Fed Debates How to Implement New Policy Strategy - Federal Reserve officials forged an agreement last month on a new framework governing how they will conduct policy over the long run. In preparing for a September meeting, they are debating how exactly to implement this strategy for an economy recovering from a severe and unusual downturn.Central bank officials are likely at coming meetings to provide more specific guidance about what conditions would justify continued low interest rates, according to public speeches and interviews.They could also clarify that their purchases of Treasury and mortgage-backed securities, initiated in March with the stated goal of repairing market functioning, are being maintained now to support a faster economic recovery. But officials’ remarks heading into their Sept. 15-16 meeting suggested they haven’t agreed on how far to go in refining any new guidance on their policy plans and whether to wait until subsequent gatherings in November or December to more fully reconfigure policy statements to reflect the new framework.Officials have indicated less urgency to reach consensus on other questions surrounding their asset purchases. These include whether to shift purchases of Treasurys to longer-dated securities to hold down bond yields, as the Fed did during its last bond-buying campaign from 2012 to 2014, and whether to eventually link guidance about their rate plans to their pace of asset purchases. Officials cut interest rates to near zero in March and are purchasing government securities at an annual rate of more than $1 trillion. With rates pinned near zero, one way officials believe they can provide more stimulus is to fortify expectations around how long short-term rates will remain low—for instance, by spelling out the inflation and labor-market conditions that would warrant keeping rates near zero. Several officials at the July meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee said they expected the Fed would need to provide more stimulus. Many regard additional government spending as likely to deliver more bang for the buck with commercial activity and employment still depressed by measures designed to slow the spreading coronavirus. Officials are set to release after their meeting next Wednesday new economic and interest rate projections that run through 2023. Nearly all Fed officials in the last set of projections in June projected rates staying near zero through 2022. Projecting near-zero rates through 2023 would offer one way for the Fed to reinforce the “lower for longer” rate refrain that emerged from the framework review, though it may have a mild effect because investors in futures markets don’t expect the Fed to lift its benchmark rate until 2024. Some Fed officials have said they are in no rush to make their guidance more specific because investors already expect the Fed to keep rates low for several years. Moreover, the unusual nature of the current economic shock has scrambled the traditional dynamics of a business-cycle downturn by preventing low rates from spurring a rebound in activity in service sectors of the economy, such as recreation and travel, most damaged by the virus.
Different economic crisis, same mistake: The Fed cannot make up for the Republican Senate’s inaction - EPI Blog by Josh Bivens - The economic shock of the coronavirus is very different from the housing bubble shock that caused the Great Recession of 2008-2009. Yet six months into the current crisis, we are in danger of repeating a same key mistake: leaning too hard on the Federal Reserve to navigate the crisis while ignoring the much more important role of a bloc in Congress that is blocking needed aid. While it is true that the Fed has shown better judgement over the course of this crisis, the tools it currently has available to address it are weak. The tools Congress has are strong, but their actions have been stymied by the mystifyingly bad judgement of Senate Republicans. The Fed is an enormously powerful institution in many ways, but their policy tools are actually quite limited forboosting the economy out of a recession or even increasing the rate of growth during recoveries. The Fed can decisively slow economic expansions, and too often in the past they have done this explicitly to weaken workers’ bargaining position and keep wage-driven pressure on prices from forming. In short, the Fed has a powerful brake but a very weak accelerator, and their use of this brake has merited much criticism in the past. If the Fed is relatively weak in its ability to end recessions, why do its actions get so much attention during times of economic crisis? Mostly because the actions of Congress (dominated for the past decade by the Republican caucus in the Senate) have been either too weak or outright damaging during these crises. For example, in the weak recovery from the Great Recession of 2008-2009, austerity imposed by a Republican-led Congress throttled growth, even as historically aggressive actions by the Fed tried (only partly successful) to counter this fiscal drag. During this period, every new Fed decision about interest rate changes or quantitative easing (QE) sparked long and loud controversy, even while having a minimal economic effect. Yet the enormous cumulative damage of fiscal austerity stemming from Congressional actions like the Budget Control Act (BCA) of 2011 merited just a tiny fraction of this debate. Yet the damage done by the BCA utterly dwarfed the small (if admirable) attempts by the Fed to push the economy back to recovery.In the current moment, there has been plenty of debate about what the Fed should do differently to ease the economic crisis. But again, it is Congress—hamstrung by Senate Republicans’ refusal to act—which has all the power to end this crisis. And “end this crisis” is not an overstatement. The playbook for dealing with the current economic crisis is pretty obvious: provide relief for families with workers put out of work by the shock for as long as labor markets remain damaged, direct resources to state and local governments whose revenues have been savaged by the shock just as spending demands have risen, and spend every last dollar that would be useful for getting the virus under control. If the federal government is currently too dysfunctionalto figure out how to spend these dollars to control the virus, then this means the aid to state and local governments should be that much greater.
Most loans in Fed's Main Street program exceed $1 million - The Federal Reserve’s Main Street Lending Program, aimed at supporting small to midsize businesses through the coronavirus pandemic, has mostly made loans in the millions of dollars, according to data disclosed by the central bank Tuesday. Of the 118 loans bought by the Fed’s program through the end of August, only 11 were under $1 million. Only one, at $265,000 was close to the $250,000 minimum loan size. The Fed initially announced the program with a minimum loan size of $1 million in April. It reduced it twice, bringing it to the existing minimum after it received comments from businesses and industry groups calling for more aid to smaller entities. Very small businesses had access to the Paycheck Protection Program, which saw loans averaging $107,000. Unlike with the Main Street facility, PPP lending is forgiven provided that certain criteria are met. Overall, the $600 billion program has made $1.2 billion in loans, the Fed said in a separate disclosure last week. That includes $741 million in loans in the Priority facility, $306 million in the New Loan facility and $82 million for two loans in the Expanded facility. Companies in 24 states have received Main Street loans, with Florida seeing the greatest volume at $332 million in borrowing.
The Fed Has Loaned $1.2 Billion from its TALF Bailout Program to a Tiny Company with Four Employees -- By Pam Martens --Every Wall Street bailout program that the Fed has created since September 17 of last year has, according to the Fed, been ostensibly created to somehow help the average American.According to the Fed’s Term Sheet for the Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility (TALF), it’s going to “help meet the credit needs of consumers and businesses by facilitating the issuance of asset-backed securities.” Not to put too fine a point on it, but asset-backed securities and related derivatives are what blew up Wall Street in 2008, creating the worst economic downturn, at that point, since the Great Depression.According to the Fed’s TALF transaction data, it has made $2.6 billion in total loans. Forty-six percent of that money, $1.2 billion, went to a company that has 4 employees (outside of clerical workers) according to its filing with the SEC. Much of the Fed’s $1.2 billion was loaned at an interest rate ranging from 0.75 percent to 1.26 percent. The loans are set to expire in three years.Under the CARES Act passed by Congress, the TALF has received $10 billion in taxpayer support from the U.S. Treasury to eat any losses in this program.On the most recent transaction data report filed by the Fed for the TALF, it lists the borrower that received the $1.2 billion total as Alta Fundamental Advisers SP LLC-Belstar-Alta Series 1 and 2. It lists the Investment Manager for the borrower as Belstar Management Company LLC. Both Alta Fundamental Advisers and Belstar Management Company LLC have funds that previously registered in the Cayman Islands, according to their SEC filings.The Fed is only selectively providing transaction level data for its myriad of bailout programs. As we previously noted, the Primary Dealer Credit Facility (PDCF) is one of the first bailout programs created by the Fed and yet it has never provided a drop of information as to who received the billions of dollars in loans under that program.The Primary Dealer Credit Facility was the most notorious of the Fed programs during the 2007 to 2010 financial crisis. The Fed secretly funneled $8.95 trillion in cumulative, below-market rate loans to the trading units of the biggest Wall Street banks and their foreign derivative counterparties according to an audit belatedly provided to the public in 2011 by the Government Accountability Office (GAO).The Fed’s hubris from 2007 to 2010 and its multi-year court battle to keep its transactions a secret from the American people make its actions today a critical area in which to demand transparency.Unfortunately, the Fed’s dealings are being essentially ignored by mainstream media – which is enabling ever more hubris.
As Fed helps businesses, Democrats ask- What about consumers? - — As the Senate Banking Committee met Wednesday to review the performance of the Federal Reserve’s emergency lending facilities, Democrats on the panel lamented lawmakers' failure to to provide additional direct financial assistance to consumers during the coronavirus pandemic. The hearing included testimony from business and labor representatives on how Congress could make the Fed credit vehicles such as the Main Street Lending Program and Municipal Liquidity Facility more accessible to businesses. Democrats insisted that the facilities are not enough and direct aid to consumers is needed. “There’s broad agreement that the economy is in trouble,” said Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee. “The best way to address it is through direct help to households. It means unemployment insurance. It means rental assistance. It means support for state and local governments.” Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., echoed Brown’s sentiment and said renters in particular need to be able to pay their landlords. “I wish there was a broader recognition that getting funds into the hands tenants to pay their landlord on the residential side and also on the commercial side is something that would be very important at this time,” Van Hollen said. A focus on the Fed facilities comes as the central bank continues to make aid available to middle-market firms through the Main Street Lending Program, in which participating banks make loans that the Fed then purchases. The program is available to companies with up to 15,000 employees or $5 billion in annual revenue, and provides loans of $250,000 to $300 million. But the Democrats' insistence that the focus of federal aid should be on consumers was backed by witnesses testifying before the panel. William Spriggs, an economics professor at Howard University who appeared on behalf of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, pushed for direct unemployment aid. He said that the $600 in weekly supplemental unemployment assistance from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act that expired at the end of July was key in preventing debt accrual. “We have to pump back into the system the money that we are losing from the loss in payroll,” Spriggs said. “Without that, we are going to face massive problems for loan holders when it comes to commercial real estate. The way to solve it isn’t to help the banks at the end. It’s to help the real economy on the front side and have workers have the money to pay the rent. Even with eviction abatement, you got to remember that people are still accruing the debt of holding that rent.” Jeffrey DeBoer, CEO of the Real Estate Roundtable, said eviction moratoriums aren’t sufficient because landlords still to need to pay their mortgages. “That problem is only going to get worse and … the moratorium does not solve the problem,” DeBoer said. “It creates a bigger problem once the moratorium is lifted without rental assistance.”
The US economy is having a Wile E Coyote moment – Megan Greene - US consumers and businesses have just run straight off a cash cliff, now that extra federal assistance to small companies and unemployed workers has ended. The US economy is now suspended in mid-air. The unemployment rate fell to 8.4 per cent in August from 10.2 per cent. Home and auto sales have been robust, driven by historically low interest rates. Consumer spending rose modestly during August.Numbers of seated restaurant diners andmanufacturing output increased. The spread of the virus has slowed. New cases in Arizona, California and Texas are trending down, though this has been partly offset by rising caseloads in 18 other states mainly driven by university reopenings. Don’t look down. The Conference Board consumer confidence index dropped to a six-year low in August. Worries about jobs and incomes increased as Congress failed to agree on a new stimulus package and the $600 per week unemployment benefit bonus expired. A temporary $300 weekly federal enhancement has been disbursed in only six states so far. Funding for that will run out in just over a month. More than 29mAmericans are still collecting some form of unemployment aid, yet federal and state unemployment benefits fell by around $60bn last month compared with July, according to research from Evercore ISI. Pandemic furloughs are becoming permanent; the number of people reporting that their jobs are gone rose to 3.4m in August — the most since 2013. American Airlines, Boeing, Raytheon and Coca-Cola are among the corporations that together have announced more than 200,000 job cuts to come. Then, there is the fact that the August payroll figures included 238,000 temporary census workers whose jobs will disappear in October. And with many schools reopening virtually, millions of parents may be unable to return to work. The Paycheck Protection Program, which offered loans to small businesses, expired in early August. Without a new round of financial assistance, the US faces a wave of small-business failures — these companies employ nearly half of American workers. According to the Census Bureau’s Small Business Pulse Survey, around 5 per cent of small firms expect to permanently shut down in the next six months, and roughly 25 per cent expect to have to obtain financial assistance or additional capital. Service industries are particularly hard hit. While some restaurants, bars, gyms and even retailers were able to move operations outside during the summer to stem losses, that will end once the weather turns in northern states. Consumption will also be damped by evictions. The Cares Act provided rental assistance and a temporary moratorium on evictions that expired in late July. Last week the government issued a new eviction moratorium but without funding for rental assistance, so that tenants unable to cover rent will face a massive balloon payment or eviction at the end of the year. This hardly gives them new financial breathing space. The US may not have started falling yet, but we are no longer on terra firma.
Seven High Frequency Indicators for the Economy -- These indicators are mostly for travel and entertainment - some of the sectors that will recover very slowly. The TSA is providing daily travel numbers. This data shows the seven day average of daily total traveler throughput from the TSA for 2019 (Blue) and 2020 (Red). This data is as of September 6th. The seven day average is down 66% from last year. Usually travel declines at this time of year (see Blue line), but travel is holding steady this year (so increasing as a percent of travel last year). The second graph shows the 7 day average of the year-over-year change in diners as tabulated by OpenTable for the US and several selected cities. This data is updated through September 6, 2020. This data is "a sample of restaurants on the OpenTable network across all channels: online reservations, phone reservations, and walk-ins. For year-over-year comparisons by day, we compare to the same day of the week from the same week in the previous year." The 7 day average for New York is still off 65% YoY, and down 19% in Florida. Dining is increasing again, probably mostly outdoor dining. This data shows domestic box office for each week (red) and the maximum and minimum for the previous four years. Data is from BoxOfficeMojo through September 3rd. Movie ticket sales have picked up over the last few weeks, and were close to $16 million last week (compared to usually under $200 million per week in the late Summer / early Fall). This graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four week average. This data is through August 29th. COVID-19 crushed hotel occupancy, and is currently down 27.7% year-over-year. With so many schools closed, the leisure travel season might have lasted longer than usual this year, but it is unlikely business travel will pickup significantly in the Fall. This graph, based on weekly data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), shows gasoline supplied compared to the same week last year of . At one point, gasoline supplied was off almost 50% YoY. As of August 28th, gasoline supplied was only off about 7% YoY (about 93% of normal). This graph is from Apple mobility. From Apple: "This data is generated by counting the number of requests made to Apple Maps for directions in select countries/regions, sub-regions, and cities." There is also some great data on mobility from the Dallas Fed Mobility and Engagement Index. However the index is set "relative to its weekday-specific average over January–February", and is not seasonally adjusted, so we can't tell if an increase in mobility is due to recovery or just the normal increase in the Spring and Summer. This data is through September 6th for the United States and several selected cities. The graph is the running 7 day average to remove the impact of weekends. According to the Apple data directions requests, public transit in the 7 day average for the US is still only about 57% of the January level. It is at 49% in Los Angeles, and 58% in Houston. Here is some interesting data on New York subway usage (HT BR). This data is through Friday, September 4th. Schneider has graphs for each borough, and links to all the data sources.Q3 GDP Forecasts - From Merrill Lynch: We revise up our 3Q GDP forecast to 27% qoq saar from 15% previously, but take down 4Q to 3.0% qoq saar from 5.0%. 2Q GDP is tracking -31.6% qoq saar. [Sept 11 estimate].. From Goldman Sachs:We left our Q3 GDP tracking estimate unchanged at +35% (qoq ar). [Sept 10 estimate] From the NY Fed Nowcasting Report: The New York Fed Staff Nowcast stands at 15.6% for 2020:Q3 and 7.3% for 2020:Q4. [Sept 11 estimate]. And from the Altanta Fed: GDPNow: The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the third quarter of 2020 is 30.8 percent on September 10, up from 29.6 percent on September 3. [Sept 10 estimate] It is important to note that GDP is reported at a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR). A 30% annualized increase in Q3 GDP, is about 6.8% QoQ, and would leave real GDP down about 4.2% from Q4 2019. The following graph illustrates this decline.
WSJ Survey: Overall Economy Is Recovering Faster Than Economists Expected – WSJ - The U.S. economy and labor market are recovering from the coronavirus-related downturn more quickly than previously expected, economists said in a monthly survey. Business and academic economists polled by The Wall Street Journal expect gross domestic product to increase at an annualized rate of 23.9% in the third quarter. That is up sharply from an expectation of an 18.3% growth rate in the previous survey. “I have been encouraged that many of the economic indicators have come in above consensus, perhaps suggesting that the U.S. economy is bouncing back stronger than expected,” said Chad Moutray, chief economist for the National Association of Manufacturers. “With that said, there continue to be lingering challenges, especially in the labor market and with uncertainties surrounding Covid-19 outbreaks.” A rebound in growth in the third and fourth quarters isn’t expected to make up for ground lost earlier in the year. GDP shrank at a 31.7% annual rate in the second quarter and declined at a 5% pace in the first.The projected rebound for the third quarter would recoup about half of the output lost in the first half of the year. To return to the previous peak recorded in the final quarter of last year, the economy would need to grow at a roughly 24% rate again in the fourth quarter of this year. Economists see that as unlikely: Their forecast for fourth-quarter growth is for a 4.9% annual rate, suggesting the recovery will be protracted. The average forecast called for GDP to shrink 4.2% this year, measured from the fourth quarter of 2019, an improvement from the 5.3% contraction predicted in last month’s survey. Nonetheless, the U.S. economy would still be on track to contract in 2020 by the most since contemporary records began in 1948, as measured from the fourth quarter of the prior year. By comparison, in the fourth quarter of 2008—during the financial crisis—GDP contracted just 2.8% from the prior year. Economists continue to believe that the economy is already in a recovery following a recession that the National Bureau of Economic Research determined began in February. Some 82.4% of economists said the recovery started in the second or third quarter of this year, broadly unchanged from last month’s survey. Economists also see faster improvement in the labor market, after employers added 1.37 million jobs to payrolls last month. The unemployment rate fell below 10% in August for the first time since March to 8.4%, and economists now expect the jobless rate to tick down to 8.1% in December. Last month, they expected a 9% unemployment rate at the end of this year.
A Surprisingly Durable Recovery Faces Tougher Tests – When the stock market began to rally back in March, it seemed oblivious to an economy sliding into its worst contraction since the Great Depression. Nearly six months later, some of that optimism has proved justified. The economy touched bottom in April, and it has clawed back ground every month since. The recovery has shown surprising resilience in the face of resurgent coronavirus infections and expiring fiscal stimulus. That’s the good news. The less-good news is that recovering the remaining ground may be tougher, which may be why the stock market has wobbled recently. Back in May, economists projected unemployment would still be 11% this December. Last month, it dropped to 8.4%. August was the fourth straight month the job market outperformed economists’ expectations. As the economy shrank at a record 31.7% annual rate in the second quarter, economists saw only a halting recovery. In July, IHS Markit, an economic analysis firm, projected gross domestic product would expand 17.7% annualized in the third quarter. But most economic indicators since have been better than projected, and IHS now sees GDP growing 29.6% in the third quarter, which ends Sept. 30. Goldman Sachs is even more optimistic, projecting a 35% gain. Economists have long used letters of the alphabet like V and U to describe economic recoveries. But the coronavirus downturn is so different from past recessions that economists are coming up with new shapes to describe the potential recovery. WSJ explains. Illustration: Jacob Reynolds Those numbers aren’t quite as good as they seem: Expressing quarterly growth as an annual rate tends to overstate the bounceback. IHS’s forecast means two-thirds of the second-quarter drop will be reversed in the third quarter; Goldman’s means roughly three-quarters would be reversed. One reason for this comeback is unprecedented monetary and fiscal stimulus. After the Federal Reserve slashed interest rates to near zero in March and boosted purchases of government bonds, mortgage rates plunged. As a result, new home sales hit a 13-year high in July, and home construction is back to pre-pandemic levels. Congress supplied households and laid-off workers with enough added income to more than offset lost wages, bolstering retail sales. More important is that, unlike typical recessions, this one was caused by a natural disaster—the Covid-19 pandemic and related restrictions on economic activity. Typically when a disaster fades, activity snaps back to its previous level. While the pandemic hasn’t passed, the economy did begin to reopen in May, and a new wave of infections across the South and West didn’t reverse that. “I’d have expected a resurgence in infections to produce more caution in consumers,” said Ben Herzon, an economist at IHS Markit. But “we haven’t seen it yet.”
