Finding a silver lining amidst all the doom,&nbsp;seismologists discovered that the Earth became 'unusually silent' thanks to&nbsp;the Covid-19 pandemic. Studying records from seismic stations across the world, experts were able to map&nbsp;a 'wave that spread from China to other countries across the world. Data was recorded&nbsp;from a network of 268 seismic sensors spread across 117 countries which included high-frequency noise and vibrations caused by industries, traffic and other such human activities. A massive 50 per cent dip in human activity related noise was observed, with the steepest decline in New York and Singapore. 'The quietening is unprecedented, at least as far as we can go back in time with continuous seismic data,' Thomas Lecocq, first author on the study published in the journal&nbsp;Science said.&nbsp;

Finding a silver lining amidst all the doom, seismologists discovered that the Earth became 'unusually silent' thanks to the Covid-19 pandemic. Studying records from seismic stations across the world, experts were able to map a 'wave that spread from China to other countries across the world. Data was recorded from a network of 268 seismic sensors spread across 117 countries which included high-frequency noise and vibrations caused by industries, traffic and other such human activities. A massive 50 per cent dip in human activity related noise was observed, with the steepest decline in New York and Singapore. 'The quietening is unprecedented, at least as far as we can go back in time with continuous seismic data,' Thomas Lecocq, first author on the study published in the journal Science said.

A Chilean photographer and explorer, Cristian Donoso is depicting the impact of climate change, through a series of images taken over the last 2 decades, during his excursions in Patagonia, Antarctica and the Arctic.&nbsp;
To minimise the impact of his travel on the environment, he makes use of wind and other human-powered forms of travel like sailboats and skis.&nbsp;
In January this year, he undertook an excursion named &ldquo;Forgotten Footsteps," in the footsteps of the 20th century explorer and artist Rockwell Kent in Patagonia. Donoso&rsquo;s images draw a sharp contrast with the paintings made by Kent years ago, depicting the huge loss of ice and altered peaks due to climate change.&nbsp;
His series "Ice Postcards" took him to some of Patagonia's least accessible places, in 2018, where he recreated the images taken by an Italian explorer over a century ago.&nbsp;
Donoso aims to build awareness about the impact of global warming through his work.&nbsp;

A lack of &lsquo;skill and expertise&rsquo; to contain the oil spill from a bulk carrier late last month forced the&nbsp;Mauritius government on Sunday to declare a state of environmental emergency. Bulk carrier,&nbsp;MV Wakashio, which was carrying 4,000 tons of fuel,&nbsp;ran aground on July 25th and since then it has been leaking oil into the Indian ocean.&nbsp;Prime Minister&nbsp;PM Pravind&nbsp;Jugnauth who sought help from France, while declaring the green emergency said that inclement weather was making the rescue operation difficult.&nbsp;While Mauritius was able to save the ship&rsquo;s crew, the cracks in its hull have made the spill more dangerous.&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;

The Milne Ice Shelf, which was the Canadian Arctic's last 'fully intact' ice shelf just collapsed, losing approximately&nbsp;40% of its area in just two days towards the end of July.
Located in the&nbsp; Northern Canadian territory of Nunavut, it seems like offshore winds and above normal temperature led to the collapse, according to the Canadian Ice Service.&nbsp;
The last 30 years have seen the Arctic warm at twice the global rate due to what is known as "Arctic amplification".&nbsp;
Canadian Arctic summer this year has been 5 degree Celsius&nbsp;above the average temperature for the last 30 years. This has majorly threatened smaller ice caps.&nbsp;

Central Europe could see a seven time increase in extreme drought if global greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise.&nbsp;
According to a new study published in the journal Scientific Reports, this research must come as a warning sign to take immediate action to reduce carbon emissions, which&nbsp; could reduce the frequency of future drought.&nbsp;
The study states that the area of crops affected by drought is also set to increase and could double by the second half of the century.
In 2018 and 2019, central Europe suffered its most damaging drought with watercourses and rivers drying up and increasing instances of wildfires.
To ensure water supply to future generations and maintain the ecosystem, urgent climate action across the globe is needed.

Damaged ecosystems increase instances of deadly diseases from wildlife, according to a new study by researchers from the&nbsp;ZSL Institute of Zoology in London.
The study which was published in the journal Nature, states that human destruction of the environment increases the number of bats and rats that harbour diseases, which cause pandemics like the Covid-19.&nbsp;
Over&nbsp;7,000 animal communities on six continents&nbsp;were analysed and researchers found that conversion of these wild spaces into settlements and farmlands wipes out large number of species. They saw that the number of species that carry these disease-causing pathogens increased by about 70% compared with in undamaged ecosystems.
The research suggests that in areas where nature is increasingly being ravaged, disease surveillance and healthcare&nbsp;must be ramped up.&nbsp;

New Guinea has topped the list for housing the greatest plant diversity in the world. The tropical island has over 13,500 species of plants, overtaking any island across the globe.
It has surpassed Madagascar, which held the previous record, by 19%.&nbsp;
According to a new study published in the journal Nature, this discovery could be significant for the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)&nbsp;Red List assessment.
The 'incredible achievement' could help boost conservation efforts and is a first step in exploring the vast flora that the island offers.

