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Experts say the state’s approach could provide a template for what can be achieved elsewhere

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Eight years ago, South Australia’s renewable energy future was in doubt as an extraordinary statewide blackout saw recriminations flow.

On 28 September 2016, a catastrophic weather event sent the entire state into system black. Around 4pm, some 850,000 homes and businesses lost power as supercell thunderstorms and destructive winds – some travelling up to 260km/h – crumpled transmission towers, causing three major power lines to trip.

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The problem: a fence that protects eastern quolls threatens long-necked turtles in Booderee national park at Jervis Bay. The solution? Turtle tunnels. Nine water-filled tunnels were built beneath a 82-hectare fence that surrounds the botanic gardens which keep out feral predators, providing a safe passage for the reptiles to go between watering holes. Over a period of 123 days, conservationists recorded 73 successful instances of the turtles using the tunnels

• ‘A symbol of our nation’: waratah among 20 more species added to Australia’s threatened wildlife list

Burning with unquenchable resentment, Restore Trust is making another attempt at taking over the institution

The leaves are starting to change and there’s autumnal coolth in the air. Which means that the opaquely funded private organisation called Restore Trust is once again making its annual attempt to take over one of the country’s most successful and best-loved institutions, the National Trust. Burning with unquenchable resentment about a 2020 report that truthfully stated that Winston Churchill opposed Indian independence; armed with inflated stories about mushroom bans, cancelled Easters and vote-rigging; and furious about a single disco ball in one room of one of the National Trust’s 230 historic houses, Restore Trust has once again put up a slate of candidates for the National Trust’s council, with a view to turning their grievances into policy. If you’re a member of the National Trust, and you’d rather not see it turned into a platform for an angry minority, vote now for its recommended candidates.

Big River Watch scheme asks general public to help monitor state of rivers after years of deregulation

Rivers will be checked for sewage and other pollution by the general public this month in an attempt to assess the health of British waterways.

Cuts to the UK regulators and a change in the law to allow water company self-monitoring of pollution in England mean there is little independent monitoring of the state of rivers in the UK.

This year will more than likely end up the warmest humanity has measured, reports European climate service

Summer 2024 sweltered to Earth’s hottest on record, making it even more likely that this year will end up as the warmest humanity has measured, the European climate service Copernicus reported on Friday.

And if this sounds familiar, that’s because the records the globe shattered were set just last year as human-caused climate change, with a temporary boost from an El Niño, keeps dialing up temperatures and extreme weather, scientists said.

Activists says EU court ruling on transparency makes mockery of laws to protect the environment

Campaigners have said that the EU is failing to enforce rules on illegal fishing, and allowing member states to conceal information that could help uncover breaches of fishing law.

The court of justice of the EU ruled on Thursday that member states could keep vital details of their implementation of fishing rules under wraps, in a blow to environmental campaigners hoping to use the information to show whether the regulations are working.

Our study links urbanisation, particularly the increase in built infrastructure and the loss of green space, to a decline in the bird communities we find most attractive

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The birds that fill our mornings with songs and our parks and gardens with colour are disappearing from our cities, our new study has found.

We examined 82 bird species across 42 landscape types in Brisbane. The range of landscapes encompassed parks, bushland reserves, and industrial and residential areas.

The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world

The third edition of Yeast looks at how human food consumption and production affects the social sphere and contributes to climate catastrophe

• Yeast photo festival: From Planet to Plate, is in Matino and Salento, Italy, from 19 September to 3 November

Because bats feed on crop pests, their disappearance led to a surge in pesticide use. Research found a rise in infant mortality in areas where the bats had been wiped out

In 2006, a deadly fungus started killing bat colonies across the United States. Now, an environmental economist has linked their loss to the deaths of more than 1,300 children.

The study, published in Science on Thursday, found that farmers dramatically increased pesticide use after the bat die-offs, which was in turn linked to an average infant mortality increase of nearly 8%. Unusually, the research suggests a causative link between human and bat wellbeing.

Enthusiasts discovered Norfolk snout, thought to have died out in the UK in 1971, in their garden

The Norfolk snout was always a rare moth in Britain. By the late 1960s, populations of this small beige moth with a distinctive protuberant “nose” had dwindled to just one site – a working quarry in north-west Norfolk.

Bad weather or possibly over-collecting by a few zealots meant that the moth, which has a 20mm wingspan, became extinct in Britain in 1971.