Symone Sanders warns of 'K-shaped' economic recovery benefiting wealthy - Symone Sanders , a senior campaign adviser to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, said on Sunday that recent economic gains are indicative of a “K-shaped” recovery that benefits the wealthy. “It is going well for folks at the top, but for folks who are middle class or below, it’s going down,” Sanders said on “Fox News Sunday.” “The question really is, is this working for working families, and the answer is no.” Sanders noted that while numerous white-collar workers have been able to work from home during coronavirus-related shutdowns, she and Biden are thinking about truck drivers, cashiers, autoworkers and others "who are at higher risk of shortened hours but also higher risk of being exposed" to COVID-19. “I just think we have to think about the pain that the working families across this country are experiencing right now,” she added. Guest host Bret Baier also questioned Sanders about whether Biden would take a potential coronavirus vaccine if it was approved before Election Day. “We all want a vaccine, but we want that vaccine to be safe, and when a vaccine is eventually available we want it to be equitably distributed,” Sanders responded but did not definitively say whether the former vice president would get vaccinated. Biden’s running mate, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), made similar comments this weekend. “I will say that I would not trust Donald Trump, and it would have to be a credible source of information that talks about the efficacy and the reliability of whatever he's talking about,” she told CNN’s “State of the Union.” Baier on Sunday also pressed Sanders on the Biden campaign’s condemnation of violence and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s (D) comment that President Trump would need “an army” to visit New York City. Sanders said she was not aware of the context of Cuomo’s remarks but added that “Gov. Cuomo doesn’t work for the Biden campaign.”
Budget Deficit Hits Record $3 Trillion As US Spends 100% More Than It Collects YTD - Those who have been following the record surge in US public debt (excluding the roughly $100 trillion in off-balance sheet obligations), which exploded by $3 trillion in the three months following the covid shutdowns and which hit an all time high $26.7 this week, will be all too aware that the US budget deficit this year - and every year after - will be staggering. Sure enough, in the latest just released deficit report, the Treasury announced that in August the US burned through another $200BN, which was a sharp increase from the $62.9 billion deficit in July when government receipts soared thanks to the July 15 tax date even as spending remained in the stratosphere. That said, the number was an "improvement" from the record $862 billion deficit recorded in June. Specifically according to the Treasury, in August, government outlays were $423.3 billion, roughly the same as the $428 billion the US spent last July, and an improvement from the record June outlays of $1.1 trillion... ... while receipts slumped from the July record of $563.5 billion - which was a one-time surge thanks to the July 15 tax filing deadline - to just $223.2 billion (the question of why anyone still pays taxes in a time of helicopter money, when the Fed simply purchases whatever debt the Treasury issues, remains). The chart below shows the July 2020 breakdown between various receipts and outlays. What all this means, is that on a YTD basis, with 1 month left to go in fiscal 2020, the US has spent $6.054 trillion and collected just $3.048 trillion, which means outlays are a record 100% higher than receipts, which also includes the $8.7BN received last month and $72.2BN YTD in deposits of earnings by the Fed. And since outlays equal receipts plus the deficit, it will come as no surprise to anyone that in the first 11 months of fiscal year, the US budget deficit is a record $3 trillion (compared to "just" $866.8 billion in 2019), higher than at any other time in US history and unfortunately due to "helicopter money" it is unlikely that the exploding deficit will ever shrink again until the monetary system is overhauled... or collapses. At some point the market will realize that this insanity is simply unsustainable. And, in fact, looking at the soaring price of gold recent temporary downdraft notwithstanding, that realization may not take too long.
As Budget Gap Soars, Costs of Servicing Federal Debt Shrink – WSJ - The cost of servicing the nation’s growing debt load is shrinking despite a historic rise in government red ink this year, suggesting the U.S. still has room to borrow to fight the coronavirus pandemic. Demand for safe Treasury assets has kept interest rates near historic lows this year, pushing net interest costs down by 10% from October through August, the Treasury Department said Friday. “That’s despite a significant increase in the level of debt outstanding,” a senior Treasury official said on a call with reporters. Soaring deficits have forced the government to ramp up borrowing this year as policy makers try to cushion the economy from the effects of the virus, which triggered business shutdowns and millions of layoffs The annual deficit nearly tripled through the first 11 months of the fiscal year, to $3 trillion from $1 trillion during the same period a year earlier. Total debt held by the public has risen to $20.8 trillion as of Wednesday, from $17.4 trillion in early March. The nation’s widening budget gap is at the center of a debate over how much more support the economy needs to recover from the pandemic, which sent the U.S. into a recession in February. Democrats have called for another sweeping aid package, which they say is essential to help the U.S. avoid a prolonged, lackluster recovery similar to the years following the 2007-09 recession. Republicans say policy makers need to keep rising debt in check, and called for a narrower bill with targeted aid. The Congressional Budget Office last week said debt as a share of economic output is set to approach 100% for fiscal year 2020, compared with 79.2% last year, and hit 108.9% by the end of the next decade. Despite the rising red ink, however, CBO lowered its projections for interest costs over the next decade by $2.2 trillion from its forecast in March, reflecting lower-than-expected interest rates. “The idea that we’ve done all this spending and our debt service is actually lower than it was in the pre-pandemic baseline is a remarkable testament to, in my view, how much more fiscal space you get when you have really low interest rates,” said Jared Bernstein, a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a Washington think tank.M
Woodward Book Exposes General James Mattis' Plot To Overthrow The US Government - According to a pre-release excerpt from the Washington Post Bob Woodward writes about a discussion between General James Mattis and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats about a plot to overthrow the elected government of the United States. [...] “Mattis quietly went to Washington National Cathedral to pray about his concern for the nation’s fate under Trump’s command and, according to Woodward, told Coats, “There may come a time when we have to take collective action” since Trump is “dangerous. He’s unfit.” (read more) What do you call a conversation between the Defense Secretary and the head of the U.S. intelligence apparatus where they are talking about taking “collective action” to remove an elected President? That’s called sedition…. A seditious conspiracy.As alarming as that sounds on its face, this actually aligns with our own previous research into key military leadership, the joint chiefs, and their corrupt intent to overthrow the elected government. Readers will remember when we noted this very issue after Lt. Col Alexander Vindman compromised his position yet was not removed by his command structure within the Pentagon. NOVEMBER 2019 – [...] For emphasis let me repeat a current fact that is being entirely overlooked. Despite his admitted usurpation of President Trump policy, Vindman was sent back to his post in the NSC with the full support of the United States Department of Defense.The onus of action to remove Vindman from the NSC does not just lay simply at the feet of the White House and National Security advisor Robert O’Brien; and upon whose action the removal of Vindman could be positioned as political; the necessary, albeit difficult or perhaps challenging, obligation to remove Lt. Col Vindman also resides purposefully with the Dept. of Defense.The Pentagon could easily withdraw Vindman from his position at the National Security Council; yet, it does not…. and it has not. WHY? There is a code within the military whereby you never put your leadership into a position of compromise; ie. “never compromise your leadership”.
Trump: Pentagon Leaders Want War to Keep Contractors 'Happy' - -- President Donald Trump said Monday that top Defense Department leaders want to keep waging wars in order to keep defense contractors “happy.” Trump continues to fight allegations that he made offensive comments about fallen U.S. service-members, including calling World War I dead at an American military cemetery in France “losers” and “suckers” in 2018. The Atlantic first reported on the anonymously sourced allegations. At a White House news conference Monday, Trump repeated his claim that the story was a “hoax” and said: “I’m not saying the military’s in love with me. The soldiers are.” However, he added, “The top people in the Pentagon probably aren’t because they want to do nothing but fight wars so all of those wonderful companies that make the bombs and make the planes and make everything else stay happy.” Trump's relationship with military brass has been strained since he threatened this summer to use the Insurrection Act to provide troops for law enforcement during the protests after George Floyd’s death. Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has also expressed regret for walking with Trump through Lafayette Square in what turned out to be a photo op during the protests. Defense Secretary Mark Esper, whom Trump appointed, was defense contractor Raytheon Co.’s chief Washington lobbyist before he became Army secretary in 2017.
DoD Confirms $10-$20 Billion COVID Bailout For Contractors After Trump Blasted Military-Industrial Complex - This is surely the last thing the American people want to hear, but it does confirm President Trump's recent statements saying that top Pentagon brass essentially seeks out constant wars to keep defense contractors "happy": the Department of Defense plans to cut major military contractors a $10 billion to $20 billion COVID bailout check.Defense One reports: "With lawmakers and the White House unable to come to an agreement on a new coronavirus stimulus package, it’s unlikely that money requested to reimburse defense contractors for pandemic-related expenses will reach these companies until at least the second quarter of 2021, according to the Pentagon’s top weapons buyer."Defense undersecretary for acquisition and sustainment, Ellen Lord, in recent statements has indicated the private defense firm stimulus would cover the period from March 15 to Sept. 15 and is estimated at “between $10 and $20 billion.” “Then we want to look at all of the proposals at once,” Lord said at a press briefing Wednesday. “It isn’t going to be a first in, first out, and we have to rationalize using the rules we’ve put in place what would be reimbursable and what’s not.”And strongly suggesting that it won't be the last of such stimulus for defense firms who have already profited immensely off post 9/11 'wars of choice' launched under Bush and Obama, Lord said, “I would contend that most of the effects of COVID haven’t yet been seen.”
Two decades of US “war on terror” responsible for displacing at least 37 million people and killing up to 12 million - A staggering new report coauthored by Professor David Vine at the Watson Institute at Brown University conservatively estimates that 37 million people, equivalent to the entire population of Canada, have been forced to flee their home country, or have become internally displaced within it by nearly two decades of unending US imperialist war. The analysis, published by the Costs of War Project, sought to quantify for the first time the number of people displaced by the United States military operations since President George W. Bush declared a “global war on terror” in September 2001 following the still unexplained attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon.Professor Vine and his coauthors note that the 37 million estimated displaced is a “very conservative estimate,” with the real number of people displaced since September 2001, “closer to 48-59 million.” That is as much as, or more than, all of the displaced persons in World War II and therefore more than any other war in the last century. It is difficult to articulate the levels of misery, poverty, hardship, strife, pain and death visited upon entire societies and endured by millions of people. The latest Costs of War report focused on eight countries that have been subjected to major US military operations: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, the Philippines, Iraq, Libya and Syria. The two countries with the highest number of displaced persons were Iraq and Syria, whose populations have suffered for decades under US-led regime-change operations and military occupations initiated by both Republican and Democratic administrations. The authors estimate that 9.2 million people in Iraq and 7.1 million in Syria have been displaced respectively, in both cases roughly 37 percent of the prewar population. The authors were careful to note that they only counted Syrian refugees and displaced persons post-2014, even though US-funded and supplied terrorist groups such as the Al Qaeda-affiliated Al Nusra Front, the Islamic State and other Islamist groupings began operations against the Syrian government as early as 2011. If the figures were to include the previous three years, the estimates exceed 11 million. Somalia, where US forces have been operating since 2002, has the highest percentage of displaced persons with 46 percent of the country or nearly 4.2 million people displaced. Throughout the “war on terror,” the authors estimate between 770,000 and 801,000 civilians and combatants on all sides have died in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Pakistan and Yemen since US forces began military operations in those countries. The number of “indirect deaths,” that is, those who weren’t confirmed killed by military weaponry, but died due to lack of healthcare, infrastructure, or food as a result of US military operations, embargoes and blockades may exceed 3.1 million, although the authors noted that credible estimates range in excess of 12 million.
Some Large Employers Reject Trump’s Payroll-Tax Deferral Plan - Some of the nation’s largest employers—including CVS Health Corp., Wells Fargo & Co. and the U.S. Postal Service—say they won’t implement President Trump’s payroll-tax deferral plan, opting to leave employee paychecks alone this fall.The president’s plan lets employers stop withholding the 6.2% Social Security tax now for most workers and requires them to pay it back early next year through additional paycheck withholding. Mr. Trump wants Congress to forgive those deferred taxes, but without any assurance of that happening, the plan continues to find little footing in the private sector as companies make their decisions.“We have reviewed the guidance issued by the U.S. Treasury Department and the IRS and have determined that participating in this optional deferral program is not in our employees’ best interest,” said Michael DeAngelis, a spokesman for CVS Health.Other large employers, including United Parcel Service Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Costco Wholesale Corp. and Home Depot Inc., say they aren’t participating either. Wells Fargo wanted “to avoid creating a future financial burden for employees,” said spokesman Peter Gilchrist.That lack of interest from companies—some of which employ hundreds of thousands of potentially eligible workers—limits the broader economic impact of the deferral. Mr. Trump, who had hoped to get Congress to slash payroll taxes to boost the economy, has been left with a program that has little reach across the country.For now, the largest group of affected workers is the one controlled by Mr. Trump—federal executive-branch employees and military-service members who will see their paychecks grow this month and then shrink in January.Mr. Trump announced the payroll-tax deferral in August, offering it as his way of getting money to households during the pandemic-induced economic downturn amid a stalemate in Congress over further assistance. He used a law that lets the administration postpone tax deadlines after a disaster. The deferral is available through Dec. 31 for workers making under $104,000 on an annualized basis. Someone making $80,000 a year could push as much as $1,653 in the employee’s share of payroll taxes from this year’s paychecks into next year’s.
1.3 million active-duty troops will have their payroll taxes deferred under Trump's controversial order — and they can't opt out- President Donald Trump's payroll-tax deferral will go into effect for 1.3 million active-duty US troops later this month — and they can't opt out of it. The Federal News Network first reported on Friday that the Trump administration was moving ahead with the deferral for the military. It will also kick in for hundreds of thousands of civilian employees within the Defense Department. A senior administration official confirmed the policy move to Business Insider. The Defense Finance and Accounting Service, which handles payment services for military service members, said in a memo that both service members and civilian employees would be "automatically" included in the initiative without the ability to opt out. It will be effective as of the pay period starting September 15. The Defense Finance and Accounting Service also said that if a military member or civilian employee departed or retired from the service before the tax collection next year, they would still be responsible for paying the tax back. It didn't provide further details on how that could be arranged. Read more: MORGAN STANLEY: The government's recession response has the stock market heading for a massive upheaval. Here's your best strategy to capitalize on the shift. The development comes as the administration also enacts the deferral for 1.3 million federal employees through the end of December. Last month, Trump signed an executive order to implement a payroll-tax holiday that temporarily suspends the collection of a 6.2% Social Security levy from workers' paychecks through the end of the year. It affects people earning below $104,000 annually. Trump has called on Congress to absolve the payments, but that's unlikely since lawmakers in both parties oppose pulling money going into Social Security, an increasingly cash-starved safety-net program. The directive has sparked substantial criticism from scores of business groups that have called it "unworkable" to set in motion. Recent guidance from the IRS said the money had to be repaid by April 30. Experts say Trump's policy will prompt a temporary pay hike for employees lasting several months, only to force workers to take a pay cut early next year. Employers must recoup the money in early 2021 by collecting the Social Security payroll tax twice. Democrats fiercely criticized the measure. Rep. Don Beyer, the vice chair of the House Joint Economic Committee, attacked the policy as a politically motivated decision that would set back troops' pocketbooks. "The President's order will give the illusion of pay increases until after the election, and then require service members to pay the money back with double tax withholding," Beyer said in a statement on Tuesday. "This is a disgraceful way to treat those who serve and sacrifice to keep us safe, and Trump's trickery is obviously designed to help his campaign."
Lawmakers Tackle Spending Deadline, Look to Revive Coronavirus Aid Talks - WSJ—Lawmakers returning to Washington after their late-summer break are hoping to revive long-stalled negotiations over additional coronavirus relief with less than two months until the election. But if they can’t reach an agreement on Covid-19 aid in coming weeks, they at least plan to avoid a government shutdown. With no Covid-19 aid deal on the horizon, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin agreed last week to pursue a short-term spending bill without any controversial policy measures. The government’s current funding expires at 12:01 a.m. on Oct. 1. “The speaker and I have agreed, we don’t want to see a government shutdown. So we’ve agreed that we are going to do a clean CR,” Mr. Mnuchin said on Fox News Sunday, referring to a continuing resolution, or short-term spending bill. He said they would do this separately from the Covid-19 aid negotiations. That agreement means that bogged-down negotiations over another relief package likely won’t derail routine government funding and spark a shutdown, which would deliver another blow to the economy if some government workers are furloughed and federal contracting projects are stalled. However, if lawmakers can reach an agreement with the administration over coronavirus aid, that could still get attached to the spending bill, aides said. Both congressional leaders and White House officials have sounded increasingly pessimistic notes about the chances of a relief deal coming together in the weeks before the election, when mounting political pressure makes it hardest to compromise. Talks between the White House and Democrats broke down last month. “I personally would like to see one more rescue package, but I must tell you the environment in Washington right now is exceedingly partisan because of the proximity to the election,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) said at an event in Kentucky Friday. “I can’t promise one final package.” Senate Republicans, who have urged caution on the size of the next package, are discussing whether to bring forward this week a “skinny” package of aid that would cost less than their previous $1 trillion proposal. Mr. Mnuchin said Sunday he expects Republicans would move forward with that this week. Democratic leaders, meanwhile, have said GOP proposals have fallen short of what is needed to respond to the coronavirus pandemic’s health and economic toll. “
Mnuchin: 'The president and I believe we should do more stimulus' - Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Sunday that he and President Trump are in favor of further stimulus in response to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. “The president and I believe we should do more stimulus,” Mnuchin said on “Fox News Sunday.” “We have about 7 and a half million jobs we need to get back until we’re back to where we were, and we want to help small businesses. We want to help businesses that are particularly impacted by this, and we’ll continue to work on proposed new legislation.” Mnuchin told guest host Bret Baier that he believed negotiations with Democrats are stuck "both on certain policy issues but more importantly on the top line.” Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Mnuchin said, “has refused to sit down and negotiate unless we agree to something like a $2.5 trillion-dollar deal in advance.” “As you know, we put $3 trillion into the economy when the economy was completely shut down. We’ve now reopened the economy. Let’s do a more targeted bill,” he said. Baier went on to ask if the White House hoped to move forward with a so-called skinny stimulus bill in the week ahead. “I’d like to call it a more targeted bill, but, yes, our expectation is we will move forward with that next week,” Mnuchin said. In the meantime, Mnuchin discussed his informal agreement with Pelosi to avert a government shutdown independent of coronavirus funds. “The Speaker and I have agreed we both don’t want to see a government shutdown, so we are going to do a clean CR [continuing resolution],” he said. “I hope by the end of the week we can begin moving forward on that.” “We haven’t agreed on the specific details,” Mnuchin said, adding that he expects it would go “through the beginning of December. That’s what we did this year.”
Top GOP senator: 'It's not beyond' Pelosi to play politics with government funding -Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) said Sunday that he would not put it past House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to politicize a deal to avert a government shutdown. “I will believe it when I see it,” Barrasso said on Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures” in reference to an informal deal between Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to pass a clean bill to fund the government. “It's not beyond Nancy Pelosi to play politics with this.” “We have been at this point before, where Democrats just want to add more money to the federal debt, with more spending. We need to end government shutdowns permanently,” Barrasso added. “I have introduced legislation with a number of my colleagues, the End Government Shutdown Act, so that there would never be a government shutdown again.” Pelosi and Mnuchin last week agreed to a clean continuing resolution to avert a shutdown at the end of the month. "We do believe that we'll be able to get funding to avoid a shutdown," White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany told reporters Thursday. Mnuchin and Pelosi agreed to "work to avoid a shutdown and keep the government open, and that the best way to do that is a clean CR [continuing resolution],” a source familiar with the talks told The Hill the same day. While the duration of the new continuing resolution is not set in stone, Mnuchin told Fox News’s Bret Baier on Sunday that the deal would likely fund the government until December, at which point Congress would need to return for a lame-duck session to pass another bill. The agreement means the continuing resolution is unlikely to be tied to coronavirus relief.
