Climate Change & Environment
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Outdoor work becomes hellish in southern Europe's tourist hot spots

Cruel heat is baking southern Europe as the continent slips deeper into summer.

In homes and offices, air conditioning is sweet relief. But under the scorching sun, outdoor labor can be grueling, brutal, occasionally even deadly.

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Early Hawaiian petroglyphs visible again with changing tides and shifting sands

Hawaiian petroglyphs dating back at least a half-millennium are visible on Oahu for the first time in years, thanks to seasonal ocean swells that peel away sand covering a panel of more than two dozen images of mostly human-looking stick figures.

The petroglyphs are easy to spot during low tide when gentle waves ebb and flow over slippery, neon-green algae growing on a stretch of sandstone. This is the first time the entire panel of petroglyphs are visible since they were first spotted nine years ago by two guests staying at a bayside U.S. Army recreation center in Waianae, about an hour's drive from Honolulu.

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Fires engulf Turkey's Mediterranean coast as government declares 2 disaster zones

New wildfires broke out on Turkey's Mediterranean coast Friday, as the government declared two western provinces in the country to be disaster zones.

Images showed flames and smoke billowing into the sky close to high-rise apartment buildings in Antalya, where local and foreign visitors flock during the summer months.

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Heavy storms in north Vietnam kill 1 as Wipha weakens into tropical depression

Heavy storms in northern Vietnam left one person dead and another missing, police said Wednesday, as Wipha weakened from a tropical storm into a depression.

A 59-year-old man was killed in Nghe An province when a tree fell on his house on Sunday before the storm made landfall, police said. Nghe An, which stretches from the coast to the mountainous Laos border, was among the areas hit hardest by heavy rain and floods. Another woman was swept away by floodwaters and remains missing. Four other people were injured.

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For hope on climate change, UN chief is putting his faith in market forces

For nearly a decade United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has been using science to warn about evermore dangerous climate change in increasingly urgent tones. Now he's enlisting something seemingly more important to the world's powerful: Money.

In an exclusive interview with The Associated Press, Guterres hailed the power of market forces in what he repeatedly called "a battle" to save the planet. He pointed to two new UN reports showing the plummeting cost of solar and wind power and the growing generation and capacity of those green energy sources. He warned those who cling to fossil fuels that they could go broke doing it.

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Global climate action at stake in UN top court's biggest ever decision

The UN's highest court is handing down a historic opinion on climate change Wednesday, a decision that could set a legal benchmark for action around the globe to the climate crisis.

After years of lobbying by vulnerable island nations who fear they could disappear under rising sea waters, the U.N. General Assembly asked the International Court of Justice in 2023 for an advisory opinion, a non-binding but important basis for international obligations.

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Bees have some ways to cope with warming Earth, but researchers fear for their future

Sweat covers Isaac Barnes's face under his beekeeper's veil as he hauls boxes of honeycomb from his hives to his truck. It's a workout in what feels like a sauna as the late-morning June temperatures rise.

Though Barnes was hot, his bees were even hotter. Their body temperatures can be up to 27 degrees Fahrenheit (about 15 Celsius) higher than the air around them. As global temperatures rise under climate change, scientists are trying to better understand the effects on managed and wild bees as they pollinate crops, gather nectar, make honey and reproduce.

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Iran's capital and surrounding province will shut for a day due to heat wave

Iranian government offices, banks and businesses in the capital province of Tehran will shut down on Wednesday due to an intense heat wave and the need to conserve energy, state-run media reported.

With temperatures in the capital exceeding 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit), the government has advised citizens to stay indoors during peak heat hours.

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As Spaniards summer at Barcelona beaches, some worry about coastline erosion

Ana García rents a shack at a beach just north of Barcelona every year, spending two months there in the summer with her daughter. But García fears summers by the sea in Montgat, about a 30-minute drive from central Barcelona, eventually could be numbered.

Storms and sea level rise driven by climate change are eroding the man-made beaches in metropolitan Barcelona, with the sea swallowing swathes of coastline every year, authorities say. Compared to natural coastlines, man-made beaches erode faster. Montgat's coastline has eroded especially fast, locals and authorities say.

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221 monsoon-related deaths in Pakistan since late June

Pakistan's disaster agency on Tuesday said 221 people have been killed and more than 500 others injured in incidents linked to nearly a month of heavy monsoon rains.

"Since June 26 up to July 21, 221 people have lost their lives, including 104 children and 40 women," a spokesperson from the national disaster management agency told AFP.

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