Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Researchers have launched the first coordinated plan to protect microbial biodiversity, calling attention to the “invisible 99% of life” that drives essential Earth systems. The IUCN has formally recognized this effort through the creation of the Microbial Conservation Specialist Group. By developing new metrics, policies, and restoration tools, scientists aim to make microbial life a core part of global conservation action. The roadmap also outlines upcoming goals such as microbial hotspot maps and new microbe-based conservation solutions.

UN secretary-general António Guterres earlier used speech at Belem summit to urge countries to find compromises in final hours of negotiations Inside the halls of Cop30 you see people from all around the world, and it can be easy to forget that there are many people who remain unrepresented. On Thursday morning, Magne Tony was standing with compatriots from French Guiana outside the entrance to the conference centre, trying to push pieces of paper into the hands of arriving delegates and observers headed: “Our Amazon is dying”. The main problem is that France are in 9,000 kilometres from Amazonia, from South America, and they’re taking decisions. [But] they don’t really know what is the problem really. They’re taking the decisions from their own mind and the problem is that they’re far from reality. That’s why we decided to alert the people in the world about [our] problems: water coming up, getting enough to eat, more heat – in some parts of French Guiana, people don’t have water. These crises, a consequence of Western capitalist madness, primarily affect the most vulnerable: women and communities dependent on forests and rivers. But they also concern all of humanity: French Guiana is part of the Amazon, a regulator of the global climate and essential to planetary balance. We remind you that French Guiana is the last colony in South America without self-determination. We will not be able to protect our environment or guarantee our food and energy self-sufficiency, essential for our collective survival, as long as decisions are made in Paris without consulting the affected communities or taking into account local specificities. Continue reading...

Experts fear plan, one of many attempts Trump’s made to dismantle wildlife protection, will speed up extinction crisis The Trump administration presented a new plan to roll back regulations in the Endangered Species Act (ESA) on Wednesday, a move experts fear will accelerate the extinction crisis if adopted. The proposed changes would allow the federal government more power to weigh economic impact against habitat designations, remove safeguards against future events – including the impacts from the climate crisis – and rescind the “blanket rule” that automatically grants threatened species the same protections as those designated as endangered. Continue reading...

Study finds rising seas could flood facilities handling waste, sewage, and oil and gas – and coastal states most at risk More than 5,500 toxic sites nationwide could face coastal flooding by 2100 due to rising sea levels, according to new research. The study, published on Thursday in Nature Communications and led by scientists at the University of California, warns that if heat-trapping pollution continues unabated, rising seas will flood a wide range of hazardous facilities including those handling sewage, toxic waste, oil and gas, as well as other industrial pollutants. Continue reading...