Brazil’s Fordlandia: Tracing the roots of Amazon deforestation | Environment News

Brazil’s Fordlandia: Tracing the roots of Amazon deforestation | Environment News

Aveiro, Brazil – The flames roared higher than a hundred feet, sending smoke billowing across the jungle. Boars scattered from the underbrush. Toucans shot from the trees. And thousands of acres of Amazon rainforest soon crumbled into ash. It was 1928, and a vast stretch of land in north-central Brazil…

Mystery groundwater upsurge floods homes in Libyan coastal town | Environment News

Mystery groundwater upsurge floods homes in Libyan coastal town | Environment News

Much of Libya is bone-dry desert but one Mediterranean coastal town is suffering the opposite problem – its houses and fields have been inundated by a mysterious upsurge of groundwater. Stagnant water and squishy mud have flooded houses, streets and palm groves around the northwestern town of Zliten, spreading a…

Mystery shipwreck causes disastrous oil spill off Trinidad | Environment News

Mystery shipwreck causes disastrous oil spill off Trinidad | Environment News

Emergency workers in Trinidad and Tobago are scrambling to clean up a massive oil spill after a mystery vessel ran aground near the Caribbean island, casting a pall over Carnival tourism. Prime Minister Keith Rowley on Sunday declared a national emergency as oil leaking from the vessel affected some 15km…

Death toll rises to 54 in southern Philippines landslide | Climate News

Death toll rises to 54 in southern Philippines landslide | Climate News

Authorities say 63 people remain missing as rescue efforts are hampered by heavy rain, thick mud and the threat of further landslides. The death toll from a landslide that hit a gold-mining village in the southern Philippines has risen to 54 people and 63 others are missing, authorities have said….

Philippines landslide strikes miners, homes in gold-mining village | Environment News

Philippines landslide strikes miners, homes in gold-mining village | Environment News

Dozens of people missing after heavy rains brought mountainside cascading over remote village. Rescuers are battling to find dozens of people missing after a landslide buried buses and houses in a gold-mining village in the southern Philippines. The landslide, triggered by heavy rains, brought part of a mountainside cascading over…

Lagos ban on styrofoam and plastics brings applause and concern | Environment

Lagos ban on styrofoam and plastics brings applause and concern | Environment

From trash-strewn pavements to street vendors packing meals in polystyrene containers, plastic waste is a constant menace in the urban landscape of Lagos, Nigeria’s economic capital and the continent’s most populous city. That image could soon change if the local Lagos State government manages to implement its recent ambitious ban…

Global warming drove record Amazon rainforest drought, study finds | Climate Crisis News

Global warming drove record Amazon rainforest drought, study finds | Climate Crisis News

New report says climate change responsible for draining rivers, wreaking havoc on biodiversity and communities. Climate change, and not El Nino, was the primary driver of the unprecedented drought last year in the Amazon rainforest that caused rivers to dry up, required deliveries of essential supplies to river communities and…

UN expert warns of ‘severe’ crackdown on climate protestors in UK | Environment News

UN expert warns of ‘severe’ crackdown on climate protestors in UK | Environment News

Last year, British police were granted anti-protest powers following years of disruptive demonstrations by environmental activists. A UN expert has warned that environmental activists face a “severe crackdown” in the United Kingdom and that peaceful protestors are the targets of “toxic discourse”. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders…

‘Conflict tinder’: Gambian traffickers continue timber trade despite ban | Environment

‘Conflict tinder’: Gambian traffickers continue timber trade despite ban | Environment

Banjul, The Gambia — On a warm May day at a restaurant on the outskirts of Banjul, Lamin (last name withheld) outlined his plan to traffic rosewood timber from Senegal to The Gambia as he cleaned the meat off his chicken drumsticks. “All of this has to be secret,” he…