport hunting of wolves. They are federally protected and listed under the federal Endangered Species Act in a central swath of the state, roughly east of The Dalles down to Lakeview and west of Canyon City and Burns. courtesy of ODFW courtesy of ODFWLast year’s 26 wolf deaths were down from 36 in 2023. People killed 22 of the wolves, all in the eastern part of the state. Fourteen wolves were killed by ranchers and state or federal wildlife officials in response to the wolf chasing or attacking livestock. To many Oregon ranchers, wolves are a threat because they kill and harass cattle and sheep, especially young calves. In 2024, two-thirds of the animals killed by wolves were sheep. Seven of the wolves were illegally killed by poisoning or shooting. Wildlife officials said wolf poaching continued to be a serious concern. The cases remain under investigation. (Twelve wolves were killed illegally in 2023, seven in 2022, eight in 2021 and four in 2020.)One wolf died after being hit by a car on Interstate-84 in Union County. The other wolves died of natural or unknown causes.Last year, wildlife officials confirmed 69 livestock killings by wolves, a slight decrease from 73 in 2023. The Oregon Department of Agriculture awarded $789,565 in compensation to ranchers in 13 counties, up from $477,661 in 2023 – though ranchers say the state’s compensation isn’t enough to make up for the long-term impacts of trauma on the herd and the ranchers themselves. Almost two-thirds of the money went toward non-lethal measures, including bright flags, electric fencing, dogs and other guard animals, humans monitoring the range, drones or devices that emit flashing lights and loud sounds. — Gosia Wozniacka covers environmental justice, climate change, the clean energy transition and other environmental issues. Reach her at gwozniacka@oregonian.com or 971-421-3154.Our journalism needs your support. Subscribe today to OregonLive.com.

Animals
Agriculture
Energy

Enviro Groups Petition DEQ to Limit Nutrient Pollution on Big Hole River

Two conservation groups are petitioning the Montana Department of Environmental Quality to designate the Big Hole River as impaired for nutrient pollution