Fact check: Claim that Pelosi was removed from House for ‘drunken and disorderly conduct’ is satire - Some social media users are sharing a text that claims U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “was removed from the House floor for drunken and disorderly conduct”. This unfounded allegation stems from a satirical article. Some people appear to have taken the claim seriously, with users sharing the text and making comments like: “Why am I not surprised” and “Aren’t they proud of this disgrace and you wonder why their leadership is evil, well, there ya have it!” The lengthy text starts: “Drunk and violent Nancy Pelosi cursed out Republicans, removed from House Floor”. Examples of the claim are visible here and here .Some iterations feature screenshots of what appears to be a news article here and here . A Google search reveals the claim stems from a satirical article by Bustatroll.org here
Lenders press Congress to restart — and revamp — PPP - As Congress returns to Washington after a summer break, lenders are pressing lawmakers to resuscitate the Paycheck Protection Program. While the first two rounds of the $659 billion program centered on getting loans into the hands of new participants, lenders want the next iteration to focus on quickly getting many of those borrowers' loans forgiven or helping those still struggling secure another round of funding. Specifically, lenders want a streamlined forgiveness process for loans of $150,000 or less. They would also like permission to make new loans to PPP participants that can show ongoing stress from the coronavirus pandemic. The viability of scores of small businesses is at stake, lenders said. “It’s critical we do an additional round of stimulus,” said Christopher Maher, chairman and CEO of the $11.3 billion-asset OceanFirst Financial in Red Bank, N.J. “This round needs to be far more targeted on the people who are feeling continuing pain.” Though Democrats and Republicans have struggled to find common ground on extending unemployment benefits, aiding state and local governments and another round of direct stimulus for Americans, broad agreement exists on the need to reinvigorate the Paycheck program, lenders said. “There’s a lot of agreement around PPP,” said Lendio CEO Brock Blake. “I’m disappointed we didn’t get it done before the recess.” PPP “seems to be the one thing everyone agrees on,” added Ryan Metcalf, Funding Circle’s head of U.S. regulatory affairs and social impact. The Small Business Administration, which is administering the Paycheck Protection Program in partnership with the Treasury Department, approved 5.2 million PPP loans totaling $525 billion before the program closed on Aug. 8. That left more than $133 billion unallocated. With the timing of a recovery unclear, demand for capital is surging after many small businesses exhausted their original loans, Blake said.
Dozens of Austrians with no US affiliation get coronavirus stimulus checks: report -- Hundreds of Austrians have received U.S. coronavirus stimulus checks despite being ineligible, according to The Washington Post.Several of the recipients were puzzled to get the checks, including pensioner Manfred Barnreiter, 73, who said he believed he was the victim of a scam at first.“We quietly went to the bank … where we were told they’ll see if it’s real,” Barnreiter told Austrian public broadcaster ORF. “Three days later, we had the money in our bank account.” Barnreiter, who briefly worked in the U.S. in the 1960s, received the full $1,200, as did his wife. Neither are citizens of the U.S. or live there, which are required to be eligible for the checks.“People initially thought it’s a treacherous form of fraud — but the checks were real,” a spokeswoman for Austria’s Oberbank told the Washington Post.The report comes the month after NPR reported thousands of foreigners who once worked in the U.S. had accidentally received checks. Government officials attributed the error to likely tax return errors. Three Austrian bank branches said that as of Wednesday, they had cashed approximately 200 American stimulus checks. None of the banks could say how many were cashed by people ineligible for the payments.Barnreiter told ORF he would likely spend the money in the U.S. once travel restrictions imposed due to the pandemic are relaxed. “Initially, I felt bad, thinking, ‘Those poor Americans, maybe they need the money more urgently than we do here in Europe,” he said. ”But in the grand scheme of things," he said, “it’s peanuts.”
DOJ has filed over 50 PPP fraud cases— The Department of Justice has filed more than 50 criminal fraud charges related to the Paycheck Protection Program since banks started issuing PPP loans in April, officials said Thursday. The program leveraged federal funding for banks to deliver forgivable loans to small businesses hurt by the coronavirus pandemic. The funds were intended to help businesses pay their employees while they had to close down under stay-at-home orders. But the Justice Department cited numerous cases where borrowers applied for loans that were instead used to buy luxury items and launder money. “In each and every one of these cases, the success of the defendants’ fraudulent loan applications meant there were fewer funds available at that time in the PPP for legitimate businesses that were in genuine need of economic support,” said Brian Rabbit, acting assistant attorney general of the department’s criminal division. The 57 individuals charged accounted for about $175 million in fraud, the department said during a press conference. The hugely popular $695 billion PPP program was administered by the Small Business Administration in connection with the Treasury Department. As recently as Wednesday, the Justice Department charged 11 Miami-based individuals in a criminal ring that included a professional athlete and his business and allegedly involved $24 million in fraud, said Rabbit. Among those charged, he said, were "individuals or small groups, acting on their own, who lied about having legitimate businesses who claimed that they needed PPP money for things like paying workers or paying bills, but instead used it to buy splashy luxury items for themselves.” “As we allege in a number of our charging documents, these defendants use lies to obtain millions of dollars in PPP funds, and then spent those funds, not on their workers, but on things like luxury cars, home renovations, diamond jewelry, even adult entertainment and trips to Las Vegas,” Rabbit said. Officials said banks assisted in identifying potentially fraudulent loans. “Many financial institutions and banks such as credit unions and other banks have been strong partners in assisting us in detecting and investigating potentially fraudulent activity in connection with the PPP and other government aid programs and safeguarding taxpayer dollars by spotting fraud and freezing funds or accounts,” Rabbit said. The Justice Department also expects to file more charges related to PPP fraud in the future, Rabbit said. “We’re talking about millions of dollars being stolen instead of going to people that are desperately in need,” said James Lee, deputy chief of the Internal Revenue Service. “We’re talking about hundreds of hours agencies are taking to prosecute fraudulent claims, as opposed to spending that time processing legitimate requests.”
Senate Democrats Using Filibuster To Block GOP Pandemic Relief -The US Senate will vote today on a 'skinny' GOP bill to provide approximately $300 billion in new COVID-19 aid - a stopgap measure which would renew a federal unemployment benefit, and establish new protections for businesses against liability lawsuits brought during the pandemic, which Democrats have labeled a "poison pill." As Reuters notes, this could be the final vote on pandemic relief before the November 3rd elections, as lawmakers will likely focus on wrapping up other work over the next few weeks so they can return to their home states and begin campaigning for reelection.Some Republican senators expressed doubts on Wednesday that a compromise coronavirus bill would emerge quickly if McConnell’s latest “skinny” bill is rejected on Thursday in the Republican-controlled chamber.“There’s always some possibility,” said Senator Richard Shelby, adding: “Unless something really broke through, it’s not going to happen.” -ReutersThe stopgap, which is not expected to reach the 60 votes needed in the 100-member chamber to advance Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's latest bill, comes as Republicans and Democrats remain deadlocked over the larger stimulus package - with Republicans insisting on a bill hovering around the $1 billion mark, and Democrats digging in on over $3 trillion in aid. Nearly $1 trillion of the Democratic proposal would go towards shoring up financially ailing cities and states. Excluded from Thursday's GOP bill is an array of other initiatives - including a second round of direct federal payments to households, bailouts for US airlines, and the aforementioned aid to state and local governments. In a surprise to nobody, Senate Democrats have used the filibuster to block debate on the GOP "skinny" pandemic relief bill.There’s the 41st vote. Senate Democrats have used the filibuster to block debate on a new COVID relief package. They recently did this on police reform, too.(Reminder: They are openly discussing eliminating the tool they’re currently using if they gain power in November).
UI claims rising as jobs remain scarce: Senate Republicans must stop blocking the restoration of UI benefits - EPI Blog by Heidi Shierholz -Last week, total initial unemployment insurance (UI) claims rose for the fourth straight week, from 1.6 million to1.7 million. Of last week’s 1.7 million, 884,000 applied for regular state UI and 839,000 applied for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA). A reminder: Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) is the federal program for workers who are not eligible for regular unemployment insurance, like gig workers. It provides up to 39 weeks of benefits and expires at the end of this year.Last week was the 25th week in a row total initial claims were far greater than the worst week of the Great Recession. If you restrict to regular state claims (because we didn’t have PUA in the Great Recession), claims are still greater than the 2nd-worst week of the Great Recession. (Remember when looking back farther than two weeks, you must compare not-seasonally-adjusted data, because DOL changed—improved—the way they do seasonal adjustments starting with last week’s release, but they unfortunately didn’t correct the earlier data.)Most states provide 26 weeks of regular state benefits. After an individual exhausts those benefits, they can move onto Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC), which is an additional 13 weeks of state UI benefits that is available only to people who were on regular state UI. Given that continuing claims for regular state benefits have been elevated since the third week in March, we should begin to see PEUC spike up dramatically soon (starting around the week ending September 19th—however, because of reporting delays for PEUC, we won’t actually get PEUC data from September 19th until October 8th). It is also important to remember that people haven’t just lost their jobs. An estimated 12 million workers and their family members have lost employer-provided health insurance due to COVID-19.Figure A combines the most recent data on both continuing claims and initial claims to get a measure of the total number of people “on” unemployment benefits as of September 5th. DOL numbers indicate that right now, 32.4 million workers are either on unemployment benefits, have been approved and are waiting for benefits, or have applied recently and are waiting to get approved. But importantly, Figure A is an overestimate of the number of people “on” UI, for two reasons: (1) Some individuals are being counted twice. Regular state UI and PUA claims should be non-overlapping—that is how DOL has directed state agencies to report them—but some individuals are erroneously being counted as being in both programs; (2) Some states are including some back weeks in their continuing PUA claims, which would also lead to double counting (the discussion around Figure 3 in this paper covers this issue well).
Democrats unveil green alternative for U.S. economic stimulus (Reuters) - Democratic lawmakers on Thursday unveiled a U.S. economic recovery agenda that would bolster union jobs while tackling climate change and racial injustice - a wide ranging alternative to Republican proposals for stimulating the coronavirus-battered economy.Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Representative Deb Haaland introduced the resolution called THRIVE (Transform, Heal, and Renew by Investing in a Vibrant Economy), which so far has 83 congressional co-sponsors, including Senator Ed Markey and congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, co-authors of the Green New Deal.“It is the duty of the Federal Government to respond to the crises of racial injustice, mass unemployment, the COVID-19 pandemic, and climate change with a bold and holistic national mobilization,” the resolution says.Republicans have resisted efforts to use economic stimulus to further environmental or social issues. Disagreements between the parties have contributed to an impasse over new measures to help the country recover from the economic fallout of the pandemic. The new resolution calls for federal investments to boost renewable energy and retrofitting buildings to make them more efficient, giving workers the right to organize, protecting minority communities affected by air and water pollution and defending tribal sovereignty. Supporters say the resolution contains several elements of the Green New Deal, a sweeping climate change agenda that did not have support from party moderates and energy industry unions. “We have an opportunity to not just recover from these interlocking crises, but to thrive by creating millions of good-paying, union, clean, green jobs while building a more just, healthy, and stable economy that leaves no one behind,” Haaland said in a statement.
Hopes Fade for Second Round of Stimulus Checks, Federal Jobless Aid – WSJ —A second round of $1,200 stimulus checks to help Americans weather the pandemic once seemed all but ensured, with both Democrats and Republicans supporting the provision in early coronavirus relief negotiations in July. Likewise, many Americans were confident that Congress would approve a new round of federal jobless aid, even if it might be less than the $600 a week that ran out at the end of that month. But with bipartisan talks now stalled, a second direct check is one of several policy proposals left in the lurch. Jobless aid is stuck as well. After Democrats blocked a pared-down Republican proposal on Thursday, lawmakers in both parties are increasingly pessimistic that Congress can reach an agreement before the November election. Some also see the urgency of new aid fading, thanks to an improving economy. No deal would mean no new check and no enhanced unemployment benefits from Congress. “I’m one of the most hopeful people I know, and I’m still not overly hopeful. Nor am I anxious about it like I might have been a month or two ago,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R., N.D.), referring to a new round of relief. Each party blames the other for the impasse. Republicans argue that Democrats are refusing to compromise because they think they have the upper hand politically if talks fail, while Democrats say Republicans won’t accept the level of aid necessary for the economic and public health crises. “Republicans have tried repeatedly to build on the Cares Act to get more help out the door to American families,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) ahead of the vote Thursday, accusing Democrats of standing in the way of aid by insisting on a broader package.Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) countered that Democrats were “waiting for our Republican colleagues to wake up to the size of the crisis in our country and work with us on a bill that actually makes sense.”In the $2.2 trillion Cares Act passed in March and signed into law by President Trump, Congress approved sending a $1,200 check to many Americans. The payments began phasing out at adjusted gross income above $75,000 for individuals, $112,500 for heads of households (often single parents) and $150,000 for married couples. The bill provided $500 for each dependent as well.In a bill that passed the House in May, Democrats proposed another $1,200 check for adults and $1,200 for dependents, with a maximum of $6,000 sent to each household. A $1 trillion proposal released by Senate Republicans in July largely replicated the first round of stimulus checks. Both the Republican and Democratic plans had income caps.
To Cowed GOP Senators, 'Herd Immunity' Means Protection from Trump's Tweets - --This is the first election in my memory where a vote for any of the Republicans running for reelection to the Senate is totally irrelevant. Why? Because Republican senators have opted for “herd immunity,” an immunity that has nothing to do with the pandemic. Rather, they are huddled as a herd to protect themselves from Donald Trump’s tweets. Is Trump trashing the nation’s intelligence agencies? No problem. Surrounding himself with convicted felons? Yawn. Turning the Census into a political football? Compromising Congress’s subpoena and appointment confirmation powers? Politicizing Homeland Security, the Post Office, the EPA? Wrecking relationships with allies? Betraying the Kurds? Not only has Trump told more than 20,000 lies since he took the oath of office, he has committed dozens of offenses that most presidents would have been pilloried for by responsible congresses. This is not history. It’s current events. Senators are not bystanders. They have a constitutional duty to see to it that the president does his--and to call out offenses when they occur. Just in recent weeks Trump has admitted trying to cripple the U.S. Post Office so it won't be able to deliver the expected crush of absentee ballots. He's illegally used the White House as a campaign prop and smugly bragged that no one could stop him. He's threatened to deny cities run by Democratic mayors legally authorized federal payments. And he's been credibly accused of violating the honor of everyone who has died serving in this nation's uniform. Asked what he thought of Trump’s outrageous comments about the nation’s military dead, all South Carolina Sen. Lindsay Graham could do was praise Trump for saving the Stars & Stripes newspaper. In Arizona, Sen. Martha McSally could only muster nice words to say about the late John McCain, whose seat she filled through appointment. On the nation's most serious current problem, there's been no effort by Republican senators to investigate why the U.S. has been so deficient in handling the coronavirus crisis.
Trump said he knew virus was deadly but still played down crisis: Woodward book - (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump acknowledged to a journalist early in the coronavirus pandemic that he played down the danger of the health crisis despite having evidence to the contrary, according to a new book. “I wanted to always play it down,” Trump told author Bob Woodward on March 19, days after he declared a national emergency. “I still like playing it down, because I don’t want to create a panic.” CNN on Wednesday broadcast interviews Woodward did with Trump for his new book “Rage.” The book, to go on sale next Tuesday, just weeks before the Nov. 3 presidential election, comes amid criticism of Trump’s efforts to battle COVID-19. The Republican president, assailed by his Democratic rival Joe Biden over the slow U.S. government response to the coronavirus, played down the crisis for months as it took hold and spread across the country. In the March 19 conversation, Trump told Woodward that some “startling facts” had emerged showing the extent of those at risk: “It’s not just old, older. Young people too, plenty of young people.”Trump on Wednesday defended his handling of the virus, which has killed more than 190,000 people in the United States. “The fact is I’m a cheerleader for this country. I love our country and I don’t want people to be frightened,” Trump said at the White House. “We’ve done well from any standard.” According to the interviews, CNN and The Washington Post reported, Trump knew the virus was dangerous in early February. “It goes through the air,” Trump said in a recording of a Feb. 7 interview with Woodward. “That’s always tougher than the touch. You don’t have to touch things. Right? But the air, you just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed. “And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flus.”
The plot against America and the world: How the US government and the media suppressed the truth about the COVID-19 pandemic - On Wednesday, senior Washington Post reporter and establishment insider Bob Woodward released recordings of telephone calls with US President Donald Trump, making clear that the White House, despite its public efforts to downplay the threat of COVID-19, was fully aware in January of the massive danger posed by the deadly new disease. The tapes establish that the Trump administration lied to the public about the threat while it deliberately implemented a policy that has led to the deaths of nearly 200,000 people. During the critical period of January through March, when timely actions, similar to those taken in China, would have saved hundreds of thousands of lives in the United States and internationally, the White House made a cold-blooded decision to lie to the public, in an unprecedented crime. This was a plot against the people of America and the world. On February 7, Trump told Woodward he had just had a conversation with Chinese President Xi Xinping, who had provided the American president with a clear and blunt assessment of the dangers posed by the pandemic. “This is deadly stuff,” Trump said. “It’s also more deadly than… even your strenuous flus… this is five percent [case fatality rate] versus one percent and less than one percent.” These words were in flagrant contradiction to the statements Trump made in public over the following weeks and months, in which he equated the pandemic with the seasonal flu, promised it would “disappear,” and claimed that cases were “going down.” Eschewing the antiscientific demagogy of his public statements, Trump demonstrated a clear and precise understanding of the spread of the disease in his discussion with Woodward. “It goes through air, Bob. That’s always tougher than the touch,” Trump said, an appraisal fully in line with the current scientific consensus. On January 28, according to Woodward's account, Trump was told by his national security adviser, Robert C. O’Brien, “This will be the biggest national security threat you face in your presidency... This is going to be the roughest thing you face." The fact that Woodward, who made his career publishing the results of the Washington Post's Watergate investigation day by day as it was occurring, withheld information that could have saved tens of thousands of lives, makes him, for all intents and purposes, an accessory to the crime committed by the White House.
Science editor says Trump 'flat-out lied' about COVID-19, demoralizing scientific community - The editor of the leading academic journal Science wrote in an editorial published Friday that President Trump "flat-out lied" to the American people based on comments revealed this week to journalist Bob Woodward. "As he was playing down the virus to the public, Trump was not confused or inadequately briefed: He flat-out lied, repeatedly, about science to the American people," wrote the editor, H. Holden Thorp. "These lies demoralized the scientific community and cost countless lives in the United States." Thorp pointed to tapes of Trump telling Woodward in early February that coronavirus was much more deadly than the flu, at a time when publicly Trump was explicitly comparing the virus to the flu. Trump later told Woodward in March: “I wanted to always play it down. I still like playing it down, because I don't want to create a panic.” Thorp wrote Friday that "playing it down meant lying about the fact that he knew the country was in grave danger." "A U.S. president has deliberately lied about science in a way that was imminently dangerous to human health and directly led to widespread deaths of Americans," Thorp added. "This may be the most shameful moment in the history of U.S. science policy." Trump defended his response to the virus during a press conference Wednesday, saying when asked if he "misled" the public: “I think if you said ‘in order to reduce panic,’ perhaps that’s so.” The president maintained that he is a "cheerleader for this country, I love our country, and I don’t want people to be frightened." Asked to respond to the Science editorial, White House spokeswoman Sarah Matthews said: “The suggestion that President Trump misled the public or concealed information that cost lives is an absurd proposition." "He has always put the health of the American people first as evidenced by his early response in January when he issued a travel ban on China, declared a public health emergency, and created the coronavirus task force," she added. "During times of crisis, people want a leader who will make decisive actions in a calm manner and as the President noted he didn’t want to induce unnecessary panic and was seeking to calm the nation.”
Most dangerous phase of US Covid-19 crisis may be yet to come | Barry Eichengreen - April marked the most dramatic and, some would say, dangerous phase of the Covid-19 crisis in the US. Deaths were increasing, bodies were piling up in refrigerated trucks outside hospitals in New York City and ventilators and personal protective equipment were in desperately short supply. The economy was falling off the proverbial cliff, with unemployment soaring to 14.7%.Since then, supplies of medical and protective equipment have improved. Doctors are figuring out when to put patients on ventilators and when to take them off. We have recognised the importance of protecting vulnerable populations, including the elderly. The infected are now younger on average, further reducing fatalities. With help from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (Cares) Act, economic activity has stabilised, albeit at lower levels.Or so we are being told.In fact, the more dangerous phase of the crisis in the US may actually be now, not last spring. While death rates among the infected are declining with improved treatment and a more favourable age profile, fatalities are still running at roughly a 1,000 a day. This matches levels at the beginning of April, reflecting the fact that the number of new infections is half again as high.Mortality, in any case, is only one aspect of the virus’s toll. Many surviving Covid-19 patients continue to suffer chronic cardiovascular problems and impaired mental function. If 40,000 cases a day is the new normal, then the implications for morbidity – and for human health and economic welfare – are truly dire. And, like it or not, there is every indication that many Americans, or at least their current leaders, are willing to accept 40,000 new cases and 1,000 deaths a day. They have grown inured to the numbers. They are impatient with lockdowns. They have politicised masks. This is also a more perilous phase for the economy. In March and April, policymakers pulled out all the stops to staunch the economic bleeding. But there will be less policy support now if the economy again goes south. Although the Federal Reserve can always devise another asset-purchase programme, it has already lowered interest rates to zero and hoovered up many of the relevant assets. This is why Fed officials have been pressing the Congress and the White House to act.
