HEARD THIS WEEK👂

🗑️ Middle Harbour Creek among NSW’s “most contaminated waterways”

There might be a river in New South Wales free from microplastic contamination, but the state's top scientists can’t find it.

What happened: A study from the NSW Environment Protection Authority sampled 120 catchments across the state and failed to find a single body of water free from microplastics.

The report ranked Middle Harbour Creek, Dee Why Lagoon and Manly Lagoon among the top 10 most contaminated waterways in the state.

Scientists conducting the assessment scooped water from the top 15cm of water and filtered it through a petri dish to see what synthetic treasures they could find.

The culprits? The majority of the pollution observed across the state falls into the categories of fragments, films and foams.

Foam: the small balls that make up foam cups, insulation and packaging.

Film: small pieces of soft plastic from plastic bags or packaging.

Fragments: broken down bits of harder plastic items, like bottles or containers.

North Shore data showed a disproportionate amount of one plastic: synthetic turf.

In Middle Harbour, a quarter of the contaminants were fragments of fake grass. At Manly Lagoon it was 56.5 percent.

In comparison, the statewide proportion of fake grass was 5.5%.

See the full piece below.

☣️ Why is acid leaking out of Tunks Park?

Cammeray residents have raised concerns about a murky substance flowing through their local waterways.

For more than a year, acid has been leaching out of the ground in Tunks Park and washing into the adjacent Long Bay.

North Sydney Council, which is responsible for the park and the bay, has been working since 2024 to find out what is causing the contamination. 

At this stage, council is certain it is coming from acid sulphate soils. But in order to nail down the source of the leakage and find potential solutions, councillors have endorsed spending nearly $330,000 on an investigation.

Read the full story below.

🚗 North Shore locals love electric cars. But how do we make them more affordable for everyone?

Sydney's North Shore has some of the highest uptake of electric vehicles in the country; but even in an area that is one of the nation's wealthiest, finding the funds to purchase a brand new EV can be tough.

A tax scheme in place since 2022, while limited in its range, has worked to incentivise further uptake of electric vehicles in Australia.

But now, with the scheme under review, industry groups and politicians have raised concerns about its potential removal.

Read the full story below.

LOOKING NATIONALLY 👀

🪨 The European Union thinks our industries don’t pay enough for pollution – and they're making us pay.

In January, the European Union introduced a tax on imports that create a lot of carbon pollution.

Aluminium, cement, fertilisers, iron and steel… that sorta thing.

They called it the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM).

The CBAM means imported goods pay the same pollution taxes as European-made ones.

The EU wants to stop "carbon leakage", which is when companies relocate to countries with weaker climate regulations to avoid costs and end up creating more emissions.

So what does this mean for goods coming from Australia?

For the full rundown, check out Archie’s video: