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Environment

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Environment
Latest news and updates about issues impacting the global environment, including climate change, recycling, pollution and sustainable living.
A worker cleans up inside a shopping centre in Hachinohe in Aomori prefecture on Tuesday. Photo: Kyodo/Reuters
Japan

‘Didn’t know where to go’: tourists struggle in Japan quake evacuation

Foreign visitors were left scrambling for multilingual information after Monday’s magnitude 7.5 earthquake.

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Mainland China

Video | Mapping China’s quest to green its deserts

US-China relations

Senior Democrat urges Rubio to fill Arctic post and halt rise of China, Russia

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Indonesia

Airbnb ban in Bali? Indonesia says no, but crackdown on illegal stays looms

Bali’s governor wants to ban the online platform but the island’s problems with illegal rentals go beyond Airbnb, critics say.

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An aerial view of Denpasar shows the many hotels and lodgings in the area. Photo: Shutterstock
Vietnam

‘I have to wear a mask all the time’: Hanoi’s smog hits crisis levels

On Thursday, Hanoi was the world’s fourth most-polluted city, with officials citing vehicles, industry, and crop burning for the poor air quality.

China economy

Opinion | How China is cementing its central role as the architect of green tech

Beyond climate leadership and capacity building, China is rewriting its own energy system – and the global energy order.

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Indonesia

‘Could go extinct here’: orangutans at risk as Indonesia floods devastate habitat

Orangutans have disappeared since landslides struck Sipirok in North Sumatra province.

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A Tapanuli orangutan, and its young, hanging on a tree in Batang Toru, Tapanuli, North Sumatra, Indonesia in 2015. Photo: Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme/EPA-EFE
Indonesia

Is Indonesian disaster response failing Sumatra’s flood victims?

Prabowo’s government is ‘busy bragging about its quick reaction’ while deaths mount and people suffer from lack of aid, critics say.

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Indonesia

Jakarta office building fire kills 22, including pregnant woman

The cause is under investigation, but witnesses reported seeing a battery spark in the testing area of the building belonging to a drone company.

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Asian cinema: Hong Kong film

‘We have this gift’: Hong Kong film shows healing power of city’s nature

Never Too Late shows how four Hongkongers found balance and freedom in the city’s natural spaces and why people should cherish its beauty.

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Diver and environmentalist Hidy Yu in a still from the Hong Kong documentary Never Too Late. Photo: Edko Films
Volcanoes

Video | Force of Kilauea eruption knocks out remote camera

Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano has been erupting intermittently since December 2024.

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Science

China desalination tech makes fresh water cheaper than tap water – plus hydrogen

Facility in Shandong province also produces mineral-rich brine for industrial use, achieving ‘one-in, three-out’ circular economy.

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India

India to pause coal power expansion beyond 2035 amid grid stress

Several Indian utilities are signing contracts with coal-fired power generators to meet a projected surge in demand for cooling.

Sri Lanka

627 dead in Sri Lanka landslides as rains batter South, Southeast Asia

At least 1,812 people have been killed in the natural disasters rolling across Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam.

An aerial view of flooded Niyamgamdora, Sri Lanka, on Tuesday. Photo: Reuters
Climate change

Opinion | Fashion industry must tailor climate plans to Asian suppliers’ reality

Efforts to cut down on greenhouse gas emissions in the fashion industry will not work if they rest on a Western design paired with Eastern sacrifice.

A worker holds a piece of clothing at a factory in Depok, Indonesia, on April 25, 2022. Photo: EPA-EFE/ADI WEDA
Extreme weather

Letters | Asia is waking up to storms that are stronger – and more polluted

Readers discuss new research that shows how typhoons spread microplastic pollution, encouraging the use of an anti-scam app, and the migrant domestic workers who fell victim to the Tai Po fire.

The Philippines

6 cyclones, 5 weeks: Philippines can’t escape its endless cycle of disaster

Corruption, complacency and climate chaos conspire to turn the Philippines’ natural hazards into man-made tragedies.

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China exports

Waste to wealth: why China is building incinerators around the world

China’s economic slowdown has left its waste-to-energy sector without enough trash to burn. So, companies are heading overseas.

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People work at a garbage incinerator power station in Zhangye, a city in China’s northwestern Gansu province. Photo: Getty Images
India

New Delhi’s smog surge linked to 200,000 respiratory cases

Acrid smog chokes Delhi’s skyline each winter, when cool air traps a deadly mix of pollutants from crop burning, factories, and traffic.

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Climate change

Editorial | Asia’s floods a deadly reminder of need to combat growing climate threat

Devastating flooding and landslides have focused attention on disaster preparedness efforts as rising temperatures threaten the region.

Extreme weather

Asia’s floods kill over 1,000, lay bare human cost of climate inaction

From Indonesia’s deadliest disaster since 2018 to a state of emergency in Sri Lanka, Asia reels from a week of climate-fuelled destruction.

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People walk past the ruins of houses in a village affected by heavy flooding in Batang Toru, Indonesia’s North Sumatra province, on Wednesday. Photo: AP
Indonesia

Indonesia’s cyclone tragedy exposes lethal cost of forest destruction

Green groups say plantations and mines have degraded Sumatra’s land, amplifying a disaster that killed more than 700 and displaced thousands.

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Men stand on logs swept away by flash floods in Batang Toru, North Sumatra, Indonesia, on Tuesday. The flooding has affected about 1.5 million people and displaced 570,000. Photo: AP
Thailand

One man kept his home dry amid Thailand’s floods. Here’s how he did it

Wicharit Leelakorn fortified his house with a makeshift flood-protection system after the first heavy rain fell on November 21.

Extreme weather

Video | Indonesian flood survivor returns to ruined home

Separate weather systems brought torrential, extended rainfall to the entire island of Sri Lanka and large parts of Indonesia’s Sumatra, southern Thailand and northern Malaysia in late November 2025.

South China Sea

Senior Chinese diplomat takes swipe at US over deep-sea mining strategy

‘The oceans are not calm,’ vice-minister warns in comments aimed at Trump executive order pushing American exploitation of seabed minerals.

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An executive order signed by US President Donald Trump allows American private companies to pursue deep-sea mining in areas beyond US jurisdiction without prior approval from the United Nations. Photo: Xinhua
Japan

‘Dying en masse’: Japan’s oyster farmers face ruin as waters heat up

Japan’s oyster farms hit by 90% deaths due to rising sea temperatures and high salinity, threatening the country’s top production area.

Japanese Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Norikazu Suzuki (right) is briefed by an oyster farmer in Hiroshima Prefecture, last month following reports of mass die-offs of the shellfish. Photo: Kyodo
Extreme weather

Video | Nearly 1,000 killed in flooding across Asia

Torrential storms have unleashed devastating floods across Asia.

Sri Lanka

Soldiers deployed in Sri Lanka, Indonesia as Asian flood toll tops 1,000

Indonesia sent three warships carrying aid while Sri Lanka used military helicopters to reach people stranded by flooding.

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