Vast journeys, among world’s great wonders, found to be under threat as freshwater fish populations crash by 81%
“It’s very hard to imagine what’s going on beneath the water when you look at a river – but you have billions of fish making these epic migrations, some of the largest animal migrations on Earth,” said Dr Zeb Hogan, at the University of Nevada in the US.
The longest migration of any freshwater fish species is that of the dorado catfish, which makes a migration of 7,000 miles (11,000km), from spawning in the foothills of the Andes to feeding in the Amazon estuary and back again. The silver-gold fish themselves were incredible, said Hogan: “They get to about 2 metres long.”
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
03/24/2026 - 05:40
Fintech company’s profits leap to £1.7bn as it gears up for US push after getting UK banking licence this month
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The UK banking app Revolut has said it could face a backlash over its support for energy-intensive sectors such as crypto and AI, as it posted a 57% increase in profits for last year.
The fintech, which can now launch as a fully fledged UK bank after a five-year wait for regulatory approval, warned in its 2025 annual report that such activities posed a “reputational risk”.
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03/24/2026 - 04:32
Ed Miliband says only clean power will provide ‘energy sovereignty’ amid opposition calls for oil and gas expansion
UK politics live – latest updates
Ministers have said expanding North Sea drilling would put the UK at further risk from volatile fossil fuel markets, amid calls from the Conservatives and some Labour MPs to breach the manifesto pledge of no new oil and gas licences.
The energy minister Michael Shanks said the UK was “learning the right lessons from this conflict so that we’re not exposed to fossil fuels in the same way again, because this isn’t the first time that households across the country have paid the price of our exposure to gas”.
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03/24/2026 - 04:00
The fishery is regulated but experts say it is wrecking the food chain. Gordon Peake joined a Sea Shepherd mission to observe the giant ships compete for catch
It is bitterly cold on the deck of the Allankay and the bosun, Luca Massari, is checking that none of us are wearing contact lenses before we descend into Antarctic waters. There is a risk, he warns, that lenses will freeze solid over the eyes. Massari himself is prepared for his surroundings. He is wearing thick goggles that make him look like an Olympic ski jumper.
Massari is a burly, heavily tattooed veteran of the environmental organisation Sea Shepherd, which campaigns against exploitating the oceans. His deck team are preparing to launch the ship’s small boat, which Massari will helm. Eight of us are bundled in bright red dry suits, helmets and lifejackets; the average time to survive hypothermia in this wind-whipped water is just five minutes.
The Allankay sailed to Coronation Island from New Zealand to document the krill fishing. Photograph: Alice Bacou/Sea Shepherd
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03/24/2026 - 01:00
When James Prescott Joule lent his name to a unit of energy, he could not have foreseen today’s alarming calculations
The primary unit of climate collapse is the zettajoule. If you have never heard of this term, you are not alone. Even scientists who work on a planetary scale struggle to relate the immensity of the change measured by this titanic unit of energy.
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03/24/2026 - 01:00
Declan Conlon will argue officials have failed to act despite clear evidence of the ecological collapse of Lough Neagh
An eel fisher is to argue at the high court in Belfast that the authorities have allowed the ecological collapse of Lough Neagh by failing to take action over pollution.
Declan Conlon, whose family have for generations fished the inland lake in Northern Ireland that once hosted the largest wild eel fishery in Europe, is seeking to take a judicial review against the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (Daera). He will argue the department has failed to act against polluters despite clear evidence of the ecological collapse of the lake.
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03/23/2026 - 20:32
Exclusive: Pacific island’s new leader Lord Fakafānua discusses ‘exciting’ US partnership as critics fear impacts of seabed exploration
The recently elected leader of Tonga has described a deal to partner with the US on deep-sea mineral exploration as an “exciting development” amid concern in the small Pacific nation over the practice of seabed mining and the potential environmental impact.
Tonga is located in the South Pacific Ocean, a region attracting growing interest over whether critical minerals buried in the seabed could be extracted to help power industries and green technologies.
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03/23/2026 - 19:01
Homes built from March 2028 will produce 75% less greenhouse gas emissions than those built to 2013 standard
Buyers of new homes are likely to be shackled to high gas prices for years to come, as the government has delayed bringing into force new regulations on low-carbon housing.
Most newly built homes will come equipped with solar panels and heat pumps from March 2028, according to updated regulations for England called the “future homes standard” (FHS), but the government has relented on plans for more stringent rules under pressure from housebuilders.
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03/23/2026 - 17:15
Australia’s gas belongs to all of us. The benefits should be shared fairly rather than hoarded by companies that pay some of the lowest taxes in the world
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We now know that the Albanese government will very likely introduce an extra levy imposed on gas producers’ high profits. The prime minister’s department has requested Treasury modelling of additional levies on gas companies in response to the Iran crisis that is driving up energy costs for Australians. The department was reported as saying that energy producers “should not benefit from high international prices at the expense of domestic customers”. Precisely. There can be no going back now from such a statement.
But this is also a time for longer term thinking. We cannot have a temporary extra tax. We must deal with Australia’s chronic undertaxing of those utilising the gas resources that belong to all Australians. Indeed, there will never be a better time for the federal government to adopt a fair share levy (FSL) – as set out by the Superpower Institute, which I chair – to ensure gas companies pay their fair share of tax to boost Australia’s prosperity and provide cost-of-living relief to Australians. The levy is based on the taxation model used by Norway, and similar to one used by the UK.
Rod Sims is chair of the Superpower Institute and an enterprise professor at the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research at the University of Melbourne. From 2011 to 2022 he was chair of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission
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03/23/2026 - 13:25
Trump administration announces deal with TotalEnergies to redirect investment in wind to oil and gas instead
As a fuel crisis triggered by the war in Iran drives up global fossil fuel prices, the Trump administration has announced it will pay French energy major TotalEnergies $1bn to kill plans to construct wind farms off the US east coast.
The deal is the latest blow to the US offshore wind industry, which has faced repeated disruptions to multi-billion-dollar projects under Donald Trump.
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