The Environment Chronicle

Fish of the Year 2014 is the Huchen or or Danube salmon (Hucho hucho).

Algal researchers of the German Botanical Society have chosen Ulva lactuca as alga of the year 2015.

The 68th UN General Assembly declared 2015 the International Year of Soils (IYS) (A/RES/68/232). The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has been nominated to implement the IYS 2015, within the framework of the Global Soil Partnership and in collaboration with Governments and the secretariat of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification. The IYS 2015 aims to increase awareness and understanding of the importance of soil for food security and essential ecosystem functions.

Laboratory Animal of the Year 2015 is the rabbit.

Butterfly of the Year 2015 is the Red Underwing (Catocala nupta).

The Endangered Domestic Breed of the Year for 2015 is the German karakul sheep.

Insect of the Year 2015 is the Chalkhill Blue (Polyommatus coridon).

Cave Animal of the Year 2015 is the Cellar Glass-snail (Oxychilus cellarius).

Fungus of the Year 2015 is the Crown-Tipped Coral ( Artomyces pyxidatus).

Global Trends in Renewable Energy Investment 2016, the 10th edition of UNEP's annual report, launched on 24 March 2016 by the Frankfurt School-UNEP Collaborating Centre for Climate & Sustainable Energy Finance and Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF), says the annual global investment in new renewables capacity, at $266 billion, was more than double the estimated $130 billion invested in coal and gas power stations in 2015. All investments in renewables, including early-stage technology and R&D as well as spending on new capacity, totalled $286 billion in 2015, some 3% higher than the previous record in 2011. Just as significantly, developing world investments in renewables (up 19% in 2015) topped those of developed nations for the first time in 2015 (down 8%). Much of these record-breaking developing world investments took place in China (up 17% to $102.9 billion).

The Federal Environment Agency's (UBA) short-term forecast shows that higher exports of electricity, cooler weather conditions compared to the previous year and lower fuel prices led to a slight increase in greenhouse gas emissions. According to the report there was a rise in emissions of 6 million tonnes to 908 million tonnes of CO2 equivalents, which equates to 0.7 percent, but overall emissions have dropped by 27.2 percent compared to 1990. CO2 emissions have gone down in electricity generation. The share of renewable energies in power generation grew considerably to 30 percent. However, this did not lead to a corresponding reduction in CO2 emissions due to the rise in electricity exports which hit a record level of 50 terawatt hours in 2015. The primary cause for the rise in emissions were the cooler weather conditions compared to the previous year which meant there was a greater need for heating energy. Households and other small-scale consumers used natural gas in particular, which increased emissions by 4.5 million tonnes.

More than three people were killed a week in 2015 defending their land, forests and rivers against destructive industries, according to Global Witness. The organisation’s new report, On Dangerous Ground, documents 185 known deaths worldwide last year – by far the highest annual death toll on record and a 59% increase from 2014. Severe limits on information mean the true numbers are undoubtedly higher. The deadliest countries for land and environmental defenders in 2015 were Brazil (50 deaths) and the Philippines (33) - record numbers in both countries - followed by Colombia (26), Peru (12), Nicaragua (12) and Democratic Republic of Congo (11). Major drivers were mining (42 deaths), agribusiness (20), logging (15) and hydropower (15). On Dangerous Ground sheds light on the particular vulnerability of indigenous people, whose weak land rights and geographic isolation make them frequent targets of land and resource grabbing. In 2015, almost 40% of victims were from indigenous groups.

Medicinal Plant of the Year 2015 is the Hypericum perforatum commonly known as St John's wort.

Tree of the Year 2015 is the Acer campestre, common name field maple.

Mollusc of the year 2015 is the Glutinous snail (Myxas glutinosa).

Lichen of the Year 2015 is the Psilolechia lucida.

Moss of the Year 2015 is the Goblin's gold (Schistostega pennata) or luminous moss or luminescent moss.

Flower of the year 2015 is the Succisa pratensis, also known as Devil's-bit or Devil's-bit Scabious, is a flowering plant of the genus Succisa in the family Caprifoliaceae.

European Spider of the Year 2015 is the Anyphaena accentuata.

Water Plant of the Year 2015 is the Utricularia commonly and collectively called the bladderworts.

Wild bee of the Year 2015 is the Andrena florea.

Microbe of the Year 2015 is the microorganism Rhizobium.

On 22 March 2015, the Global Nature Fund announced, the choice of the Lake schwerin in Mecklenburg Vorpommern as Living Lake of the Year 2015.

The onion (Allium cepa) has been chosen for the Medicinal Herb of the Year 2015 by the NHV Theophrastus.

Soil of the Year 2015 is the Pseudogley.

Bird of the Year 2015 is the is the true hawk (Accipiter gentilis).

Cactus of the year 2015 is the Mammillaria zeilmanniana.

Vampyrella lateritia is the Protozoan of the Year 2015.