In an exciting discovery, satellite images have captured 11 new colonies of emperor&nbsp;penguins in Antarctica, boosting the number of known colonies by about 20%!
The red-brown guano patches the birds leave on the ice, made the discovery possible. This species is especially vulnerable to the climate crisis as these emperor penguins breed on sea ice, rather than on land. Most of the new colonies were spotted in areas that are at 'high risk' of climate change.
Researchers from the British Antarctic Survey, who led the study shared that the European Space Agency&rsquo;s Sentinel-2 satellite made it possible to locate the much smaller colonies.&nbsp;
Now, Antarctica is home to&nbsp;61 known emperor penguin colonies and the next step is to count the number of penguins in each of these. It is also important to protect the species by reducing global heating or they will be lost to extinction.&nbsp;
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In a possible sustainability lesson for fellow food chains, Chipotle&nbsp;has announced that it will employ used&nbsp;avocado pits that would otherwise go to waste to dye clothes, bags and more!
The company is launching a fashion line called&nbsp;Chipotle Goods, which will include 'responsibly sourced' apparel made with organic cotton and other merchandise. The Mexican food chain&nbsp;said that&nbsp;nearly 300 million avocado pits go to waste across its restaurants every year. But now Chipotle&nbsp;will&nbsp;upcycle&nbsp;leftover pits to make&nbsp;sustainable, plant-based dye varying in colour, that ultimately results in one-of-a-kind apparel and accessories for the brand.&nbsp;

As the world rushes to reduce Covid-19's death rate, there is another ongoing&nbsp;crisis&nbsp;whose death toll is posed to be far greater and is going largely&nbsp;unrecognised. New research says that mortalities related to a global rise in temperatures will be much&nbsp;higher than deaths from all infectious diseases combined if&nbsp;planet-heating emissions aren&rsquo;t controlled.
If emissions are not curbed,&nbsp;global mortality rates will rise by 73 deaths per 100,000 people by the end of the century. The tally matches&nbsp;the current death toll from all infectious diseases, such&nbsp;as tuberculosis, HIV, malaria, and dengue.
Published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, the study found that much like the novel coronavirus, climate-related deaths will also make people with pre-existing conditions like heart or lung problems, more vulnerable to its impact.
The worst brunt of the crisis will be faced by poorer nations inhabiting some of the hottest regions on Earth including&nbsp;Ghana, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sudan.
Studying a huge&nbsp;global dataset&nbsp;linking death with temperature records, the team found the economic cost of these deaths to be around 3.2% of global economic output by the end of the century if things don't change.&nbsp;

Approximately one third of India's total tiger population lives outside the 50 tiger reserves in India, according to&nbsp;the latest&nbsp;All-India Tiger Population Estimation Report.
In most cases, the wild cats were found in neighbouring forest blocks outside the reserves.&nbsp;
The&nbsp;2018 tiger population report revealed that Indian forests are home to&nbsp;2,967 tigers, and the areas outside reserves where they reside have been described by authorities as 'tigers utilizing tiger reserves&rsquo;. They are extremely significant for genetic exchange and survival of the species.&nbsp;
The report highlights the importance of having sustainable forest habitats, tiger corridors and sink habitats to safely allow movement of tigers from one to another.&nbsp;
The report states that regions like&nbsp;Corbett, Dudhwa, Bandhavgarh and&nbsp;Pench&nbsp;are home to tigers which largely stay outside the reserve, but frequent them from time to time.&nbsp;

The effects of human-induced climate change are now cropping up globally.
According to a new study published in the journal&nbsp;Nature Climate Change, the&nbsp;extreme melting of the New Zealand's glaciers in 2018, was at least ten times more likely to have happened because of human beings!
10 of New Zealand&rsquo;s glaciers were analysed by researchers in 2018. They noticed that in 2018, almost half of the glaciers had no snow over them.&nbsp;
2011 was an 'extreme melt year' for the country and experts have warned that if the current trend continues, we could expect a year like 2011 to repeat itself once every 8 years!
There is still hope they feel and if greenhouse gas emissions are cut, we could save the future for our glaciers.&nbsp;

France's largest musical instrument, which is housed inside the famed Notre&nbsp;Dame Cathedral in Paris, is ready to be cleaned and the entire process of dismantling, cleaning and re-assembling could take almost 4 long years!
Fortunately, the &nbsp;8,000-pipe organ survived the devastating fire that broke out in the cathedral in April last year. But large amounts of toxic dust covered the instrument that now needs to be cleaned. Temperature variations have also affected the functioning of the organ.&nbsp;
According to the general who leads the restoration agency of the cathedral, the organ which dates back to&nbsp;1733, will next play again on April 16, 2024. This will mark 5 years of the five that engulfed Notre&nbsp;Dame.&nbsp;

With an aim to increase green cover, the Forest Department in Uttarakhand&nbsp;has plans to develop six 'city forests' in the&nbsp;Kumaon region.&nbsp;Tejaswini Patil, chief conservator forests Kumaon region shared that 2 of these urban forests will come up in the plains and 4 in the hilly districts.
Department officials have also begun looking for land in municipal&nbsp;areas for the project. They hope this will encourage more individuals to come forward and plant more trees, in order to save the environment from the disastrous consequences of climate change.
Hilly districts will feature&nbsp;one-hectare city forests as it is quite challenging to identify larger areas in these regions. In the plains, 10 hectares of land is being identified to develop these forests.&nbsp;
As per the India State of Forest Report 2019, last year, Uttarakhand&nbsp;reported an increase of just&nbsp;&nbsp;8.04 sq km of forests.

