While forest advocates had high hopes, the EU parliament voted this week not to declassify woody biomass as a renewable energy source, paving the way for more EU, U.S., and Canadian forests to be turned into wood pellets and burned.
Critics say that “the white rhinos of old-growth forests” in British Columbia are rapidly being felled by timber companies, even as the provincial government largely postpones its 2020 pledge to protect the remaining ancient forests.
A new study conveys a dire warning for the future: multiple tipping points could be triggered if global warming exceeds the critical threshold of 1.5°C. Published this week in Science,…
The death knell of coal has been proclaimed, but policy loopholes in Asia allow for cofired power plants, where coal and wood are combined as fuel. Both fuels produce lots of carbon emissions, but those from wood aren’t counted.
It was a victory for African climate campaigners and their allies in Europe and the United States: a group of powerful countries and institutions including the U.S., Canada and the…
Bangladesh, a least developed country in South Asia, has made remarkable progress in various development sectors over the last few decades. From agricultural production and food security to infrastructural development,…
Indonesia’s planned new capital city on the island of Borneo, Nusantara, is being touted by the government as a "green" city. However, its construction may lead to a surge in…
Environmental regulation runs up against political roadblocks in many nations, but the trend is especially strong in authoritarian countries like Turkey, where weak laws, lack of transparency, and repression are rife.
Iluka Alain was a bit surprised when the two men turned up on a motorcycle in December 2021 in Bofekalasumba, the village where he’s chief in the northwestern Democratic Republic…
The Tongass National Forest in the U.S. state of Alaska is a special place for conservation biologist Dominick DellaSala, even after decades of traveling the world to study temperate rainforests.…
The UK and EU were the primary users of woody biomass for energy. But Japan and South Korea have drastically stepped up their burning of wood pellets — potentially threatening forests, biodiversity, and the climate.
For the first time, a portion of the EU government has challenged the sustainability of burning forest biomass to make energy, a controversial policy pushed by the forestry industry but condemned by environmentalists.
A new book by Wake Smith, “Pandora’s Toolbox,” explores controversial ideas for artificially cooling the planet. Smith discusses the hopes and hazards of geoengineering in an exclusive Mongabay interview.
Japan and South Korea are increasingly burning biomass, such as wood pellets, to make energy, with potentially adverse impacts on the global climate, deforestation and biodiversity.
Current pledges to cut emissions won’t be enough to slow climate change, according to a new report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). U.N. Secretary-General António…
Organizations in the Malaysian state of Sabah have filed a complaint with the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples about a once-secretive deal aimed at locking up…
The rate at which carbon escaped from the deforestation of tropical forests more than doubled in the first two decades of the 21st century, according to new research. Earlier assessments…
The EU remains committed to burning forests to make energy, despite conclusive scientific evidence of its climate destabilizing impacts. In a new strategy, forest advocates plan to take the EU to court to fight that policy.
Climate change is endangering the health of the planet, humanity, and the species and ecosystems that anchor life on Earth, according to a report released Feb. 28 by the Intergovernmental…
On the border of northern Nevada and southeastern Oregon sits a caldera that formed around 16 million years ago through the collapse of a super volcano’s lava dome. Its formation…
An agreement for the rights to the natural capital covering 2 million hectares (4.9 million acres) in Malaysian Borneo for the next 100 years “in its present form is legally…
After a disappointing track record over the past two decades, carbon credit markets are back in style. Also known as “offsets,” carbon credits are having a renewed moment, as corporations…
Achieving net-zero carbon emissions by the middle of the century was one of the goals of the COP26 U.N. climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, last November. Guyana claims to have…
Recovering Together, Recovering Stronger. Indonesia adopted this tagline when it took over the rotating chair of the club of the world’s 20 largest advanced and emerging economies, the Group of…
KWALE COUNTY, Kenya — More than 20 years ago, along the lush southeastern coast of Kenya, the area known as Vanga Bay was home to a mangrove forest spanning 4,428…
Movement is a way of life among the Kel Tamasheq of northern Mali. Living near Timbuktu, the transhumance traditions of this branch of nomadic Tuaregs (or Touaregs) who speak Tamasheq have…
Update Feb. 10, 2022: Sabah's attorney general says the consent of Indigenous communities is required for this agreement to move forward. Read the update here. Adrian Lasimbang, an Indigenous leader in…
At least 12,500 tonnes of wood came from rainforest species considered threatened by the Brazilian Forestry Service (SFB).
When China announced, in late September, that it would stop financing the construction of new coal plants overseas, Indonesia looked to be one of the most impacted countries. The Southeast…
In one of the largest and most spontaneous protests in post-apartheid South Africa, thousands of people gathered on the country’s eastern coastal beaches last Sunday to voice their dissent against…
