VEN – Good News on Climate Action – Blog

Image: The systemic mechanisms driving waste and hindering retailers’ engagement with waste reduction initiatives. From Koskela-Huotari, Kaisa & Svärd, Kristin & Williams, Helén & Trischler, Jakob & Wikström, Fredrik. (2023). Drivers and Hinderers of (Un)Sustainable Service: A Systems View. Journal of Service Research. 27. 1-18. 10.1177/10946705231176071. in abc.net.au by By Isla Evans and Floss Adams…

Image: a fungal battery from impact lab.com Source: Carolina Reyes et al. 3D Printed Cellulose-Based Fungal Battery. ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering, 2024. Using fungi, cellulose, and carbon, researchers 3D printed small batteries, that can be stored dry and later activated with water and simple sugars. By Anthropocene Team January 16, 2025 Anthropocene Researchers have…

Changing the foods you eat can have a big impact on your carbon footprint. Many of these changes will also be beneficial for your health! For example, shifting to a vegetarian meal one day a week for one year could save the equivalent of driving 1,160 miles. But you don’t have to be fully vegetarian…

Image: pathfinder project identifying low emission activities to incentivise January 31, 2025 03:30 | Michael West and AAP News From planting carbon-sequestering windbreaks to feeding cows seaweed to stop them burping as much methane, Australia’s green bank wants to make it easier for farmers to cut emissions. The Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) has teamed…

Portland’s aluminium smelter is the largest consumer of electricity in Victoria. (Supplied: Alinta Energy) Federal Labor to pledge $2 billion for ‘green aluminium’ in new election pitch By political reporter Tom Lowrey in abc.net.au Sun 19 Jan SEE ORIGINAL IMAGE IN ARTICLE The Tomago Aluminium plant near Newcastle has announced plans to switch to renewables…

CSIRO, WWF and Australian government team up to launch AdaptLog conservation solutions project By Clancy Balen in ABC.net.au Mon 20 Jan SEE ORIGINAL ARTICLE PHOTO Dr Jess Melbourne-Thomas says AdaptLog is a “new tool that can help conservationists think about what to do when environments are changing incredibly quickly”. (ABC News: Jordan Young) In short:…

Image: examples of EV incentives in Europe. For full list see ACEA report They’re cleaner and greener, so why won’t the government give hybrids tax breaks? By Mike Foley January 20, 2025 in The Age Penny Nelson is one of the hundreds of thousands of Australians who have switched from a petrol-powered car to a…

Graphs: Christopher Callahan, an Earth system scientist and postdoc at Stanford, explored the challenges of linking specific fossil fuel emitters to measurable climate damages, citing examples like the 2021 Pacific Northwest heatwave, which led to a lawsuit brought by Multnomah County, Oregon, against major fossil fuel companies. from news.Climate.columbia.edu Advances in climate attribution science are…

Image: from Wikimedia commons Patrick Greenfield 09/01/2025 in The Guardian Down To Earth Newsletter During Britain’s industrial revolution, the peppered moth became one of the most famous examples of rapid evolution. The black and white insect, widespread in the northern hemisphere, largely disappeared from urban areas in England as its habitat became covered with factory…

Table: Source: New Weather Institute What might sports look like in a warming world? When playing against the climate clock, make a new game plan. By Mark Harris January 16, 2025 in Anthropocene If you like home runs, you’ll love climate change. As the temperature rises, air resistance goes down. Researchers at Dartmouth College have…

Image: Collaborative management partnerships strongly decreased deforestation.  New research suggests the answer is yes. Logging rates are dramatically lower where governments in Sub-Saharan Africa partner with NGOs to run protected areas. By Warren Cornwall In Anthropocene magazine January 8, 2025 Efforts to save habitats around the world face this conundrum: Some of the most biologically…

Image: from Brittanica.com Scientists question whether these credits can deliver lasting conservation. By Warren Cornwall in ANthropocene magazine December 18, 2024 Having trouble finding that last minute holiday present for someone? Perhaps you could buy them some biodiversity. You might be wondering if I’ve sampled too much of my buddy’s legendary holiday eierlikör (look it…

Image from article: Biogenetic mosquito control. Published: 07 January 2025 Recombinant venom proteins in insect seminal fluid reduce female lifespan Samuel J. Beach & Maciej Maselko Nature Communications volume 16, Article number: 219 (2025) Cite this article Abstract The emergence of insecticide resistance has increased the need for alternative pest management tools. Numerous genetic biocontrol approaches, which involve…

Image: from the 11th annual edition of the Imperva Bad Bot Report. CLICK to Download report The internet now makes up around 7.4 per cent of global emissions – with half of that made up of bots. But it’s possible to track the perpetrators of bot-related energy waste By Andrew Irvin and Maria Pia Dunne,…

Graph: from Fact-checking reduces the propagation of false news in social networks, Emeric Henry, Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, Sergei Guriev 21 May 2020 Mark Zuckerberg says time to ‘get back to our roots’ around free expression but opponents argue ‘ordinary citizens should be very concerned’ Dan Jervis-Bardy, Ben Doherty and Sarah Basford Canales Wed 8 Jan 2025…

Climate and Environmental Protest as a Percentage of all Protest and Response rates to such protest. Source: Data on climate and environmental protests, and response types was obtained via ACLED. Separate data on killings in absolute numbers was obtained from Global Witness. From Berglund, O., Franco Brotto, T., Pantazis, C., Rossdale, C. and Pessoa Cavalcanti,…