Trump administration adds $1 billion to USDA food box program that has failed to deliver on food aid -- New reports on the Farmers to Families Food Box program indicate that the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) overpaid and underprovided on promises to deliver tens of millions of food aid boxes to families in need. Ostensibly, the program was designed to bridge the gap between farmers who had lost markets during the pandemic and the millions of people struggling to put food on the table. It would do this by contracting distributors to purchase, package and deliver the food to charities and food banks around the country. In theory, this would have provided food to those in need, saved farmers from bankruptcy and eased the burden on food banks. The reality has been far from what was promised. Within just weeks, the program has been riddled with issues of inefficiency, disorganization and fraud. The USDA had promised to deliver 40 million boxes by the end of June. By June 17, only 17 million boxes had been delivered and by the end of July Reuters was reporting that just two-thirds of the boxes ordered had actually arrived. Food banks across the country were reporting that orders were not being fulfilled. In Puerto Rico, the distributor Caribbean Produce Exchange failed to show up to a scheduled distribution event in mid-May in San Juan, leaving 600 people waiting for food that never arrived. The catering company CR8AD8 (pronounced Create a Date) was awarded a $39 million contract but failed to deliver 250,000 boxes of the 750,000 ordered. The boxes that were delivered were often reported to have issues with packaging and labeling, making it difficult for food banks to actually distribute the provided food once delivered. Even when food boxes were delivered on time they were consistently overpriced. Both Caribbean Produce Exchange and CR8AD8 were paid up to $100 per box, much to the dismay of food bank organizers who noted that equivalent boxes could be made for two-to-three times less money.
FCC Estimates It’ll Cost $1.8 Billion To Remove Huawei, ZTE Equipment From US Networks CNET - The Federal Communications Commission on Friday said it could cost an estimated $1.8 billion to remove and replace Huawei and ZTE equipment that's in US telecommunications networks receiving federal funds. In June, the FCC officially classified Huawei and ZTE as national security threats, though since 2019, the agency has barred carriers from using its $8.3 billion a year Universal Service Fund to purchase equipment from the two Chinese tech giants. US President Donald Trump also signed legislation in March that stops carriers from using government funds to buy network equipment from Huawei and ZTE. "By identifying the presence of insecure equipment and services in our networks, we can now work to ensure that these networks -- especially those of small and rural carriers -- rely on infrastructure from trusted vendors," said FCC Chairman Ajit Pa in a release, adding that he would "once again strongly urge" Congress to appropriate funding to reimburse carriers.Earlier this year, the FCC began collecting data from US carriers that use network gear from Huawei and ZTE, to help it reimburse smaller and rural carriers for those costs. The US, UK and Australia have all banned Huawei from providing 5G technology for their respective wireless networks over security concerns that Huawei has close ties with the Chinese government. Huawei has repeatedly denied that charge. India is also expected to lock Huawei and ZTE out of its 5G rollout.
Customs And Border Protection Bought Half A Million Dollars Worth Of Location Data - Customs and Border Protection (CBP) just got its hands on a whole bunch of location data. The news service Motherboard (Vice’s technology segment) uncovered a procurement order for $476,000 paid to the company Venntel Software last month. Venntel specializes in location data mining, compiling and selling GPS data gathered on users from various phone apps.Sources who work with Venntel gave Motherboard more insight into the type of data the government now has its hands on.Venntel’s technology only gives anonymized data, meaning it does not identify specific people or phone numbers. It gives only a randomized identification number. BUT there is an easy way to identify the owners of the phone.The technology allows the CBP to draw a perimeter around a geographical area, and obtain the location data for any phones in that area. In this way, CBP could draw a circle around one particular home, acquire the data from it, and surmise that the few devices in that home belong to the homeowners.What this means: This allows Customs and Border Protection to ignore laws that require them to obtain a warrant before surveilling particular subjects. They simply purchase the data, instead of having to show probable cause that a crime has been committed. And keep in mind that CBP does not just target immigrants. 'It’s just a question of, one, is it ethical, and two, does that open up the information to being released elsewhere?,'grants. They recently flew their surveillance drones over cities outside the border zone to help other local and federal law enforcement agencies identify and monitor protesters. Of course, CBP is being tight lipped about what exactly the Venntel software will be used for.
Privately built border wall will fail, engineering report says - It's not a matter of if a privately built border fence along the shores of the Rio Grande will fail, it's a matter of when, according to a new engineering report on the troubled project. The report is one of two new studies set to be filed in federal court this week that found numerous deficiencies in the 3-mile border fence, built this year by North Dakota-based Fisher Sand and Gravel. The reports confirm earlier reporting from ProPublica and The Texas Tribune, which found that segments of the structure were in danger of overturning due to extensive erosion if not fixed and properly maintained. Fisher dismissed the concerns as normal post-construction issues. Donations that paid for part of the border fence are at the heart of an indictment against members of the We Build the Wall nonprofit, which raised more than $25 million to help President Donald Trump build a border wall.Former Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon, We Build the Wall founder Brian Kolfage and two others connected to the organization are accused of siphoning donor money to pay off personal debt and fund lavish lifestyles. All four, who face up to 20 years in prison on each of the two counts they face, have pleaded not guilty, and Bannon has called the charges a plot to stop border wall construction. We Build the Wall, whose executive board is made up of influential immigration hard-liners like Bannon, Kris Kobach and Tom Tancredo, contributed $1.5 million of the cost of the $42 million private border fence project south of Mission, Texas.Last year, the nonprofit also hired Fisher to build a half-mile fence segment in Sunland Park, New Mexico, outside El Paso.Company president Tommy Fisher, a frequent guest on Fox News, had called the Rio Grande fence the "Lamborghini" of border walls and bragged that his company's methods could help Trump reach his Election Day goal of about 500 new miles of barriers along the southern border. Instead, one engineer who reviewed the two reports on behalf of ProPublica and The Texas Tribune likened Fisher's fence to a used Toyota Yaris. "It seems like they are cutting corners everywhere," "It's not a Lamborghini, it's a $500 used car."
Court Puts Census Count On ‘More Solid Footing’ — For Now - The Census Bureau sent out new guidance to its regional directors after a federal judge temporarily stopped the Trump administration from “winding down or altering any census field operations,” according to a Tuesday court filing. The lawsuit, led by the National Urban League, aims to stop the administration from chopping the timeline for census data collection from eight months to four. The guidance targets a lot of the on-the-ground work census workers do, including having workers resume making six contact attempts to make sure that a housing unit is vacant and reintroducing random cases to reinterview. “The order puts the largest, most complex census operation — which is the door-knocking phase — back on more solid footing, in my opinion,” said Terri Ann Lowenthal, a consultant who is a well-regarded expert on the census. “It takes the pressure off of census workers to rush through data collection at a time when that work should take more time, not less, because of the disruption and displacement of people and even entire households caused by the pandemic.” Earlier this month, the administration severely curtailed the time census workers had to collect and review data, a decision in contradiction to the advice of the Bureau’s own experts. That announcement came on the heels of President Donald Trump’s directive to exclude undocumented immigrants from apportionment data which determines, among other things, how many House seats each state gets.The temporary halt is better than nothing, said Lowenthal. “I don’t think the court order has created any more chaos than the administration’s unexplained, sudden decision in early August to abandon its request for an extended timeframe for the census and for reporting data and for reporting the results,” she said.
‘Dereliction of Duty’: Outrage as USPS Board Issues Gushing Praise for DeJoy Amid Mail Slowdowns, Medicine Delays, and Straw-Donor Scandal -Brushing aside widespread alarm over mail slowdowns, prescription medicine delays, potentialelection sabotage, and Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s reported role in an illegal straw-donor scheme, members of the Republican-dominated U.S. Postal Service Board of Governors on Wednesday said they are “thrilled” by DeJoy’s performance thus far as head of America’s most popular government institution.After meeting with DeJoy behind closed doors to discuss several ongoing congressional investigations into his actions as USPS chief and previous work as a GOP fundraising powerhouse, two Republican board members gushingly praised the postmaster general and said there are no plans to discipline him over his destructive policy changes or possible criminal actions.“The board is tickled pink, every single board member, with the impact he’s having,” board member John Barger—who, like DeJoy, is a Republican donor—told the Washington Post in an interview following the private meeting. “He’s an excellent leader. He’s an excellent supply-chain logistics savant. And I’m very, very pleased with his performance since coming on board.”William Zollars, another GOP member of the board, said DeJoy has the full support of the panel, which currently consists of four Republicans and two Democrats—all appointed by President Donald Trump. Zollars told the Post that DeJoy insisted during the closed-door meeting that “he feels like he has done nothing wrong.”“From a logistics and operations standpoint, Louis DeJoy is as good as it gets,” said Zollars. “He has support on both sides of the aisle.”The board members’ comments drew ou trage from lawmakers and watchdogs who have been urging the body to exercise its authority to remove—or, at the very least, suspend—DeJoy over policy changes that have significantly disrupted Postal Service operations just weeks ahead of an election that could be decided by mail-in ballots.Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), chairman of the House Subcommittee on Government Operations,tweeted late Wednesday that “when given the opportunity to restore confidence in the USPS, the Board of Governors today chose instead to continue their dereliction of duty.”“Mr. DeJoy’s term as postmaster general has been defined by conflict, sabotage, incompetence and politicization,” said Connolly. “Anything short of his immediate removal is a total failure in oversight and accountability.”The USPS Board of Governors unanimously appointed DeJoy—a former logistics executive with zero prior Postal Service experience—in May following a search process that Democratic lawmakers have deemed “highly irregular.”David Williams, a former board member who resigned in protest in April, told the Congressional Progressive Caucus last month that he believes it was Barger who suggested DeJoy as a postmaster general candidate “late in the process.” Williams also alleged that Barger assisted DeJoy in job interviews with the board, helping him “finish a number of sentences where he got stuck.”
USPS Postmaster General Louis DeJoy gave bonuses to former employees who donated to GOP candidates, new report says - Former employees of Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said they felt pressured to make political contributions to GOP candidates while working for his former business, The Washington Post reported.Several people who worked under or were familiar with DeJoy at his former business New Breed Logistics, a supply chain company, told the Post that DeJoy asked employees to donate to GOP fundraisers in return for bonus payments to make up for the costs."Louis was a national fundraiser for the Republican Party. He asked employees for money. We gave him the money, and then he reciprocated by giving us big bonuses," David Young, a former human resources director who previously had access to New Breed's payroll records, told the Post.The Post said an analysis of campaign finance records saw a "pattern of extensive donations by New Breed employees to Republican candidates." Monty Hagler, a spokesman for DeJoy, told Business Insider in a statement that DeJoy "was never notified by the New Breed employees referenced by the Washington Post of any pressure they might have felt to make a political contribution, and he regrets if any employee felt uncomfortable for any reason." DeJoy was a controversial choice for postmaster general, as he joined the post office with no prior experience but is a prominent GOP fundraiser and as personally raised millions for Republican politicians. Business Insider previously reported that he and his wife donated around $1.6 million since Trump's election in 2016.DeJoy has since been criticized for his drastic cost-cutting measuresin the USPS including cutting overtime for postal service workers, cutting post office hours, and displacing some mail collection boxes,which have been associated with delayed mail delivery. Lawmakers have questioned DeJoy, as concerns for delayed mail loom over an election that expects a high number of mail-in-ballots due to the coronavirus pandemic that could skew results.
Facebook announces political censorship plan in advance of US presidential election - Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a program of censorship measures on Thursday that the social media platform will take “to help secure the integrity of the US elections” before, during and after November 3. In a lengthy post to his own Facebook account, Zuckerberg said that he is concerned about “the challenges people could face when voting” and “worried that with our nation so divided and election results potentially taking days or even weeks to be finalized, there could be an increased risk of civil unrest across the country.” In motivating his proposed censorship actions, Zuckerberg claims that they are needed to protect “our democracy” by “helping people register and vote,” “clearing up confusion” about the elections and “taking steps to reduce the chances of violence and unrest.” Zuckerberg also says that Facebook’s leadership has learned “from our elections work over the past four years and the conversations we’ve had with voting rights experts and our civil rights auditors.” In other words, taking direction from the US government—and the intelligence agencies in particular—the social media giant has spent the last four years developing political censorship techniques aimed at ensuring that the content and dialogue on Facebook do not find a path outside of the narrow confines of the capitalist two-party system. Among the measures that Facebook will take are refusing to accept any new political advertising in the last week before the election, removing posts that claim people will get COVID-19 by voting in person and placing an “informational label” on content that seeks to delegitimize the election outcome or any candidate or campaign that seeks to declare victory before the official results are published by Reuters and the National Election Pool, a consortium composed of ABC News, CBS News, CNN, and NBC News. That the fundamental purpose of Zuckerberg’s announcement is aimed at defending the bourgeois political setup dominated by the Democrats and Republicans and especially at blocking socialist and left-wing politics from entering the public discourse prior to the elections is revealed in the last of the proposed measures. Zuckerberg says that Facebook has already “strengthened our enforcement against militias, conspiracy networks like QAnon, and other groups that could be used to organize violence or civil unrest in the period after the elections.”
Facebook’s Political Ad Ban Also Threatens Ability to Spread Accurate Information on How to Vote< - Facebook this week said it would bar political ads in the seven days before the presidential election. That could prevent dirty tricks or an “October surprise” and give watchdogs time to fact-check statements. But rather than responding with glee, election officials say the move leaves them worried.Included in the ban are ads purchased by election officials — secretaries of state and boards of elections — who use Facebook to inform voters about how voting will work. The move effectively removes a key communication channel just as millions of Americans will begin to navigate a voting process different from any they’ve experienced before.“Every state’s elections office has a very small communications office that is doing everything that they can to get the word out about the election,” said Gabe Rosenberg, the communications director for Connecticut Secretary of the State Denise Merrill (who is not related to this reporter). “This just makes it a little bit harder, for, as far as I can see, no real gain.” The rule change was announced Thursday in a Facebook post by the site’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. Previously, Facebook’s rules for fact-checking certain campaign ads but not others have come under fire. Taken together, they demonstrate how Facebook has become an integral piece of the American democratic process — but one that is controlled by the decisions of a private corporation, which can set rules in its own interest.For elections administrators, the last few days before an election can be the most stressful and when communication is needed most. They remind voters to mail back their absentee ballots and when Election Day voting begins and ends. Many of these ads can still be run under Facebook’s new rules, as long as they’re set up more than a week before the election.Amid the coronavirus pandemic, local election offices are scrambling to find new ways for eligible voters to cast their ballots. Voting methods and locations will be changing fast, even within the seven-day window included in Facebook’s ban.
Trump Labor Day press conference: Empty boasts and fascistic threats - The Labor Day press conference held by President Trump at the White House was a spectacle of snarling ferocity, lies and appeals based on nationalistic frenzy. All that was missing to complete the picture of Trump as a cornered rat was a declaration that “you’ll never take me alive.”The US president began by boasting of what he called the “spectacular” performance of the American economy, which he claimed was outperforming that of every other nation. “We are rebounding much more quickly from the pandemic,” he said. “We have added a record-setting 10.6 million jobs since May.”Since the US economy lost 21.2 million jobs officially in March and April—plus another 10 million or more when contractors, the self-employed and other contingent workers are included—this Trump claim merely demonstrates the gulf between the real conditions of life for working people and the fortunes of the superrich, which have fully recovered and in some cases risen sharply because of the pandemic.Hailing the creation of one-half or one-third the number of jobs wiped out by the COVID-19 pandemic is like cheering the dispersion of flood waters after Hurricane Katrina: The damage has been done, and the wreckage stretches as far as the eye can see. As always, Trump celebrated the stock market, which he said was “setting records. The NASDAQ has set 17 records already.” He pledged a new round of tax cuts to boost “growth,” modeled on those enacted in December 2017, which overwhelmingly favored the wealthy.As he continued through the 45-minute session, Trump’s tone became more and more strident and his threats about the consequences of a Democratic victory November 3 more apocalyptic.He warned Wall Street, “Joe Biden and radical socialist Democrats would immediately collapse the economy. If they get in, you will have a crash the likes of which you have never seen before.”Actually, however, both the stock exchange and the major banks are favoring the Democrats with the lion’s share of their campaign funds, in part as insurance because they see the Democrats as more likely to win, in part because the financial elites view the present occupant of the White House as a spent force who is provoking increasing popular opposition that endangers the profit system as a whole.
The killing of Michael Reinoehl: A police assassination ordered by Trump - On September 3, Michael Forest Reinoehl, 48, was shot and killed by a federal fugitive task force led by the US Marshals Service outside an apartment complex in Lacey, Washington. Reinoehl’s killing came several hours after he had been charged with the murder of Aaron “Jay” Danielson, a Trump supporter and right-wing vigilante, at a protest in Portland, Oregon, on August 29. Reinoehl’s death was a state-sanctioned killing, carried out with the support of the Justice Department and the White House. Just minutes before Reinoehl’s death was announced, President Donald Trump tweeted a demand that the police take action to apprehend Danielson’s killer. “Do your job, and do it fast. Everybody knows who this thug is,” Trump declared. While the precise circumstances leading to Reinoehl’s death remain murky, statements by police investigators, the US Marshals and Attorney General William Barr make clear there was no attempt to arrest him alive. His death was the intended outcome of an operation meant to intimidate others opposed to police violence and set a precedent for violent state attacks on workers coming into struggle against mass unemployment and the ruling class’s homicidal back-to-work and back-to school drives in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. The most chilling statement came from Attorney General William Barr, who said in a press release posted on the Justice Department’s website that the killing of an “admitted Antifa member” was “a significant accomplishment in the ongoing effort to restore law and order.” Barr justified Reinoehl’s extrajudicial killing by declaring that he had “attempted to escape arrest and produced a firearm.” Such claims have been used to whitewash the killing of political opponents, including the FBI’s efforts to destroy the left-wing Black Panther Party in the 1960s and 1970s. 17-year-old Bobby Hutton, the treasurer of the Black Panthers, was shot and killed by police who claimed he had attempted to flee.
Trump Unveils List Of Potential Supreme Court Picks, Challenges Biden To Do Same - President Trump unveiled a 'short' list of 20 potential Supreme Court nominees on Wednesday - a move which will put pressure on the Biden camp to do the same, according to USA Today. "My nominee will come from the names I have shared with the American public," in the event of a vacancy, said Trump, adding "Joe Biden has refused to release his list, perhaps because he knows the names are so extremely far-left." "Apart from matters of war and peace, the nomination of a Supreme Court justice is the most important decision an American president can make," Trump added - saying that presidential candidates "owe the American people" a list of potential Supreme Court picks. The move comes nearly two months after Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 87, disclosed that she is receiving treatment for a resurgence of liver cancer. Ginsburg was previously treated for pancreatic cancer in 2019 and 2009. Trump's list includes Sens. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Ted Cruz of Texas and Josh Hawley of Missouri - who has already turned down the potential nomination.
Biden's Immigration Pick Causing Outrage On The Left - Open-border advocates are furious over the addition of former Obama administration immigration expert Cecilia Muñoz to Joe Biden's transition team, according to The Hill.. Muñoz, formerly with the National Council of La Raza before joining the Obama administration, was harshly criticized by immigration advocates for not doing enough for immigrant rights during her time in the Obama White House - and instead, "too often defended policies that led to the deportation of more than 2 million people." "Huge mistake. Huge. Huge mistake. Worst part? We have no other option. I guess we gotta pick our opponent. That’s what it has come down to," wrote immigration rights activist Erika Andiola, advocacy director for the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services. 'If Biden wins, no one from the Obama administration should be allowed to touch the immigration policy portfolio," said Pablo Manríquez, a former Democratic National Committee spokesman who’s been overtly critical of Obama on immigration. "Cecilia Muñoz is the one person besides [Trump White House aide] Steven Miller who has spent years of her public service dedicated to the smooth execution of mass deportation policy at the West Wing level," he added. Amy Maldonado, an immigration attorney, said of Muñoz: "She was the person in the White House who shielded Obama from all the flak," adding "The whole reason she was in that room was to give a perspective they weren’t hearing, and instead she covered for them."