Dusky sea snake was placed on threatened species list this week and is known only to exist on a small number of reefs off the Kimberley coastline

Conservation scientists advising the federal government have called for fossil fuel activity in the location of Woodside’s proposed multibillion gas project to be urgently reviewed to protect the stronghold of an endangered sea snake.

The dusky sea snake, Aipysurus fuscus, was placed on the country’s threatened species list this week and is known only to exist on a small number of reefs off the Western Australia Kimberley coastline.

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Experts urge Australia not to delay target too long as report by Climate Change Authority identifies six barriers to net zero

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The Australian government may delay the announcement of a 2035 climate target until after the February deadline and beyond the next election, in part due to uncertainty about the ramifications of the US presidential election.

Some big emitting countries are lagging in developing their 2035 emissions reduction targets, which under the Paris climate agreement are due before the UN climate summit in Belém, Brazil, in November next year.

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The Climate Change Authority’s sector pathways review says a huge national effort is needed and the net zero goal should become front of mind for business, investors and governments

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A zero-carbon mindset must “become the new normal” in Australia, according to a much-anticipated report from the federal government’s independent climate advisory body.

The report, released today by the Climate Change Authority, describes how Australia can meet the crucial target of net zero emissions by 2050.

CEOs in England and Wales could face two years in prison under proposals to force firms to supply data quickly

Water bosses in England and Wales could be jailed for up to two years if they cover up sewage dumping, under legislation proposed by the Labour government.

At the moment, CEOs of water companies face fines for failing to comply with investigations by the Environment Agency (EA) and the Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI), but there have been just three such fines since privatisation three decades ago.

Scheme helping people in England connect with nature led to better mental health, report finds

A major scheme helping people in England connect with nature led to big improvements in mental health, a report has found.

The prescribing of activities in nature to tackle mental ill health has benefited thousands of people across England, a government-backed project has shown.

Footage shows Danish police apprehending the activist Greta Thunberg at a Gaza war protest. Six demonstrators were detained at the scene, at the University of Copenhagen, after about 20 people blocked the entrance to a building and three entered, a police spokesperson told Reuters

• Greta Thunberg arrested at Gaza war protest in Copenhagen

Dialogue with green groups results in agreement on ‘urgent, ambitious and feasible’ reforms in agriculture

Europe’s food and farming lobbies have recognised the need to eat less meat after hammering out a shared vision for the future of agriculture with green groups and other stakeholders.

The wide-ranging report calls for “urgent, ambitious and feasible” change in farm and food systems and acknowledges that Europeans eat more animal protein than scientists recommend. It says support is needed to rebalance diets toward plant-based proteins such as better education, stricter marketing and voluntary buyouts of farms in regions that intensively rear livestock.

In his new book, the professor says nuclear is costly, risky and takes too long to scale up. Can he win over converts?

You’d be forgiven for thinking that the debate on nuclear power is pretty much settled. Sure, there are still some naysayers, but most reasonable people have come to realise that in an age of climate crisis, we need low-carbon nuclear energy – alongside wind and solar power – to help us transition away from fossil fuels. In 2016, 400 reactors were operating across 31 countries, with one estimate suggesting roughly the same number in operation in mid-2023, accounting for 9.2% of global commercial gross electricity generation. But what if this optimism were in fact wrong, and nuclear power can never live up to its promise? That is the argument MV Ramana, a physicist, makes in his new book. He says nuclear is costly, dangerous and takes too long to scale up. Nuclear, the work’s title reads, is not the solution.

This wasn’t the book Ramana, a professor at the University of British Columbia, planned to write. The problems with nuclear are so “obvious”, he wagered, they don’t need to be spelled out. But with the guidance of his editor, he realised his mistake. Even in the contemporary environmental movement, which emerged alongside the anti-war and anti-nuclear movements, there are converts. Prominent environmentalists, understandably desperate about the climate crisis, believe it is rational and reasonable to support nuclear power as part of our energy mix.

Climate activist one of six detained by police after students block university building in Danish capital

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Danish police have arrested the environmental activist Greta Thunberg in Copenhagen at a protest against the war in Gaza, a spokesperson for the student group organising the demonstration has said.

Six people had been detained on Wednesday at the University of Copenhagen after 20 people blocked the entrance to a building and three entered, a police spokesperson said.