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Indigenous territories in Ecuador Amazon can maintain forest conditions as effectively as formally protected areas, even without government conservation contracts, according to a new study that highlights the importance of local governance in protecting tropical forests. Researchers compared forests governed under three different systems in Ecuador government protected areas, community managed forests operating under formal conservation agreements, and Indigenous territories without formal conservation contracts. Using satellite data, they assessed long term changes in vegetation, sudden disturbances linked to activities such as roads, settlements and agriculture, and forest responses to the severe 2015–16 El Niño drought. The study found that community protected forests performed ...

  NEW DELHI: The Delhi Jal Board (DJB) has informed the National Green Tribunal (NGT) that it resolved 1,573 of the 1,633 drinking water contamination complaints received between January 7 and January 20, 2026, while outlining measures to strengthen monitoring and prevent contamination across Delhi’s water supply network. The figures were submitted in DJB’s reply and affidavit in Original Application No. 21 of 2026, filed by Suyash Kumar Mishra against the Union of India and others before the NGT’s Principal Bench in New Delhi. According to the submission, the Board has established a centralised system to monitor complaints received through the 1916 helpline, Central Control Room, social media platforms, Public Grievance Monitoring System (PGMS), Centralised Public Grievance ...

A wet winter can increase summer fire fuel, while burned landscapes can worsen flooding and erosion, highlighting the need for integrated disaster planning Wildfires and floods are often treated as separate disasters, but events in Portugal’s Pinhal Interior region show how one hazard can increase the risk of another. Across southern Europe, rising temperatures, extreme rainfall and worsening wildfire conditions are forcing authorities to rethink disaster preparedness. In Portugal, the sequence began with an exceptionally wet winter before the country entered another summer of elevated wildfire risk. February 2026 was Portugal’s wettest February in 47 years, with rainfall reaching three to four times the normal monthly amount across large parts of mainland Portugal. Repeated Atlan...

  African countries and international partners have called for faster expansion of multi hazard early warning systems across the continent, urging governments to strengthen financing, technology, cross border cooperation and community level preparedness to ensure warnings reach people before disasters strike. The call came through the Addis Ababa Call to Action on Early Warnings in Africa adopted following the Africa Early Warnings Forum held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from September 2 to 4, 2026. The forum brought together more than 400 participants from over 50 African countries, including government officials, regional organisations, development banks, financing institutions, technology companies, academics, civil society groups and community based organisations. The mee...

  Nepal has sought $20 million in climate compensation from the United Nations loss and damage fund following devastating floods that killed more than 1,300 people and left over 5,500 missing, with the country warning that the disaster highlights the growing climate risks facing the Himalayas. Nepal Foreign Minister Shisir Khanal told The Guardian that the world’s largest and historically highest emitting economies must recognise their shared responsibility for helping vulnerable countries recover from climate related disasters. Nepal contributes less than 0.1 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. The floods struck in late August after the partial collapse of a melting glacier triggered a landslide and powerful flash floods across parts of Tibet and Nepal. Khanal descr...

Lake rich Arctic networks retain carbon longer, giving microbes more time to convert dissolved organic carbon into atmospheric CO₂, particularly during warm, low flow summers. Lakes and streams could play a more significant role in the global carbon cycle than previously understood, with a new Swedish study finding that lake rich Arctic stream networks release a greater share of carbon into the atmosphere instead of transporting it downstream. The study published in Geophysical Research Letters on August 25, 2026, found that lakes significantly extend the time water and carbon remain within interconnected stream networks. This longer residence time provides microbes with more opportunity to break down dissolved organic carbon (DOC) into carbon dioxide (CO₂), which can subsequently es...

  A dispute over Tata Group’s century-old soda-ash mining concession near Kenya’s Lake Magadi has divided local communities, with the government pushing for greater local processing and residents split over whether the Indian conglomerate should continue its operations. Kenyan President William Ruto has withdrawn Tata Group’s concession to mine trona, the mineral used to produce soda ash, arguing that the company has failed to establish local processing facilities that could create jobs and generate greater economic value for Kenya. The decision has sparked debate in Kajiado County, where Maasai communities depend on the area’s land and resources. While some residents say Tata’s departure could threaten essential services provided by the company, others support the government...

  Scientists in China have experimented with cloud seeding to produce artificial snowfall over the Muz Taw Glacier, with an early trial suggesting that the additional snow may have reduced ice loss by 14% to 17%. The experiment was conducted in August 2018 on the 3.2 kilometre long Muz Taw Glacier in the Sawir Mountains of Xinjiang, near the China Kazakhstan border. The glacier has been retreating continuously since 1959, with its decline accelerating in recent years. Researchers used 14 remotely controlled, solar powered generators to release silver iodide into suitable clouds. Silver iodide can act as an ice forming nucleus, helping water vapour in clouds develop into ice particles that can eventually fall as snow. A weather radar at the Jimunai Meteorological Station wa...

Marine protected areas cover around 10% of the world’s oceans on paper, but new research suggests less than 2% may actually be seeing meaningful recovery of marine ecosystems. The study, based on underwater biodiversity data collected from thousands of shallow coral and rocky reefs around the world, examined fish populations inside and outside marine protected areas. Researchers used fish biomass the total weight of fish on a reef as an indicator of whether ecosystems were genuinely recovering. Their findings challenge the assumption that an ocean area labelled “protected” is necessarily delivering effective conservation. The researchers estimate that less than 2% of the global ocean lies within protected areas where marine ecosystems are actually recovering. Even this figure is cons...

China has begun operations at what is described as the world’s largest iron ore magnetisation roasting project, using a new industrial process to convert low grade iron ore and discarded mine tailings into high grade iron concentrate. The facility in Anshan, Liaoning province, has passed official acceptance tests and is operating at full capacity, according to the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). Developed by researchers at CAS’s Institute of Process Engineering, the plant can process about 5.56 million tonnes of refractory iron ore and mine tailings annually. The technology can upgrade material containing as little as 11 per cent iron into concentrate with an iron grade of about 65 per cent. Researchers say it is the first industrial scale technology capable of processing iron tai...