Two conservation groups are petitioning the Montana Department of Environmental Quality to designate the Big Hole River, a treasured southwestern Montana fishery, as impaired for nutrient pollution.The groups argue that an impairment designation will lead the state to put the Big Hole on a “pollution diet” to limit the nitrogen and phosphorous that are contributing to the fishery-damaging algal blooms that have become a recurrent issue.Common sources of nutrient pollution can include runoff from fertilizers, insecticides and herbicides as well as poorly maintained septic systems and manure from livestock.Upper Missouri Waterkeeper and the Big Hole River Foundation are basing their petition on five years of data collection that has found consistently high levels of nitrogen and phosphorus at multiple sites on the Big Hole. The groups also incorporated a macroinvertebrat, or bug, study and an overview of the state and federal laws governing the beneficial uses of waterways in their petition.“There’s no disputing that there’s a nutrient pollution problem on the Big Hole River, with neon-green algal blooms fueled by nutrients cropping up each summer,” Upper Missouri Waterkeeper Executive Director Guy Alsentzer wrote in a release Wednesday about the petition. “Thankfully, the State of Montana has the tools to restore rivers impaired by nutrients, like the Big Hole. We now need to hold the State accountable for taking the necessary steps to designate the river as impaired, develop a pollution diet, and work to reduce pollutant sources that are causing degradation.”Overgrown algae can depress dissolved oxygen levels, harming fish and some of the macroinvertebrates they eat. In some areas, an increase in algae is linked to reduced biodiversity and diminished ecological resilience. The petitioners would like the DEQ to acknowledge that portions of the Big Hole are exceeding established water quality thresholds, recognize they “are not fully attaining their aquatic life or recreational uses” and designate the waterway as impaired for nutrient pollution. The petition also notes the historically low flows, high water temperatures, and declining fish populations the Big Hole has seen in recent years. The 32-page petition comes as anglers and researchers attempt to understand the factors contributing to a marked decline of trout populations in a handful of cold-water fisheries in the Jefferson Basin. In 2023, FWP biologists recorded historically low numbers of brown trout along some stretches of the Big Hole. Anglers and conservationists floated a number of possibilities that may be contributing to the decline, ranging from pathogens and drought conditions to angling pressure and unmitigated pollution. Save Wild Trout, a nonprofit formed in 2023 to understand which factors merit further investigation, has described the 2023 southwestern Montana fishery “collapse” as a “canary in the coal mine moment.”Wade Fellin, a longtime fishing guide who serves as Save Wild Trout’s program director, described the impairment designation petition as part of his group’s larger effort to help the Big Hole recover from chronic and acute threats.“The Big Hole is suffering blow after blow — extremely low flows prompting mid-season fishing closures, and miles-long algal blooms,” Fellin said in the release. “We must do what we can now to make measurable improvements for the river, and that should start with an official impairment determination to clean up the nutrient pollution that is degrading water quality and aquatic habitat.”A spokesperson for DEQ wrote in an email to MTFP on Wednesday that “nutrient conditions and other algae growth factors appear to be at levels conducive for algae growth in the Big Hole River and several of its tributaries.”The agencies noted that it has been monitoring algae levels on the Big Hole since 2020 and that streamflows and temperatures play an important role in both overall fishery health and algae growth.Under existing law, DEQ is required to provide an initial determination on the petition within 60 days, although Montana lawmakers are debating a bill by House Majority Leader Steve Fitzpatrick, R-Great Falls, that would stretch the agency’s response time to 180 days. House Bill 684 passed through the House last month and cleared an initial Senate vote on Wednesday.Researchers are just embarking on the second year of that research, which will continue for at least three years, according to FWP spokesperson Morgan Jacobsen. One component of that research is examining how flows, water temperature, angling and disease may be contributing to adult fish mortality. A second prong will evaluate tributaries’ contribution to the recruitment of juvenile fish into the adult population. Finally, FWP is examining disease threats with the hope of developing a way to proactively support fish health. To facilitate that research, biologists have tagged trout in the Big Hole, Ruby, Beaverhead and Madison Rivers. FWP is asking anglers who catch a tagged trout to fill out a report online to aid researchers.This story was originally published by Montana Free Press and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See - Feb. 2025

Pollution
Conservation
Water

US West senators introduce bipartisan wildfire mitigation bill, despite environmentalist opposition

A bipartisan cohort of U.S. West senators on Friday introduced legislation aimed at managing forests and mitigating fires, despite ongoing opposition from many environmental groups. The Fix our Forests Act, a companion bill to House legislation with the same name, seeks to bolster wildfire resilience by improving forest administration, supporting fire-safe communities and streamlining approvals for projects that...

