Environment
Need some good news about the environment? The Optimist Daily is your go-to herald of positive environmental news, highlighting eco-friendly solutions and scientific progress around climate action, circularity, conservation, and more. Learn about everything eco in our Environment section.
Why beekeeping is big business these days
How do beekeepers make most of their money? While honey may seem like the obvious answer, the real answer is that beekeepers make most of their money from pollination services where they provide hives to farmers. Just look to California where nearly 80 percent of the world’s almonds are grown. Read More...
How hemp crops can help save pollinators during the summer months
For honeybees, the months between July and September aren’t the finest months for collecting pollen in America—which is problematic considering these are the months that honeybees are supposed to thrive. The reason behind this is that there’s a lack of farm crops during that time that Read More...
Researchers have finally found a greener way to produce graphene
We’ve written about graphene before and for good reason: it is extremely strong, ultra-thin, and has an excellent electrical and thermal conductivity that opens up all kinds of possibilities. The only problem is that producing it is resource-intensive and expensive. But that’s all set to change Read More...
These companies are turning CO2 into useful products
Until recently, it was assumed that companies burning fossil-fuels would eventually need to capture the resulting carbon emissions and bury them underground. This option turned out to be inefficient and costly. That’s why innovators have been digging for new ideas that would eventually slash the Read More...
Ireland becomes the latest country to ban the practice of farming fur
Most of the fur sold globally come from animals on fur factory farms – dismal, often filthy places where thousands of animals are crammed into tiny wire-mesh cages their entire lives, just to be killed later on for fashion purposes. Fortunately, fur bans have been introduced in numerous countries Read More...
Island-nation Vanuatu to ban disposable diapers in fight against pollution
It is but a tiny speck in the Pacific Ocean, but the island state of Vanuatu is leading the global fight against plastic waste. Being one of several Pacific nations severely affected by climate change, Vanuatu introduced one of the toughest single-use plastic bans in the world earlier this year. Read More...
Scientists in New Zealand are using ‘eavesdropping’ technology to protect birds
This week we’re giving extra attention to birds, bees and all the pollinators that keep our ecosystems in order. For today’s edition, let’s have a word about the Hihi bird—a rare species of bird that was recently reintroduced to a nature reserve in New Zealand after being regionally extinct Read More...
Scientists discover supposedly extinct species living in the forest of Honduras
Just because a species is labeled as extinct does not necessarily mean that they’re gone from this Earth forever. Deep in the Mosquitia rainforest of Honduras, researchers recently rediscovered a species thought to be extinct at the ruins of a recently discovered ancient settlement known as the Read More...
Thousands of climate activists just stormed a coal mine in Germany
After school kids woke up the world to the immediacy of the climate crisis with their Fridays4Future school strikes this year, the stage was set for a new wave of civil disobedience protests to urge stronger climate action. A prime example of this happened in Germany this week as thousands of Read More...
Argentina’s wild bees are choosing a strange material to build nests: plastic
The ways that bees adapt to problems created by humans is both brilliant and saddening. Just look to Argentina where researchers have discovered bees constructing nests entirely made of the flimsy plastic packaging material left on farms. From 2017 to 2018, researchers at Argentina's National Read More...