Kids News - Environment Articles

Just days after destroying parts of Cuba and leaving much of the country without power, Hurricane Ian pummeled Southwest Florida on September 28, 2022. The powerful storm came ashore with sustained winds of 150 miles per hour. It was just 7 miles short of becoming a Category 5 hurricane....

Yvon Chouinard, the founder and CEO of outdoor apparel and gear company Patagonia, has always been a climate activist. Most of Patagonia's products are made using renewable and recycled raw materials. Additionally, since 1985, the company has been donating one percent of its annual sales to protect and restore the environment....

The 1,450-mile-long Colorado River and its tributaries snake through seven states and two nations — the US and Mexico. They provide water and electricity to about 40 million people in Arizona, California, Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming, and Utah. The country's sixth largest river also irrigates 4 to 5 million acres of farmland in the Southwest....

The powerful eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai underwater volcano rocked the island nation of Tonga on January 15, 2022. The spectacular 13-mile-wide explosion is the largest recorded in the 21st century thus far. It expelled ash and gas plumes as high as 19 miles and triggered tsunami warnings across the Pacific....

A sprawling seagrass meadow has just been declared the "world's largest single living organism" based on area. The Poseidon’s ribbon weed seagrass (Posidonia australis) is located in Shark Bay, a protected body of shallow water in Western Australia. It covers an impressive 77 square miles (200 square kilometers) — the equivalent of about 280 soccer fields! The record was previously held by a 3.7 square-mile mushroom, dubbed "Humongous Fungus," in the Malheur National Forest in Oregon, USA....

The residents of Leye County in South China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region are no strangers to sinkholes. The area's 29 majestic sinkholes and underground caves have earned themselves a UNESCO World Heritage Site designation. But the one explored by scientists in early May 2022 harbored an extraordinary secret — a pristinely-preserved ancient forest....

An unprecedented flood hit Yellowstone National Park on June 13, 2022. The catastrophic event was caused by a combination of unusually heavy rains and rapid snowmelt. The high and fast water flows destroyed bridges and swept away entire roadways, leaving communities and homes isolated. Fortunately, the approximately 10,000 park visitors were safely evacuated....

Extreme weather caused by global warming is expected to increasingly challenge the yields of conventional crops like corn, wheat, and soy. Small-scale farmers — who lack the resources to adapt to climate change — will be particularly hard hit. Scientists believe that the only way to combat this is by introducing new, hardier crops to what they're currently growing. That's where Ethiopia's enset, or "false banana," plant comes in....

The birth of three rare Asiatic cheetah cubs in Iran is being hailed as a victory by conservationists worldwide. The May 1, 2022, announcement by Ali Salajegheh, head of Iran's Department of Environment (DOE), marks the first time the critically-endangered cheetah subspecies has reproduced in captivity....