Richard Dixon

The heavy rain that causes sewers to overflow is increasing because of climate change (Photo: Gareth Fuller/PA Wire)

Why Scottish Water may struggle to stop sewage overflows – Dr Richard Dixon

Adam Norris surveys the damage at his home near Drayton, Alberta, this week, after a wildfire swept through the area (Picture: Walter Tychnowicz/AFP via Getty Images)

Warning signs across the world suggest climate change is now out of control

Some major offshore windfarms are providing no community benefits at all (Picture: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Why ordinary Belgians, but few Scots, will reap rewards of offshore wind power

As wildfires rage, glaciers melt, the seas rise and storms get stronger, the world needs to stop burning fossil fuels and making the situation worse (Picture: David McNew/Getty Images)

Tories and SNP must kick out the fossil fuel lobbyists – Dr Richard Dixon

With the closure of the Emsland plant and two others, Germany no longer has any nuclear power stations (Picture: David Hecker/Getty Images)

Germany's phaseout signals the end for nuclear in Europe – Dr Richard Dixon

Is the rise of the electric car inevitable, a reader asks

Readers' letters: Electric car cabling will cause massive disruption

Electric cars are stacked in a storage tower following assembly at the Gläserne Manufaktur production facility in Dresden, Germany (Picture: Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

Electric vehicles are coming quicker than you might think – Dr Richard Dixon

A firefighter battles a wildfire near the village of Saumos, southwestern France, in September last year (Picture: SDIS33 fire brigade via AP)

UK persists with crazy idea it can tackle global warming and produce more oil

A boy walks on a damaged railway track in Sunamganj, Bangladesh, where climate change has increased the frequency of floods (Picture: Mamun Hossain/AFP via Getty Images)

World must cut carbon emissions, not rely on expensive, unproven technology

Nicola Sturgeon, seen with Ugandan activist Vanessa Nakate during the COP26 summit in Glasgow, put significant energy into climate change issues (Picture: Jane Barlow/PA)

Why is climate change the forgotten issue in SNP leadership contest?

The Hinkley Point C nuclear power station is being built in Bridgwater, Somerset (Picture: Finnbarr Webster/PA)

Why Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is dead wrong about nuclear power – Dr Richard Dixon

A northern bottlenose whale leaps from the waters of Gare Loch near the Faslane naval base (Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

High Seas Treaty is vital, but Scotland must act quickly to protect its waters

Street artists Ciaran Globel and Conzo Throb paint a mural designed by Colin Li, 14, on a wall opposite the COP26 climate summit venue in Glasgow in 2021 (Picture: Andy Buchanan/AFP via Getty Images)

Scotland's cultural sector can help people connect with climate change

Biffa has been convicted multiple times of exporting poorly sorted and contaminated waste

Anger over ‘big climate polluter’ role in flagship recycling scheme

Climate change activists are taking to the courts as well as the streets (Picture: Omer Messinger/Getty Images)

How legal action is being used to spur action on climate change

Plastic bottles are a major source of litter in Scotland (Picture: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Deposit Return Scheme is vital to tackle plastic pollution – Dr Richard Dixon

Viewed from afar, humanity's efforts to address climate change appear to be a sign of collective insanity (Picture: Nasa/Newsmakers via Getty Images)

Intelligent aliens would be aghast at humans' stupidity over climate change

As wildfires and other symptoms of global warming become an increasing problem, the next international summit on the issue, COP28, will be run by an oil industry executive (Picture: Angelos Tzortzinis/AFP via Getty Images)

Oil chief's appointment as COP28 president is worrying sign – Dr Richard Dixon

Air pollution targets are set to be reduced because of the damage it causes to health (Picture: Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Despite good news on air pollution, it's still not clean – Dr Richard Dixon

Oil rigs stacked up in the Cromarty Firth during a previous price slump (Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

Is Scottish Government set to end oil and gas industry? – Dr Richard Dixon

The Insulate Britain campaign group, seen delivering a letter to 10 Downing Street, has helped to highlight the need to improve home insulation (Picture: Leon Neal/Getty Images)

A 'war effort' on boosting home insulation is now vital – Dr Richard Dixon

Oil gushes from the stricken Liberian-registered Braer tanker after it ran aground at Garths Ness on the Shetland Islands on January 5, 1992. (Photo by GERRY PENNY/AFP via Getty Images)

Why the Braer spill 30 years ago reminds us that our future cannot not be in oil

Researchers said radioactivity levels in seafood in the south-west of Scotland were mostly due to the effects of past discharges from the Sellafield nuclear site in Cumbria. Picture: Christopher Furlong/Getty

Discharges spark 15 year high in radioactivity levels in seafood

A man and a youth use a satellite dish to move children across a flooded area after heavy monsoon rains caused widespread flooding in Jaffarabad district and much of Pakistan (Picture: Fida Hussain/AFP via Getty Images)

A big step forward for nature in 2022, but fossil fuels remain a problem

Hedgehogs are classed as vulnerable to extinction in Scotland, according to the Mammal Society (Picture: Andrew Milligan/PA)

The world has just taken a big step forward for protection of nature – on paper

A circular economy would see far less waste go into landfills (Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

SNP and Greens should be ambitious about circular economy – Dr Richard Dixon

The Grangemouth refinery would be a particularly bad location for a nuclear reactor (Picture: Andy Buchanan/AFP via Getty Images)