Osama Bin Laden’s Niece Warns If Trump Loses There Could Be Another 911 -In a bizarre interview with the New York Post, Osama Bin Laden’s niece, Noor bin Ladin, warns that if Donald Trump loses the election against Joe Biden another 9/11-style attack may be just around the corner.“ISIS proliferated under the Obama/Biden administration, leading to them coming to Europe. Trump has shown he protects America and us by extension from foreign threats by obliterating terrorists at the root and before they get a chance to strike,” Noor, Despite living in Switzerland and not being American. However, Noor says and is convinced that Trump helps protect foreign countries from Jihadists as well.“I have been a supporter of President Trump since he announced he was running in the early days in 2015. I have watched from afar and I admire this man’s resolve,” she said. “He must be reelected … It’s vital for the future of not only America, but western civilization as a whole.”“You look at all the terrorist attacks that have happened in Europe over the past 19 years. They have completely shaken us to the core … [Radical Islam] has completely infiltrated our society,” Noor continued. “In the US it’s very worrying that the left has aligned itself completely with the people who share that ideology.”Noor also mentioned Rep. Ilhan Omar and how she had urged her home state to give “compassionate sentences” to 13 suspected ISIS recruits plotting terror attacks in the U.S. “You do have a situation now in America where you have people like Ilhan Omar who actively hate your country,” Noor said, expressing how Omar had urged “compassionate” sentences for 13 ISIS recruits busted in Omar’s home state of Minnesota. Noor stated to the NYPost that she was just 14 years old when her uncle Osama Bin Laden committed the deadliest attack on U.S. soil in history. “I was so devastated,” she said remembering the day. “I had been going to the states with my mom several times a year from the age of three onwards. I considered the US my second home.”
Trump's ex-lawyer Cohen links Falwell’s endorsement in 2016 to suppression of racy photos - (Reuters) - In his book released today, Michael Cohen, the former fixer for U.S. President Donald Trump, ties for the first time the 2016 presidential endorsement of Trump by American evangelical leader Jerry Falwell Jr to Cohen’s own role in helping to keep racy “personal” photographs of the Falwells from becoming public. As Reuters reported last year, the Falwells enlisted Cohen to keep “a bunch of photographs, personal photographs” from becoming public, Cohen said in a recording, made surreptitiously by comedian Tom Arnold. “I actually have one of the photos,” he said, without going into specifics. “It’s terrible.” In “Disloyal: The Memoir,” Cohen describes thinking that his involvement in the Falwell photo matter would be a “catch and kill” — the practice of American tabloids to obtain and then suppress unfavorable stories about celebrities — “but in this case it was just going to be kill.” He later writes: “In good time, I would call in this favor, not for me, but for the Boss, at a crucial moment on his journey to the presidency.” Cohen has said that he helped persuade Falwell to endorse Trump just before Republican voters gathered in Iowa in February 2016 to nominate a presidential candidate. Falwell not only publicly vouched for Trump’s Christian virtues but also barnstormed with the candidate. His backing of Trump — a twice-divorced candidate who had talked about grabbing women’s genitals and engaged in extramarital affairs — was one of the major surprises of the 2016 campaign.
Trump boat parade: Several boats sink on Lake Travis near Austin, Texas during event supporting president - -- Five boats sank in Texas Saturday during a parade in support of President Donald Trump, according to police. The incidents were reported at Lake Travis in Travis County, home of the state capital Austin. As soon as the parade began, Travis County Sheriff's Office said they began receiving calls from attendees in distress. In a press release, TCSO said the first call came at 12:15 p.m. and the last distress call was at 1:53 p.m. "We responded to multiple calls of boats in distress, several of them sank," but there are no reports of fatalities or injuries and investigators have not determined how many boats sank on the lake near Austin, according to sheriff's spokesperson Kristen Dark. A total of 15 boaters reported distress to police while in the water. The reasons for calling included boats taking on water, stalled engines and capsized boats. Three additional reports of boats taking on water were also called in from a local towing company. The press release added that weather conditions were calm and most boats were able to be hooked up and towed before they sank to the bottom of the lake. Videos posted to social media show hundreds of boats donning Trump flags idling in the Lake Travis water and helicopters flying above.
US asks to defend Trump in rape accuser’s defamation lawsuit - The U.S. Justice Department is seeking to take over President Donald Trump’s defense in a defamation lawsuit from a writer who accused him of rape, and federal lawyers asked a court Tuesday to allow a move that could put the American people on the hook for any money she might be awarded. After New York state courts turned down Trump’s request to delay E. Jean Carroll’s suit, Justice Department lawyers filed court papers Tuesday aiming to shift the case into federal court and to substitute the U.S. for Trump as the defendant. That means the federal government, rather than Trump himself, might have to pay damages if any are awarded. The filing complicates, at least for the moment, Carroll’s efforts to get a DNA sample from the president as potential evidence and to have him answer questions under oath. Justice Department lawyers argue that Trump was “acting within the scope of his office” when he denied Carroll’s allegations, made last year, that he raped her in a New York luxury department store in the mid-1990s. She says his comments — including that she was “totally lying” to sell a memoir — besmirched her character and harmed her career.
“Pandemic be damned”: Forbes 400 wealthiest Americans list reveals billionaire bonanza - The American business magazine Forbes published its 39th annual list of the 400 richest people in the country on Tuesday, celebrating the parasitic elite’s total wealth expansion by $240 billion to a record $3.2 trillion over the past year. While millions of working-class families in the US are facing unemployment, economic ruin, eviction and hunger arising from the deep economic crisis sparked by the coronavirus pandemic, Forbes introduces its top billionaires list with “Pandemic be damned.” Noting that the stock market has “defied the virus,” Forbes editors write, “Even in these trying times mega-fortunes are still being minted.” Topping the Forbes list for the third year in a row is Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, with a net worth of $179 billion. Up from $114 billion in 2019—an increase of 57 percent—Bezos’s increase in personal wealth of $65 billion in one year is greater than the individual wealth of all but eight others at the top of the list. Along with Bezos, the top ten richest Americans include: Bill Gates (Microsoft, $111 billion), Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook, $85 billion), Warren Buffett (Berkshire Hathaway, $73.5 billion), Larry Ellison (Oracle, $72 billion), Steve Ballmer (Microsoft, $69 billion), Elon Musk (Tesla, SpaceX, $68 billion), Larry Page (Google, $67.5 billion), Sergey Brin (Google, $65.7 billion) and Alice Walton (Walmart, $62.3 billion). With the exception of Warren Buffett, whose net worth dropped by $7.3 billion over the past year, the other nine of the top ten richest billionaires increased their wealth by a total of $194 billion. This means that 80 percent of the increases in the top 400 wealthiest fortunes went to nine of the ten richest individuals. Forbes began the repugnant business of hailing the accumulation of personal capitalist wealth in 1982. This was during the decade that began with the election of Republican Ronald Reagan as President and when the ruling elite went on the offensive against every gain made by the working class since the 1930s. Since that time, a massive intensification of the exploitation of the working class and transfer of wealth to the financial oligarchy has taken place. Providing something of a picture of just how far the social counterrevolution of the past four decades has penetrated American society, in 1982 there were 13 billionaires in the Forbes 400, and someone with a fortune of $75 million could secure a spot on the list.
OCC chief, N.Y. regulator dig in on fintech chartering, preemption— Acting Comptroller of the Currency Brian Brooks and New York Department of Financial Services Superintendent Linda Lacewell traded barbs Wednesday in the perpetual struggle between federal and state regulators over the dual banking system. In remarks during a livestreamed event hosted by the Cato Institute, Brooks took issue, among other things, with the view by some states that their laws better protect consumers. He said some aggressive state laws to restrict interest rates have the effect of “rationing” credit. “We want banks to be able to export their own fixed interest rate. We want there to be preemption because without it, the parochial interests of individual states, acting under the belief that they're protecting people, are in fact preventing those same people from accessing credit,” Brooks said. “If you believe as I do that more credit and more risk-taking leads to more dynamism and growth in the economy, you don't want credit to go away, which is what those kinds of rationing state laws tend to do,” Brooks continued. Brooks' remarks, which were followed at the same event by an appearance from Lacewell, came against the backdrop of New York state's legal challenge of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's special-purpose fintech charter. Lacewell's department prevailed in the federal case, which is now pending an appeal. State regulators have also protested Brooks' recent statements that he wants the OCC to offer a payments charter. Lacewell said the New York Department of Financial services, unlike the OCC, has explicit authority to charter financial institutions that do not accept federally insured deposits. “We want responsible innovation. I do think it’s possible and, by the way, we have to do it, because right now, there is no federal authority for any kind of chartering for fintech companies, whether they're [involved in] payment or lending, that are not depositories,” she said. Lacewell argued that "the federal-state dual banking system ... is critical, and each has a role to play.” Advocates of state authority frequently cite the importance of local bank supervisors as consumer watchdogs. But Brooks said the notion that states are better watchdogs is unproven. “This idea that if the states want to go further, they can be more protective and everything, that's a trope you hear a lot,” Brooks said. Lacewell emphasized the role of states in protecting their citizens. “The states are the people, and the people are the consumers,” she said. “Everything that we do, and everything that our licensed entities do, affect real people in their lives.”
Citi Names First Female CEO Of Wall Street Mega-Bank; Corbat Out - Citigroup is making Wall Street history.Michael Corbatt, the long-serving CEO of Citigroup who led the bank through most of its post-crisis recovery, will retire in February, and in his stead, the bank has appointed Jane Fraser, who was named the company's president last year, and who will now become the first female head of a major Wall Street bank. Fraser will join the bank's board immediately, it said in a statement, but won't officially take the reins until Corbatt leaves early next year,Corbatt, who is probably best known to the public for his appearance at last year's Congressional hearing with his fellow Wall Street leaders, said in a statement that "we completed our transformation from the financial crisis and emerged a simpler, safer and stronger institution,” Corbat said in the statement. “There is always more to do and I believe the time is right for my successor to lead Citi through this next stage of progress.”Fraser has long been seen as a contender for the top job, according to reports published back in October 2019 when she was named president of the international banking giant.The bank's profitability soared during Corbatt's reign, though that hasn't always been reflected in the share price.A 16-year veteran at Citi, Fraser first joined the bank to run client strategy in the investment bank, and had been running the bank’s Latin America business, including its Citibanamex division in Mexico, for the past few years before taking over the then-vacant president seat last year.She has run Citi’s private bank, as well as its troubled mortgage business, and is credited internally with helping the bank recover after the financial crisis, when Citi had to take $45 billion in taxpayer money to survive.
JPMorgan probing employees’ role in misuse of COVID relief funds- JPMorgan Chase says it has identified instances in which COVID-relief funds were misused by customers and is probing employees’ involvement in the potentially illegal activities. The New York-based bank said the conduct includes “instances of customers misusing Paycheck Protection Program Loans, unemployment benefits and other government programs” and that some “employees have fallen short, too,” according to a memo to staff from the bank’s senior leaders Tuesday. The firm said the incidents don’t meet its principles “and may even be illegal.” “We are doing all we can to identify those instances and cooperating with law enforcement where appropriate,” according to the memo. The bank asked workers to report any conduct that violates its policies. JPMorgan spokeswoman Trish Wexler declined to comment. The Small Business Administration’s paycheck program was the centerpiece of the $2.2 trillion coronavirus relief package enacted in March and allowed small businesses to apply for a loans of as much as $10 million each. JPMorgan, the biggest U.S. bank, issued about 280,000 loans totaling more than $29 billion, making it the top PPP lender in the country, according to SBA data. The U.S. Department of Justice has been pursuing cases of potential fraud in the emergency program. A congressional subcommittee found earlier this month that more than $1 billion in federal coronavirus relief went to U.S. small businesses that received multiple loans, according to a report that also raised red flags for potential fraud with thousands of other companies.
JPMorgan finds some workers improperly pocketed COVID relief funds - JPMorgan Chase found that some of its employees improperly applied for and received COVID 19-relief money that was intended for legitimate U.S. businesses hurt by the pandemic, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. The bank discovered the actions, all of which were tied to the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, after noticing that suspicious amounts of money had been deposited into checking accounts owned by bank employees, said the person, who asked not to be identified because the information is private. The findings prompted an unusual all-staff message from JPMorgan on Tuesday that puzzled many across the industry for its candid admission of potentially illegal acts by some of its own while not describing what they had done. The Small Business Administration’s disaster loan program had been expanded significantly after the pandemic led to rolling shutdowns across the country, leaving many small enterprises in need of a cash lifeline. Unlike with the Paycheck Protection Program, banks didn’t issue or underwrite the disaster loans and grants. Instead, loans or grants came directly from the SBA. The findings of employee misconduct came in a broader sweep of individual accounts that received business aid, the person said. The SBA warned banks on July 22 to be on the lookout for suspicious deposits or activity as part of the EIDL program. The agency’s inspector general has since flagged evidence of fraud in the program, saying it identified more than $250 million in aid given to potentially ineligible recipients as well as $45.6 million in possibly duplicate payments. A Bloomberg Businessweek analysis of SBA data last month identified $1.3 billion in suspicious payments. A JPMorgan spokeswoman declined to comment. The nation’s largest bank sent a memo to roughly 256,000 employees Tuesday in which senior leaders said they were probing whether any staffers helped people misuse aid programs including “Paycheck Protection Program Loans, unemployment benefits and other government programs.” The firm had said it identified conduct by customers that didn’t meet its principles and “may even be illegal” and that some employees had fallen short on ethical standards, too. The firm’s leaders decided to send the memo to highlight the widespread abuse of relief programs they’d found, the person said, and the message asked employees to report any unethical activity they’d witnessed.
JPMorgan Finds Some Employees Illegally Pocketed Covid-Relief Funds -Yesterday, when we first reported that JPMorgan was probing its employees' role in abuse of PPP funds following reports of "instances in which Covid-relief funds were misused by customers and is probing employees’ involvement in the potentially illegal activities", we said that it was about time the role of banks was put under the microscope because " while it was easy to blame the administration for rushing to hand out hundreds of billions in grants/loans (without which the US economy would still be in a depression), a key question is how and why did the private banks that were gatekeepers for all this capital, allow such abuse to take place."Well, it now turns out that not only did JPM employees allegedly enable fraud by clients when obtaining PPP loans, the largest US bank also found that some of its employees themselves "improperly applied for and received", i.e. stole, Covid-relief money that was intended for legitimate U.S. businesses hurt by the pandemic, according to Bloomberg.The bank discovered the actions, which were tied to the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, "after noticing that suspicious amounts of money had been deposited into checking accounts owned by bank employees." The findings prompted an unusual all-staff message from JPMorgan Tuesday which according to Bloomberg "puzzled many across the industry for its candid admission of potentially illegal acts by some of its own while not describing what they had done." What is odd, is that unlike with the Paycheck Protection Program, banks didn’t issue or underwrite the disaster loans and grants. Instead, loans or grants came directly from the SBA, which raises questions how employees of the largest US commercial bank intermediated themselves in a process that should have been streamlined without middle-men. JPM's surprising findings of illegal employee activity come amid a broader sweep of individual accounts that received business aid. On July 22, the SBA warned banks to be on the lookout for suspicious deposits or activity as part of the EIDL program. The SBA's inspector general has also flagged evidence of fraud in the program, saying it identified more than $250 million in aid given to potentially ineligible recipients as well as $45.6 million in possibly duplicate payments. A Bloomberg analysis of SBA data last month identified $1.3 billion in suspicious payments. According to the FT, JPMorgan has fired several employees accused of pocketing U.S. coronavirus relief funds. The employees had not been acting in their capacity as JPMorgan employees and breaking the law was a violation of the bank’s conduct code, which led to the dismissals. Clearly at JPM only executives are allowed to benefit from billions in government relief funds.
Legal win could position credit unions for more federal suits - A recent court decision involving Navy Federal Credit Union could have long-term ramifications in the courtroom for other FCUs. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit recently overturned a district court’s decision, ruling that federal charters, including as the $129 billion-asset Navy, can claim diversity jurisdiction when filing lawsuits in federal court. Diversity jurisdiction allows litigants broader access to federal courts to avoid parties from differing states seeking a local advantage in their home state’s courts. In most situations, both parties must have a federal case or be citizens of different states to file in federal court. The ruling is especially important for FCUs such as Navy that do business in various states or have multi-state branch networks, said Nicola Foggie, chief regulatory officer for the CrossState Credit Union Association, which serves CUs in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. “This ruling aids federally chartered and state-chartered credit unions to better align as Congress intended [in the Federal Credit Union Act],” she said. “FCUs now have equal access to federal courts, which state-incorporated companies have enjoyed for decades.” The primary issue under review was whether Vienna, Va.-based Navy, the largest credit union in the world, is a citizen of any state as a federally-chartered credit union. Despite being headquartered in Virginia, Navy successfully argued that based on statutory language classifying FCUs as corporations, it is not a citizen there or in any other state. “In other words, a federally chartered credit union could not file suit in federal court under the diversity jurisdiction statute,” said Brandon Wilson, an attorney with Michigan-based Honigman LLP. Wilson said Navy’s win is good for credit unions that want to have state-law claims resolved in federal court. He said the feeling used to be that federal courts were friendlier venues for financial institutions, although in recent years that feeling has dissipated a bit. “Because credit unions are so community-focused, I actually think they can fare better in state court where judges and jurors are familiar with them and their local contributions,” he said. Eric Richard, an attorney with CU Counsel PLLC, said the ruling increases federal credit unions' options for choosing a forum in any disputes that occur with citizens of other states. He said every lawyer believes "choice of forum" can determine the outcome of a case, depending on the precedents in each forum, the quality of the judges and other factors.
FDIC board to discuss fund restoration plan next week — The board of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. will consider a plan on Sept. 15 to shore up the Deposit Insurance Fund after its reserve ratio fell below the statutory minimum. Last month, the FDIC announced that the reserve ratio of the DIF — the fund responsible for covering depositor losses and administrative costs when a bank fails — had fallen 9 basis points between the first and second quarter of 2020, from 1.39% to 1.30%. The decline was attributed to an unprecedented surge in deposits. Congress requires the agency to maintain reserves of 1.35% of estimated insurance deposits. “I want to emphasize that the Fund has more money than at any time in the FDIC’s history, and the reduction in the reserve ratio was solely a result of the unprecedented increase in bank deposits,” FDIC Chair Jelena McWilliams said in prepared remarks last month announcing the results of the agency’s Quarterly Banking Profile. The DIF’s current balance is $114.7 billion. It is unclear whether the FDIC’s coming restoration plan will raise premiums on banks. While the DIF is primarily funded by assessment fees paid by banks, McWilliams said in her prepared remarks last month that the agency believes “deposit growth is likely to normalize in the upcoming quarters and for the reserve ratio to rise above 1.35 without any need to modify assessment rates in the near term.” The Dodd-Frank Act raised the statutory minimum of the DIF's reserve ratio from 1.15% to 1.35% in 2010, and gave the agency until Sept. 30, 2020, to hit the new target. The FDIC managed to reach the goal early, achieving a reserve ratio of 1.36% in September 2018.
BankThink: FDIC's brokered deposit proposal has a glaring problem - Richard Cordray - A Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. proposal to modify the brokered deposits definition — established well before online banking — is understandably in need of an update. But some aspects of the proposal go too far and should be cut back. And that’s saying something as a former director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (and former member of the FDIC Board) who’s joined the former president and CEO of the Independent Community Bankers of America on this topic. We come from different perspectives and haven’t always agreed on key issues. But we both fear the same thing now: that in the name of making brokered deposit rules simpler, the agency’s proposal will instead jeopardize financial stability while aiding larger banks at the expense of smaller banks. To assess the proposal, one must recall why brokered deposits were restricted in the first place. In the early 1980s, troubled banks began using deposits obtained by brokers to grow (assets) out of their problems. These deposits were “hot money” meaning; banks obtained them by offering higher interest rates. But these deposits could leave just as suddenly as arrived, which was destabilizing. This was a large reason the FDIC, taxpayers and the industry had to pay more than $160 billion (or more than $300 billion in today’s dollars) to clean up the savings and loan crisis. As a result, Congress forced the FDIC to place limits on brokered deposits. And for the most part, these limits have worked. The FDIC has repeatedly found that brokered deposits increase the risk and cost of bank failures. In a landmark 2011 study under FDIC Chair Sheila Bair, the agency found that the 2008 crisis would have been even worse and more costly without restrictions on brokered deposits. While we understand the desire to modernize the rules around brokered deposits, key safeguards that protect the financial system and taxpayers remain essential. The chief defect of the FDIC’s proposal lies in wrongly treating certain accounts the same as traditional core deposits. A Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. proposal to modify the brokered deposits definition — established well before online banking — is understandably in need of an update. But some aspects of the proposal go too far and should be cut back.And that’s saying something as a former director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (and former member of the FDIC Board) who’s joined the former president and CEO of the Independent Community Bankers of America on this topic.We come from different perspectives and haven’t always agreed on key issues. But we both fear the same thing now: that in the name of making brokered deposit rules simpler, the agency’s proposal will instead jeopardize financial stability while aiding larger banks at the expense of smaller banks.To assess the proposal, one must recall why brokered deposits were restricted in the first place.In the early 1980s, troubled banks began using deposits obtained by brokers to grow (assets) out of their problems. These deposits were “hot money” meaning; banks obtained them by offering higher interest rates. But these deposits could leave just as suddenly as arrived, which was destabilizing.This was a large reason the FDIC, taxpayers and the industry had to pay more than $160 billion (or more than $300 billion in today’s dollars) to clean up the savings and loan crisis.As a result, Congress forced the FDIC to place limits on brokered deposits. And for the most part, these limits have worked.The FDIC has repeatedly found that brokered deposits increase the risk and cost of bank failures. In a landmark 2011 study under FDIC Chair Sheila Bair, the agency found that the 2008 crisis would have been even worse and more costly without restrictions on brokered deposits. While we understand the desire to modernize the rules around brokered deposits, key safeguards that protect the financial system and taxpayers remain essential. The chief defect of the FDIC’s proposal lies in wrongly treating certain accounts the same as traditional core deposits.
