Grape expectations! Champagne vines given more room to grow as century-old rule demanding five-foot distance between plants is scrapped to cut emissions Champagne growers scrapped a rule governing the distancing between plants For 100 years, the maximum allowed has been 5ft to force the vines to compete But a study has found larger spaces would … Read more
Birmingham City Council has dished out more than 44,000 fines to drivers who failed to pay an £8 daily charge to enter its new Clean Air Zone. The CAZ, which went live at the beginning of June, began charging users of non-compliant older vehicles from 14 June. Non-payment results in a fine of £120, though … Read more
The Queen‘s lawyers secretly lobbied the Scottish government for her private land to be exempt from a new climate change law, it has been revealed. The monarch, whose Balmoral Estate makes her a major landowner in the country, is the only person not required to use renewable energy to heat her buildings. In documents unearthed … Read more
Get ready to fry! UK summers are to hit 104F within the decade as scorching weather becomes our new ‘normal’ by the end of the century, forecasters have warned Scientists fear the rate of global warming is spiralling out of control, saying that ‘climate change is happening and it’s happening now’ Experts warn that temperature … Read more
Fix your carbon footprint first, Boris! As Government’s green spokesman says don’t rinse plates before using dishwasher, it emerges No10 Downing Street has a poor eco-rating Allegra Stratton advised public not to rinse dishes before using a dishwasher But the message has been somewhat diluted after it emerged that No10 itself has an especially poor carbon … Read more
In a world where the urgent need to tackle climate change is clear, it is a shocking fact that 40 per cent of all the food grown on our planet goes uneaten. More than four million square kilometres of land – roughly equivalent to the land mass of the Indian subcontinent – is used to … Read more
An ‘iron-air’ battery has been developed in the US that can store electricity from wind or solar power stations for days at a time, slowly discharging it to the grid. It will help tackle climate change by reducing the need for fossil fuel power plants, according to technology startup Form Energy, from Massachusetts, US. The Iron-Air … Read more
Climate change has dramatically altered the Swiss Alps by transforming glaciers into nearly 1,200 new lakes since 1850 – and 1,000 of them still exist today. A team of scientists from the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (Eawag) combined aerial photo data of the massive mountain range and years of data on … Read more
Giant butterfly thought to be extinct in Britain since 1960s has been found breeding in the country again The Large Tortoiseshell, pictured, disappeared from woodlands in the 1960s Two groups of larvae have been discovered by conservationists on elm trees Hoped they will produce two dozen butterflies – the UK’s first colony in 50 years … Read more
British consumer goods giant Unilever is set to add ‘carbon footprint labels’ to its products by the end of this year, it has announced. Carbon footprint labels show the carbon footprint of particular products – the total greenhouse gas emissions for which they are responsible, from ‘farm to fork’. Unilever’s 75,000 products include Pot Noodle, Marmite, Cornetto, Magnum and Hellmann’s … Read more