Six companies in east China's Jiangsu Province were ordered to pay 160 million yuan (26 million U.S. dollars) for discharging waste chemical to rivers by a court on 30 December 2014. It is the highest fine of its kind in China ever imposed.

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo wants to make Paris a diesel-free city by 2020. The first step, she said on 28 December 2014, will be to ban the “most polluting” diesel delivery trucks and buses by July 2015.

On 23 December 2014, a pipeline leak with oil emulsion seepage took place during pipeline testing at the 242nd km of the Tikhoretsk-Tuapse-2 oil pipeline under construction in the area of Grechesky Village, Tuapse Region. The total amount of leakage is estimated at 8.4 cubic meters. The pipeline wall was damaged by a landslide. Some of the seeped oil emulsion got into the Tuapse River. As a result of unfavorable weather conditions – abundant precipitation and high wind – some of the oil emulsion ended up in the sea. On water surface in the Tuapse Bay, oil slicks were detected.

On 17 December 2014 Governor Andrew Cuomo said he would defer a decision to extend New York's existing ban on fracking to his environmental commissioner Joe Martens and health commissioner Howard Zucker. Cuomo made the announcement after Martens and Zucker presented findings of their environmental and health reviews on the controversial drilling technique on 17 December 2014. The report concluded that hydraulic fracturing for shale gas and oil carried "significant public health risks" that required "long-term studies" before it could be called safe.

The European Commission adopted on the 16 December 2014 its Work Programme for 2015. The Commission's 2015 Work Programme sets out: 23 new initiatives proposed by the Juncker Commission, following the Political Guidelines presented to the European Parliament; 80 existing proposals which the Commission proposes to withdraw or amend for political or technical reasons. The European Commission plans to scrap future sustainable policies such as waste reduction and air quality. The decision was taken despite 11 EU countries, including Germany, France, Italy and Spain, urging the Commission not to withdraw either proposal and strong support from some industries and businesses for a revision of the EU’s waste targets. The Green 10 condemn in the strongest possible terms the Commission’s plans to withdraw and retable key proposals on waste management and to create confusion and uncertainty about the fate of the air package.

On 15 December 2014 Europe’s largest battery storage project was officially opened by Amber Rudd, Minister at Department for Energy and Climate Change at Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire. S&C Electric Europe, Samsung SDI and Younicos collaborated to deploy the technology onto a UK Power Networks substation. The fully automated 6MW/10MWh Smarter Network Storage (SNS) project will assess the role of energy storage in cost effectively delivering the UK’s Carbon Plan, and save over £6 million on traditional network reinforcement methods.

On 12 December 2015 a High Court in London referred a review of the animal testing ban put forward by by the European Federation for Cosmetics Ingredients Manufacturers (EFfCI) to the European Court of Justice. The EFfCI wants companies to be able to sell cosmetics in the EU that have been newly tested on animals, as long as the tests were conducted on animals in countries outside the EU.

On 9 December 2014, the European Commission published its Decision establishing the ecological criteria for the award of the EU Ecolabel for rinse-off cosmetics. The criteria catalogue states that “palm oil and palm kernel oil and their derivatives used in the product must be sourced from plantations that meet criteria for sustainable management that have been developed by multi-stakeholder organisations that have a broad- based membership including NGOs, industry and government.“ Other criteria relevant for the bio-based sector are the prohibition of micro-plastics in the cosmetics and the exclusion of certain plastics for the packaging.

On 9 December 2014, an oil tanker sank and dumped hundreds of liters of furnace oil into the Sundarbans delta after a collision with another vessel. The oil has spread over 350-square-kilometer area straddling Bangladesh and India.

The Nasca Line action took place on the occasion of the climate conference in Lima, Peru. On 8 December 2014, Greenpeace activists placed a message, consisting of 45 cloth letters on the ground, next to the Hummingbird geoglyph. The letters spelled, "Time for change, the future is renewable - Greenpeace". They used yellow colored stones (carried in with them) to hold the letters in place, and used a GIS system to ensure everything is laid out in the right place. On 9 December 2014 the Peruvian Ministry of Culture accused the activists of having damaged the site.

A pipeline, which carries oil between Eilat and Ashkelon, was breached on 3 December 2014, during construction work in Be'er Ora, near Eilat. The official, Guy Samet, said there is a seven-kilometer (4.3 mile) long river of oil flowing through the Evrona Nature Reserve in southern Israel, some 20 kilometers (about 12 miles) north of Eilat.

The chair of the steering committee of the National Platform for Electric Mobility (NPE), Professor Henning Kagermann, presented the NPE's 2014 progress report to Chancellor Merkel on 2 Dezember 2014. This report marks the conclusion of the NPE's market preparation phase (2010 to 2014) and describes the current situation. In the report, the NPE also makes proposals for the upcoming market start-up phase (2015 to 2017) which focus on how Germany can achieve its goals of becoming a leading supplier and lead market in the field of electric mobility by 2020.