Environment
Need some good news about the environment? The Optimist Daily is your go-to herald of positive environmental news, highlighting eco-friendly solutions and scientific progress around climate action, circularity, conservation, and more. Learn about everything eco in our Environment section.
Zimbabwe bans coal mining in national parks in major conservation win
Home to more than 40,000 elephants and numerous other species, including the endangered black rhino, Zimbabwe’s biggest national park, Hwange, is a thriving wildlife haven. In 2015, however, the country’s government gave permission to two mining companies to explore the park for coal, Read More...
Giant robot in Arizona hunts for crops that thrive in hot climates
On the farmlands of Arizona, the world’s largest farming robot is being rolled out to help secure the future of food. The robot, which is called the Field Scanalyzer, looks a bit like a bridge at first glance, spanning from one side of the crop field to the other. With this vantage point over Read More...
Great Barrier Reef seafloor mapping reveals new species and rare samples
The Schmidt Ocean Institute's research vessel Falkor embarked on its fourth expedition this year to explore the deepest regions of the Great Barrier Reef. At 1,820 meters deep, the researchers discovered five new species of corals and sponges and took the first sample of the 40 and 50 million year Read More...
This upcycled flour is made from spent beer grain
Did you know that the average craft brewery generates two tons of "spent grain" every week? That’s up to 500 pounds per ten kegs. This is why NETZRO, an innovative food recovery company, is transforming spent grain from brewing into flour. Spent grain is made up of barley, wheat, oats, and Read More...
Map shows the natural areas we must protect to mitigate climate change
The world’s population has exploded and expanded over the past century, but more than half of the earth is still in a natural or semi-natural state. Protecting these untouched areas is critical for mitigating climate change, so the Global Safety Net project has created an interactive map of both Read More...
This sustainable building is home to more than 1,000 trees
What if a building could host more plants than the entire nearby park? This is the vision of designer Koichi Takada Architects who plans to build a beautiful green Urban Forest in Brisbane, Australia. The proposed building would be covered in 1,000 trees and 20,000 plants, including 259 native Read More...
Hawaiians build state-of-the-art fence to save rare native birds
While the Hawaiian islands are home to all kinds of life today, that wasn’t always the case. Apparently, not a single land-dwelling called the islands home 1,500 years ago—only winged insects, one variety of bat, and a vast array of birds had the honor of living on the archipelago. Many of Read More...
Meet the animals that came back from “extinction”
While animals and plants have always come and gone, we have seen a huge increase in the number of vertebrate animals that have disappeared since the 16th century—almost all because of human-related changes such as loss of habitat or over-hunting. Now with climate change, more species than ever Read More...
Portuguese youth are taking 33 countries to court over climate change
The youth isn’t very happy about climate change. If the Fridays4future climate strikes didn’t make that clear, a new court case filed by young activists from Portugal at the European court of human rights makes it abundantly clear. The case, which was crowdfunded, demands 33 countries make Read More...
Mountain lions are seeing a baby boom near Los Angeles
On Saturday, we published a story about the California legislature imposing a ban on a rat poison that has been found to kill mountain lions. In other good news for mountain lions in California, park rangers have reported a mountain lion baby boom that has occurred this summer in the Santa Monica Read More...