Photo: Rahul Chowdhury/Unsplash (CC0)
Today’s Squirrel News talks about Spain’s new affordable nationwide transport pass, the launch of Erasmus+ bringing new education and employment opportunities to UK students, and New York’s rotating Grandma Stands where strangers can stop for life advice.
Spain’s socialist-led government is to launch a national public transport pass that will allow people to travel anywhere in the country by bus or train for a flat monthly fee of €60 (£52.70). The prime minister, Pedro Sánchez said the initiative would come into effect in the second half of January.
Source: The Guardian
The scheme, known officially as Erasmus+, will be reopened to those involved in education, training, culture and sport from 2027. The UK government said up to 100,000 people of all ages could benefit in the first year.
Source: The Guardian
Under proposed European rules, clothing could soon come with digital passports revealing how and where garments are made, in a bid to curb greenwashing in the global fashion industry. The system would allow shoppers to scan QR codes or electronic tags to view details on materials, energy and water use, chemicals, and production stages.
Source: Context
The first new treatments for gonorrhoea in decades have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration, raising hopes of improved control of the sexually transmitted infection as global cases climb to an estimated 82 million.
Source: CNN
Norway’s newly elected government has put plans to issue deep-sea mining licenses in the Arctic on hold until at least 2029, delaying a controversial industry that has drawn strong opposition from environmental groups.
Source: Euronews
New federal rules outline how Canada, the world’s fourth-largest oil producer, plans to sharply reduce methane emissions from the oil and gas sector, aiming for a 75% reduction from 2014 levels within the next decade.
Source: Reuters
According to an Oxford University study, green energy spending gives a bigger boost to supply chains and wages than fossil fuels, and that potential is most significant in low- and middle-income countries, where a quick enough transition to renewables was found to give a GDP increase as high as 10%.
Source: Semafor
After record flooding submerged Bor in South Sudan in 2020, the emergency response became a beacon of climate crisis adaptation. The water treatment plant built to replace the destroyed infrastructure provides jobs, revenue, and a pipeline giving farms, schools, and the community easy access to clean water.
Source: The Guardian
A grassroots group of women in Jharkhand used air-quality mapping to expose pollution across dozens of rural sites in Bokaro and Dhanbad, uncovering 26 hotspots. The research prompted coal companies to take immediate steps to curb emissions, including dust suppression and improved monitoring.
Source: Good Good Good
Staffed by about 15 volunteer grandmas, the Grandma Stand rotates through parks and street corners across New York, offering free conversation and life advice. The pop-up uses handwritten prompts, ranging from personal loss to relationships, to invite strangers to pause and talk.
Source: Good Good Good