A bipartisan cohort of U.S. West senators on Friday introduced legislation aimed at managing forests and mitigating fires, despite ongoing opposition from many environmental groups. The Fix our Forests Act, a companion bill to House legislation with the same name, seeks to bolster wildfire resilience by improving forest administration, supporting fire-safe communities and streamlining approvals for projects that defend residents and ecosystems from devastating blazes, according to its authors. The bill — introduced by Sens. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.), John Curtis (R-Utah), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) and Tim Sheehy (R-Mont.) — resulted from months of negotiations to reach a bipartisan consensus on these strategies and on collaborative efforts among federal agencies, states, tribes and other stakeholders.  “We need to act NOW with the speed required to mitigate wildfires and make our homes and businesses more resilient to these disasters, and to put in place protections for our communities and the environment,” Hickenlooper said in a statement. Echoing these sentiments, Curtis warned that the America West is “on the front lines of a growing wildfire crisis,” while noting the months of “bipartisan cooperation and consensus-building” that took place among himself and his colleagues. “The longer we wait, the more acres will burn, and more families will be impacted,” the Utah Republican added. The legislation would involve establishing new programs to reduce wildfire risks across high-priority “firesides,” while expanding tools for fresh health projects — such as faster access to certain hazardous fuels treatments, the senators explained. Also key to the bill would be the creation of a single interagency program to help residents build and retrofit using fire-resistant tactics within the wild land-urban interface. The senators also emphasized a need to expand research and demonstration initiatives, streamline federal response and enable watershed protection and restoration projects to include adjacent non-federal lands.  The Fix Our Forests Act has earned the support of several conservation groups, including the Environmental Defense Fund, The Nature Conservancy and the Alliance for Wildfire Resilience. Also on board with the bill are Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D), California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) and Utah Gov. Spencer Cox (R). Nonetheless, the legislation has also amassed vehement opposition from other key environmental voices — circumstances that were already apparent when the House companion bill, sponsored by Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.), passed in January. Earthjustice on Friday warned that “the bill would stifle citizen voices, remove science from land management decisions, and facilitate a large-scale rollback” of longstanding environmental protection policies “on millions of areas of federal land.” “This bill instead would codify the Trump administration’s attacks on our national forests and open the door for the timber industry to recklessly log our forests under the guise of forest management,” Blaine Miller-McFeeley, Earthjustice senior legislative representative, said in a statement. An analysis from Earthjustice argued that the bill would open swaths of federal land to logging without requiring scientific review or community input, and thereby raise the risk of wildfires. The group also flagged that the legislation removes Endangered Species Act consultation mandates and restricts the rights of citizens to judicial review. Environment America, meanwhile, has maintained that the Fix our Forests Act proposes exempting a range of “vegetation management activities,” such as logging, from environmental review.  A press statement from the organization noted that more than 85 environmental groups oppose the bill for similar such reasons. But Environmental Defense Fund’s executive director, Amanda Leland, argued that “with the right funding, this bipartisan proposal will help,” as many Americans fight “a very real and growing threat to their homes.” Padilla, who co-chairs the bipartisan Senate Wildfire Caucus, advocated for “durable solutions to confront the growing impacts of the wildfire crisis.” The bill, he contended, constitutes “a strong, bipartisan step forward, not just in reducing wildfire risk in and around our national forests, but in protecting urban areas and our efforts to reduce climate emissions.”

Forests
Business
Conservation

A New Satellite Will Map the Carbon Content of Rainforests From Space, and It's Set to Launch This Month

The European Space Agency’s new probe, Biomass, will spend five years orbiting the planet and gathering radar imagery of forests across multiple continents

