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Categories: Geoscience: Environmental Issues, Geoscience: Landslides
Published What really matters in multi-story building design?


The impact of multi-story building design considerations on embodied carbon emissions, cost, and operational energy has been revealed.
Published At least 80% of the world's most important sites for biodiversity on land currently contain human developments


At least 80% of sites identified as being internationally important for biodiversity on land currently contain infrastructure -- of which more than 75% contain roads. In the future, more sites that are important for biodiversity could contain powerplants, mines and oil and gas infrastructure.
Published Closed loop for circular economy: New polymer recycling strategy ensures both high stability and complete recyclability


Large amounts of plastic waste are incinerated or deposited in landfills. This degrades the environment and depletes valuable resources. In this light, recycling plastics such as polymers is promising. However, recycling diminishes their quality. Recently, researchers have proposed a 'closed-loop' recycling process based on polymer microparticles. It produces fully recyclable polymer films with high mechanical stability and fracture energy, which they retain upon recycling.
Published New wood-based technology removes 80% of dye pollutants in wastewater


Researchers have developed a new method that can easily purify contaminated water using a cellulose-based material. This discovery could have implications for countries with poor water treatment technologies and combat the widespread problem of toxic dye discharge from the textile industry.
Published Without this, plants cannot respond to temperature


Scientists have significantly advanced the race to control plant responses to temperature on a rapidly warming planet. Key to this breakthrough is miRNA, a molecule nearly 200,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair.
Published Genome of a drought-tolerant plant: Many genes are involved in 'resurrection'


Some plants can survive months without water, only to turn green again after a brief downpour. A recent study shows that this is not due to a 'miracle gene.' Rather, this ability is a consequence of a whole network of genes, almost all of which are also present in more vulnerable varieties.
Published Drought, heat waves worsen West Coast air pollution inequality


A new study found drought and heat waves could make air pollution worse for communities that already have a high pollution burden in California, and deepen pollution inequalities along racial and ethnic lines. The study also found financial penalties for power plants can significantly reduce people's pollution exposure, except during severe heat waves.
Published Global experts propose a path forward in generating clean power from waste energy


Scientists have created a comprehensive 'roadmap' to guide global efforts to convert waste energy into clean power.
Published Road noise makes your blood pressure rise -- literally


If you live near a busy road you might feel like the constant sound of roaring engines, honking horns and wailing sirens makes your blood pressure rise. Now a new study confirms it can do exactly that.
Published Towards reducing biodiversity loss in fragmented habitats


By combining lab experiments and mathematical modelling, researchers have found a way to predict the movement of species that could guide conservation efforts to reconnect fragmented habitats.
Published New water treatment zaps 'forever chemicals' for good


Engineers have developed a new water treatment that removes 'forever chemicals' from drinking water safely, efficiently -- and for good.
Published Sea ice will soon disappear from the Arctic during the summer months -- and it has happened before


In a new study, an international team of researchers warn that the Arctic Sea ice may soon be a thing of the past in the summer months. This may have consequences for both the climate and ecosystems. Ten thousand years ago, the ice melted at temperatures similar to those we have today.
Published Mercury emission estimates rarely provide enough data to assess success in eliminating harmful global gold mining practice


A global treaty called the Minamata Convention requires gold-mining countries to regularly report the amount of toxic mercury that miners are using to find and extract gold, designed to help nations gauge success toward at least minimizing a practice that produces the world's largest amount of manmade mercury pollution.
Published Next epidemic could be spotted early in wastewater



Researchers behind the UK's first pilot public health surveillance system based on analysis of wastewater say that routine monitoring at sewage treatment works could provide a powerful early warning system for the next flu or norovirus epidemic, alerting hospitals to prepare and providing public health agencies with vital health information.
Published New invention: The oxygen-ion battery


An oxygen-ion-battery has been invented, based on ceramic materials. If it degrades, it can be regenerated, therefore it potentially has an extremely long lifespan. Also, it does not require any rare elements and it is incombustible. For large energy storage systems, this could be an optimal solution.
Published Researchers get to the 'bottom' of how beetles use their butts to stay hydrated


Beetles are champions at surviving in extremely dry environments. In part, this property is due to their ability to suck water from the air with their rear ends. A new study explains just how. Beyond helping to explain how beetles thrive in environments where few other animals can survive, the knowledge could eventually be used for more targeted and delicate control of global pests such as the grain weevil and red flour beetle.
Published New animal welfare scoring system could enable better-informed food and farming choices


Scientists have come up with a system of measuring animal welfare that enables reliable comparison across different types of pig farming.
Published The devil is in the details: Re-imagining fertilizer precursor synthesis


Researchers have improved the Faradaic efficiency of the nitrogen reduction reaction into ammonia by straightforward optimization of chemical process parameters. They found that trace water was the probable source of the high selectivity by facilitating incorporation of lithium oxide into the solid electrolyte interphase. These findings will also aid optimization of other analogous reactions, and thus help the chemicals industry optimize the sustainability of one of the most carbon-intensive reactions globally.
Published Synthesis gas and battery power from sunlight energy


Plants use photosynthesis to harvest energy from sunlight. Now researchers have applied this principle as the basis for developing new sustainable processes which in the future may produce syngas (synthetic gas) for the large-scale chemical industry and be able to charge batteries.
Published Human and ocean health impacts of ocean plastics


Researchers from the fields of healthcare, ocean science, and social science have collaborated to quantify plastic's considerable risks to all life on Earth. The Minderoo-Monaco Commission on Plastics and Human Health report presents a comprehensive analysis showing plastics as a hazard at every stage of their life cycle.