Hundreds of pleasure boats equipped with sophisticated miniature environmental sensors forming a monitoring network transmitting real-time data on the state of the oceans and coasts to scientists might sound like a sci-fi scenario, but it is actually the brain child of an international initiative with an exotic name, YachtGOOS.

YachtGOOS is a recreational Global Ocean Observing System involving yachtsmen and women in a number of countries. It enables real-time, automated monitoring of the marine environment and covers diverse regions of the coastal and open ocean, leading the way in the use of state-of-the-art technology and environmental policy. The data gathered will have a range of potential applications, including improved weather forecasting, marine ecosystem forecasting and coastal and fisheries management.

Researchers at Environmental Ocean Team (EOT), in collaboration with MyOcean Resources Ltd (project leaders), and Chelsea Technologies Group, ENEA and the National Oceanography Centre have already conducted pilot studies to test the feasibility of this initiative.

On Tuesday 24 April, volunteers will be helping the Environment Agency and Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust with landscaping works on the River Chelt in Priors Norton, Gloucestershire.

Over the coming weeks the area will be landscaped, attracting more wildlife such as birds, bats, dragonflies and eels. Surplus wetland plants from the Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust’s Coombe Hill nature reserve and a section of the Stroudwater Navigation at Wallbridge, are being rehomed, thanks to volunteers. These local reeds, flag iris and purple loosetrife will give natural colonisation a helping hand.

Residents in the Tewkesbury area may have noticed machinery on the River Chelt along the A38 at Priors Norton last autumn. This work is a part of an ongoing river restoration project led by the Environment Agency and supported by Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust.   A new meandering section of river has been created to bypass the Norton Weir. Fish can now move freely up another 6km of the River Chelt, where they were not able to before. The previously straight and deep channel has been reengineered into an attractive and dynamic river, complete with two ponds and three backwaters.   The clay that was dug out from the channel was recycled to rebuild the flood bank further away from the river, to create an additional hectare of space for water and wetlands.

The Environment Agency has declared official drought zones in a further 17 English counties and said the shortages could last until Christmas or beyond.

Environmental experts said dry weather over the past few months had left some rivers in England exceptionally low and had now extended the country's "drought map" into the Midlands and the South West.

Environment Agency officials stress that public water supplies are unlikely to be affected by the ongoing drought, but are reiterating calls from consumers to combat the dry conditions by using scarce water wisely.

Warning of the prospect of the current drought stretching into 2013, Trevor Bishop, head of water resources at the Environment Agency, said: "A longer term drought, lasting until Christmas and perhaps beyond, now looks more likely.

"While we've had some welcome rain recently, the problem has not gone away, and we would urge everyone - right across the country - to use water wisely now, which will help to prevent more serious impacts next year."

The release today of a second report into the earthquakes caused by Cuadrilla resources’ fracking activity in Lancashire has been met with disdain from environmental activists.

The report, commissioned by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), concludes that, ‘it would not be possible to state categorically that no further earthquakes will be experienced during a similar treatment in a nearby well’.

Though seemingly damming, a report that focuses the minds of the press and public on minor seismic events could be seen as a PR coup for a company whose extraction method of choice has consistently been linked to groundwater contamination, severe methane leakage, air pollution, climate change and radioactive waste.

Companies involved in the search for, and extraction of, other types of unconventional gas in the UK are also likely to be enjoying the superficial investigation offered by the report.