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.
Your toothpaste pollutes. Here are some eco-friendly alternatives
While a nice, minty toothpaste can leave your mouth feeling fresh, it has the opposite effect on the environment. Some of the chemicals in toothpaste cause serious water pollution, and with most people spitting those chemicals down the drain twice a day, all that pollution adds up. With that in Read More...
Cleaning and personal care products use lots of plastic. Here’s a solution
When you stop to think about it, much of the cleaning products or personal care products that we’re shipping around the world is water with ingredients mixed in to clean, moisturize, or do whatever you need. Now imagine if we could remove the water and only ship the additive. It could come in Read More...
Major architecture firm pledges to make all its buildings carbon-neutral by 2030
One of the most overlooked sources of greenhouse gas emissions is in buildings. The energy that goes into constructing buildings, the materials that go into it, and the heating and cooling systems used by buildings all add up to a whole lot of emissions. In 2018, the World Green Building Council Read More...
Turkey postpones music festival to protect endangered sea turtles
A Turkish pop music festival, which was planned to take place at the beginning of June on one of Turkey’s southern beaches, has been delayed due to concerns about the spawning period of the endangered Caretta, also known as the loggerhead sea turtle. The announcement of the festival on social Read More...
Atlanta will soon be home to the nation’s largest public food forest
In Seattle, an “edible urban forest” exists where people are allowed to walk in and pluck fruits and veggies for free. The idea behind Seattle’s Beacon Food Forest is to boost public health by regenerating public land into an edible forest ecosystem where people who suffer from food Read More...
How Chernobyl went from nuclear disaster zone to wildlife haven
The Chernobyl nuclear disaster is looking more and more like a blessing in disguise. Why? Because the massive disaster zone is teeming with rare and endangered wildlife now that humans have been gone for more than 30 years. In 1986, the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in northern Ukraine released Read More...
Philippines approve bill requiring students to plant 10 trees before graduating
As an archipelago in the Western Pacific with a high vulnerability to extreme weather and sea level rise, the Philippines is among the top countries in the world that are most affected by climate change. However, the Southeast Asian country has also demonstrated some of the most ambitious actions Read More...
NYC sees hundreds of whales make a comeback to the city’s surrounding waters
Over the last couple of decades, due to high levels of pollution and overfishing, the waters surrounding New York City have become bereft of some of their original marine inhabitants, such as the humpback whale. But it appears that New York City is once again able to see whales from its shores, as Read More...
Researchers have photographed a giant albino panda for the first time
The photo you see above is not of a plump polar bear that has wondered way too far from its home. No, the image you see is of an all-white, albino giant panda—believed to be the first of his (or her) kind known to human researchers. The image, taken by the reserve's motion-activated cameras in Read More...
Florida just appointed its first chief science officer to tackle climate crisis
The former governor of Florida, Rick Scott, was widely seen as a disaster for the environment, slashing $700m from the water management budget, rolling back crucial water quality safeguards and pursuing pro-industry policies that critics said turned a blind eye to pollution and polluters. On Read More...