Breaking Waves: Ocean News

A harder rain needs to fall on those responsible for the water crisis. Let Thames Water fail – it doesn’t deserve a bailout In a bone dry summer, every drop of water counts. So, even though the rain is finally falling again now, it’s still hard to take it for granted, or to ignore the way that everything in the countryside still feels unnervingly out of rhythm: earth too cracked, grass too bleached, wheat harvest being brought in too early, rivers too low – and, knowing what Thames Water has been pumping into them, water quite possibly too dirty to cool off in. In May, the company was fined £122.7m for the combined sins of sewage dumping and continuing to pay shareholder dividends despite its environmental failings. It responded by protesting that it might go bust if actually held accountable for its actions, a sentence that sums up everything people find infuriating about the water industry. Yet its resentful customers have no choice but to keep paying bills that are expected to rise by a third over the next five years – though Thames Water, inevitably, asked to be allowed to charge more – while wondering how we ever let a commodity this precious become so badly managed, heading into a volatile new era of summer drought and winter flood. Gaby Hinsliff is a Guardian columnist Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

More than 600 captive-bred spotted tree frogs have joined the dwindling wild population near Mount Beauty – and so far more than half have been found again Sign up for climate and environment editor Adam Morton’s free Clear Air newsletter here Hundreds of captive-bred, critically endangered frogs are managing to survive after being released at a fast-flowing mountain stream near Mount Beauty in Victoria, with some moving a “considerable distance” from the release point. More than 600 spotted tree frogs have joined dwindling wild populations in the Kiewa River, as part of a Zoos Victoria conservation breeding program to boost numbers and genetic diversity after 50% of the frog’s Victorian habitat was severely burnt in the 2019-20 black summer bushfires. Continue reading...

Technicalities of case mustn’t stop Albanese government from bold action on emissions before problems of climate change are visited upon communities closer to home Want to get this in your inbox when it publishes? Sign up for the Clear Air Australia newsletter here As parliament returns for the first time since the May election, talk is focused on productivity, disastrous childcare failures and how Australia should position and prepare itself amid rising global turmoil. If our leaders are serious, they should also make time to look back on the events of a week ago, when federal court justice Michael Wigney handed down a judgment in Cairns that is likely to echo for years to come – and says just as much about what lies ahead as the latest rhetoric from Washington and Beijing. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email Continue reading...

1.2tn yuan project has broken ground in Tibet, premier says, despite fears of downstream nations India and Bangladesh Construction of the world’s biggest hydropower megadam has begun, China’s premier has said, calling it the “project of the century”. The huge structure is being built on the Yarlung Tsangpo river, in Tibetan territory. Continue reading...