Trump tweets can have explosive impacts on corporate brand images, study finds - It is no surprise that Donald Trump’s use of Twitter can influence political attitudes. But new research provides evidence that his tweets can alter consumer perceptions as well. The study, published in Political Research Quarterly, suggests that Trump’s calls to boycott companies can have swift and polarizing impacts on corporate brands. “The frequency and suddenness in which Donald Trump has used Twitter to call for boycotts (or elevate existing calls for boycotts) provided my co-authors and I with a great opportunity to evaluate Trump’s ability to shape both opinion towards these brands and purchasing behavior.” The researchers used data from YouGov’s BrandIndex, which conducts daily surveys to track perceptions of more than 1,700 brands, to examine how Trump’s tweets impacted consumers’ views towards Macy’s, Nike, and Apple. They found evidence that Trump’s statements could quickly polarize the public’s evaluations of companies. “Donald Trump’s criticism of brands on Twitter can have immediate effects on how Democrats and Republicans evaluate those brands, with the views of Democrats and Republicans moving in opposite directions. The impact of these tweets on both brand evaluations and purchasing intentions can persist for weeks,” Endres told PsyPost. For example, on July 1, 2015, Trump used Twitter to call for a boycott of Macy’s after the department store announced they would no longer be selling Trump-branded products. This resulted in improved perceptions of the company among Democrats and worsened perceptions among Republicans. An even more dramatic polarization occurred after Trump used Twitter to call for a boycott of Nike on September 5, 2018, after the footwear company released an advertising campaign featuring Colin Kaepernick. Prior to Trump’s tweet, there was only a small difference between how Democrats and Republicans perceived the company. But during the month after the tweet, the difference in perceptions was “especially large.”
Fed wants banks to say what they’re doing to promote diversity -The Federal Reserve wants the banks it oversees to provide more information on what they’re doing to promote racial and gender diversity, a senior central bank official said. “In the last two years, regulated entities slightly increased their submissions of assessments of their diversity policies and practices,” Sheila Clark, program director of the Fed’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion, said in congressional testimony published ahead of a hearing Tuesday. “However, we are not satisfied with the level of responsiveness.” She said the Fed is continuing to explore ways to promote greater participation by the banks, including by working with other financial regulators. Much of Clark’s scheduled testimony to a House Financial Services Committee panel was devoted to detailing the steps that the Fed has taken to promote diversity. Among the “significant accomplishments” she cited was an increase in the number of women and minorities in senior leadership positions at the Fed board in Washington. “In 2019, there were 19 appointments to the official staff, of which five were minorities (26%) and six were women (32%),” she said in testimony posted on the Fed and committee’s websites. The Fed’s Board of Governors “is deeply committed to an inclusive workplace and a diverse workforce, as well as to fostering diversity in our own procurement practices and those at the institutions we regulate,” Clark said.
BofA details investments to help Black- and Hispanic-owned businesses - After pledging $1 billion to address racial and economic inequities in the areas it serves, Bank of America is detailing how it plans to spend $300 million of that financial commitment.The Charlotte, N.C., bank said Tuesday that it will invest a combined $200 million in Black- and Hispanic-owned businesses seeking capital and in programs that develop future entrepreneurs in minority communities.The company will invest $50 million in minority depository institutions. The bank will also spend $25 million on community outreach and an additional $25 million on jobs initiatives in Black and Hispanic communities.“These initiative investments will address access to jobs and support for small businesses by creating more pathways to employment in communities of color and more support for minority entrepreneurs,” Chairman and CEO Brian Moynihan said in a news release. The bank’s financial support is already underway. So far, it has completed investments in three minority depository institutions: First Independence Corp. in Detroit, Liberty Financial Services in New Orleans and SCCB Financial Corp. in Columbia, S.C. Each of those investments amounted to roughly 5% of the respective bank's common equity. To help communities combat the spread of coronavirus, the bank has also already provided 5 million masks to communities in need.On deck are investments in additional Black and Hispanic-owned depository institutions, more donations of personal protective equipment, and grant funding to provide career training for Black and Hispanic individuals. The grants will be facilitated through partnerships with over 20 colleges and universities serving Black and Hispanic students. The bank said it expects to release more details about direct equity investments at a later date.
Morgan Stanley pledges $15B help low-income communities - Morgan Stanley will commit $15 billion over the next four years in the form of lending, investments and other financial support for low-income communities, as part of its deal to buy E-Trade Financial Services. The plan includes financial support for community development financial institutions and other nonprofit organizations, as well as a pledge to bolster its own internal diversity efforts. Morgan Stanley developed the plan with input from the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, the NCRC said Thursday. “This is a big commitment for Morgan Stanley to increase the value of the firm’s lending and investments in lower-income communities and communities of color that have long been neglected by the nation’s banks,” NCRC CEO Jesse Van Tol said in a press release. Such large-dollar community benefits plans have long been a feature of mergers and acquisitions, although nationwide protests over racial injustice and the COVID-19 pandemic have drawn greater attention to racial and economic inequality this year. For instance, Huntington Bancshares in Columbus, Ohio, recently announced a similar, $20 billion pledge building off a community benefits plan it made in 2016 when it acquired FirstMerit. Morgan Stanley first announced in late-February that it would buy the discount brokerage firm for $13 billion. That deal, which is expected to close in the fourth quarter, will give Morgan Stanley a stronger foothold into retail banking. Van Tol said the bulk of the $15 billion will go toward lending and investments in community development projects, like affordable housing. He said that currently, Morgan Stanley and E-Trade make around $2 billion a year in lending and investments in lower-income communities and that the plan outlined on Thursday represents about a 43% increase over that. The investment bank’s community benefits plan includes $50 million in grants to CDFIs, loan funds and community development groups providing counseling and capital during the pandemic. It will also make a $5 million grant to the NCRC, which the nonprofit will then pass on to NCRC members that are focused on racial equity and don’t currently receive support from Morgan Stanley. Additionally, Morgan Stanley will make up to $1 billion in bond offerings to CDFIs with no fees and will support uniform standards for supplier diversity.
CFPB gets tough with debt collectors as it readies rule The industry has largely praised the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's cautious approach to regulating debt collection, but at the same time the agency has been willing to punish collectors that it sees treating borrowers unfairly. The agency is expected to finish a rule next month setting limits on collectors' communications with debtors. Financial institutions supported the bureau's middle-of-the-road proposal last year, which was not as severe as restrictions initially proposed by former Obama-appointed CFPB Director Richard Cordray. But observers say recent CFPB enforcement actions against two debt collection operations are a sign the agency still intends to crack down on certain activities, even if those activities are not highlighted in the upcoming rule. “This is definitely a shot across the bow to the collection industry,” said Joann Needleman, leader of the consumer financial services group at the law firm Clark Hill, of the two recent actions. This past week, the CFPB filed a lawsuit against Encore Capital Group, the nation's largest giant debt buyer and collector, claiming the San Diego company and its subsidiaries violated a 2015 consent order by filing at least 100 lawsuits against consumers to collect debts after the statute of limitations had expired. The CFPB also said Encore failed to provide consumers with the required documentation verifying debts, among other practices. "The failure to provide these consumers with the [original account-level documentation] that they had requested impeded the consumers' ability to determine whether their debts were truly owed," the CFPB said in the complaint. On the same day, the bureau filed a lawsuit with the New York attorney general against a network of five companies outside of Buffalo for allegedly using deceptive, harassing and improper methods to collect debts. The complaint accuses the companies of violating the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act by threatening arrests or other legal action that they did not intend to pursue, among other things. “This lawsuit should send a clear message to debt collectors who violate the law that we will take action to stop such practices and protect consumers,” CFPB Director Kathy Kraninger said in a statement accompanying the complaint. “The Bureau is committed to holding these companies and individuals accountable for threatening, harassing, and deceiving consumers." Observers said the enforcement actions are consistent with the suggestion from policymakers that debt collectors should suspend aggressive actions as consumers cope with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic. They also imply the agency could take a tougher approach to punishing firms for "unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts and practices." As the virus spread this past spring, many banks and auto lenders began self-imposed moratoriums on collecting debts. Most courthouses were closed, making collections difficult. Banks were also on the front lines helping small-business owners apply for loans and didn’t want to draw scrutiny from regulators by collecting debts when so many workers were unemployed. Large debt buyers, however, took the opposite position, experts said. They continued to file lawsuits against defaulted consumers. “There has been a big drumbeat to stop debt collection since COVID started," said Needleman. "We’re going back to the era for legal collections to be highly scrutinized again.”
HUD finalizes contentious revamp of fair-lending rule with one tweak - The Department of Housing and Urban Development has finalized a controversial interpretation of the Fair Housing Act's disparate impact standard — with one twist. "With the exception of the defense for algorithms, the rule is broadly the same as what HUD proposed last year," said Jeffrey Naimon, a partner at the law firm Buckley LLP, who represents financial services companies and has defended them against several types of claims, including allegations of fair-lending rule violations. The original proposal allowed a defendant to rebut a plaintiff's case by citing the use of an algorithm that was "nondiscriminatory." Because HUD received several comments citing a concern about algorithms, which some fear could make lending discrimination worse instead of better, it removed the specific reference to them as a way to rebut claims. "HUD expects that there will be further development in the law in the emerging technology area of algorithms, artificial intelligence, machine learning and similar concepts. Thus, it is premature at this time to more directly address algorithms," the department said in its final rule. However, the rule also noted that "a defendant may show that predictive analysis accurately assessed risk" to support a rebuttal of claims, and called this "an alternative for the algorithm defenses." Some consumer and civil rights advocacy groups acknowledged that the softening of the language around algorithms was welcome, but they are still concerned about remaining language around the use of predictive analysis because it leaves the door open for the use of algorithms in the defense of fair housing and lending claims. "I think the ways algorithms are referred to in the final rule is still pretty concerning," said Linda Jun, senior policy council at the Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund. "I think a few things are slightly improved, but taken as a whole this rule is extremely dangerous. It really guts the ability to challenge hidden discrimination at a time when COVID is already having a disparate impact on communities of color." However, HUD said the revision could encourage more lending by bringing previous standards more in line with a Supreme Court ruling on the issue and decreasing fears about broad legal liabilities that increase risk-management costs. "HUD is bringing the 2013 Obama-Biden disparate impact rule into alignment with the 2015 Supreme court ruling," the department said in the statement. "This action brings legal clarity for banks and underwriters, and that clarity will stimulate mortgage credit and affordable housing for low-income and minority populations."
Could capital plan for Fannie and Freddie stymie homeownership? - — A proposal for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's capital levels to grow by more than five times once the companies return to the private sector has drawn the ire of both the mortgage industry and consumer groups over concerns the plan could drive up housing costs. The proposed rule unveiled in May by the Federal Housing Finance Agency would align capital requirements for the government-sponsored enterprises with those of the large banks and incorporate the spirit of several post-2008 crisis regulations. The plan would not go into effect until after Fannie and Freddie are released from conservatorship, whenever that is. But in comment letters submitted to the FHFA, many industry groups and even the two companies themselves pushed back on the idea that the GSEs should be treated like banks. “While the U.S. bank capital framework may provide a useful precedent, the Enterprises’ business models and risk profiles are substantially different from those of banks,” said Ricardo Anzaldua, executive vice president and general counsel at Freddie. “In contrast to banks, the Enterprises are pass-through, monoline businesses focused on a traditional, well understood and secured asset class.” The plan would result in a colossal effort to strengthen the GSEs' balance sheets. For example, if the framework had been in effect in September 2019, the FHFA estimates that the companies would have been required to hold a combined $234 billion in capital, representing 3.85% of their total assets and 13.9% of risk-weighted assets. Currently, Fannie and Freddie's retained earnings are capped at $45 billion combined. Ed DeMarco, the president of the Housing Policy Council and a former acting director of the FHFA, agreed that the GSEs are substantially different from banks. He suggested that the capital framework use insurance companies in addition to banks as a point of comparison for Fannie and Freddie. “Banks do not engage principally in the mortgage credit guarantee business, which is the core business of the Enterprises,” he said in the group’s comment letter. “Moreover, unlike banks, the Enterprises do not rely upon deposits for funding, so they do not face the same liquidity and interest rate risk as banks.” The Community Mortgage Lenders of America also urged the FHFA to treat Fannie and Freddie more like insurance companies and less like banks. “We remain highly skeptical of arguments that the GSEs must mirror bank-like capital standards given that they have solidified their business models as insurance companies, with a ... regulator better able to keep them in this space relative to the old regulatory model,” the group said, referring to the FHFA.
MBA Survey: "Share of Mortgage Loans in Forbearance Declines to 7.16%" - Note: This is as of August 30th. From the MBA: Share of Mortgage Loans in Forbearance Declines to 7.16% The Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) latest Forbearance and Call Volume Survey revealed that the total number of loans now in forbearance decreased by 4 basis points from 7.20% of servicers’ portfolio volume in the prior week to 7.16% as of August 30, 2020. According to MBA’s estimate, 3.6 million homeowners are in forbearance plans....“The share of Ginnie Mae loans in forbearance increased again this week, as the current economic crisis continues to disproportionately impact borrowers with FHA and VA loans. As a result, IMB servicers, which have roughly one-third of their portfolio with Ginnie Mae, had a forbearance share that was unchanged, while depositories, which have a larger share of GSE and portfolio loans, saw a decrease,” said Mike Fratantoni, MBA’s Senior Vice President and Chief Economist. “The labor market continued to heal in August, with strong job growth and a large decline in the unemployment rate. However, the economy still faces an uphill climb and remains far away from full employment. High unemployment, and jobless claims consistently around 1 million a week, continue to cause financial strain for some borrowers – and especially for those who work in industries hardest hit by the pandemic.”By stage, 35.76% of total loans in forbearance are in the initial forbearance plan stage, while 63.29% are in a forbearance extension. The remaining 0.94% are forbearance re-entries.This graph shows the percent of portfolio in forbearance by investor type over time. Most of the increase was in late March and early April, and has been trending down for the last ten weeks.The MBA notes: "Total weekly forbearance requests as a percent of servicing portfolio volume (#) decreased relative to the prior week: from 0.10% to 0.09%, the lowest level reported for this series since March."There hasn't been a pickup in forbearance activity related to the end of the extra unemployment benefits.
Black Knight: Number of Homeowners in COVID-19-Related Forbearance Plans Decreased - Note: Both Black Knight and the MBA (Mortgage Bankers Association) are putting out weekly estimates of mortgages in forbearance. This data is as of September 8th. From 1.7M Forbearance Plans Set to Expire in SeptemberImprovement in the number of active forbearance plans continued this past week. Entering the month, more than 2M forbearance plans were set to expire in September.That number’s already down 350K to 1.7M in the first full week of the month as those expirations begin to be assessed for extensions and removals. After dropping by nearly 150K last week, the total number of mortgages in active forbearance declined another 66K (-2%) this week....All in all, active forbearances are now down 238K (-6%) over the past 30 days, as servicers continue to proactively work their way through the wave of forbearance plans set to expire in September. As of September 8, 3.7M homeowners remain in COVID-19-related forbearance plans. That’s down more than 22% from the peak of over 4.7M in late May. Note: We might see an increase in forbearance requests in September without further relief, although the lack of disaster relief is probably hitting renters harder.
Black Knight Mortgage Monitor for July: "Record-Low Rates, Largest Quarterly Volume on Record" - Black Knight released their Mortgage Monitor report for July today. According to Black Knight, 6.91% of mortgages were delinquent in July, down from 7.59% in June, and up from 3.46% in July 2019. Black Knight also reported that 0.36% of mortgages were in the foreclosure process, down from 0.49% a year ago. This gives a total of 7.40% delinquent or in foreclosure. Press Release: Black Knight: Surge in Refinance Lending Driven by Record-Low Rates Leads to Largest Quarterly Volume on Record; Just 18% of All Refinancing Borrowers Retained by Servicers This month, Black Knight looked at both Q2 2020 origination data as well as interest rate locks thus far in Q3 2020 to get a sense of how the lending market has fared in the era of COVID-19. A period of record-low interest rates has provided a much-needed backstop to the impact of shutdowns, unemployment and economic uncertainty. “Despite the nation being under pandemic-related lockdowns for much of the quarter, a record-breaking surge in mortgage originations occurred in Q2 2020, driven by the record-low interest rate environment,” . “Nearly $1.1 trillion in first lien mortgages were originated in Q2 2020, which is the largest quarterly origination volume we’ve seen since first reporting on the metric in January 2000. Refinance lending grew more than 60% from the previous quarter and more than 200% from the same time last year, accounting for nearly 70% of all Q2 originations by dollar value. At the same time, purchase lending declined 8% year-over-year as the traditional spring homebuying season was impacted by COVID-19-related restrictions. However, mortgage loan rate lock data – a leading indicator of lending activity – suggests that the homebuying season was simply pushed forward into the third quarter. “Purchase locks in Q3 2020 have already made up for the losses of a COVID-impacted Q2 – and then some – based upon normal seasonal expectations. In fact, rate locks are suggesting that we could see Q3 purchase lending break typical seasonal trends and rise by 30-40%, which would push us to a new record high. Likewise, while Q2 refinance activity was record-breaking, refi lock data suggests Q3 refinance volumes could climb even higher. Locks on refinance loans expected to close in the third quarter, assuming a 45-day lock-to-close timeline, are already up 20% from Q2. With market conditions as they are and given the recent delay of the 50 basis points fee on GSE refinances until December, we would expect near-record low interest rates to continue to buoy the market. This graph from Black Knight shows the surge in first lien originations in Q2. Nearly $1.1T in first lien mortgages were originated in Q2 2020, the largest quarterly origination volume on record since Black Knight began reporting the metric in January 2000
NMHC: Rent Payment Tracker Shows Decline in Households Paying Rent in September - From the NMHC: NMHC Rent Payment Tracker Finds 76.4 Percent of Apartment Households Paid Rent as of September 6: The National Multifamily Housing Council (NMHC)’s Rent Payment Tracker found 76.4 percent of apartment households made a full or partial rent payment by September 6 in its survey of 11.4 million units of professionally managed apartment units across the country. This is a 4.8-percentage point, or 552,796-household decrease from the share who paid rent through September 6, 2019 and compares to 79.3 percent that had paid by August 6, 2020. These data encompass a wide variety of market-rate rental properties across the United States, which can vary by size, type and average rental price. “The initial rent payment figures from September have begun to demonstrate the increasing challenges apartment residents are facing. Falling rent payments mean that apartment owners and operators will increasingly have difficulty meeting their mortgages, paying their taxes and utilities and meeting payroll,” said Doug Bibby, NMHC President. “The enactment of a nationwide eviction moratorium last week did nothing to help renters or alleviate the financial distress they are facing. Instead, it only is a stopgap measure that puts the entire housing finance system at jeopardy and saddles apartment residents with untenable levels of debt. Federal policymakers would have been better advised to continue to provide support as they successfully did through the CARES Act." ... "It is worth noting that the Labor Day weekend, which occurred a week later than in 2019, may have impacted the collections data for the first week of the month, just as our data showed a comparable dip the first week of July because of the Fourth of July holiday,” said Bibby. “Next week’s Rent Payment Tracker numbers will help indicate the degree to which the drop in payments was a result of the holiday weekend or decreased ability of residents to pay their rent.”