Anti-nuclear campaigners will fight any Grangemouth reactor plan

Vaping devices do not have to be disposable, with rechargeable and refillable versions available (Picture: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

Disposable vapes are causing tidal wave of plastic pollution – Dr Richard Dixon

Planting trees can be a good thing but they need to be the right trees in the right places (Picture: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

COP27's nature-based solutions are not as nice as they sound – Dr Richard Dixon

Despite climate change, the global oil and gas industry has big plans for expansion (Picture: Katja Buchholz/Getty Images)

Big Oil is working to stop COP27 interfering with $1 trillion expansion plans

Pastoralists from the Gabra community walk among carcasses of dead sheep and goats in Marsabit county, Kenya, earlier this year after a devastating drought (Picture: Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images)

World must help the most climate-vulnerable people on planet – Dr Richard Dixon

Rishi Sunak arrives for a speech at the COP26

Rishi Sunak's attitude to COP27 doesn't inspire confidence - Richard Dixon

String duo Sequoia and filmmaker Monika Smekot have collaborated to create two music videos inspired by the River Clyde pathway and the problem of stopping marine litter at source. It is one of a rush of creative responses to climate change in Scotland that should be supported, given their power to engage with people on a deeper level, writes Dr Richard Dixon. PIC: Monika Smekot.

A creative response to climate change creates a deep understanding

The management of grouse shooting estates must change because of climate change (Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

Why management of shooting estates must change radically – Dr Richard Dixon

Oil and gas industry subsidies of more than £10 billion a year must end

Climate-sceptic Jacob Rees-Mogg now runs the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, which is responsible for the UK's action on global warming (Picture: Oli Scarff/AFP via Getty Images)

World just missed a deadline for more action on climate change agreed at COP26

Carbon emissions come with a price and it must be paid (Picture: Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

Why progress towards net-zero emissions is painfully slow – Dr Richard Dixon

Giant container ships transport goods all over the world (Picture: David McNew/Getty Images)

Shipping's lack of action on carbon emissions will lead to a global crisis

Prime Minister Liz Truss, expected to reveal details of the support package this week, speaks in the House of Commons alongside Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng

Readers' letters: Truss’s voodoo economics will not work

Liz Truss has put fracking back on the political agenda (Picture: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Dear Liz Truss, fracking is a pointless gamble – Dr Richard Dixon

Dr Richard Dixon: Expert is not convinced by Scottish Govt's new energy strategies

Energy scenarios almost point the way - but not quite

Bathing water may not always be as free from sewage as we would like (Picture: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

Beaches can be swimming in sewage without this showing up in official results

The Sizewell B nuclear power station in Suffolk is set to be joined by Sizewell C (Picture: Fiona Hanson/PA)

Building nuclear power stations as cost-of-living crisis grows is a bad joke

Even the mighty Danube River, seen at Szentendre, Hungary, has been much reduced by drought (Picture: Ferenc Isza/AFP via Getty Images)

Why saving water even when it's not scarce is a good idea – Dr Richard Dixon

Conservative leadership contender Liz Truss plans 'a red tape bonfire' (Picture: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Brexit fundamentalism threatens swathe of environmental gains

The European Union regulates chemicals in a range of products, including cosmetics (Picture: Mireya Acierto/Getty Images)

Hard Brexit is putting people at risk from toxic chemicals – Dr Richard Dixon

Using green electricity to make hydrogen may not be as efficient as using the electricity directly (Picture: Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images)

Scotland needs to focus on green electricity, not hydrogen – Dr Richard Dixon

Plastic pollution is a growing problem with tiny fragments getting into the food chain (Picture: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Scotland consumes about twice as much as we need for a good life – Richard Dixon

Creating a commercially viable system for capturing carbon emissions has proved difficult (Picture: Lukas Schulze/Getty Images)

If Scotland is to be net-zero by 2045, how can it allow new gas power plants?

In an exclusive interview for Scotland on Sunday, Bermuda premier David Burt discusses common problems facing the two nations and what each can learn from the other. “We share with Scotland a wish to innovate in renewables, in our case using the sun and tides, to become carbon-neutral over time, and radically to reduce our carbon footprint over the next decade," he said.

Car ban footprint: Should Scotland follow Bermuda's lead to save the planet?

Young people protest during the Cop26 climate summit in Glasgow in November (Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

Scotland's carbon emissions in lockdown worked out at 7.3 tonnes per person

The National Grid requires reliability of supply

Readers' letters: Rejecting nuclear power is a form of national self-harm

Construction work continues on the delayed and over-budget Hinkley Point C nuclear reactors (Picture: Finnbarr Webster/Getty Images)

Why nuclear should have no place in our energy future – Dr Richard Dixon

A cyclist on Princes Street wearing an anti-pollution mask. Scotland is well-placed to lead the way in creating cleaner air, writes Richard Dixon. PIC: Jon Savage.

Scotland needs to drive harder towards clean air goals - Dr Richard Dixon

The 2015 Paris Agreement agreed a set of global aims, including keeping the planet’s final temperature rise well below 2ºC, but action by any specific country is purely voluntary, writes Dr Richard Dixon. PIC: Hajue Staudt/Creative Commons

Countries can do as they please without climate change targets set in law

Bill Clinton, soon to be elected US President, speaks at a press conference about the ongoing Rio Earth Summit in June 1992 (Picture: Ben Rusnak/AFP via Getty Images)

Thirty years on from Rio Earth Summit, did it actually achieve anything?

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