cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20636883

This indirect use of palm oil is often overlooked in the zero-deforestation accounting process, despite its growing use, according to a report by U.S.-based advocacy group Rainforest Action Network (RAN). The report found that palm oil-based animal feed is now the single largest palm oil product category imported by the U.S., accounting for 36% of all palm oil imports into the country by weight.

archived article (Wayback Machine)

archived report from RAN (Wayback Machine)

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/19354588

A marine rewilding initiative to restore an underwater kelp forest in West Sussex is celebrating "remarkable" results, a wildlife trust has said.

The project was launched after the implementation of a new bylaw prohibiting trawling in a 117 sq mile (302 sq km) coastal area between Shoreham-by-Sea and Selsey in March 2021.

Celebrating its fourth anniversary, Sussex Kelp Recovery Project (SKRP) researchers have reported positive signs of recovery, including an increase in the populations of lobster, brown crab, angelshark and short-snouted seahorse.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20534437

Thorn forest once blanketed the Rio Grande Valley. Restoring even a little of it could help the region cope with the impacts of climate change

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20533605

Chevron has been ordered to pay $744.6 million to a Louisiana parish government to help restore coastal wetlands the company destroyed.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20597671

archived (Wayback Machine)

Main Takeaways

• Internal combustion vehicles – those that run on gasoline and diesel fuel – produce CO~2~ and a number of air pollutants.
• Over recent decades, big improvements have been made in reducing vehicle-emission pollution; however, it is still problematic at a global scale.
• Transport accounts for one fifth of CO~2~ emissions globally; of this portion the majority comes from road transport (cars, motorcycles, buses, and taxis).
• Rising atmospheric CO~2~ from vehicle emissions and other human activities has been driving recent global warming.
• Air pollution from vehicles has health effects like respiratory and cardiovascular diseases, and even an increased risk of getting cancer.
• You can reduce your vehicle pollution by using more sustainable transport options like electric vehicles, ride sharing, walking, bicycles, and public transport.

Related: Some of that air pollution actually counters the greenhouse effect, and climate models have so far underestimated this.

A UK company has developed a loop system which turns methane gas into hydrogen and graphene. It's being tested at several farm sites.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20585491

Many of the suburbs and cities hit hardest in recent years were caught off-guard, and key stakeholders are racing to understand the dynamics that drive these fires

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20537638

In a drought-hit Mexican border region at the center of growing competition with the United States for water, conservationists are working to bring a once-dying river delta back to life.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20541313

archived (Wayback Machine)

research cited (Wayback Machine) - page 420 of PDF

The leaves are soft and the size of a square of toilet paper. The plant grows up to 2 m tall.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20512702

Wayback Machine

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/19706595

2024 climate trends should be a "wake-up call that we are increasing the risks to our lives, economies and to the planet,” said Celeste Saulo

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20488683

BR-319: Paving the way for Indigenous displacement and environmental catastrophe.

related:

• Protecting peatlands and mangroves could halve Southeast Asia’s land-use emissions
• Peru’s rare peatland swamps at risk as gold mining expands
• Congo Peatlands - the largest and most intact across the world's tropics
• What happens to the world if forests stop absorbing carbon? Ask Finland

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20385906

Archived (Wayback Machine)

Update 2025: https://slrpnk.net/post/20382724

As Mongabay reported, researchers have found 3.5 million km (2.2 million mi) of roads in the nine Brazilian states encompassing the Legal Amazon. They estimated that at least 86% of these roads are used by loggers, gold miners and unauthorized settlers — branching off from official roads. Studies have also found that 95% of deforestation happens within 5.5 km (3.4 mi) of a road and 85% of fires each year occur within 5 km (3.1 mi).

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20382724

Archived (Wayback Machine)

To be clear, exports of "Brazilian soy and corn" = "feed crops for animal agriculture" in China and Europe.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20381983

Archived (Wayback Machine)

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20381758

Archived (Wayback Machine)

The White House is weighing an executive order that would fast-track permitting for deep-sea mining in international waters and let mining companies bypass a United Nations-backed review process, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the deliberations.

If signed, the order would mark U.S. President Donald Trump's latest attempt to tap international deposits of nickel, copper and other critical minerals used widely across the economy after recent efforts in Greenland and Ukraine. Trump earlier this month also invoked emergency powers to boost domestic minerals production.

The International Seabed Authority - created by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which the U.S. has not ratified - has for years been considering standards for deep-sea mining in international waters, although it has yet to formalize them due to unresolved differences over acceptable levels of dust, noise and other factors from the practice.

Trump's deep-sea mining order is likely to stipulate that the U.S. aims to exercise its rights to extract critical minerals on the ocean's floor and let miners bypass the ISA and seek permitting through the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's mining code. The plans are under discussion and could change before Trump signs the order, the sources said.

https://archive.ph/5w0z0