National Public Radio: It's appropriate that Darwin, the tropical capital of Australia's Northern Territory, is named for the English naturalist. The massive, powerful and deadly saltwater crocodile - the world's largest living reptile - is the evolutionary triumph of 50 million years of natural selection. And in Darwin, the crocodile is equally dreaded and beloved. Crocodylus porosus was hunted to near extinction in the last century. But in 1974, the Australian government put the species, known affectionately as...

BBC: Overfishing of EU fisheries is costing £2.7bn (3.2bn euros) a year and 100,000 jobs, a report has said. The research, by the UK-based New Economics Foundation, said a third of Britain's fish consumption could be met if stocks were allowed to recover. Separate research suggests that half of fishermen would not be willing to give up their livelihoods. Last week, a report said there were reasons to be optimistic that fisheries could recover from past exploitation. "Overfishing is bad for...

Summit Voice: The deep-diving elephant seals of Marion Island, in the southwestern Indian Ocean, are going to even greater depths to find prey like squid, as global warming heats up the water. Scientists with the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research who have been tracking the pinnipeds for the past few years say that warming in the upper levels of the ocean has pushed prey to greater depths than ever before, forcing the elephant seals to follow. “The food in the sea is unevenly distributed....

Guardian: The renewable energy industry has dismissed as "trumped-up nonsense" an attack by Donald Trump on Scottish wind energy projects. But the Scottish government has declined to respond directly to the billionaire's stinging criticism of Alex Salmond's plans for renewable energy. When asked in an interview on Thursday night about Trump's comments, Salmond replied only with a prediction that once renewable energy created a large number of jobs in Scotland, "just about everybody will get on board, even...

Guardian: Restoring fish stocks to health would create jobs and increase the income of Europe's fishing fleets by £2.7bn a year, according to a report published on Friday. If fish stocks were allowed to recover, more fish would actually be caught in future than are caught at present, found the New Economics Foundation (NEF) in its study – but the short-term focus of fisheries policy at present means that stocks are not allowed to recover. Restoring fish stocks would be worth £2.7bn a year, in the form...

Indo-Asian News Service: The Maldives, the tiny Indian Ocean archipelago that underwent a tumultuous regime change, says the "mistrust" between rich and poor nations on climate change negotiations needs to go and all countries should shun the blame game while dealing with an issue so critical to everyone's survival, particularly small island nations like theirs. "There is lot of mistrust in climate change negotiations as developing countries think this is obstruction to their development while developed countries think...

Reuters: La Nina, a weather phenomenon usually linked to heavy rains and flooding in Asia-Pacific and South America and drought in Africa, seems to have reached its peak and is expected to fade between March and May, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Friday. A weak to moderate La Nina pattern has cooled the tropical Pacific since around October, a considerably weaker event than in 2010-11, the United Nations agency said in a statement. "Model forecasts and expert interpretation suggest...

Indo-Asian News Service: Climate change could affect Antarctica's Dry Valleys more rapidly than previously expected, particularly the microbial communities in the soil, a study reveals. We used to think that microbial change took place slowly over centuries, said Craig Cary, professor at the University of Waikato, who led the study. It's important we keep documenting the current biodiversity in Antarctica so we can predict the effects of climate change, said Cary, the journal Nature Communications reported. To do...

Yale Environment 360: A coalition of European companies today opened a 367-megawatt wind farm off the British coast, a massive project that developers say will power as many as 320,000 households annually and is the world’s largest offshore wind project to date. The Walney Wind Farm, located nine miles (15 kilometers) off Cumbria in the Irish Sea, is comprised of 102 wind turbines, each with a capacity of 3.6 megawatts. The £1 billion ($1.58 billion) project was developed by some European utility giants -- including British...

SciDev.Net: Tropical cyclone damage costs will increase four-fold to US$109 billion a year across the world by 2100, according to a study published in Nature Climate Change last week (1 February). Predicted increases in population and economic activity by 2100 will increase cyclone damage costs to US$56 billion a year -- more than double the current figure of US$26 billion. And more frequent and stronger cyclones as a result of climate change are expected to add a further US$53 billion a year to the bill,...

