Environment

Why countries failed to reach a global deal on cutting plastic pollution

4:36am December 06, 2024

by Leila Fadel

NPR's Leila Fadel speaks with Monterey Bay Aquarium chief conservation and science officer Margaret Spring about why negotiators failed to clinch a global treaty on reducing plastic pollution.

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Environment

The effort to nurse 300 stranded sea turtles back to health in Massachusetts

6:28pm December 05, 2024

Hundreds of sea turtles are stranding on Cape Cod this week. We visit the facility that is nursing them back to health.

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Climate change and extinction risk

6:15pm December 05, 2024

by Jonathan Lambert

A new study projects just how bad things could get for biodiversity if global warming speeds up. NPR's Jonathan Lambert reports that under the most extreme warming scenarios, about one in three species could be threatened with extinction by the end of the century.

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Most spiders wait for prey to fly into their webs — not slingshot spiders

4:45am December 05, 2024

by Ari Daniel

The tiny ray spider uses its web to grab its prey out of the air. Though common practice with comic book characters, this ability is unusual in spiders.

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Sea turtles are getting trapped in cold waters. This team gets them back to safety

4:25am December 05, 2024

by Michel Martin

Turtles are ending up in the cold waters of Cape Cod Bay. Here's how the New England Aquarium is warming them up and nursing them back to health.

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Wearing salmon as hats is in vogue — at least for orcas

4:46pm December 04, 2024

by Tinbete Ermyas

NPR's Ailsa Chang speaks orca researcher Deborah Giles about behavior she witnessed recently: whales wearing salmon as hats.

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A North Carolina town is suing utility Duke Energy over climate change

9:24am December 04, 2024

A small North Carolina town is suing Duke Energy for costs from climate change, claiming the utility knew its fossil fuel power plants were heating the planet and deceived the public.

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Environment

More than 150 countries failed to agree on a plan to cut plastic pollution

5:55pm December 03, 2024

by Michael Copley

For almost two years, countries have been trying to negotiate a United Nations treaty to rein in plastic pollution. The talks were supposed to end with an agreement, but that didn't happen.

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Hurricane Helene took 103 lives in North Carolina. Why don’t we know their names?

4:15pm December 03, 2024

by Blue Ridge Public Radio, Laura Lee

Two months ago, Hurricane Helene devastated the North Carolina mountains and claimed at least 103 lives, but governmental organizations have declined to publicly identify any victims.

Negotiators fail to reach an agreement on a plastic pollution treaty. Talks to resume next year

8:25pm December 02, 2024

The negotiations in Busan, South Korea, were supposed to be the fifth and final round to produce the first legally binding treaty on plastics pollution, including in the oceans, by the end of 2024.