Potential outcomes on 1.5C, climate finance, adaptation funding, loss and damage, World Bank reform and African gas
Participants attend the Cop27 climate summit in Egypt’s Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.Photograph: Mohammed Salem/Reuters
Fiona Harveyin Sharm el-SheikhWed 9 Nov 2022 02.00 EST
Meeting the target of limiting heating to 1.5C
At Cop26 in Glasgow,countries agreed to limit global heating to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. The pledges on emissions cuts they came forward with were not enough to meet this goal, however, so they agreed to return this year with strengthened commitments. Few have done so – only 24 submitted new national plans on emissions to the UN in advance of Cop27.
Likelihood:0/5
Verdict:There will not be enough progress here to meet the 1.5C goal, but there is a baby step forward – the UN estimates that the improved plans that have been submitted will…
Colville, Washington is like a lot of bare-knuckle Western towns, with dusty pickups parked at family businesses, government agencies stabilizing the boombust ranch-and-timber economy, and a string of fast-food franchises along U.S. Highway 395 that heads north to Canada. It’s the late general season for deer this week in northeast Washington, but this year hunters aren’t seeing nearly as many elk or pine-ridge whitetails as usual.
They mostly blamewolvesthat have moved into this rural corner of Washington over the past decade and the increasing number of cougars that are no longer staying way out in the Colville National Forest. Instead, lions have been coming closer to town, following the scarcity of…
Nelson, WI(KROC-AM News)-A young hunter from Wabasha was airlifted from a Wisconsin property he was hunting at after he fell from his tree stand over the weekend.
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The Buffalo County Sheriff’s Office says deputies were dispatched to the property east of Wabasha shortly after 1 p.m. Sunday. A news release indicates 16-year-old Garret Pavelka told first responders he fell about 20 feet after a limb he was holding while climbing into the stand broke off of the tree.
SAN MIGUEL COUNTY, Colo. — A man from California who failed to return to his group after going hunting in southwestern Colorado was found dead Saturday morning.
TheSan Miguel County Sheriff’s Officesaid the 64-year-old left his group of family and friends Friday afternoon with plans to return to them at their campsite in the Dry Creek Basin area outside of Norwood around sunset.
When he didn’t return, the group conducted a search but didn’t find him. They called dispatch at 5 a.m. Saturday and while deputies and search and rescue crews were preparing to search for him, the group resumed their own search and found the man dead…
Chad M. McCullough, 34, of Franklin, Ga. was sentenced Friday in federal court in Lincoln to two years’ probation, a $5,000 fine and $4,000 in restitution for transporting ill-gotten game out of state.
Acting U.S. Attorney Steven Russell sai, McCullough connected with Noble Outdoors in October 2020 for an archery mule deer hunt. Noble is a commercial big game guide and outfitter in North Platte.
During the hunt, McCullough unlawfully shot a mule deer in Lincoln County and subsequently transported trophy parts to Georgia for taxidermy service, Russell said.
It is the third federal sentencing involving defendants and violations by Noble Outdoors and its owner, associates, and clients, Russell said.
Russell said in the fall of 2020, McCullough traveled to Noble Outdoors with two hunting partners to hunt mule deer during the…
LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) – A Georgia hunter was sentenced in federal court on Friday for illegally shooting a mule deer in Lincoln County in 2020.
Chad McCullough, 34, of Georgia violated the Lacey Act when he took parts of the deer to Georgia to be taxidermized.
The Lacey Act bans the trafficking of wildlife or plants that were illegally taken, possessed or sold.
Officials determined that in October 2020, McCullough traveled to Nobel Outdoors, a commercial big game business in North Platte, with two other hunting partners.
The group was going to go on an archery mule deer hunt.
During the hunt, McCullough shot the deer with a rifle while in the…
W.Va. Natural Resources Police reported a Randolph County man was charged after officers found a baited blind and live trap in Monongahela National Forest. (WCHS)
RANDOLPH COUNTY, W.Va. (WCHS) —A Randolph County man is facing multiple charges after officers located a baited blind and live trap within the Monongahela National Forest.
A hunter was apprehended and charged with baiting and feeding wildlife on public land, trapping during the closed season and using untagged traps, according to a social media post from West Virginia Natural Resources Police shared Saturday.
The post said the man was warned for abandoning property, failure to make daily checks of traps, cutting or damaging trees and littering.
This commentary is by Brenna Galdenzi of Stowe, president of Protect Our Wildlife.
The recreational trapping season in Vermont started on Oct. 22 and runs through March 31. This includes the use of baited steel-jawed leghold and body-gripping kill traps, as well as cage traps that are set underwater that drown multiple animals at once.
