While we work towards net zero, we also need to adapt. And we can pay for cooling measures like splash pads and trees by taxing the worst polluters
There’s a lot to be anxious about as a new parent, let alone in a heatwave when the thermometer in your one-year-old daughter’s room is reading 26C. That’s six degrees higher than the upper limit of the recommended temperature for a child’s room. After scrolling my phone for advice on how to cool her room, I couldn’t help waking up every few hours to check she was OK on the baby monitor.
In the UK, we are unprepared at every level for the extreme weather caused by climate breakdown. Whether it’s unbearably hot buildings in the summer, our damp and cold homes (some of the leakiest in Europe) filled with mould in the winter, our unprotected towns built on flood plains, or our unfit-for-purpose train tracks that get shut down at the slightest weather warning, the climate crisis is already wreaking havoc on public and private infrastructure – and it’s only getting worse.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
07/06/2025 - 02:00
07/05/2025 - 15:00
Activating real civic resilience could be a KPI for the prime minister’s progressive patriotism, rather than spending billions more on big, shiny machines
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Australians have long taken some comfort in the protection afforded by geography and the tyranny of distance. It was an article of faith that Australia would have 10 years warning to prepare for any conflict, and that the nation the defence minister calls our capital-A ally would spring to our defence.
The 10-year buffer was debunked in the 2020 defence review, and the update two years later concluded that the Australian Defence Force “as currently constituted and equipped is not fully fit for purpose”.
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07/05/2025 - 07:00
Following the destruction from 2010’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill, an anti-drilling coalition took action with HB 1143 – and got it signed by DeSantis
The giant and catastrophic Deepwater Horizon oil spill, also known as the BP oil spill, didn’t reach Apalachicola Bay in 2010, but the threat of oil reaching this beautiful and environmentally valuable stretch of northern Florida’s Gulf coast was still enough to devastate the region’s economy.
The Florida state congressman Jason Shoaf remembers how the threat affected the bay.
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07/05/2025 - 06:00
Climate change, development, labor shortages and tariffs are making life the pits for the state’s cherry farmers
Nearly 100 years ago, north-west Michigan cherry farmers and Traverse City community leaders started a festival to promote the city and their region’s tart cherry crop as a tourist destination.
Now known as the “cherry capital of the world”, Traverse City’s National Cherry Festival draws 500,000 visitors over eight days to this picturesque Lake Michigan beach town to enjoy carnival rides and airshows, and to eat cherries. It also sparked a thriving agrotourism industry amid its rolling hills that now boasts dozens of shops, wineries, U-pick orchards, and farm-to-table restaurants helmed by James Beard-award-winning chefs.
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07/05/2025 - 03:15
Girls from Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp along the Guadalupe River, are still missing, says city manager. This blog is now closed.
We have more from the Associated Press on Camp Mystic, the all-girls Christian summer camp from which up to 25 people are missing.
Chloe Crane, a teacher and former Camp Mystic counsellor, said her heart broke when a fellow teacher shared an email from the camp about the missing girls.
At least 24 people have died and up to 25 people are missing after torrential rain caused flash floods along the Guadalupe River in Texas on Friday.
Rescue teams are searching for the people who were attending the Christian all-girls Camp Mystic summer camp just outside the town of Kerrville 104km (64 miles) north-west of San Antonio.
As of Friday night, emergency personnel had rescued or evacuated 237 people, including 167 by helicopter, Reuters reports.
The Texas Division of Emergency Management had 14 helicopters and hundreds of emergency workers, as well as drones, involved in search-and-rescue operations.
A month’s worth of heavy rain fell in a matter of hours. In less than an hour the river rose 26 feet (7.9m) in what Kerr county sheriff’s office called “catastrophic flooding”.
The flooding swept away mobile homes, vehicles and holiday cabins where people were spending the 4 July weekend, the BBC said.
A state of emergency has been declared in several counties.
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday, US President Donald Trump said, “We’ll take care of them,” when asked about federal aid for the disaster.
Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly, the top local elected official, said a disaster of such magnitude was unforeseen. “We had no reason to believe this was going to be anything like what’s happened here,” he said. “None whatsoever.”
More rain is expected in the state, including around Waco, and flooding is anticipated downriver from Kerr county.
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World Ocean Explorer Wins Gold Medal Serious Simulation Award from Serious Play Annual International Competition
10/26/2023 - 14:35
For Immediate Release October 19, 2023
Sedgwick, Maine USA World Ocean Explorer, a 3D virtual aquarium and educational simulation, was recently cited for excellence, winning a Gold Medal Award in the 2023 International Serious Play Awards Program.
World Ocean Explorer is an innovative 3D virtual aquarium designed for educational exploration of the world’s oceans. With interactive exhibits and a lobby space, visitors can immerse themselves in realistic marine environments, including a DEEP SEA exhibit funded by Schmidt Ocean Institute, showcasing unprecedented deep-sea discoveries off Australia. Targeted at 3rd graders and beyond, this immersive experience offers a range of perspectives on the ocean environment and can be explored through guided tours or user-controlled interfaces. Visit DEEP SEA at worldoceanexplorer.org/deep-sea-aquarium.html.
Serious Play Conference brings together professionals who are exploring the use of game-based learning, sharing their experience, and working together to shape the future of training and education. For more information on Serious Play Award Program visit seriousplayconf.com/international-serious-play-award-programs.
World Ocean Explorer is a transformative virtual aquarium designed to deepen understanding of the world ocean and amplify connection for young people worldwide. Organized around the principles of Ocean Literacy and the Next Gen Science Standards, World Ocean Explorer brings the wonder and knowledge of ocean species and systems to students in formal and informal classrooms, absolutely free to anyone with a good Internet connection. As an advocate for the ocean through communications, World Ocean Observatory believes there is no better investment in the future of the sustainable ocean than through a new approach to educational engagement that excites, informs, and motivates students to explore the wonders of our marine world and to understand the pervasive connection and implication for our future, inherent in the protection and conservation of all aspects of our ocean world.
World Ocean Explorer presents an astonishing 3-dimensional simulated aquarium visit, organized to reveal the wonders of undersea life, with layers of detailed data and information to augment the emotional connection made to the astonishing beauty and complexity of the dynamic ocean. Within each of the virtual exhibits, students visit exemplary theme-based sites with myriad opportunities to understand the larger perspectives of scientific knowledge as organized and visualized to dramatize the impact and change on ocean life as a result of natural and human-generated events. Through immersion among displays, mixed media and 3D models, the experience of an aquarium visit will be brought into classrooms or home school environments as a free, accessible, always available opportunity for teaching and learning. All of this will be available to a world audience without physical limitation or cost. World Ocean Explorer, a project of the World Ocean Observatory, receives support from the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, Visual Solutions Lab, the Climate Change Institute, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, and The Fram Museum Oslo. To learn more about the current and future exhibits of World Ocean Explorer, visit worldoceanexplorer.org.
media contact
Trisha Badger, Managing Director, World Ocean Observatory | director@thew2o.net +12077011069
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