His aim was to develop a system that could capture the oil right at its source, before it disperses on the surface of the ocean.

Oil is less dense than water and therefore the oil escaping the sea bed travels up to the water surface. Dr. Fivos Andritsos and his colleagues from the Joint Research Center in Ispra, Italy have now developed a reservoir which can be applied on top of the leakage.

It does look like a resounding, spectacular success. During this year’s neonicotinoid-free maize sowing in Italy hardly a bee colony has been lost, bar a suspicious case where some leftover seed from last year may have been used.

“It’s around one metre, bang there in the middle”. Professor Tim Lenton, professor of Earth Systems Science at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, sounds very pleased when he hears that policy-makers now officially revise the estimated sea level rise for London to around +94 cm within a century.

Worldwide the water supply sector is facing tremendous challenges due to global warming and climate change, urbanisation, and increasing water stress and pollution of raw water sources.

Scientists of the European research project ALARM (Assessing LArge scale Risks for biodiversity with tested Methods) achieved an alarming result: pollinators and insect-pollinated plants in Britain and the Netherlands are declining in parallel.

Faced with the desertification that threatens Mediterranean Europe, researchers with Desertlink, a European Commission funded project, are trying to curb risk zones by studying certain exacerbating factors.

Freshwater ecosystems, already under stress from land-use change and pollution, now face additional pressures from climate change, directly and through interaction with other drivers.

CyberCar, who's going to drive? It travels at around 30 km/h. No driver. No fuel. You might call it a ‘CyberCar’ - an automated vehicle, guided by three computers installed in the chassis.

In the attempt to reduce pollution, the representatives of the most industrialised countries in Europe have agreed upon the Kyoto Protocol, which establishes quotas on gas release and supports the plantation as well as the preservation of forests.

In the attempt to reduce pollution, the representatives of the most industrialised countries in Europe have agreed upon the Kyoto Protocol, which establishes quotas on gas release and supports the plantation as well as the preservation of forests.

Locals often refer to Alkmaar as “a small Amsterdam” , with a slower pace of life and a “human-size” atmosphere.

Photo credit: Tim van der Kuip on Unsplash Moving towards climate neutrality, which includes a net-zero greenhouse gas impact, is not easy.

Spring is a season that turns our world green, but olives trees in the hills of Andalusia in southern Spain have never been so pale. For local farmers it is yet another difficult year.

The building sector has a significant impact on the European economy and the environment. It represents about 9% of the EU’s gross domestic product (GDP) and provides 18 million direct jobs.

It is a familiar sight for any city dweller: the truck double parked or stopping traffic on a busy road to deliver some package at a house door. Commercial deliveries are an increasing congestion issue, particularly for European historical city centres.

“Wood may be present in people’s life more than we think”, says Mariana Hassegawa, a researcher at the European Forest Institute . She is one of the authors of a case study on new wood-based products by the BioMonitor EU project.

“If I just look at my courtyard , three of my neighbors have an electric car" , says Christian Patermann, long-time program director at the European Commission and now internationally known as the “father of the bioeconomy”.

Even though people increasingly recognise the plastic pollution threat, we have used more plastic since the covid-19 pandemic began .

The Turkish city of Antalya, on the country’s southwest coast, is perhaps best known internationally as a holiday destination. But as one of Turkey’s largest cities, Antalya is home to around 2.