Throwing up some startling statistics, official figures from Brazil show a big increase in the number of fires in the Amazon rainforest&nbsp;in&nbsp;July compared to the same month last year.
Satellite images shared by Brazil's National Space Agency revealed the number of forest fires in the region this year was 6803, which is a rise of 28%.
Experts blame President Jair Bolsonaro's&nbsp;call for&nbsp;agricultural and mining activities in the Amazon, as the reason behind the spike in forest fires.
But under pressure from international investors and environmental&nbsp;agencies,&nbsp;in early July his government banned starting fires in the region.

In its first-ever Chicken Welfare Report, fast-food giant&nbsp;KFC&nbsp;has admitted that more than a third of birds from its suppliers in the UK and Ireland suffer from a painful inflammation known as footpad dermatitis.
The condition is characterised by lesions on the feet of poultry, that in the worst cases may make the birds unable to walk properly. In the report that has been lauded for its transparency says that&nbsp;the number of birds affected has fallen from more than half to 35% in just four years and that KFC's top suppliers were achieving levels of 15% or below.
In addition to this, 1 in 10 KFC chickens also suffer hock burn caused by ammonia from the waste of other birds. To combat these problems, the food chain is planning to&nbsp;reduce stocking density on its supplier farms and&nbsp;wants to transition more of its 34 suppliers to slower-growing breeds, which are less prone to disease and injury.&nbsp;

India's largest wildlife orphanage is all set to come up on a&nbsp;130-acre land at Warje in Pune. According to reports, the project has been approved by the Maharashtra government and will cost approximately almost Rs 57&nbsp;crore.&nbsp;NCP MP Supriya Sule&nbsp;shared the news on Twitter, stating that the country's largest wildlife orphanage and safari world will come up at survey number 96 in the&nbsp;Chandni Chowk&nbsp;area.&nbsp;

The declining bee populations in agricultural&nbsp;areas is affecting food crops, according to a new study by the&nbsp;Rutgers University, published by the Royal Society. Wild bees are suffering due to the climate crisis, loss of habitat and the use of toxic pesticides. This comes as a major warning sign as three quarters of the&nbsp;world&rsquo;s food crops are dependent on pollinators. The&nbsp;UN&rsquo;s Food and Agriculture Organization states that over the last 50 years, the amount of crops dependent on insects and pollinators has grown 300%. With this decline in bee population, certain fruit and vegetable varieties&nbsp;could become rarer, and thus more expensive.

Air pollution has shortened the average Indian life expectancy by 5.2 years, suggests a new report produced by the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago (EPIC). The same report said that if pollution were reduced to meet the WHO guidelines, residents of Delhi could see 9.4 years added to their lives.&nbsp;The World Health Organisation guideline stipulates that PM2.5 does not exceed 10 micron per cubic metre and that PM10 does not exceed 20 micron per cubic metre.&nbsp;In India, the average PM2.5 concentration in 2018 was 63 micron per cubic metre.&nbsp;Lucknow was seen to have the highest level of pollution in the country, with pollution 11 times greater than the WHO guideline.&nbsp;Four countries that account for nearly a quarter of the world's population -- Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan -- are also among the most polluted, with northern India emerging as the most polluted part of South Asia, the report noted.

The West Bengal Forest department will undertake a plantation drive along the sea beach in the popular tourist spot Digha in Purba Medinipur district, a senior minister has shared.
Cyclone Amphan had uprooted a large number of trees in the coastal belt two months back.&nbsp;
Forest minister Rajib Banerjee on Tuesday said sturdy trees, which are not easily uprooted during severe storms and go well with the soil character of the area, will be preferred for plantation while some of the felled trees will be replanted in the project which will be completed in 2021.&nbsp;He said the project is being implemented in collaboration with Digha Development Authority.

100 million-year-old sea microbes below the seafloor are still alive and thriving! According to a new study, published in the journal Nature Communications, these marine microbes exist in the oxygen-filled sediment of the&nbsp;South Pacific Gyre&nbsp;located in the South Pacific Ocean. These micro-organisms&nbsp;account for approximately&nbsp;98% of the total mass of organisms living in the ocean. Not much was know about these organisms and how they manage to survive in a region which scarce food sources. When brought back to the lab and fed, they began to multiply. This new study makes us believe that microbial life is very persistent and find a way to survive, say researchers.

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Noise pollution dropped 50% due to pandemic-related shutdowns: study

Jul 28, 2020 17:47 IST

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