In 2024, nearly a million hectares of Ukraine’s land burned. Heat, mines and shelling contributed, but footage of drones targeting firefighters has raised the question of war crimes
Natalia Pryprosta was tending to her pigs when fire swept into the village of Studenok, near the city of Izium in eastern Ukraine. There was no time. She grabbed her papers, pulled her elderly mother into a friend’s car, and tried to get the animals out of the shed. Smoke and the speed of the blaze made it impossible. She didn’t see the animals burning, but learned of their fate later.
Smoke smothered Studenok, turning the village as dark as night. Pryprosta’s neighbours fought the flames with shovels, digging in scorched earth to stop the crown fire’s advance. Firefighters arrived, but the blaze was relentless. At one point, it surged around a fire truck, trapping the crew.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
10/22/2025 - 23:00
10/22/2025 - 22:40
Sussan Ley’s sharp criticism marks a shift for the opposition, which had appeared open to a deal on the bill
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The Albanese government’s second attempt at rewriting federal environmental protection laws is in jeopardy after the Coalition joined the Greens in criticising the proposed changes, leaving Labor without an obvious partner to get it through the Senate.
The opposition leader, Sussan Ley, claimed the nature laws were a “red light” for jobs and a “handbrake” for investment, warning the Coalition would need far more convincing before agreeing to support the plan.
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10/22/2025 - 22:00
Use of wood-burning stoves and fires in homes is mostly unnecessary and their toxic pollution costs the NHS millions
The burning of wood and coal in homes contributes to almost 2,500 deaths a year in the UK, analysis has found. Stopping unnecessary burning would save the NHS more than £54m a year, the experts concluded.
Wood-burning stoves and open fires are one the biggest sources of small pollution particles, which cause heart and lung disease, and their use has risen in recent years. The report also links this toxic air pollution to 3,700 cases of diabetes and 1,500 cases of asthma a year, although the health impacts are likely to be underestimated.
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10/22/2025 - 14:02
US and Qatar say new rules will hinder imports of LNG, posing ‘existential threat’ to European economies
The US has demanded that the European Union roll back its climate and human rights rules in order to allow greater imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG), as the Trump administration approved a controversial gas export hub along the Gulf of Mexico coast.
A letter jointly sent by the US and Qatar, two of the three largest LNG exporters in the world, warned the EU that its new rules pose an “existential threat” to European economies as they would hinder imports of gas from countries such as theirs.
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10/22/2025 - 13:53
Exclusive: Promise to remove almost all fossil fuels from UK’s electricity supply by 2030 may be quietly abandoned over cost
Ministers are considering dropping one of their central green pledges in an effort to keep energy bills down, sources have told the Guardian.
Government insiders say Keir Starmer is prepared to miss his own target of removing almost all fossil fuels from the UK’s electricity supply by 2030 if doing so proves much more expensive than building gas power instead.
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10/22/2025 - 11:19
Transport secretary says updated airports national policy statement (ANPS) will be published by next summer
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Heathrow’s third runway plans will be fast-tracked so Britain can “experience the benefits sooner”, ministers said as they launched a key part of the government process required for the airport’s expansion.
The transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, said work had started on a new airports national policy statement (ANPS), allowing a final decision by the end of this parliament to “realise the government’s ambition” of a runway by 2035.
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10/22/2025 - 09:39
Council had initially defended the fixed-penalty penalty issued to Burcu Yesilyurt near Richmond station
A woman from west London who was fined £150 for pouring the dregs of her morning coffee down a street drain has had the penalty revoked after a council review.
Three enforcement officers stopped Burcu Yesilyurt near Richmond station on 10 October and handed her a fixed-penalty notice on her way to work.
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10/22/2025 - 09:00
LA wildfires and storms this year cost $101bn, new study by non-profit resurrecting work axed by Trump says
The first half of 2025 was the costliest on record for major disasters in the US, driven by huge wildfires in Los Angeles and storms that battered much of the rest of the country, according to a climate non-profit that has resurrected work axed by Donald Trump’s administration that tracked the biggest disasters.
In the first six months of this year, 14 separate weather-related disasters that each caused at least $1bn in damage hit the US, the Climate Central group has calculated. In total, these events cost $101bn in damages – lost homes, businesses, highways and other infrastructure – a toll higher than any other first half of a year since records on this began in 1980.
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10/22/2025 - 08:00
Experts say the administration’s Maha agenda ‘betrays the public’ and doesn’t actually seek to regulate junk food
As health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr has repeatedly blamed industrially manufactured food products for the country’s chronic illness and obesity crises, and urged Americans to limit their consumption of foods with added sugar, salt, fat, dyes and preservatives.
Amid a slew of controversial and unbacked public health claims, his stance on ultra-processed foods is one of his least polarizing. More than 65% of Americans say they are in favor of reforming processed foods to remove added sugars and added dyes, according to a January Associated Press and National Opinion Research Center poll.
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10/22/2025 - 05:00
Data analysis found higher than average migration growth to the US from areas in Guatemala, Bangladesh and Senegal hit by repeated climate disasters
This article was produced in partnership between Columbia Journalism Investigations and Documented.
Mohamed* sat cross-legged on the carpet before Friday afternoon prayers at a mosque in the South Bronx in New York City and shared memories of his crops.
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