A coalition of leading European environmental groups has cautiously welcomed a “landmark” agreement by lawmakers in Brussels on new rules aimed at curbing a major source of microplastic pollution in…
For years, Jack Auty studied how inflammation in the human body drives diseases, ranging from stroke to sepsis to Alzheimer's, at the Tasmanian School of Medicine. But a visit to…
COLOMBO — Beneath Sri Lanka’s serene waters, a pearl oyster cherished her pearl, living in harmony. But disaster struck when a blazing ship sank, poisoning the sea. Entangled in debris,…
UGGUBSENI and ISBERYALA, Guna Yala, Panama — “Our ancestors fought for this land,” says Jair Goporas, 21. He leans forwards into the dim glow of a bare bulb, his eyes…
JAKARTA — With the Islamic month of Ramadan now over, a familiar sight has returned to the streets of daytime Jakarta: street vendors serving up chicken porridge, and everyone from…
On a busy morning in November 2024, a dramatic scene unfolded in a supermarket in Banani, Dhaka. Government officials, armed with security personnel, launched a joint operation to crack down…
Plastic waste is increasingly causing problems for fishers. Fishnets bring up bottles, propellers get tangled in bags, water pumps get clogged with debris, and boats collide with bags of trash.…
In a lab in Türkiye, researcher Sedat Gündoğdu zooms in on the image of a small red fiber. For the first time on film, viewers are witnessing microplastics in the…
In Finland’s freezing Arctic, lakes and rivers have nourished the lifeways of Indigenous Skolt Sámi communities for generations as they fished and herded reindeer. But three years of research undertaken…
Marine biologists diving in the Gulf of Thailand were thrilled in 2023 to rediscover several colonies of a rare type of ocean sponge once thought to be extinct in the…
1. Long-awaited plastics treaty flops, for now Despite around-the-clock efforts from delegates, negotiators and numerous advocacy groups, the fifth session of the U.N. Environment Programme’s Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-5) on…
“Just wait till next year!” goes the slogan often attributed to disappointed sports fans. Those same words could equally apply to proponents of an internationally binding U.N. agreement to phase…
Corpus Christi is a city of 316,000 residents on Texas's Coastal Bend, a rich marine area along the Gulf of Mexico. Located close to multiple water hungry industries, this city…
At the end of a long day, you might sit down with friends or family to eat a bowl of hot noodle soup. A savory scent fills the air as…
“Plastics pollution exacerbates the impacts of all [nine] planetary boundaries,” warns a report published this month in the journal One Earth in the run-up to what could be the final…
Bottlenose dolphins leapt and torpedoed through the shallow turquoise waters off Florida’s Sarasota Bay. Then, a research team moved in, quickly corralling the small pod in a large net. With…
It’s been clear for some time: We’re in the midst of a rapidly escalating global plastics crisis. More than 11 billion metric tons of virgin plastics were produced worldwide from…
‘Out of sight, out of mind’ is a typical approach to waste and is one of the main reasons why the waste trade persists. The world discovered that toxic waste…
Rob Wilson stood on his home’s back deck in Flagstaff, in the U.S. state of Arizona, as the wildfire approached. All was chaos: Utility trucks rushed through his neighborhood, shutting…
The chances for a stronger international agreement on limits to plastic production may have increased dramatically as the world nears a U.N. deadline for achieving a plastics treaty. The game…
Mycologists believe the solution to some of our biggest pollution issues is under our feet. Humble fungi are now being used as meat alternatives, eco-friendly leather and to help break…
The newly formed government in Bangladesh is about to implement the existing law regarding plastic usage by strictly banning — initially — single-use plastic and, gradually, all possible plastic uses.…
Nguyen Thi Thanh Thuy, a waste worker from Binh Dinh, Vietnam, has worked in the waste collection industry for four decades. She has spent every day at the landfill –…
Plastic waste is a global problem, and the food sector is one of its main drivers. It only takes a quick visit to a supermarket to realize this: With the…
With a final round of negotiations on a global plastics treaty set to take place later this year in Busan, South Korea, an autopsy is premature, especially with the dynamics…
Plastic trash has become one of the most visible global environmental crises of our time. Single-use plastics make up nearly half of all plastics produced, with 15 million metric tons…
In recent years, there has been a significant trend in young people from around the world joining the fight against environmental threats and climate change. These educated youths have played…
Mongabay’s award-winning investigation that revealed water contamination from palm oil plantations in Indigenous territories in the Brazilian Amazon inspired an art installation at UNESCO’s World Press Freedom Day Conference in Santiago; the artwork was also exhibited at Chile’s Museum of Contemporary Art.
The Caribbean Basin is drowning in waste, especially plastic trash that’s contaminating rivers and the surrounding sea.
Biological solutions offer hope for tackling human-caused pollution — but only if government and industry significantly support getting those solutions out of the lab and into the real world.
PULAU SERIBU, Indonesia — Mustaghfirin unmoors his boat every day in the Thousand Islands archipelago, two hours’ sailing from the Jakarta coast, and sets off into a sea filled with…
Representatives of 170 nations met in Ottawa, Canada, last week pushing a final U.N. plastic pollution treaty agreement closer to completion. But much remains to be done, with debate over plastic production limits and other barriers still unsettled.
