Breaking Waves: Ocean News

01/27/2025 - 00:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 27 January 2025; doi:10.1038/s44183-025-00102-z Author Correction: The struggle at the International Seabed Authority over deep sea mineral resources
01/26/2025 - 14:40
Chancellor expected to unveil new building projects and revise planning rules to stimulate UK economy Rachel Reeves has given her strongest hint yet that she will back a third runway at Heathrow airport, arguing that she is willing to make difficult decisions while pursuing economic growth. The chancellor is poised to make a significant speech this week where she will outline her plans to boost the British economy by radically altering planning rules and accelerating building projects. Continue reading...
01/26/2025 - 08:30
‘It was striking that the White House memo included toilets and shower heads as a presidential priority,’ said one expert From crusading against showers he feels don’t sufficiently wash his hair to reversing protections for a small fish he calls “worthless”, Donald Trump’s personal fixations have helped shape his first environmental priorities as US president. While withdrawing the US from the Paris climate accords and declaring an “energy emergency” were among Trump’s most noteworthy executive orders on his first day in office, both were further down a list of priorities put out by the White House than measures to improve “consumer choice in vehicles, shower heads, toilets, washing machines, lightbulbs and dishwashers”. Continue reading...
01/26/2025 - 08:03
Private developers offer politicians a simple solution for bulldozing through this crisis – build more. But it won’t work Build baby, build. That’s about the intellectual limit of the government’s housing strategy. Millions are under-housed, so let’s “bulldoze” the planning system and build more homes. But it’s not nearly so simple. As soon as anyone challenges the policy, the government brands them a nimby – another of the crude truncations that pass for debate on this issue: nimbys versus yimbys. So before I go further, let me state that I want to see lots of new social and genuinely affordable housing built as part of a massive programme to solve the worst housing crisis of any wealthy country. I’ve been making similar calls for years, not least in the report I co-authored for the Labour party in 2019: Land for the Many. I oppose Labour’s current approach for a different reason. It will fail. George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
01/26/2025 - 05:53
Chancellor says runway would mean fewer planes circling London, and points to moves towards sustainable flying Rachel Reeves has indicated her support for building a third runway at Heathrow airport, arguing that it would have environmental benefits such as fewer planes circling London. Ahead of a major speech on economic growth this coming week, the chancellor made the case for Heathrow expansion and said there was “huge investment” in more sustainable aviation. Continue reading...
01/26/2025 - 05:00
Analysis by campaign group finds utility company had highest rate of ‘no-flow’ samples of any water and sewerage firm in 2024 The water firm Anglian Water passed thousands of pollution tests at its sewage plants that were never carried out. Operational data reveals how more than 6,000 pollution tests from 2015 to 2024 could not be carried out under a controversial self-monitoring regime because it was reported there was no outflow of treated sewage from the plants. Continue reading...
01/25/2025 - 18:34
Weather will aid firefighters, but heavy downpours on charred hillsides could bring the threat of poisonous runoff Rain on the way to parched southern California on Saturday will aid firefighters mopping up multiple wildfires. But heavy downpours on charred hillsides could bring the threat of new troubles like toxic ash runoff. Los Angeles county crews spent much of the week removing vegetation, shoring up slopes and reinforcing roads in devastated areas of the Palisades and Eaton fires, which reduced entire neighborhoods to rubble and ash after breaking out during powerful winds on 7 January. Continue reading...
01/19/2025 - 00:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 19 January 2025; doi:10.1038/s44183-024-00101-6 Offshore wind energy: assessing trace element inputs and the risks for co-location of aquaculture
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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