Eviction Moratorium Delays Crisis Until January, When Tenants Will Owe Back Rent - Alexis Goldstein - The nationwide eviction moratorium announced by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will provide immediate and welcome relief through the end of the year for certain renters, buthousing rights advocates say the move is woefully inadequate because it fails to provide any payment assistance to renters.Tenants will still owe back rent plus interest and fees once the moratorium ends in January. This new eviction moratorium is in effect from September 4 through December 31, 2020, and is expected to face legal challenges by landlords. It applies to all 50 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories, with the exception of American Samoa, which is excluded for now as it has reported no cases of COVID-19. In order to qualify, renters must meet five requirements. First, they must expect to face homelessness, or expect to move into “close quarters” with others if they are evicted. Second, they must be unable to pay their rent either due to a loss of income or major medical expenses. Third, they must make partial rent payments each month “as close to the full payment as the individual’s circumstances may permit.” Fourth, they must have “used best efforts” to find government assistance for rent. Finally, they must either have received a stimulus check, not filed a tax return in 2019 or make less than $99,000 (or less than $198,000 if filing a joint tax return).If a renter meets all of these criteria, they must sign a written declaration to their landlord, under penalty of perjury, stating they meet the requirements. (A declaration form can be found on the last few pages of the HHS/CDC notice). Needing to supply this written declaration directly to their landlord may prove difficult to renters whose only access to a computer or internet is through a smartphone — which is about one in five U.S. residents. Those without easy access to a printer (especially with the closure of libraries due to the pandemic) may also have difficulty getting the required documentation to their landlord. “Any time you impose even minimal documentation requirements to qualify for a protection like this, it raises an impediment for people to comply,” said Eric Dunn, director oflitigation at the National Housing Law Project. The documentation requirement may also create opportunities for landlords to say what tenants submit isn’t sufficient.
Mortgage Applications Increase in Latest MBA Weekly Survey -Mortgage applications increased 2.9 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending September 4, 2020. This week’s results are being compared to the week of Labor Day 2019.... The Refinance Index increased 3 percent from the previous week and was 60 percent higher than the same week one year ago. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 3 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 0.2 percent compared with the previous week and was 40 percent higher than the same week one year ago.“Mortgage rates declined last week, with a noteworthy 5-basis-point decrease in the 15-year fixed rate to a new record low of 2.62 percent. The drop in rates led to a rebound in refinancing activity, driven mainly by borrowers applying for conventional loans,” said Joel Kan, MBA’s Associate Vice President of Economic and Industry Forecasting. “Purchase applications were 40 percent higher than the same week last year, but the increase is skewed higher by being compared to Labor Day 2019. Nevertheless, there continues to be resiliency in the purchase market. Applications were up almost 3 percent on a weekly basis and the average loan size continued to increase, hitting a survey high at $368,600.”...The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with conforming loan balances ($510,400 or less) decreased to 3.07 percent from 3.08 percent, with points remaining unchanged at 0.36 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent loan-to-value ratio (LTV) loans.
Home sales set records for minorities across America -In the midst of the volatile economy riven with uncertainty because of the coronavirus, there is some welcome news from the housing market. Home sales are a bright spot in the pandemic because existing home sales in the summer were the highest in almost 14 years, at an annual rate of nearly six million home sales, as reported by the National Association of Realtors. The Census Bureau reported the annual rate of 900,000 new home sales, the highest since the end of 2006 before the start of the Great Recession. About a third of these families were buying their first houses, making that decision in the midst of a rough downturn. While sales certainly fluctuate from month to month, we have witnessed a steady upward trend that has continued despite the pandemic. But this news is only part of the story. The Census Bureau noted the highest rate of homeowners at 68 percent since 2008. In our national conversation about race, there are indications that this trend benefits minority homeowners. It is certainly true for black households, whose rate of homeowners is now the highest in 12 years. For hispanic households, the news is even better. Their rate of homeowners is the highest in 45 years, which is a record since the Census Bureau started to collect information on this group. This progress is worth celebrating. For the fallout from the Great Recession, the national rate of homeowners decreased and bottomed out after eight years. Since the end of 2016, the trend has reversed as the rate of homeowners has now increased without much fanfare. Further, home prices have been on the mend, which means homeowners are growing their wealth. Those families who purchased over the last four years have enjoyed more value and equity in their homes. The median price for existing homes sold this summer hit a new record of more than $300,000, according to the National Association of Realtors. A year ago, the median price was at about $280,000, which means families who purchased homes last summer have added about $24,000 over their net worths since then. Two years ago, the price was about $270,000, and families who purchased then are richer by around $34,000. Over the last three and a half years, the median price has risen by about $60,000. For new homes, the median price is more than $330,000, an increase for $23,000 for families who purchased their homes last year, almost exactly the same as the increase with buyers of existing homes. For most families, their homes are their most important assets, and the value for such assets has been on the rise despite several crushed sectors of the economy. Finally, in the last three and a half years, the country has added 10 million homeowners, as four million of them are minorities, including one million black families and almost two million hispanic families. We not only have near record home sales, although that by itself is strong for the economy, but we also have many homeowners who are starting the critical process of fulfilling a traditional American dream and building their wealth that is often a source of prosperity between generations across the country.
What Rent Drop? Listed Prices Aren’t Budging Where COVID-19 Hit Hardest - In some parts of the city, rents have dropped since the COVID-19 crisis began. But for neighborhoods that felt the effects of the coronavirus most, listed prices have risen slightly, according to a new analysis. The annual rental report by the apartment-listings site StreetEasy paints a very different price picture between the neighborhoods with the lowest coronavirus infection rates — primarily wealthier neighborhoods in Manhattan and Brooklyn — and the hardest-hit areas, mostly in Queens and The Bronx.Between February and July of this year, rents fell by 1.9% in the zip codes with the lowest COVID-19 rates in the city, like Battery Park City, Greenwich Village and Tribeca, according to the report, comprised of market-rate listing data.However, in the neighborhoods with the highest rates of COVID-19, per city health department data — East Elmhurst, Corona and Jackson Heights topped the list — advertised rents have climbed a bit in the same time period, rising 0.3%. The findings contradict the claim that there’s an “exodus out of the city,” said Nancy Wu, an economist at StreetEasy. “That’s specific to Manhattan, and a lot of these Manhattan-esque neighborhoods,” she said. Elsewhere in the city, “it’s a very different picture.”The StreetEast report released Thursday analyzed six years of rental data in the five boroughs through July of 2020, comparing ZIP codes with the highest tested rates of COVID-19 per 100,000 people since the start of the pandemic with those with the lowest.Each pool of least- and most-affected neighborhoods was defined by StreetEasy by adding up top and bottom ZIP codes with the highest and lowest infection rates until they had 1 million people in each category.Over that period, listed rents in the most virus-affected neighborhood rose by 22.1% while the least-affected areas saw advertised prices rise only 10% over the same period.Some of the trend is attributable to the fact that, generally, areas with lower median rents tend to see price growth at rates faster than higher-priced neighborhoods, Wu noted — because “there’s more demand for affordable properties as other places get more expensive.”But it also points to a confluence of factors and “housing stressors” that overlap in the communities that have experienced high COVID-19 rates, said Barika Williams, executive director at the Association for Neighborhood & Housing Development, a consortium of nonprofit development groups.
52% of young adults are living with their parents: Pew Research Center -Pete Davidson isn't the only one: 52% of young Americans are living with their parents, according to a new poll by Pew Research Center.The number is now the highest on record, according to Pew, surpassing the 48% peak recorded during the Great Depression.Even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, a large portion of 18- to 29-year-olds were living with a parent. A 2016 report said millennial men were more likely to live with a mom or dad than with a significant other. And a 2019 report found that millenials, already behind because of the 2008 financial crisis, are plagued by four main costs: college tuition, housing, healthcare, and childcare. In July of 2019, 47% of young adults lived with a parent. But the coronavirus pandemic has worsened the economic outlook for this generation struggling financially, pushing 2.6 million more young people to move back home. One quarter of young-adult workers, aged 16 to 24, lost their jobs between February and May, according to Pew, and another study found that 18- to 29-year-olds lost jobs or received pay cuts in greater shares than other age groups. Comedian and actor Pete Davidson, who is known to live in the basement of a Staten Island home he bought with his mom, put the phenomenon simply on an episode of "Saturday Night Live." "She's not just my mom," he said. "She's also my roommate."
Hotels: Occupancy Rate Declined 19% Year-over-year; Boosted by Hurricane and Fires -- From HotelNewsNow.com: STR: US hotel results for week ending 5 September: Boosted in part by Labor Day weekend, U.S. hotel occupancy increased slightly over the previous week, according to the latest data from STR.30 August through 5 September 2020 (percentage change from comparable week in 2019):
• Occupancy: 49.4% (-18.9%)
• Average daily rate (ADR): US$100.97 (-17.1%)
• Revenue per available room (RevPAR): US$49.87 (-32.8%)
Hotel demand grew to 18 million room nights sold (+500,000 week over week). Saturday (5 September) occupancy came in at 69.0%, just 2.6% less than the comparable Saturday in 2019, and leisure markets that have showed the highest summer occupancy levels reported strong increases from the previous weekend. At the same time, the markets with the highest occupancy for the week were not leisure destinations. Rather, the high occupancy markets were those housing displaced residents from Hurricane Laura and the California wildfires. The following graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four week average. The red line is for 2020, dash light blue is 2019, blue is the median, and black is for 2009 (the worst year probably since the Great Depression for hotels). The leisure travel season usually peaks at the beginning of August, and then the occupancy rate typically declines sharply in the Fall. However, with so many schools closed (or openings delayed), the leisure travel season lasted longer than usual this year. It seems unlikely business travel will pickup significantly in the Fall.
Apocalypse On Broadway- Study Finds 78% Increase In Vacant Storefronts - If the rising taxes and complete loss of law and order in the midst of a global pandemic wasn't enough to drive you out of New York City, perhaps complete apocalypse on the city's iconic Broadway will do it. A stunning new report shows that more than 300 storefronts are now vacant along Broadway. It marks a 78% increase from three years ago. More than 33% of those vacancies were located between 14th and 59th streets, in the heart of Manhattan. The tally was calculated by Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer and her staff in late August while visiting 13 miles and 244 blocks, according to the Wall Street Journal. Her staff was able to count 39 empty storefronts between 96th and 125th street, 66 empty spots between 59th and 96th street and 43 vacancies below 14th street. 42 stores were boarded up - though some were open for business. Brewer commented: “The rent is so high, particularly on Broadway in Manhattan, that it’s hard for the small shops to make a go of it. At this point, with the gates down and sometimes plywood on the storefront, you don’t know whether it’s going to be rented.” Marilyn Jacques, a wholesaler of imported lace and tulle from France, who has a company off Broadway near West 36th Street, commented: “It’s not only Broadway, it’s also all the side streets. Retail is in terrible trouble, we all know that. But now, when you’re working from home, you don’t need 25 pairs of leggings.” She compared the current state of Broadway to when she started her business back in 1980: “At lunch time you couldn’t walk on the sidewalk, it was so full. The side streets were filled with people with racks of clothes going through, yelling, ‘Watch your backs, watch your backs.’”Recall, we posted a video in mid-August of a dystopian looking New York City, following a car driving down a deserted 5th Avenue, with almost all of the area's high end stores boarded up and shut down. There are few people seen on what is usually a busy street. "Look at everything. Everything's boarded up. Even the hotel. Boarded up," the video's narrator, who is obviously fed up with how the city looks, says. He continues: "This is all Manhattan, boarded up. Have you ever seen Manhattan look like this? The media will not report this." "Everything boarded up. They don't want to show this to you people because they're afraid. Saks 5th Avenue - boarded up from end to end. They put up barbed wire. Everywhere you see boards, windows are gone. Look at New York City - what happened," he says. The video runs over 2 minutes and shows dozens of boarded up businesses. You can watch it here:
A 'tsunami' of retail bankruptcies is about to sweep the US and drown courts in Chapter 11 filings, lawyer says Bankruptcy lawyer Corali Lopez-Castro has been even busier than usual these past few months. The Miami-based firm where Lopez-Castro works typically handles 15-20 Chapter 11 cases at a time. But since the pandemic hit, they have had about 30-35 cases going at once — almost twice the volume as before. "Not a lot of sleep, let's just say that. I have three devices going at any one time," she told Business Insider in an interview. "I feel like I'm looking at three screens continually and there's no time where I can say, 'okay I'm going home now and I'm off work.' I'm on 24/7" Castro-Lopez's crazy hours and increased caseload likely aren't shocking to anyone following the retail headlines during the pandemic. More than 30 retailers have filed for Chapter 11 restructuring since the pandemic first hit the U.S. and forced closures in March, affecting the already stressed industry. Lopez-Castro unfortunately doesn't think that's going to slow down anytime soon, either."We still haven't even seen what we're going to see. I think a tsunami is coming," she said. Lopez-Castro outlined for Business Insider two major reasons she thinks that the retail industry has yet to see all of its bankruptcy filings.First, "some businesses have been surviving on their PPP loan from the government," she said. The U.S. government gave out more than $659 billion in loans to businesses through the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), which closed to applications on August 8. Lopez-Castro thinks that many businesses have been able to stay afloat because of these loans, but when the funds run out, they might have to consider entering into Chapter 11 bankruptcy."And two, the banks have been forbearing on exercising their rights," Lopez-Castro said. Many banks offered deferrals to customers who were affected by the pandemic, but deferral periods don't last forever. "Banks have shareholders that they answer to, and that's coming to a close too." When an indebted company decides to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, the company has to propose a plan for the reorganization of their business that will both keep the company alive and pay its creditors over time. That plan then is approved by the bankruptcy court. Lopez-Castro said that another major obstacle for companies who file for Chapter 11 restructuring is the unpredictable economic state of the country during COVID. Many retailers have already reopened their doors, only to have to close them shortly thereafter because of another surge in cases. "How can you comfortably and confidently project what your revenues will be in the future in order to prove feasibility under the bankruptcy court?" she said. "How much confidence can you have in those projections when there's so much uncertainty about what's going to happen to business openings and closures during the next few months?"
J.C. Penney Reaches $800 Million Rescue Deal With Landlords To Avoid Liquidation -- Don't count the venerable - if bankrupt - department store and mall anchor tenant, J.C. Penney out just yet. One week after we reported that J.C. Penney (docket #20-20182, in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas) was on the verge of liquidation after talks with its two largest landlords had collapsed, today the company's lenders reached a tentative deal with mall landlords Simon Property Group and Brookfield Property Partners to buy the bankrupt chain. The deal, valued at $1.75 billion, would rescue the beleaguered department store chain from bankruptcy proceedings, averting a liquidation that would have threatened roughly 70,000 jobs and represented one of the most significant business collapses following the coronavirus pandemic, Joshua Sussberg, a Kirkland & Ellis LLP lawyer representing the company, said during a brief court hearing Wednesday, confirming an earlier Reuters report. The landlords are poised to put $300 million toward the rescue and have agreed to a nonbinding letter of intent with J.C. Penney, he said. The operating company they are acquiring would assume $500 million of debt. The deal also calls for new financing from existing lenders; in the end, J.C. Penney will have about $1 billion of cash to fund its business when the deal closes, Sussberg said. The financing includes a commitment for $2 billion of new asset-based lending led by Wells Fargo, as well as $500 million of so-called takeback debt from existing first-lien lenders, he said. The deal would split J.C. Penney into an operating company and two real estate holding companies. The restructured retailer is expected to operate about 650 stores, according to Reuters: hedge funds and private-equity firms financing J.C. Penney’s bankruptcy, meanwhile, would take ownership of 161 of those stores and separate distribution centers after forgiving portions of the Plano, Texas-based company’s $5 billion debt load, Sussberg said. These lenders, led by H/2 Capital Partners, would own those assets in two separate real estate investment trusts.
$41 Billion Lululemon Is Holding Classes On Resisting Capitalism While Selling $128 Yoga Pants - There's no better example of groupthink taking over people's common sense than $41.7 billion clothing retailer Lululemon, who sells signature yoga pants for $128, holding a seminar on "resisting capitalism". But, it's 2020 and so, the examples of hypocrisy shall play on! Lululemon got caught promoting a workshop on how to "decolonize gender" (whatever that means) and "resist capitalism" on its social media account yesterday. The seminar is being hosted by "company brand ambassador" Rebby Kern, according to the Daily Mail. Meanwhile, sales at the retailer have exploded during the pandemic, as workers look to shift to the casual attire that comes with working at home. Shares have rallied more than 100% off their coronavirus lows in March and the company's Q2 comps were up 2% despite the chaos of the pandemic. Chip Wilson, the company's founder is a Canadian billionaire. We're guessing he didn't "resist capitalism". And as a result, Lululemon found itself being ridiculed on Twitter: All wokeness aside...resist capitalism? I see this happen over and over and can't fully wrap my head around how these brands survive these suicidal campaigns. They can easily be called on their hypocrisy, just to begin with: they outsource everything they manufacture, even IT! This companies current stock price is 333.30 with a revenue of 3.98 billion, and they have the boldness to market a resist capitalism campaign!
U.S. Consumer Prices Broadly Rebounded in August – WSJ - U.S. consumer prices rose in August due to higher costs for a range of items, a sign of firmer inflation as demand for goods continues to rebound from a coronavirus pandemic-induced downturn earlier this year. The consumer-price index—which measures what consumers pay for everyday items including groceries, clothing and electricity—climbed a seasonally adjusted 0.4% in August,, the Labor Department said Friday. That marked the third straight month of gains for consumer prices, after sharp declines at the pandemic’s onset. Excluding the often-volatile categories of food and energy, so-called core prices increased 0.4%. Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal expected a 0.3% increase for both the overall consumer-price index and the core index. The bounceback in consumer prices over the summer came as states reopened their economies and weathered a resurgence in coronavirus cases. Prices for certain goods have rebounded especially well, reflecting a shift in consumer habits and preferences amid the pandemic, as well as continued business disruptions and adaptations in many industries. Used-vehicle prices, for example, rose 5.4% in August, accounting for 40% of the increase in core prices, the Labor Department said. Sales of used cars and trucks have increased during the pandemic due to several factors, including limited supply of new vehicles because of factory closures during the spring. Prices for gas, shelter, and apparel also moved higher last month. Notably, prices for food at home fell slightly by 0.1% over the month, the second consecutive decline. Grocery prices posted strong increases in February through June as people stayed at home. Longer-term trends suggest inflationary pressures are muted. On a non-seasonally adjusted basis, the overall consumer-price index rose 1.3% in August from a year earlier and core prices increased 1.7% over the year. The Federal Reserve, acknowledging that inflation has mostly remained below its 2% target for several years, recently changed its policy framework to no longer pre-emptively lift interest rates to prevent higher inflation.
US Consumer Prices Accelerate In August; Used Car & Furniture Prices Spike As Rent Inflation Slows - While yesterday's producer prices continued to show YoY deflation, this morning's consumer price data pionted hitter than expected with the headline up 1.3% YoY - the fastest since March. Graph Source: Bloomberg Core CPI also surged more than expected, rising 1.7% YoY. The index for all items less food and energy increased 0.4 percent in August after rising 0.6 percent in July. The index for used cars and trucks increased 5.4 percent in August, its largest monthly increase since March 1969. The shelter index increased in August, rising 0.1 percent, with the indexes for rent and owners’ equivalent rent both rising 0.1 percent. The recreation index increased 0.7 percent in August after falling in June and July. The index for household furnishings and operations increased 0.9 percent, its largest monthly increase since February 1991, as the index for furniture and bedding rose 1.6 percent and the index for appliances increased 2.0 percent. The apparel index rose 0.6 percent in August, its third consecutive monthly increase. The index for motor vehicle insurance rose 0.5 percent, and the index for airline fares increased 1.2 percent over the month. The index for medical care rose slightly in August, increasing 0.1 percent. The indexes for hospital services and for physicians’ services both rose 0.1 percent, while the index for prescription drugs declined 0.2 percent. The new vehicles index was unchanged in August after rising in July. The education index decreased 0.3 percent in August, the first decline in the history of the index, which dates to 1993.