Traps inflict tremendous fear and suffering upon the trapped animals who are, all too often, not even killed humanely. Drowning, bludgeoning and strangling are all legal methods of killing trapped animals in Vermont. Not surprisingly, Vermont trappers have fought recent efforts to restrict the method of kill to gunshot only.
Traps not only injure, but also maim and kill their intended victims; untold numbers of non-targeted animals like owls, eagles and even turtles are caught every year. They are cavalierly referred to by trappers and Vermont Fish &…
Report at Cop27 shows the world is now deep into the climate emergency, with the 1.5C heating limit ‘barely within reach’
Forest fires approach the village of Pefki on Evia, Greece’s second-largest island, in August during the worst heatwave in decades.Photograph: Angelos Tzortzinis/AFP/Getty Images
The past eight years were the eight hottest ever recorded, a new UN report has found, indicating the world is now deep into the climate crisis. The internationally agreed 1.5C limit for global heating is now “barely within reach”, it said.
The report, by the UN’sWorld Meteorological Organization(WMO), sets out how record high greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are driving sea level and ice melting to new highs and supercharging extreme weather from Pakistan to Puerto Rico.
The stark assessment was published on the opening day of the UN’sCop27climate summit in…
A deep-sea batfish. (Ben Healley/Museums Victoria)
From fish on stilts to creatures of ooze, the strange denizens of the deep uncovered during investigations of two new marine parks located 2,500 kilometers (about 1,500 miles) off Australia’s western coast were a dream come true for researchers.
Even before the expedition departed on 30 September 2022, Museums Victoria (MV) senior curator of marine invertebrates Tim O’Hara anticipated a discovery or two would be made.
“We know the region is covered with massive seamounts formed during the dinosaur era and we know the region sits at a critical juncture between the Pacific and Indian Oceans,” O’Hara said.
“We are really excited about the prospect of discovering new species, perhaps even new branches of the tree of life, which until now have remained hidden beneath the waves in this unexplored region.”
On their way to the new marine park territories that will protect 740,000 square kilometers (about 285,000 square miles) of ocean around Cocos Keeling and Christmas Islands, researchers observed a dazzling array of winged fishes casting themselves into the air.
These animals risk being snapped up by hungry seabirds to escape larger fish, Australian Museum Research Institute fish biologist Yi-Kai Tea explained in a blog post about the voyage.
Using sonar, teams on the research vessel (RV) Investigator mapped the seabed over 35 days of exploration on their 13,000 kilometer voyage, uncovering ancient sea mountains, volcanic cones, canyons and ridges. The extinct volcanoes formed 140 to 50 million years ago.
The sonar revealed Cocos Keeling Islands were twin peaks of a massive sea mountain rising nearly 5,000 meters from the sea floor. A third submerged peak was also identified, 350 meters below sea level.
The crew reported collecting a big treasure haul of species after sampling habitats with small trawl nets from 60 meters down to a depth of 5,500 meters below the surface.
O’Hara estimates up to one-third of these species may be new to science. This includes a potentially new type of blind cusk eel, with loose, gooey see-through skin.
A blind cusk eel. (Ben Healley/Museums Victoria)
“These fish have really reduced eyes. In fact, if you see the picture you’ll find they’re like little golden depressions in the skin. They’ve got really loose, flabby, gelatinous skin and they’re incredibly rare,” MV senior collections manager Dianne Bray told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
Then there is the adorable deep-sea batfish, which looks like a bit of limbed, well-cooked ravioli with a ‘please love me’ expression on its tiny face. This odd little creature shuffles its way along the seabed on stubby little fin-legs with big ‘feet’.
Deep-sea batfish. (Ben Healley/Museums Victoria)
“These are tiny little anglerfish relatives … they’ve got a tiny little lure that sits in a depression on their snout that they can actually move to attract prey and they essentially walk over the floor on their modified arms and legs,” Bray explains.
Another fish was caught anchored to the ground with bizarrely elongated stilt-fins, with which it can hover effortlessly just above the seafloor, waiting to pounce on unsuspecting prey below.
Once the vessel returns to the mainland, the sampled creatures will be studied by taxonomists who specialize in different animal groups to confirm their identity or describe new species, using DNA extracted from the animals as a vital source of information.
“The research outcomes from this voyage will be invaluable to our understanding of Australia’s deep-sea environments and the impact humans are having on them,” explained MV CEO Lynley Crosswell.
You can catch the latest from this and other RV Investigator expeditions here.
A deep-sea batfish. (Ben Healley/Museums Victoria)
