Exclusive: Costs of UK cleanup will reach £9.9bn a year in UK if emissions of ‘forever chemicals’ remain uncontrolled
Industry using ‘tobacco playbook’ to fend off ‘forever chemicals’ regulation
The cost of cleaning up toxic forever chemical pollution could reach more than £1.6tn across the UK and Europe over a 20-year period, an annual bill of £84bn, research has found.
The number of British pollution hotspots is also on the rise. If emissions remain unrestricted and uncontrolled, the costs of cleanup will reach £9.9bn a year in the UK, according to the findings of a year-long investigation by the Forever Lobbying Project, a cross-border investigation involving 46 journalists and 18 experts across 16 countries.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
01/14/2025 - 00:00
01/13/2025 - 19:58
Fires have killed at least 24, displaced thousands, destroyed over 12,000 structures as winds predicted until Wednesday
California fires – live updates
Fire crews are trying to get the upper hand on blazes that are tearing through Los Angeles before expected high wind gusts threaten their progress. The fires, which may become the most expensive in US history, have killed at least 24 people, displaced thousands, destroyed more than 12,000 structures and have 100,000 people under evacuation orders.
Sustained winds of up to 40mph (64km/h) and gusts in the mountains reaching 65mph (105km/h) are predicted through Wednesday, forecasters said. Winds picked up on Monday and were expected to strengthen on Tuesday, fire behavior analyst Dennis Burns said.
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01/13/2025 - 19:18
This blog is now closed. You can read our latest story here
Tell us about the financial consequences you are facing due to the California fires
Weather forecasters are predicting that the dry season in Los Angeles is likely to get worse in the coming weeks and that the drought which intensified last week across southern California will continue to worsen into March.
Meteorologist Eric Holthaus has written for the Guardian and says the rain forecast for the next three weeks in Los Angeles means the city’s record-dry start to its rainy season will keep getting worse.
This year’s rainy season is running at just 2% of normal for Los Angeles, which has only seen 0.16in of rain so far.
Weather models increasingly indicate that southern California will receive no rain at all during the rest of January, and potentially no rain during the first week or two of February as well.
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01/13/2025 - 17:22
Warning of ‘particularly dangerous situation’ with gusts expected as LA fire chief says: ‘We are not in the clear yet’
Firefighters battling the disastrous wildfires around Los Angeles were prepared for a return of dangerous winds that could again stoke the flames as the death toll in the tragedy has hit at least 24.
Fierce gusts known as Santa Ana winds have been largely blamed for turning the wildfires into devastating infernos that leveled huge tranches of neighborhoods around America’s second-largest city, which has also been hit by drought.
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01/13/2025 - 17:16
Concerns that dangerous fine particle pollution can become embedded in bloodstream and lungs
Los Angeles wildfires: full report
California fires – live updates
The Los Angeles wildfires have claimed the lives of at least 24 people and have burned well over more than 12,000 structures. While the focus is understandably on avoiding the flames, another immediate danger lurks across the county and beyond, one more difficult to escape: smoke.
The most dangerous component of wildfire smoke is fine particle pollution, also known as PM2.5 or soot. These tiny particles, smaller than one 20th the width of a human hair, can, if inhaled, become embedded in the bloodstream and lungs. It is estimated that about one-third of all particulate matter pollution in the US now comes from wildfire smoke.
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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
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