Peers say ‘woeful’ record on prosecutions has led to a ‘low-risk, high-reward’ criminal culture
Organised crime groups in the UK are making millions every year from illegally dumping and burning rubbish, peers have told ministers, after an inquiry found a lack of enforcement made it a “low-risk, high-reward” criminal enterprise.
“Criminality is endemic in the waste sector,” a Lords committee told the government on Tuesday, after it found at least 38m tonnes of waste was illegally managed every year, “leading to serious environmental, economic and social consequences”.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
10/27/2025 - 19:01
10/27/2025 - 19:01
Exclusive: ‘Devastating consequences’ now inevitable but emissions cuts still vital, says António Guterres in sole interview before Cop30
I am the first Indigenous journalist to exclusively interview António Guterres. How many others will listen?
Humanity has failed to limit global heating to 1.5C and must change course immediately, the secretary general of the UN has warned.
In his only interview before next month’s Cop30 climate summit, António Guterres acknowledged it is now “inevitable” that humanity will overshoot the target in the Paris climate agreement, with “devastating consequences” for the world.
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10/27/2025 - 13:09
One energy industry source says they expected an annual budget as high as £2bn to meet UK’s green energy targets
The energy secretary, Ed Miliband, has set aside £1.1bn a year for offshore wind power developers investing in new projects in a funding round seen by some in the industry as too small to meet the UK’s green electricity targets.
The government’s energy department said today it had budgeted £900m to pay developers of fixed wind turbines at sea and £180m for floating platforms.
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10/27/2025 - 09:52
Climate crisis drives near-total collapse of staghorn and elkhorn corals that formed backbone to state’s reefs
Two of the most important coral species that made up Florida’s reef are now functionally extinct after a withering ocean heatwave caused catastrophic losses, scientists have found.
The near-total collapse of the corals that once formed the backbone of reefs in Florida and the Caribbean means they can no longer play their previously crucial role in building and sustaining reef ecosystems that host a variety of marine life.
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10/27/2025 - 09:00
Do I really need to replace my telephone every two years? Could my next laptop be recycled rather than brand new?
I have an urgent desire to shed myself of goods and chattels.
The acquisitions of a fortunate life have accumulated like an overflowing email inbox and simply must be dealt with while I am alive, and not left to my children to wrangle when they’ll (hopefully, long down the track) be grieving.
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10/27/2025 - 07:32
Extinction rates are not spiraling upward as many believe, according to a large-scale study analyzing 500 years of data. Researchers found that species losses peaked about a century ago and have decreased since, with different drivers shaping past and present threats. Whereas invasive species once caused most island extinctions, habitat destruction now looms largest on continents.
World Ocean Explorer Wins Gold Medal Serious Simulation Award from Serious Play Annual International Competition
10/26/2023 - 14:35
For Immediate Release October 19, 2023
Sedgwick, Maine USA World Ocean Explorer, a 3D virtual aquarium and educational simulation, was recently cited for excellence, winning a Gold Medal Award in the 2023 International Serious Play Awards Program.
World Ocean Explorer is an innovative 3D virtual aquarium designed for educational exploration of the world’s oceans. With interactive exhibits and a lobby space, visitors can immerse themselves in realistic marine environments, including a DEEP SEA exhibit funded by Schmidt Ocean Institute, showcasing unprecedented deep-sea discoveries off Australia. Targeted at 3rd graders and beyond, this immersive experience offers a range of perspectives on the ocean environment and can be explored through guided tours or user-controlled interfaces. Visit DEEP SEA at worldoceanexplorer.org/deep-sea-aquarium.html.
Serious Play Conference brings together professionals who are exploring the use of game-based learning, sharing their experience, and working together to shape the future of training and education. For more information on Serious Play Award Program visit seriousplayconf.com/international-serious-play-award-programs.
World Ocean Explorer is a transformative virtual aquarium designed to deepen understanding of the world ocean and amplify connection for young people worldwide. Organized around the principles of Ocean Literacy and the Next Gen Science Standards, World Ocean Explorer brings the wonder and knowledge of ocean species and systems to students in formal and informal classrooms, absolutely free to anyone with a good Internet connection. As an advocate for the ocean through communications, World Ocean Observatory believes there is no better investment in the future of the sustainable ocean than through a new approach to educational engagement that excites, informs, and motivates students to explore the wonders of our marine world and to understand the pervasive connection and implication for our future, inherent in the protection and conservation of all aspects of our ocean world.
World Ocean Explorer presents an astonishing 3-dimensional simulated aquarium visit, organized to reveal the wonders of undersea life, with layers of detailed data and information to augment the emotional connection made to the astonishing beauty and complexity of the dynamic ocean. Within each of the virtual exhibits, students visit exemplary theme-based sites with myriad opportunities to understand the larger perspectives of scientific knowledge as organized and visualized to dramatize the impact and change on ocean life as a result of natural and human-generated events. Through immersion among displays, mixed media and 3D models, the experience of an aquarium visit will be brought into classrooms or home school environments as a free, accessible, always available opportunity for teaching and learning. All of this will be available to a world audience without physical limitation or cost. World Ocean Explorer, a project of the World Ocean Observatory, receives support from the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, Visual Solutions Lab, the Climate Change Institute, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, and The Fram Museum Oslo. To learn more about the current and future exhibits of World Ocean Explorer, visit worldoceanexplorer.org.
media contact
Trisha Badger, Managing Director, World Ocean Observatory | [email protected] +12077011069
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