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.
French diplomacy in full swing to make a success of Paris climate talks
With the United Nations global climate conference in Paris only a month away, France made it top priority to work towards a major climate change deal. The Guardian reports climate diplomacy has never seen such a concerted push to forge a new global agreement on climate change. In the past couple Read More...
Big win for environmentalists as Obama administration cancels oil drilling lease sales
Shell announced a few weeks ago that it would be stopping its oil exploration in the Arctic indefinitely, but only now can environmentalists let out a sigh of relief. That’s because The Interior Department has scrapped two lease sales for 2016 and 2017 for oil drilling rights in the Arctic Ocean, Read More...
Israelis and Palestinians march for peace together in Jerusalem
This weekend, Israelis and Palestinians marched together in a Jerusalem solidarity rally. Together, they were calling for an end to the current wave of violence. In addition, they demanded peaceful talks toward a two-state solution in the region. The event was organized on Read More...
Biodiversity stabilizes ecosystems during climate extremes
Can biodiversity help protect ecosystems from extreme conditions? That question is much on the minds of scientists and policy makers as a changing climate brings more wildly swinging conditions at the same time human activities reduce the number of species available to produce food and oxygen and Read More...
Meet the new climate panel chief, who promises to focus on solutions
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the most authoritative gathering of climate scientists, setting the agenda for policy makers. Last week, South Korean economist Hoesung Lee was elected as the new chairman. In an interview with Nature he says: "I would like to be remembered as Read More...
The quest for greener weed
The cash crop is hogging more and more water and energy as U.S. production grows. So some pot industry insiders are taking early steps to make it more sustainable. Growing weed isn't usually very green. In rural California, where marijuana is the top cash crop, it uses massive amounts of water Read More...
An MIT scientist has invented a way to turn pollution into printer ink
Anirudh Sharma doesn't just want to pull harmful carbon from the air. He wants to offer a cheaper alternative to the exorbitant costs of ordinary printer ink. Sharma recently invented "Kaala," a device that can gobble up harmful pollutants and instantly repurpose them, with a little help from Read More...
Drones can speed up reforestation, and plant trees cheaper
Last year’s UN Climate Summit committed to plant some 300 billion trees. However, with our current planting techniques alone we may not be able to get that done in a timely and affordable way. That's where drones come in. At BioCarbon Engineering, an Oxford-based start-up company, engineers Read More...
Britain shows that world can cut carbon emissions and still get richer, says PwC
Britain has led the developed world in combining economic growth with cutting emissions, with the two finally “uncoupling”, according to a major report into the world economy’s reliance on carbon. However, the research warned that the world economy is still reducing emissions at too slow a Read More...
How cities can drive the Sustainable Development Goals
To create a framework for sustainable development beyond 2015, the United Nations recently announced a set of 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), also known as the Global Goals. Broader in scope than a preceding set of Millennium Development Goals, the new goals identify a long list of targets Read More...