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.
Indian town makes it a condition for new buildings to plant at least two trees
In a step to make the environment greener, a municipality in the district of Kerala, India, has decided to pass legislation that will require newly constructed buildings to have at least two native fruit trees planted mandatorily. The rule will apply to any new buildings, commercial or Read More...
Pomegranates may hold key compound to slowing down aging
Since aging is a key driver of many diseases, targeting that process could be a handy catch-all for treating a range of diseases and improving the quality of life for pretty much everybody. That’s why, for a long time, researchers have been busy looking for various ways to slow down the process Read More...
How activists in this Californian city stopped a gas plant from being built
When NRG Energy, one of the largest electric power producers in the country, won a contract to build a new gas plant on the beach in Oxnard, California, in 2014, nearly everyone assumed it was a done deal. The region’s electric utility, Southern California Edison, needed a new source of power to Read More...
A new marketplace is paying farmers to capture carbon emissions
If farmers make changes to the way they manage soil on farms—and that happened on farmland globally—it could theoretically suck a trillion tons of CO2 from the atmosphere, or as much as humans have emitted since the Industrial Revolution. The changes aren’t particularly complicated, and Read More...
In one year, Scotland has planted a mind-boggling 22 million new trees
Planting trees is one of the most effective, natural tools we have for capturing carbon that would otherwise enter the atmosphere. Since the United Kingdom has some of the lowest levels of tree cover in the world, the UK made a pledge years ago to plant more trees across the nation. And while Read More...
Over 600 divers in Florida just set the record for biggest underwater cleanup
It’s amazing what people will do to break a Guinness World Record. Just this past weekend, for example, hundreds of scuba divers entered the waters of Deerfield Beach in Florida for the largest underwater cleanup the world has ever seen. The previous record was reportedly set in 2015 by a group Read More...
This automaker is repurposing old EV batteries for solar power in Puerto Rico
Rivian is known for pushing the boundaries of battery tech. Not only is the startup working on the first all-electric pickup for the US market, but it's also planning "Rivian-to-Rivian" charging, which will allow its vehicles to charge each other, and it designed a camp stove add-on that takes Read More...
No elephants poached last year in one Africa’s largest wildlife preserves
Aggressive poaching over the years cut the number of elephants living in one of Africa’s largest wildlife preserves from about 12,000 to a little over 3,600 in 2016. But thanks to new conservation strategies, not a single elephant was found killed by poachers this past year in the reserve, which Read More...
Britain just committed to net zero emissions by 2050
The United Kingdom has just become the first major economy in the world to commit to reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050. Although the UK already had a 2050 target to reduce emissions by 80%, which was agreed upon by MPs under the Climate Change Act in 2008, that target is now amended to the Read More...
You can toss these shoes into the compost once they’re worn out
Look down at your feet. Your shoes might seem innocuous, but they contain lots of forms of plastic, and often leather, giving them their own sizeable carbon footprint. As all companies try to limit their plastic use, shoe manufacturers are trying to design new shoes with lower embedded Read More...