Releasing balloons at weddings and other celebrations is festive, until they break into pieces and become plastic pollution. A citizen science project is spotlighting the problem.
Garbage in New York’s subway system offers easy meals for rats.
AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews
Climate change, globalization and concerns about rat poison soon could drive rat infestations to levels not seen in centuries. One way to curb them is getting humans to stop wasting food.
Abandoned trolleys litter a roadside in Whalan, a suburb in Sydney’s outer west.
Shutterstock
Abandoned trolleys are an all-too-common sight. A solution to this intractable problem depends on a combination of policy and legal changes, public engagement and tracking technology.
Our experiment shows we need to work out just how damaging discarded cigarettes are to plantlife.
Electric scooters could solve the ‘last mile’ problem of urban transport if operators learn from the mistakes that plagued the introduction of dockless bikes.
CrowdSpark/AAP
Shared electric scooters appeal as a way to cover that awkward distance between public transport stops and your destination. But first e-scooter operators must solve the littering and dumping problem.
How much would you pay to make this disappear?
Emilian Robert Vicol
What would you pay to keep trash off your favorite beach, or pollution away from a national park? Economists can tease these values out of our travel choices and use the numbers to help make policy.
Dumped waste is a constant eyesore on the streets of Johannesburg, South Africa’s economic hub.
African News Agency Archives (ANA)
Banning single-use plastic bags makes sense, as long as it doesn't usher in behaviours that are just as bad, or worse – like over-using heavier bags made of even more plastic.
Pollution and debris off the Sri Lankan coast.
David Jones/plasticoceans.org
By 2050, 99% of the world's seabird species will be accidentally eating plastic, unless we take action to clean up the oceans. And some of the highest risk to wildlife is in the Southern Ocean off Australia.
Tut tut: Belgian cyclist Dries Devenyns throws his bottle during the 10th stage of the 2011 Tour de France.
EPA/Nicolas Bouvy
It’s that time of year again. The 101st Tour de France begins this Saturday July 5 in the Yorkshire city of Leeds, and three days later it returns to French home soil for Stage 4 (Le Touquet-Paris-Plage…
Plastic bags are still hanging around years later.
Adrian S Pye
After months of deliberation and consultations, the UK government’s long-awaited announcement about a plastic bag charge arrives, only for Defra to shoot it full of holes by opting to exempt retailers…
Director of Health Programs, BehaviourWorks Australia; Lead, Monash-McMaster Social Systems Evidence Collaboration, Monash Sustainable Development Institute, Monash University