Good News Monday
- Editor OGN Daily
- Jun 30
- 4 min read
What better way to start the week than with some upbeat news stories.
Rule, Britannia!
A Union Jack flown from HMS Spartiate at the Battle of Trafalgar on 21 October 1805 is being exhibited at Christie's in London ahead of being auctioned tomorrow in the auction house's Exceptional Sale. It is estimated to sell for up to £800,000 ($1.1m). At the famous battle the British Royal Navy, led by Admiral Lord Nelson, defeated the combined French and Spanish fleets off the coast of Cape Trafalgar in southwestern Spain. This victory was crucial in preventing Napoleon's planned invasion of Britain and cemented British naval dominance for over a century.
America’s Amazon
Nearly 8,000 acres of forest in Alabama’s Mobile-Tensaw Delta, one of the most biodiverse places in North America, is now protected as the E.O. Wilson Land Between the Rivers Preserve - named after a pioneering biologist from the state. The land was at risk of becoming the site of a wood pellet mill, and large swaths of the forest were at risk of being cut down, chipped, and shipped overseas to be used as biomass energy. The land was purchased for $15 million with funds from Patagonia’s Holdfast Collective alongside an anonymous donor. This is great news delta - 'America’s Amazon', as the area is sometimes called - is not only incredibly biodiverse, the hardwood trees and surrounding ecosystem stores an incredible amount of carbon - and that needs to be protected.
Good News For Kids
Gavi has secured $9 billion to immunise 500 million children, despite attempted sabotage by the United States, reports Reuters. Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, has enough pledges to deploy 24 vaccines to half a billion children by 2030, plus create 150 outbreak stockpiles. RFK Jr announced that the US was pulling out on the eve of the summit, but Europe, the UK and the Gates Foundation bridged the gap, while multilateral banks offered concessional loans, debuting a hybrid model that should buffer Gavi from future political swings.
Adjusting Focus
How big is a killer whale compared to a teeny-tiny krill? That is a question now more easily answerable thanks to the Marine Organismal Body Size Database (publicly available through GitHub). The new library features body size data for over 85,000 marine animal species, from massive mammals to microscopic organisms. “Put simply, biologists have tended to focus on bigger organisms,” says Tom Webb, one of the researchers involved. “And as a result, a lot of our understanding of how marine food webs and ecosystems work is based on knowledge of these larger species. But we also know that small-bodied species are really important.” Craig McClain, the marine ecologist spearheading the project, added: “Body size isn’t just a number - it’s a key to how life works.” Whether the animal weighs thousands of pounds or barely one gram, size affects everything from movement and diet to evolution, he said.
UK on Track
Reaching net zero emissions by 2050 just might be within grasp in the UK, ‘provided the government stays the course’, say Climate Change Committee (CCC) experts. The government’s advisory panel revealed in its annual progress report that emissions in 2024 dropped to just under 50 percent of 1990 levels. It means the nation is on track to meet the interim target of a 68 percent cut by 2030.
Astonishing Progress
In a major milestone for the clean energy transition, China just surpassed 1 TW of solar capacity - almost as much as the rest of the world combined. By the end of May 2025, cumulative solar capacity in China officially reached 1.08 TW, a 57 percent increase year over year. Between January and May, new installations were almost four times as much as the same period last year. The country added 92.92 GW in May alone. To put that into perspective, the US currently has a total of around 250 GW of solar capacity, and the European Union has roughly 330 GW.
Climate Cash
A plan from the Inter-American Development Bank could unlock billions of dollars in private investment for renewable energy in developing countries. Under the proposal, public development funds would buy up private green-energy loans in poorer countries - currently off-limits to many mainstream investors due to rules about creditworthiness - and securitize them for institutional funds. The plan's architect, Avinash Persaud, said it could transform climate finance, kick-starting a virtuous cycle of investment ahead of November's COP30 summit.
"To listen well is as powerful a means of communication and influence as to talk well." Chief Justice John Marshall
On This Day
30 June 1937: The world's first emergency telephone number (999) was launched in London.
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