Museum temporarily closes as activists hang huge banners renaming the new BP-sponsored Sunken Cities Egypt exhibition as ‘Sinking Cities’
Greenpeace activists have climbed the British Museum and have hung banners off its columns in protest at BP’s sponsorship of its new ancient Egypt exhibition.
The museum was temporarily closed for around four hours on Thursday during the protest because of “visitor safety reasons.”
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Source: Guardian Environment
Taskforce will work with farming leaders and government to replace and reduce antibiotic use for livestock
A new taskforce to reduce the use of antibiotics in farming in the UK is being set up in response to government concerns on the growing resistance of diseases to antibiotic medicines.
The alliance for the Responsible Use of Medicines in Agriculture (RUMA) said it would work with organisations including farming leaders, food companies and government to find ways to replace antibiotic use where possible, and reduce it where not.
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Source: Guardian Environment
The richest and poorest residents of Argentina’s capital are separated by the walls of gated communities. When heavy rains in 2013 left those outside the barriers vulnerable to severe flooding, their only hope was to tear them down
On 2 April 2013, Matías Duarte awoke at three in the morning. For once it was not the noise of his alarm clock that stirred him, but the sound of pouring rain outside – and a room flooded to the level of his bed.
Duarte lived in Las Tunas, a working-class neighbourhood 35km north-west of Argentina’s capital, Buenos Aires. Running through the centre of the neighbourhood is the arroyo Las Tunas, a small creek. Though the arroyo had flooded before, it had never been this severe.
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Source: Guardian Environment
£2m scheme by Hounslow council on Western International Market will be biggest solar scheme by any local authority, and use batteries to store energy
A London council is unveiling a vast installation of 6,000 solar panels on a wholesale market rooftop, which it says is the largest such array put up by a local authority.
The London Borough of Hounslow says its £2m investment in solar, which has been installed on the roof of Western International Market, is also the first by a council to adopt battery storage to maximise the power from the panels.
The 1.73 megawatt (MW) array of 6,069 panels and four 60kW lithium batteries system now generates half the site’s required electricity.
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Source: Guardian Environment
For areas on the wrong side of a boom, ‘jobs and growth’ makes sense – in the absence of a better-articulated vision for northern Australia, symbolism matters
I’m back in Townsville for a family funeral. The relationship between the present and the past is at the top of my mind. Right now, all that means is I’m finding it hard to envision the future of the city I see around me. I’m not the only one.
I didn’t make it to Malcolm Turnbull’s press conference – there are arrangements to be made, relatives to visit. In any case, in local media he’s been inescapable.
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Source: Guardian Environment
The senator who started out as an anti-pokies campaigner is likely to be leading a new, significant political force after the poll
If Malcolm Turnbull wins the election, Nick Xenophon could help him introduce emissions trading, stop some of his company tax cuts, frustrate his attempts to cut Gonski schools funding and stall some of his sweeping changes to superannuation. If Bill Shorten wins, Xenophon could force big changes to Labor’s centrepiece policy on negative gearing.
And those nation-shaping or agenda-cruelling possibilities are what Guardian Australia has learned from just a few snatched conversations with the hyper-busy senator.
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Source: Guardian Environment
Norway issues licences for fresh areas of exploration for the first time in 20 years as part of what minister calls ‘a new chapter’ for petroleum industry
Norway awarded Arctic drilling licences to 13 oil companies on Wednesday, including in a hitherto unexplored part of the Barents Sea, drawing condemnation from environmental groups.
Related: Licence to drill: Centrica awarded rights to explore Barents Sea
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Source: Guardian Environment
Districts with nearly 40m will compare water supply and demand assuming that dry conditions will stretch for three years, but some say it’s a tough decision
California decided Wednesday to allow hundreds of local water districts to set their own conservation goals after a wet winter eased the five-year drought in some parts of the state.
The new approach lifts a statewide conservation order enacted last year that requires at least a 20% savings.
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Source: Guardian Environment
This election is Australia’s last chance to save the reef, which requires $1bn a year for 10 years to reduce water pollution to give it a chance to survive climate change, report warns
The 2016 Australian election is the last opportunity to save the Great Barrier Reef, the authors of a new scientific paper have warned.
The government needs to commit to $1bn a year for 10 years to reduce water pollution, which would give the reef a chance to survive the impacts of climate change, according to the paper published in the journal Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science.
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Source: Guardian Environment
The more than 88,000 Fort McMurray residents evacuated during the wildfire must wait until June to begin a phased re-entry plan, says Alberta premier
The wildfire in northern Alberta continues to rage out of control, growing to more than 423,000 hectares as officials said it would be at least another two weeks before the tens of thousands of evacuated Fort McMurray residents would be allowed to return to the city.
Relief – in the form of cooler weather and slight precipitation – may be on the way for fire crews, Rachel Notley, the Alberta premier, said on Wednesday. “So of course we’re all crossing our fingers that that happens.”
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Source: Guardian Environment