Opinion – Puerto Rico’s hurricane deserves more coverage
Last week, Puerto Rico was without safe drinking water or electricity, but blanket news coverage of Queen Elizabeth IIs funeral has raised questions about how networks should prioritise their content. On Monday last week, hurricane Fiona left Puerto Rico without drinking water or power. By the early hours of Tuesday,...
Current in Change
New Jersey to sue oil giants over climate change damages
New Jersey has joined a cohort of seven US states determined to sue giant oil companies for their roles in delaying climate policy, as well as damages related to extreme weather. Around 24 climate liability suits have been making their way through US courts since 2015, and oil giants continue...
Can Rishi Sunak rebuild UK’s green agenda after Truss?
Succeeding the brief tenure of Liz Truss, Rishi Sunak’s appointment as prime minister is seen by several environmental groups as something of an improvement. Can the damage be repaired? Early trepidations about Liz Truss’ tunnel vision approach to boosting the economy (at the expense of the environment) were instantly confirmed...
Cost of living crisis fuelling a rise in eating disorders
A charity has warned that the number of people struggling with a ‘morbid preoccupation with food’ is likely to soar as basic necessities become increasingly unaffordable across the country. According to Beat, the UK’s leading eating disorder charity, around 1.25 million British citizens are suffering from anorexia, bulimia, or avoidant...
VeryNile builds plastic pyramid to highlight river pollution
Last weekend, to observe the World Cleanup Day, volunteers from Egypt built a pyramid made from plastic collected at the banks of River Nile to highlight environmental conservation. A group of volunteers in Egypt have taken part in a cleaning exercise along the River Nile to highlight how important protecting...
Sierra Leone gives citizens veto power over large-scale projects
Under new laws, the West African nation will allow local communities to have a direct say in whether environmentally destructive mining, farming, and industrial projects get to move forward. In what’s being referred to as a ‘globally unprecedented’ move to protect the environment, Sierra Leone is giving local communities veto...
New report shows drastic decline in global wildlife
According to a leading scientific assessment warning that humanity is ‘losing the war’ to save nature, wild species populations have shrunk on average by 69 per cent since the 1970s. A bleak new report from WWF in collaboration with the Zoological Society London on biodiversity loss has revealed that the abundance of wild mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles, and fish is in freefall – shrinking 69 per cent on average between...
Something is making the Earth spin faster
Scientists just recorded the planet’s shortest day since records began. Now they’re considering dropping a second off their atomic clocks to keep them aligned with rotation. If you’ve been reading my articles this week, then you may have developed something of a sense of dread towards the state of things at present. That is if you weren’t already being kept awake at night by the bleak reality that climate change is...
Biden pardons all federal offences of simple marijuana possession
In a surprise move just a month before midterm elections, the President announced on Thursday that he’s taking considerable steps to overhaul America’s cannabis laws. On Thursday, President Biden took steps to overhaul US policy on marijuana by pardoning thousands of people with federal offenses for simple cannabis possession. Initiating a review of how the drug is classified, he hopes that his executive action will relieve the ‘collateral’ consequences of prior...
Report claims giant oil pipe expansions could ruin climate targets
More than 24,000km of new oil pipelines are under development globally, according to a new report. This is equivalent to almost twice the Earth’s diameter and puts us ‘dramatically at odds’ to achieve our climate goals. Despite knowing full well that carbon emissions need halving by 2030 to remain under 1.5C of global warming, any real sense of urgency remains to be seen. Infuriatingly, a recent report from Global Energy...