Yale Environment 360: It is easy to be cynical. Back in 1992, more than 100 world leaders, including George H.W. Bush, showed up for the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. It was a two-week mega-event that attracted huge attention, highlighted by the signing of two groundbreaking treaties on climate change and biodiversity and grand declarations about creating a future green and equitable world. To put it mildly, the subsequent two decades have not lived up to the promises. George W. Bush effectively broke the climate...

Press Association: Offshore renewable projects could be developed more efficiently and quickly under recommendations of a new blueprint on green energy, it has emerged. A task force examined how to streamline initial development of offshore projects, as well as the process of planning them and gaining approval. Its report, which includes a series of recommendations, has been welcomed by leading energy firms. First Minister Alex Salmond also stressed the importance of ensuring that "scoping, planning, development...

Greenwire: In the Earth's frozen extremes, it appears, the future is now. For some time, it's been thought in climate science that the glaciers and ice caps crowning mountain ranges from the Andes to the Himalayas are the canaries of the cryosphere. Seen making dramatic retreats in the face of human-caused global warming, melting glaciers have been flagged as the most likely frozen source for the planet's rising seas. Ultimately, melting of the massive ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland would become...

New York Times: Since 1964, the Mokelumne River Fish Hatchery in California has supplied the watershed with four to 10 million juvenile Chinook salmon each year. The hatchery began the practice as a way of countering the effects of dams that block migration and making sure that the salmon population remained viable. But recent research shows that the massive influx of hatchery-raised fish is masking the fact that wild fish populations are not holding up. “Without distinguishing hatchery from wild fish, the perception...

Reuters: A new 367 megawatt offshore wind farm opened off the Cumbrian coast in Britain Thursday and will supply up to 320,000 households with renewable power a year, the companies behind the project said. The 1 billion pound ($1.58 billion) Walney wind farm is a joint venture between utilities DONG Energy, SSE and OPW, a consortium of the Dutch pension fund service provider PGGM and Ampere Equity Fund. The companies claim Walney is the world's biggest offshore windfarm, with 102 wind turbines, each...

Xinhua: Climate change is affecting the world's last great unspoiled wilderness of the Antarctic faster than previously thought, according to a New Zealand-led international team of researchers. The scientists, led by Professor Craig Cary, of the University of Waikato, have been studying ecosystems in the continent's Dry Valleys and found that microbial communities in the soil undergo rapid and lasting changes in response to environmental conditions. "We used to think that changes in microbial change...

Reuters: A US federal judge has thrown out an animal rights group's lawsuit accusing SeaWorld of enslaving captive killer whales, ruling that orcas have no standing to seek the same constitutional rights as people. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta) had accused the chain of aquatic theme parks of violating the rights of whales under the 13th amendment of the US constitution, which abolished slavery. The lawsuit, filed in the US district court of San Diego, listed as plaintiffs five performing...

Reuters: U.S. scientists using satellite data have established a more accurate figure of the amount of annual sea level rise from melting glaciers and ice caps which should aid studies on how quickly coastal areas may flood as global warming gathers pace. John Wahr of the University of Colorado in Boulder and colleagues, in a study published on Thursday, found that thinning glaciers and icecaps were pushing up sea levels by 1.5 millimeters (0.06 inches) a year, in line with a 1.2 to 1.8 mm range from other...

Yale Environment 360: A new report released by the administration of Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal projects that the state’s already vulnerable coastline could face 3 feet of sea level rise by the end of the century. Based on current sea rise models, a science panel with the state’s Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority suggests that rising seas and coastal land changes will increasingly expose lowlands to storm surges, with some regions facing as many as 4 feet of sea level rise. Their report, part of ongoing efforts...

Reuters: Blizzards and ice-laden power lines in southeastern Europe pushed gas and electricity networks near to breaking point Wednesday as consumption soared, while some western countries scrambled to prevent similar breakdowns. As electricity cables buckled under the weight of ice and snow in southeastern Bosnia, where some 15,000 customers were left in darkness, Serbia warned of a "possible collapse" of its energy system as record-breaking demand stretched the power grid near its technical limits. ...