The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
08/08/2025 - 00:00
Social media post led to discovery that samplers measuring toxic particles in air can also detect fragments of DNA
As the UK’s Big Butterfly Count reaches more than 100,000 submissions, an international group of scientists have produced the first national survey of biodiversity using an entirely different approach. Instead of looking for species by eye, they took advantage of the samplers around the UK that constantly measure toxic metal particles in the air, and used them to measure tiny fragments of DNA.
Dr Joanne Littlefair from University College London, part of the research team, said: “Organisms lose bits of themselves all the time – dead skin cells, fragments of hair or feathers, saliva, even faeces and urine. Some of this will blow up into the air and become airborne ‘environmental’ DNA or eDNA.”
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08/08/2025 - 00:00
Plans have provoked outrage from communities in areas of Great Britain expected to host new infrastructure
The government is pushing head with a plan to offer those who live near new electricity pylons a discount of £2,500 from their energy bills over the next 10 years to ease the backlash against its clean power plans.
Thousands of households within half a kilometre of new or upgraded electricity infrastructure could each receive up to £250 off their annual energy bill from next year to help speed up the rollout of infrastructure critical to the government’s targets.
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08/07/2025 - 21:45
News Corp broadsheet puts Pollyannish spin on study that found a record decline in the world’s largest coral reef. Plus: Grok goes woke
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The Australian Institute of Marine Science’s annual monitoring study came out on Wednesday. It warned that the Great Barrier Reef could reach a tipping point where it cannot recover fast enough between major catastrophic events.
The Guardian reported it as: Great Barrier Reef coral bleaching event in 2024 most widespread and severe on record
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08/07/2025 - 17:04
Ex-fossil fuel executive Chris Wright said administration is reviewing national assessments made by past governments
The US energy secretary, Chris Wright, is facing growing criticism from scientists who say their “worst fears” were realized when Wright revealed that the Trump administration would “update” the US’s premier climate crisis reports.
Wright, a former oil and gas executive, told CNN’s Kaitlin Collins earlier this week that the administration was reviewing national climate assessment reports published by past governments.
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08/07/2025 - 14:04
Otterpool Park’s 8,500 homes will run on solar power and batteries – with enough renewable energy to help keep lights on elsewhere
One of Britain’s first all-electric towns to be built with almost no reliance on fossil fuels could soon help to power the grid with renewable energy.
The developers of a new garden town in Kent have struck a deal with a leading energy infrastructure company to design and operate a “smart” energy grid, which could mean its 8,500 households act as a virtual power plant for the rest of the country.
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08/07/2025 - 13:15
Trees to remain as memorial to Marline Anderson, who died recently, and who planted them in Battersea in 1980s
The pair of subtropical grapefruit trees have stood, slightly incongruously, on a street in south-west London for 40-odd years since Marline Anderson brought them over from Grenada – a “gift” from her homeland – and planted them in her front garden.
The trees will remain as a memorial to Anderson, who died recently, after campaigners seeking to protect them were told on Thursday they had been successful.
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08/07/2025 - 12:35
‘Duplomb law’ provision to allow use of acetamiprid, toxic to pollinators, found not to abide by environmental charter
France’s top constitutional authority has ruled against the reintroduction of a pesticide that is harmful to ecosystems, saying it is unconstitutional.
The decision on Thursday night deals a blow to the government. It comes after weeks of opposition from the left, environmentalists and doctors, and a record-breaking 2m signatures on a petition against a bill that would have allowed a pesticide banned in France in 2020 to come back into use.
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08/07/2025 - 10:41
Environmental group says industry figures will be obstructive and aim to reduce overall ambition of meeting
More than 200 industry lobbyists are attending the UN’s meeting to hammer out a global plastics treaty, raising fears that moves to prevent runaway plastic production may be undermined.
The 234 lobbyists from the oil, petrochemical and plastics industries outnumber the combined delegations of all 27 EU member states, and far exceed the number of people attending with the delegation of scientists as well as Indigenous peoples at the Geneva talks.
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08/07/2025 - 10:00
Overall clearing was up 3%, with almost half in Great Barrier Reef catchment areas while 21% was remnant woodland, government data shows
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Forest and woodland across an area more than 1,000 times the size of the Sydney CBD was bulldozed in Queensland in 2022-23, newly published figures show, sparking warnings the state is escalating risks to endangered species and worsening climate change.
Almost half (44%) of the 332,015 hectares of clearing was in Great Barrier Reef catchment areas, causing nutrient and sediment flow that puts additional pressure on corals already bleaching due to climate change.
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