The national climate assessments help state and local governments prepare for the impacts of a warming world
Legally mandated US national climate assessments seem to have disappeared from the federal websites built to display them, making it harder for state and local governments and the public to learn what to expect in their back yards from a warming world.
Scientists said the peer-reviewed authoritative reports save money and lives. Websites for the national assessments and the US Global Change Research Program were down Monday and Tuesday with no links, notes or referrals elsewhere. The White House, which was responsible for the assessments, said the information will be housed within Nasa to comply with the law, but gave no further details.
Continue reading...
Breaking Waves: Ocean News
07/01/2025 - 12:55
With net zero targets under attack from the populist right, dangerously high temperatures should refocus minds
At times like now, with dangerously high temperatures in several European countries, the urgent need for adaptation to an increasingly unstable climate is clearer than ever. From the French government’s decision to close schools to the bans in most of Italy on outdoor work at the hottest time of day, the immediate priority is to protect people from extreme heat – and to recognise that a heatwave can take a higher toll than a violent storm.
People who are already vulnerable, due to age or illness or poor housing, face the greatest risks from heatwaves. As well as changes to rules and routines, public health warnings are vital, especially where records are being broken and people are unfamiliar with the conditions. In the scorching European summer of 2022, an estimated 68,000 people died due to heat. Health, welfare and emergency systems must respond to those needing help.
Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.
Continue reading...
07/01/2025 - 12:11
Governor Gavin Newsom says bureaucratic roadblocks have made it difficult to build housing in the most populous state
California is overhauling its landmark environmental protection rules, a change state leaders say is essential to address the state’s housing shortage and homelessness crisis.
California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, had threatened to reject the state budget passed last Friday unless lawmakers overhauled the California Environmental Quality Act, or Ceqa, a 1970s law that requires strict examination of any new development for its impact on the environment.
Continue reading...
07/01/2025 - 10:00
News comes as research finds record lows of Antarctic sea ice had seen more icebergs splintering off ice shelves
Scientists analysing the cascading impacts of record low levels of Antarctic sea ice fear a loss of critical US government satellite data will make it harder to track the rapid changes taking place at both poles.
Researchers around the globe were told last week the US Department of Defence will stop processing and providing the data, used in studies on the state of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice, at the end of this month.
Continue reading...
07/01/2025 - 09:42
Portugal and Spain suffer historic temperature highs for June, as French schools close because of heat
Outdoor working has been banned during the hottest parts of the day in more than half of Italy’s regions as an extreme heatwave that has smashed June temperature records in Spain and Portugal continues to grip large swathes of Europe.
The savage temperatures are believed to have claimed at least three lives, including that of a small boy who is thought to have died from heatstroke while in a car in Catalonia’s Tarragona province on Tuesday afternoon.
Continue reading...
07/01/2025 - 09:00
Surrey council’s designs for mini-parks aim to demonstrate the benefits of less car-focused public spaces
Mini-gardens that fit inside a parking space have been presented by a council at Hampton Court flower show as part of a drive to make public spaces less car-focused.
Three gardens created by Surrey county council are on display at the show to demonstrate that areas used as parking spaces can give far more benefit to the community if they are thoughtfully designed as mini-parks.
Continue reading...
07/01/2025 - 07:00
The unlikely return of the bentwood box underscores the challenges facing Indigenous communities working to reclaim items raided from their lands
When the plane took off from Vancouver’s airport, bound north for the Great Bear Rainforest, Q̓íx̌itasu Elroy White felt giddy with excitement.
The plane traced a route along the Pacific Ocean and British Columbia’s coast mountains, still snow-capped in late May.
Continue reading...
07/01/2025 - 06:35
Aberdeen chair says some asset managers may have put themselves at legal risk by exaggerating ESG role
Business live – latest updates
Pension funds and institutional investors made a “huge mistake” and exaggerated their role in environmental, social and government (ESG) issues to promote their products, the outgoing chair of Aberdeen Group, Douglas Flint, has said.
Flint, who has chaired the recently rebranded fund manager since 2019, said “ridiculously extravagant claims” had been made by some companies, which were driven by a mindset that their job was “not really about investing money: we’re just jolly good people and we’re saving the world”.
Continue reading...
07/01/2025 - 03:38
Public health warnings as heatwave raises concerns about impact of climate change
What you need to know about heatwaves
The French prime minister François Bayrou, who attended a government crisis meeting over the heatwave, was asked about the great difficulty of French schools to handle the heatwave.
More than 1,350 schools across France were fully or partially closed on Tuesday as classrooms proved dangerously hot for children and teachers, amid anger from teaching unions.
Continue reading...
World Ocean Explorer Wins Gold Medal Serious Simulation Award from Serious Play Annual International Competition
10/26/2023 - 14:35
For Immediate Release October 19, 2023
Sedgwick, Maine USA World Ocean Explorer, a 3D virtual aquarium and educational simulation, was recently cited for excellence, winning a Gold Medal Award in the 2023 International Serious Play Awards Program.
World Ocean Explorer is an innovative 3D virtual aquarium designed for educational exploration of the world’s oceans. With interactive exhibits and a lobby space, visitors can immerse themselves in realistic marine environments, including a DEEP SEA exhibit funded by Schmidt Ocean Institute, showcasing unprecedented deep-sea discoveries off Australia. Targeted at 3rd graders and beyond, this immersive experience offers a range of perspectives on the ocean environment and can be explored through guided tours or user-controlled interfaces. Visit DEEP SEA at worldoceanexplorer.org/deep-sea-aquarium.html.
Serious Play Conference brings together professionals who are exploring the use of game-based learning, sharing their experience, and working together to shape the future of training and education. For more information on Serious Play Award Program visit seriousplayconf.com/international-serious-play-award-programs.
World Ocean Explorer is a transformative virtual aquarium designed to deepen understanding of the world ocean and amplify connection for young people worldwide. Organized around the principles of Ocean Literacy and the Next Gen Science Standards, World Ocean Explorer brings the wonder and knowledge of ocean species and systems to students in formal and informal classrooms, absolutely free to anyone with a good Internet connection. As an advocate for the ocean through communications, World Ocean Observatory believes there is no better investment in the future of the sustainable ocean than through a new approach to educational engagement that excites, informs, and motivates students to explore the wonders of our marine world and to understand the pervasive connection and implication for our future, inherent in the protection and conservation of all aspects of our ocean world.
World Ocean Explorer presents an astonishing 3-dimensional simulated aquarium visit, organized to reveal the wonders of undersea life, with layers of detailed data and information to augment the emotional connection made to the astonishing beauty and complexity of the dynamic ocean. Within each of the virtual exhibits, students visit exemplary theme-based sites with myriad opportunities to understand the larger perspectives of scientific knowledge as organized and visualized to dramatize the impact and change on ocean life as a result of natural and human-generated events. Through immersion among displays, mixed media and 3D models, the experience of an aquarium visit will be brought into classrooms or home school environments as a free, accessible, always available opportunity for teaching and learning. All of this will be available to a world audience without physical limitation or cost. World Ocean Explorer, a project of the World Ocean Observatory, receives support from the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, Visual Solutions Lab, the Climate Change Institute, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, and The Fram Museum Oslo. To learn more about the current and future exhibits of World Ocean Explorer, visit worldoceanexplorer.org.
media contact
Trisha Badger, Managing Director, World Ocean Observatory | director@thew2o.net +12077011069
Read more »
