Every day, we breathe in between 15,000 and 20,000 litres of air – enough to fill three hot air balloons in a year. This precious substance is made up of 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen and 1% carbon dioxide. But what else is in the air we breathe, how did it get there, and what does it mean for our health?

Air pollution is an invisible problem. But the consequences for our everyday health are serious. Polluted air can cause shortness of breath, coughing, burning eyes, and can agitate asthma. Long-term deterioration of air quality can lead to more serious consequences for our health such as asthma, cardiovascular disease and lung cancer, as well as diseases related to the nervous and reproductive systems. According to the World Health Organisation, air pollution is responsible for the prematur...

Elske Krikhaar, Greenpeace International

The first thing that went through my mind as I entered Jan and Ineke van Genderen’s living room was how close the DuPont/Chemours facility was. I could almost see it from the window. It is one street over.

Jan and Ineke are a friendly retired couple from Dordrecht, a town of about 118 000 people in the western Netherlands. They have lovely grandchildren and are active in their community. Jan worked at the DuPont’s Teflon division. He met Ineke at the entrance of the plant 35 years ago.

Today they have become the faces of PFC pollution in the area, a group of chemicals produced by DuPont and other chemical companies and used in many consumer goods, including packaging, cookware and outdoor waterproof gear.

In April 2015, the Dutch newspaper Al... Read more >

I am hopeful and determined today. The first ever truly global agreement to fight climate change, the Paris Agreement, is having its first ever formal meeting. I have been working towards this moment for decades. This is no normal diplomatic affair. Few expected this first meeting to happen in this year. But here we are. The world has ratified the Paris Agreement at record speed. The cynics who claimed that the world would fail to unite against the threat of climate change were proven wrong. The world is coming together to address the biggest threat we face.

This gives me hope. Indeed, it is remarkable to what degree these global climate negotiations are now about good news. Over the past many years these negotiations were about raising the alarm. I remember clearly the fire alarm that G...

India’s capital, Delhi, is right now the most polluted city in the world. According to a WHO report, 12 out of 22 of the world’s most polluted cities are in India. It’s a public health disaster, but it wasn’t always like this.

Winters in Delhi have always had a special appeal to me. I have grown up in its famous mist, shivering in the cold breeze. Riding on my father's scooter to Shahjahan road for chaat (Indian snacks) would be an adventure the whole family would look forward to in the winters. I don't think it was the chaat we all craved for though, it was always the freezing rides through the Lutyens Delhi - the old colonial part of Delhi.

Years later, my memories of winters revolved around long heated discussions with friends at the local chai wallah (roadside tea stall). Winter was... Read more >

This past Saturday – 5 November, 2016 – hundreds of people gathered at the ruins of the Bento Rodrigues school in Mariana, Minas Gerais state, Brazil. They were there out of remembrance, and to call for justice.

Exactly one year before, two nearby dams holding mining waste collapsed, sending a wall of contaminated mud into the surrounding community. Without any warning, the Bento Rodrigues school, along with the homes and livelihoods of thousands, were utterly destroyed. Twenty-one people were killed.

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That was only the beginning of this environmental catastrophe. 25,000 Olympic pools-worth of toxic mineral waste and mud released by the dams flowed into the nearest waterway – Brazil’s Rio Doce. Over the course of weeks, the contaminated material slowly worked its way to the Atlantic ...

Imagine this…

“Super Typhoon Haiyan is moving over the Philippines this weekend bringing with it winds close to 200 miles per hour…” – ABC World News

An elderly couple walk past rubble left by the damage caused by Typhoon Haiyan in Tacloban City. 

November 7, 2013, just like any other day, I wake up to the music of the Beatles playing on the stereo. My 60-year-old parents are avid fans, especially my mom, Thelma. I go out of my room to the dining table and find my father, Cesar, taking a sip of his morning coffee as he discusses current events with my elder brother, Julius. Being lawyers, their discussion eventually turns into a debate, and the only person who can pacify the situation is my nephew, Tarin who is calmly eating his breakfast - eggs, banana and sweet potato dipped in peanu...