21 Aug 2025

Image description: Fishermen from Qarmat Ali with the Nahr Bin Umar oilfield across the Shatt al-Arab River. They complain that due to pollution and the river’s increased salinity, they often pull in dead fish. Image by Daniela Sala / The Guardian.   The Guardian recently reported on the decline of Iraq’s Hawizeh wetlands, part of […]

14 Aug 2025

Image description: A swimmers back profile as they stand chest-high in water. Photo by Chris on Unsplash   A new government analysis revealed thousands more waterways are being used for swimming and boating in England than were previously recorded. Their data revealed 3,347 “water recreation locations”, places where people take part in activities including swimming, […]

14 Aug 2025

Image description: Aerial view of the Hong Kong skyline at dawn. Photo by Simon Zhu on Unsplash   Hong Kong firm in lead to buy Thames Water Hong Kong’s CKI, an infrastructure company is reportedly a leading contender to buy Thames Water if the heavily indebted company collapses in coming weeks, according to the Times. […]

14 Aug 2025

Image description: Aerial view of two tractors driving toward each other along parallel lines. Photo by Johny Goerend on Unsplash   After legal pressure from campaign group River Action, the Department for Environment, Farming and Rural Affairs has closed what they claim was “a major loophole”; manure can now only be spread when crops actually […]

14 Aug 2025

 Image description: strawberries in a black plastic punnet. Image by Engin Akyurt / Pexels   A new report from Deep Science Ventures has uncovered that the industrial economy has created more than 100 million ‘novel entities’ (chemicals not found in nature), and around 40,000 – 350,000 can be found in commercial use and production. However, […]

14 Aug 2025

Image description: A field of dry grass. Image by Alexandre Debiève / Unsplash   The National Drought Group met this week with the current water shortfall situation in England now defined as a “nationally significant incident” according to the Environment Agency. The agency reported that five of its fourteen operational regions are already in drought, […]

31 Jul 2025

Farmers in England will get new payments for cleaning up the waterways near their land, the environment secretary has said, as reported in the Guardian. Speaking at the National Farmers’ Union water summit at Beeston Hall farm in West Yorkshire, Steve Reed said his department would be launching changes to the sustainable farming incentive (SFI) […]

31 Jul 2025

Ofwat has proposed a £62.8m enforcement package following its finding that Anglian Water has breached its legal obligations in operating its wastewater treatment works and network.     Ofwat’s investigation found that Anglian Water has failed to operate, maintain and upgrade its wastewater assets adequately to ensure they could cope with the flows of sewage […]