A New Satellite Will Map the Carbon Content of Rainforests From Space, and It’s Set to Launch This Month The European Space Agency’s new probe, Biomass, will spend five years orbiting the planet and gathering radar imagery of forests across multiple continents Sara Hashemi - Daily Correspondent April 11, 2025 12:03 p.m. Biomass will monitor the Earth's tropical forests over the next five years. ESA / ATG medialab under CC-BY-SA 3.0 IGO After more than ten years of development, the European Space Agency (ESA) is preparing to launch a satellite that will map the carbon content of the world’s rainforests. The probe, named Biomass, was recently shipped to French Guiana, where it’s slated to lift off from Europe’s Spaceport on April 29 aboard a 230-ton Vega-C rocket. Over the next five years, the spacecraft will orbit the Earth and monitor forests’ above-ground biomass—think trunks and large branches—as well as the height of trees in Africa, Asia and South America. Those measurements, captured with the help of a first-of-its-kind radar, can then serve as a proxy for tracking stored carbon. “What the mission will do, effectively, is weigh the forests it studies,” says physicist Shaun Quegan, the leader of the Biomass science team, to Robin McKie at the Observer. “We know half that weight must be made up of carbon. So, we are going to be able to weigh the carbon content of the world’s tropical forests from space and, crucially, work out how much these are changing over time.” “We will then know the balance of carbon that is flowing to and from the atmosphere,” Quegan adds. “That is enormously important.”Forests are valuable carbon sinks—they alone sequester a quarter of human-generated carbon emissions annually. But their ability to store carbon is weakening because of deforestation and environmental degradation: A 2020 study led by researchers at the University of Leeds in England found that rainforests could take up one-third less carbon in the 2010s than in the 1990s. The new probe will allow scientists to understand exactly how carbon levels are fluctuating, teach scientists more about the carbon cycle and map areas of deforestation. “We need to know the health of our tropical forests,” explains Simonetta Cheli, ESA’s director of earth observation programs, to the Observer. “We need to know the quality and diversity of its vegetation and the amount of carbon stored there. To get that information, we are going to create 3D images of them—from the top of the forest canopy to the roots of its trees.” Barely any sunlight reaches the floor of a tropical rainforest, but the space-based probe will be able to image all the way to the ground. That’s because it will carry a new P-band synthetic aperture radar, an imaging system that has never been used by a satellite before. The radar signals sent by the instrument can penetrate through dense forest canopies to visualize what’s below. “By pushing the boundaries of remote sensing, Biomass not only advances our understanding of global forests and carbon cycles but also demonstrates the transformative potential of space-based innovation in tackling Earth’s most pressing environmental challenges,” Cheli adds in a statement. The Biomass satellite, shown at Airbus in Toulouse, France, before it was shipped to French Guiana ESA / S. Corvaja The probe’s capabilities can be transferred to other research areas as well, according to a statement from the ESA. Its radars can be used to observe the structure and motion of ice sheets, for instance, or create models of other areas covered by dense vegetation. In dry areas, it could peer underground. Scientists hope to use the data from Biomass to create new climate change and carbon cycle models by integrating it with artificial intelligence. “That will tell us what is likely to happen in future,” says Quegan to the Observer. “It will tell us what we are up against.” That information can also help inform policy decisions on forest management and climate mitigation. Now, engineers have finished fueling the satellite, and they will be making final preparations before its scheduled launch this month. “It’s marvelous to see the satellite standing proud today, and I wish to thank our industrial partners for all they have done,” Cheli says in a statement. Once Biomass is in orbit, it will collect and deliver “much-needed data to advance Earth science and our understanding of the carbon cycle.” Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

Forests
Climate
Science

Global Warming Isn't Funny -- Except in the Hands of These Comedians

Comedians have long used jokes to raise awareness of serious problems, and many are now turning the gaze to climate change

