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.
New cleanup technology burns oil spills while minimizing water and air pollution
Science News from research organizations Source: Worcester Polytechnic Institute Summary: Tests of a novel technology that can accelerate the combustion of crude oil floating on water demonstrated its potential to become an effective tool for minimizing the environmental impact of oil spills. The Read More...
Ancient Egyptian irrigation technique protects plants against drought
In ancient times North-Africans buried clay pots to water the roots of their plants. An Egyptian company has modernized this ancestral technique to create a cheap and effective larger irrigation Read More...
Inspired by India’s poor: Making roads from plastic waste
This Scottish entrepreneur traveled in India and saw how people melted down plastic from landfill sites to repair potholes. It made him think that plastic waste can be used to reinforce and repair roads in the western world as well. Now his company is exactly doing that. By adding plastic to the Read More...
Computer models show agroforestry can repair watersheds
Watersheds sustain life but many have been degraded. Computer modelling has shown that agroforestry can help rescue them, says David Wilson with Regine Joy P. Evangelista, at the Philippine’s First International Agroforestry Congress. Watersheds not only supply water for domestic use but also Read More...
How 5 chief resilience officers are preparing for the next 50 years
Resiliency is everywhere today. Governments around the world are thinking about how to make their infrastructure adaptable to the stresses and shocks of a changing world. Yet, because many federal governments’ attention is stretched thin, compounded by budget issues and Read More...
Climate change: The world is abandoning coal in dramatic style
The fossil fuel coal had a hard time in 2016, and experts say it's only going to get worse. According to researchers, the number of new coal-fired power stations being built worldwide in 2016 dropped 62 percent. Additionally, there was also a 48 percent reduction in “pre-construction activity”. Read More...
The man who planted a tree and grew a whole family of forests
When Antonio Vicente bought a patch of land in São Paulo state and said he wanted to use it to plant a forest, people called him crazy. It was 1973 and forests were seen by many as an obstacle to progress and profit. Brazil’s then military government encouraged wealthy landowners to Read More...
Environmental innovation: A New Zealand river has become a legal living entity
This is international environmental innovation. A New Zealand river revered by the native Maori has been recognized by parliament as a "legal person". The river will have its own legal identity with all the corresponding rights, duties and liabilities of a legal person. In practical terms, it means Read More...
Trees do more than absorbing CO2, they regulate water and climate
Science News from research organizations Source: World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) Summary: Forests and trees play a major role on water cycles and cooler temperatures, contributing to food security and climate change adaptation. In recent decades, the climate change discourse has looked at forests Read More...
Chocolate companies are uniting to stop deforestation
The chocolate industry’s biggest players have admitted that their buying habits have helped destroy virgin forests, and have signed an agreement to help stop deforestation in major cocoa-growing areas. The agreement commits companies like Nestle and Mars to present a plan-of-action to address Read More...