Boom in air cargo due to shoppers’ expectations of speedy delivery and shift in post-pandemic economy, researchers say

Air freight operators have increased their greenhouse gas emissions by 25% compared with 2019, analysis has found.

In 2023, air freight operators ran about 300,000 more flights than in 2019, an increase in flight volume of almost 30%. The US accounted for more than 40% of global air freight emissions, according to the report by campaign group Stand.earth.

Statutory nuisance complaint lodged by Save Windermere against United Utilities is a first over sewage pollution

Campaigners fighting to stop sewage discharges into Windermere, the Lake District’s largest lake, have made a statutory nuisance complaint against a water company in the first legal action of its kind.

The civil complaints are normally used in noise disputes, or over noxious smells. But the environmental barrister Nicholas Ostrowski has for the first time lodged a complaint on behalf of campaign group Save Windermere against United Utilities over raw sewage discharges into the lake.

On a journey along the Thames – where fury at pollution has spawned a wave of local activism – it is clear that the decline of rivers is among this government’s worst legacies

Red kites swoop above Fawley Meadows as Dave Wallace dips a sampling beaker into the deep green water of the River Thames on a late spring day. A sharp wind blows droplets upstream towards the arches of Henley Bridge, while the might of the river, its path here straight and wide, pulls downstream towards Windsor, on its 215-mile odyssey to the North Sea.

Today, the water meadows along its banks host blue and white striped marquees, lined up in uniform rows for the Henley regatta. After the rowers depart, the river bears the swimmers who follow. They dip, jump and dive its depths at an annual festival of open water races, echoing the galas that took place in Victorian days.

In the run-up to July's general election, the Guardian video team is touring the UK looking at the issues that matter to voters. After swimmers and rowers fell sick from sewage discharges into the River Thames we went to the seat of Henley and Thame to see how environmental concerns rank for voters in a seat that has been Conservative for more than 100 years

Enlarge / Light painting reveals a cloud of particulates on Airport Road, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PM2.5 10-20 micrograms per cubic meter). (credit: Robin Price)

Light painting is a technique used in both art and science that involves taking long-exposure photographs while moving some kind of light source—a small flashlight, perhaps, or candles or glowsticks—to essentially trace an image with light. A UK collaboration of scientists and artists has combined light painting with low-cost air pollution sensors to visualize concentrations of particulate matter (PM) in select locations in India, Ethiopia, and Wales. The objective is to creatively highlight the health risks posed by air pollution, according to a new paper published in the journal Nature Communications.

“Air pollution is the leading global environmental risk factor," said co-author Francis Pope, an environmental scientist at the University of Birmingham in the UK who spearheaded the Air of the Anthropocene project with artist Robin Price. "[The project] creates spaces and places for discussions about air pollution, using art as a proxy to communicate and create dialogues about the issues associated with air pollution. By painting with light to create impactful images, we provide people with an easy-to-understand way of comparing air pollution in different contexts—making something that was largely invisible visible."

Light painting has been around since 1889, when Étienne-Jules Marey and Georges Demeny, who were investigating the use of photography as a scientific tool to study biological motion, created the first known light painting called Pathological Walk From in Front. In 1914, Frank and Lillian Mollier Gilbreth tracked the motion of manufacturing and clerical workers using light painting techniques, and in 1935, Man Ray "signed" his Space Writing series with a penlight—a private joke that wasn't discovered until 74 years later by photographer/historian Ellen Carey in 2009.

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