BURBANK, Calif. (AP) — Esteban Gast remembered feeling ashamed in high school while calculating how much carbon dioxide, the main driver of climate change, his daily activities created, known as a carbon footprint. “Have you ever driven a car or flown in an airplane?” were among the long list of questions posed by the calculator. Gast, who said his “Catholic guilt” compelled him to keep adding activities to the calculator, thus raising his footprint, recently told the story during a show at Flappers Comedy Club in Burbank, Calif. Then he hit the crowd with a twist: It was the oil and gas giant BP that popularized the idea of tracking individual emissions to shift the responsibility for climate change from companies that produce oil, gas and coal to people. “That’s like your friend who is addicted to cocaine telling you not to have a latte," he said. The audience roared with laughter. Gast continued: "BP, famous for spilling oil into the Gulf of Mexico, was like, ‘Hey, Esteban, do you ever drive?’ And I’m like, ‘I don’t know, sometimes.’ And they’re just like pouring oil into a turtle’s mouth.”Gast is among a growing group of comedians using humor to raise awareness of climate change. On the stage, online and in classrooms, they tell jokes to tackle topics such as a major U.S. climate law passed in 2022, called the Inflation Reduction Act, fossil fuel industries and convey information about the benefits of plant-based diets that emit less planet-warming emissions. They hope to educate people about the climate crisis, relieve anxiety with laughter and provide hope. And although the impacts of climate change are deadly and devastating, experts say using humor to talk climate is an important part of the larger ecosystem of how it's communicated. Comedian Brad Einstein thinks of it this way: “How do we look that horror in the eyes and let it look back at us and then give it a little wink?”In Rasheda Crockett’s YouTube comedy series “Might Could,” the actor-comedian blends humor with information about climate change. In one video, she quips about the environmental benefits of plant-based diets while begging food scientists to make vegan cheese that actually melts. “I'm now requesting all vegans who care about the planet to make melting vegan cheese their number one priority,” she quipped. “Because that's what's going to make veganism more viable. It's the change we have to cheese.”Her interest in writing climate humor is also deeply personal. As a Black woman, she knows that global warming disproportionately hurts Black and other non-white communities. “This is just another instance where people of color are going to be adversely impacted first by a disaster," said Crockett, a 2023 fellow in the Climate Comedy Cohort, a program Gast co-founded that brings together climate experts and comedians. "The Earth is warming up like the inside of a Hot Pocket ... and I just want people to care.”Surveys show that many people do. A 2023 poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that 64% of U.S. adults said they’d recently experienced extreme weather and believed it was caused at least partially by climate change. And about 65% said that climate change will have or already has had a big impact in their lifetime. Humor can bridge the gap between the technical world of climate science and policy and the average person, Gast said. And he thinks comedians are among the “unlikely” messengers who can do that. “We need someone talking about science, and then we need someone who doesn’t even mention science and just mentions a dope sunset for surfers," he said. At the University of Colorado in Boulder, climate comedy is a longtime tradition. For the past 13 years, professors Beth Osnes-Stoedefalke and Maxwell Boykoff have taught a creative climate communication course on how information about climate issues and solutions can be conveyed creatively. Sometimes they work on their own sketch comedy or standup they later perform at the annual “Stand Up for Climate Comedy." It's the kind of event the professors help encourage elsewhere, including the show Gast performed at. Several years ago, the professors decided to use their students and event attendees as case studies to learn about the effects of merging climate information with comedy. Among their findings were that climate comedy increased people's awareness of and engagement with the issue and reduced their climate anxiety.Numerous other studies have also shown that humor reduces stress, depression and anxiety. One study from 2021 found that humor helped people remember political information and made it likelier they’d share it with others.“You can’t just stack up all the IPCC reports and hope that people get it,” said Boykoff, an environmental studies professor, referencing the United Nations’ scientific papers on global climate impacts. “You got to find these creative spaces.”Theater professor Osnes-Stoedefalke said humor also has the power to exploit cracks in bad arguments and draw nuance from them. But perhaps more important, it can give people hope. Climate comedy “helped give this feeling of constructive hope," she said, "and without hope, action doesn't make sense.” Making sense of the moment Climate can also be used to reflect on the politics of anything given time. Bianca Calderon, a master's student in environmental policy and renewable energy, is taking the creative climate communications class, where she's writing a standup bit about grant proposals. In the piece, she realizes she needs to rewrite her grant summary to omit words like “diversity," “community” and “clean energy” to comply with the Trump administration's directives. But there's a big problem: She's seeking federal funding for research on engaging diverse communities and getting them into the clean energy job market. “At the end of it, it’s like, ‘Oh, I actually don’t have any words to use because none of them are allowed,” she said, adding that the piece is based on her actual experience applying for funding.Einstein, the comedian and a two-time National Park Service artist-in-residence, is also using humor to talk about the administration's actions. Using a pine cone as a microphone, Einstein has been posting social media videos about the recent mass layoffs of park service employees. The online response is unlike anything he's ever received on the internet, he said. “We need an informed citizenry that can can critique the messaging coming to them,” said Osnes-Stoedefalke. “And I think comedy can achieve that in a way that no others can, in a way that holds people’s attention.”The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See - Feb. 2025

Climate
CO2
Energy

No Results today.

Our news is updated constantly with the latest environmental stories from around the world. Reset or change your filters to find the most active current topics.

Join us to forge
a sustainable future

Our team is always growing.
Become a partner, volunteer, sponsor, or intern today.
Let us know how you would like to get involved!

CONTACT US

sign up for our mailing list to stay informed on the latest films and environmental headlines.

Subscribers receive a free day pass for streaming Cinema Verde.
Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.