U.S. producer prices beat expectations in August - U.S. producer prices rose a bit more than expected in August as the cost of services increased solidly, while underlying producer inflation continued to firm. The producer price index for final demand rose 0.3% last month after surging 0.6% in July, the Labor Department said on Thursday. In the 12 months through August, the PPI fell 0.2% after dropping 0.4% in the 12 months through July. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast the PPI would gain 0.2% in August and fall 0.3% on a year-on-year basis. Producer prices were led by a 0.5% increase in services. Nearly 20% of the rise in services was attributed to a 1.1% increase in margins for machinery, equipment, parts, and supplies wholesaling. Prices for goods edged up 0.1%. Excluding the volatile food, energy and trade services components, producer prices rose 0.3% in August, advancing by the same margin for three straight months. In the 12 months through August, the core PPI gained 0.3%. The core PPI edged up 0.1% on a year-on-year basis in July. The Federal Reserve tracks the core personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index for its 2% inflation target, a flexible average. The core PCE price index climbed 1.3% in July after increasing 1.1% in June. August data is scheduled to be released at the end of the month.
‘The Situation Is Dire’: As Trump Takes Victory Lap, New Jobs Report Reveals Alarming Surge in Permanent Unemployment - President Donald Trump on Friday wasted no time taking a victory lap after the Bureau of Labor Statistics announced the U.S. unemployment rate fell to 8.4% in August, but economists warned a closer look at the new economic figures reveals an alarming surge in permanent joblessness that could portend a prolonged recession if Congress and the White House fail to quickly approve additional relief. The number of Americans classified as permanently unemployed—as opposed to being on temporary furlough—grew by 534,000 in August even as the U.S. economy added 1.4 million jobs. On Twitter, Trump celebrated the latter data point as “great” and “much better than expected.” The total number of workers who are permanently jobless is now 3.4 million, according to the bureau’s latest data. Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), wrote in a blog postFriday that contrary to the White House’s rosy spin, the new BLS report shows “the pain is nowhere near over for millions of workers and their families across the country.”“At this point, the U.S. economy is still down 11.5 million jobs from where it was in February, before the pandemic hit,” wrote Gould. “With this kind of slowing in job growth, it will take years to return to the pre-pandemic labor market. And, without the $600 boost to unemployment insurance, jobs will return even more slowly than had policymakers stepped up and continued that vital support to workers and the economy.”EPI’s Heidi Shierholz echoed Gould’s assessment, noting in a series of tweets that “the situation is dire” and “the labor market remains in crisis.”On top of the growing number of Americans whose jobs have completely disappeared due to the Covid-19 pandemic and resulting economic collapse, economist Jared Bernstein noted that another “worrisome development” spotlighted by the new BLS report is “the shift to longer-term unemployment: the share of job losers unemployed for at least 15 weeks has gone from 8% in April to 60% in August.” “In sum, the failure of the Trump administration to control the virus has led to a slower pace of job gains and, while the jobless rate fell significantly last month, it is still in recessionary territory and more job seekers are at risk of longer-term unemployment,” wrote Bernstein, a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. “Importantly, note that this shift is occurring as Congress, particularly Senate Republicans, has dropped the ball on further fiscal relief.”
BLS: Job Openings increased to 6.6 Million in July - From the BLS: Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary -The number of job openings increased to 6.6 million on the last business day of July, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Hires decreased to 5.8 million in July. Total separations was little changed at 5.0 million. Within separations, the quits rate rose to 2.1 percent while the layoffs and discharges rate decreased to 1.2 percent. These changes in the labor market reflected an ongoing resumption of economic activity that had been curtailed due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and efforts to contain it. The following graph shows job openings (yellow line), hires (dark blue), Layoff, Discharges and other (red column), and Quits (light blue column) from the JOLTS. This series started in December 2000. Note: The difference between JOLTS hires and separations is similar to the CES (payroll survey) net jobs headline numbers. . When the blue line is above the two stacked columns, the economy is adding net jobs - when it is below the columns, the economy is losing jobs. The huge spikes in layoffs and discharges in March and April 2020 are labeled, but off the chart to better show the usual data. Jobs openings increased in July to 6.618 million from 6.001 million in June. The number of job openings (yellow) were down 8.5% year-over-year. Quits were down 18% year-over-year. These are voluntary separations. (see light blue columns at bottom of graph for trend for "quits"). Job openings increased in July, but were still down YoY - and quits are down sharply YoY.
Weekly Initial Unemployment Claims unchanged at 884,000 - The DOL reported:In the week ending September 5, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 884,000, unchanged from the previous week's revised level. The previous week's level was revised up by 3,000 from 881,000 to 884,000. The 4- week moving average was 970,750, a decr ease of 21,750 from the previous week's revised average. The previous week's average was revised up by 750 from 991,750 to 992,500.The previous week was revised up.This does not include the 838,916 initial claims for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) that was up from 747,993 the previous week.The following graph shows the 4-week moving average of weekly claims since 1971.
Comments on Weekly Unemployment Claims – McBride - Earlier: Weekly Initial Unemployment Claims unchanged at 884,000 This was the 25th consecutive week with extraordinarily high initial claims. More importantly, continued claims are still extremely high (second graph below). The following graph shows regular initial unemployment claims (blue) and PUA claims (red) since early February (all NSA). Initial claims, including Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) are rising, and are close to 1.7 million per week.The worst week during the great recession was 665,000 (SA). So total initial weekly claims are still more than 1 million higher than the worst week of the great recession!We are probably seeing some layoffs related to the end of some Payroll Protection Programs (PPP), andpossibly due to the fires in the West. The second graph shows all person receiving unemployment insurance benefits on all programs. Note that this data is released with a two week lag, and is not seasonally adjusted. There are typically around 2 million people receiving benefits from the various programs (mostly regular unemployment insurance).As of the release this morning, there were still almost 30 million people receiving benefits as of August 22nd.This was a very disappointing weekly report. Initial claims were higher than expected, and there was a further increase in initial claims (regular and PUA), and the total continued claims increased - and remains at a very high level.
Goods Producing Versus Services Providing Employment: August 2020 - The Department of Labor has monthly data on employment by industry categories reaching back to 1939. At the highest level, all jobs are categorized in either Service-Providing Industries or Goods Producing Industries. The adjacent chart illustrates the ratio of the two since 1939.The latest monthly employment report showed a gain of 1.76M nonfarm jobs, which consists of a gain of 1.72M service-providing jobs and a gain of 39K goods-producing jobs.In 1939 service providing industries employed more people than goods-producing, 63.1% to 37.2%, a ratio of 1.7-to-1. World War II triggered a surge in goods-producing employment and an accompanying reduction in services. But following the war, we've seen a steady tilt toward services. The ratio is now 6.1 services jobs for every goods-producing job. The key drivers of this secular trend have been the growth of automation that reduces the need for human labor and the globalization of goods production.The next chart provides a more detailed view of these two employment cohorts. We've adjusted for the 371% growth in the employed population since 1939. A conspicuous feature of this snapshot is the sharp trend reversal in the early 1940s reflecting the impact of World War II on the demand for goods. Another notable detail is the stable ratio since the last recession. We saw shorter periods of a sustained ratio during the stagflation of the 1970s and for about three years starting at the end of 2003. The current ratio of services to goods-producing has been essentially unchanged for the last decade.Another notable insight is the consistent impact of recessions on the relative growth of the two cohorts: Even though the unemployment rate increases during recessions, the employed service providing population increases and goods-producing jobs disappear. We also see that post-recession recoveries don't reverse this pattern.
Rising Education Levels Provide Diminishing Economic Boost – WSJ - The U.S. lacks a key ingredient that helped propel it to economic dominance in the 20th century: productivity gains from higher education. Figuring out why could help influence the economy’s long-term trajectory once it emerges from the coronavirus crisis. In 2009, President Obama, worried about the economy’s global standing, set a goal for the U.S. to have the world’s most-educated workforce by 2020. The share of U.S. workers with college degrees has grown significantly, even if the country fell short of his goal. But those gains hadn’t translated into a substantial productivity boost as Mr. Obama and economists hoped. Rising education levels—first in high school, then in college and graduate school—helped fuel strong economic growth in the latter half of the past century. In 1910, just 14% of Americans age 25 or older had a high-school diploma and just 3% had a bachelor’s degree, census data show. By 2000, 84% had graduated from high school and 26% had a bachelor’s degree. As Americans raised their skills, the country shifted from an agrarian economy in the 19th century to an industrial one and then a digital one, leading to electrified cities, the mass assembly line, television, the computer, men on the moon, and the internet. American households became wealthier, and living standards climbed rapidly. It was all tied to education, argued Harvard economists Claudia Goldin and Lawrence Katz in their 2008 book, “The Race Between Education and Technology.” More-educated workers use their knowledge and skills to invent and innovate, helping the economy become more efficient, thus boosting productivity—or output per labor hour—the key ingredient to rising living standards, they argue. Productivity rose an average of 2.3% a year from 1947 to 2000, Labor Department data show. Ms. Goldin and Mr. Katz estimate roughly a quarter of the average annual gain came from rising educational attainment.
Rate case activity slips, COVID-19 proceedings remain at the forefront in August | S&P Global Market Intelligence - A relatively modest amount of rate case activity took place in August, with a handful of initial filings and decisions occurring. State regulators and utilities continue to grapple with the short- and long-term effects of the coronavirus pandemic, with several states extending moratoriums on service disconnections while other states head in the opposite direction. On Aug. 31, Avista Corporation subsidiary Alaska Electric Light and Power Co., or AEL&P, submitted a compliance update with the Regulatory Commission of Alaska and stated that effective Oct. 1, the utility will resume disconnections of service for customers who have delinquent balances and who have not submitted to AEL&P a signed statement of COVID-19-related financial hardship and a signed deferred payment agreement. AltaGas Ltd. subsidiary ENSTAR Natural Gas Co. submitted its compliance update with the commission Aug. 26, stating that effective for billings on or after Sept. 1, it would resume service disconnection with respect to commercial, i.e., nonresidential, general-service customers.Delaware Gov. John Carney extended the state of emergency and each of its related provisions Aug. 5, including the moratorium on utility disconnections until Sept. 4.The Hawaii Public Utilities Commission voted Aug. 25 to extend the state's moratorium on utility service disconnections through the end of 2020.The Maryland Public Service Commission issued an emergency order Aug. 31 extending the moratorium on utility service disconnections to Nov. 15 from Sept. 1. Under the emergency order, termination notices could be issued as early as Oct. 1, but service could not be shut off for 45 days following the notice. On Aug. 21, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy announced that the state's water, gas and electric utilities agreed to extend their voluntary moratorium on customer shut-offs through Oct. 15 and agreed to offer customers flexible extended deferred payment plans of between 12 and 24 months.On Aug. 7, Duke Energy Corp. subsidiaries Duke Energy Carolinas LLC and Duke Energy Progress LLC requested authority from the North Carolina Utilities Commission to defer incremental expenses associated with the COVID-19 pandemic for potential recovery in a future rate case. Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission Chairman Gladys Dutrieuille issued a letter Aug. 10 directing utilities and other interested parties to offer comments regarding amendments to the existing service termination moratorium and other coronavirus-related customer protections. Written comments are due Aug. 18. The PUC had been expected to consider whether it should lift the COVID-19-related mandatory moratorium on utility service disconnections at its Aug. 27 open meeting. However, the PUC postponed the discussion until its next open meeting, scheduled for Sept. 17.On Aug. 10, the Tennessee Public Utility Commission voted to lift the ban on utility service disconnections effective Sept. 28.The Public Utility Commission of Texas adopted a transition plan Aug. 27 that allows customers to apply for benefits, including protection from a service shut-off for nonpayment, under its Electricity Relief program through Aug. 31, but the benefits themselves would not expire until Sept. 30.On Aug. 24, the Virginia State Corporation Commission extended the mandatory moratorium on utility service disconnections through Sept. 16 as the General Assembly debates issues related to COVID-19 in a special session convened Aug. 18.On Aug. 20, the Public Service Commission Of Wisconsin extended the moratorium, which had been scheduled to expire Sept. 1, to Oct. 1. The commission is to again consider whether to extend or rescind the moratorium at a Sept. 17 meeting.
COVID Financial Pain 'Much, Much Worse' Than Expected, Warns Harvard Study - New findings from a survey by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, published by NPR News on Wednesday, reveal low-income minority households have experienced the most financial hardships in the virus-induced recession. The pandemic heavily impacted Black and Latino households across America's four largest cities (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston) with massive job loss or reduction in hourly wages or a decline in working hours. The survey, conducted from July 1 through Aug. 3, found Latino households (77%) and Black households (81%) in the Greater Houston area incurred "serious" financial problems. As for the three other major cities, the survey showed 73% of Latinos in New York City experienced severe financial hardships, 71% of Latinos in Los Angeles, and 63% in Chicago. Black households in New York City (62%), Los Angeles (52%), and Chicago (69%) also reported severe financial distress because of the downturn. The survey found a majority of low-income minority households had their savings wiped out, which is similar to our recent report detailing how tens of millions of Americans depleted emergency savings this year. Nationally, white households and ones that have incomes over $100,000 escaped much of the financial distress. But for low-income minorities, which mostly survived on direct transfer payments from the government (i.e., Trump stimulus checks), the exhaustion of the checks has caused more financial stress ahead of the presidential election in November. "Before federal coronavirus support programs even expired, we find millions of people with severe problems with their finances," said Robert Blendon, a poll co-director and executive director of the Harvard Opinion Research Program at the Harvard Chan School. "And it's going to get worse because there is nothing for the people we surveyed who earn under $100,000 a year to fall back on." Blendon said the downturn has produced substantial economic damage among low-income minority households. He warned: "This is much, much, much worse than I would've predicted."
Workers Keeping Americans Fed Are Going Hungry in the Heartland -- Jessica Traxler was surrounded by food that she couldn’t afford. In southern Minnesota, she looked out at corn stalks, lush green, as far as the eye could see. A few miles to the east, a mill was pumping out flour. Just beyond it, a farm grew peppers, beans and berries. To the north, there were dairies, one after the other. To the south, a huge pork plant. Grain elevators, poultry yards, cheese plants—all stood just a short drive away. If one place underscores just how dire America’s hunger problem has become during the pandemic, it is here—in the middle of the breadbasket that supplies food from coast to coast. The ranks of Americans fighting hunger are projected to swell some 45% this year to more than 50 million. Traxler, her husband and six children are among them. She had come to this spot, an empty school parking lot in the town of Mankato, to collect free boxes of food staples: milk and apples and carrots. Hundreds of Minnesotans waited in line ahead of her for hours. Before the coronavirus shut down the U.S. economy and cost Traxler her job as a substitute teacher, she’d visited some community food shelves, but had never been to a large-scale food bank in her life. Now, at age 41, she is a regular. This is one of the most jarring aspects of the hunger crisis: About one-third of those relying on food shelves, large-scale and emergency food distributions now are doing so for the first time, according to Feeding America, the nation’s largest hunger-relief organization. In parts of Minnesota, that number is closer to 70%.With the nation pitched in a fierce debate over entrenched and systemic inequalities, the most basic divide—who eats well and who goes hungry—is becoming more acute every day. Even before the pandemic, the U.S. already had the highest number of people who couldn’t afford a basic energy-efficient diet among the world’s 63 high-income countries. During the pandemic, about a 10th of American households reported they haven’t had enough food in a given week. That’s a shocking figure for the world’s richest country. It’s more than double pre-Covid figures and the highest since comparable government data starts in 1995.In contrast to the Dust Bowl years of the Great Depression or the rationing of World War II, the crisis has nothing to do with food supplies. The U.S. is in a time of historic abundance, with plentiful grains, meat and dairy, so much so that farmers have been plowing over excess crops and dumping milk. But lockdowns have snarled supply chains, and food inflation is projected to rise at the fastest pace in almost a decade. Meanwhile, unemployment, low wages and reduced working hours are diminishing purchasing power—all of which are disproportionately impacting women and minorities, as is food insecurity.
Senate Democrats urge Amazon to recall, stop sales of explosive products - Democratic Sens. Richard Blumenthal (Conn.), Bob Menendez (N.J.) and Ed Markey (Mass.) on Friday called on Amazon to stop the sale of products that have reportedly caused explosions and other electrical malfunctions. The senators announced in a press release that they had written a joint letter to Amazon CEO and Chairman Jeff Bezos calling on the company to “immediately stop the sale of dangerous and defective AmazonBasics products, recall them, and effectively and immediately notify consumers of potential risks.” The letter comes after CNN reported on Thursday that dozens of Amazon products sold under its AmazonBasics line have exploded and started fires. The outlet referenced at least 1,500 customer reviews, covering more than 70 items, with descriptions of products exploding, catching on fire, smoking or posing other risks. CNN reported that about 30 items with three or more of those reviews remained for sale on Amazon’s website as of Thursday. The press release from the senators mentioned the case of Austin Parra of Connecticut, who was hospitalized with second-degree burns and throat injuries from smoke inhalation after his AmazonBasics USB cord set fire to an office chair while he was sleeping. Phone chargers were said to have caused burns on people's limbs, and exploding batteries reportedly sprayed chemicals, according to CNN. “Amazon must prioritize consumer safety over sales, particularly as consumers turn to online marketplaces during the coronavirus pandemic,” the senators wrote in their letter to Bezos.
Police shoot 13-year-old boy with autism several times after mother calls for help --A 13-year-old boy with autism was shot several times by police officers who responded to his home in Salt Lake City after his mother called for help.Linden Cameron was recovering in a Utah hospital, his mother said, after suffering injuries to his shoulder, both ankles, his intestines and his bladder. Golda Barton told KUTV she called 911 to request a crisis intervention team because her son, who has Asperger’s syndrome, was having an episode caused by “bad separation anxiety” as his mother went to work for the first time in more than a year.“I said, ‘He’s unarmed, he doesn’t have anything, he just gets mad and he starts yelling and screaming,’” she said. “He’s a kid, he’s trying to get attention, he doesn’t know how to regulate.”She added: “They’re supposed to come out and be able to de-escalate a situation using the most minimal force possible.”Instead, she said, two officers went through the front door of the home and in less than five minutes were yelling “get down on the ground” before firing several shots. “He’s a small child,” she said. “Why didn’t you just tackle him? He’s a baby. He has mental issues.”In a briefing on Sunday, Sgt Keith Horrocks of Salt Lake City police told reporters officers were responding to reports “a juvenile was having a mental episode” and thought Cameron “had made threats to some folks with a weapon”. Police confirmed they did not find a weapon at the scene.
Entire Rochester Police Command Resigns - Rochester, NY Police Chief La'Ron Singletary said in a surprise announcement on Tuesday that he will be retiring at the age of 40 after less than 18 months on the job, after controversy erupted over the March death of a black man while in police custody. His deputy and the city's entire command staff joined him in leaving, according to ABC News and Bloomberg. Speaking via Zoom, Mayor Lovely Warren confirmed the moves, adding "The Chief was not asked to give his resignation." When asked who would be in charge of the police department this evening in the event of new protests, Warren said she didn’t know and asked for the briefing to be adjourned so that a replacement could be found. As of Sunday, a total of 37 people had been arrested and eight police officers hospitalized amid the unrest. -Bloomberg Singletary came under fire following news of the death of Daniel Prude, a mentally ill black man who died of asphyxiation after police attempted to take him into protective custody in March - two months before the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, yet the incident didn't become public until last week, according to the Democrat & Chronicle. Prude, 41, had been suffering from a mental health episode and was running naked throughout the streets. Once officers caught him, a 'spit hood' was placed over his head after he began spitting. He was then held face down on the pavement for just over two minutes, after which he stopped breathing. Prude was pronounced DOA to the hospital from asphyxia.
Remote Schools’ Hidden Cost: Parents Quit Work to Teach, Prompting New Recession Woes - Clara Vazquez’s 7-year-old son, Kevin, asks her a troubling question before he goes to sleep each night. “‘Mom, who’s going to take care of me tomorrow?’ he asks me,” said the 27-year-old resident of Sunnyside, Wash. “I feel so bad because I have to say, ‘I don’t know.’” She’ll have to come up with an answer soon, and it may cost Ms. Vazquez a big part of her livelihood. In two weeks, her son’s online-only classes start running from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. If she can’t find child care, she will give up at least one of her two jobs as a home health-care worker to help her son manage his studies. “I don’t want to quit my job because it’s going to put us in financial strain,” said Ms. Vazquez, whose husband is a truck driver. “But I feel like I’m out of options.” It is a trade-off that looms for millions of families across the U.S. whose children are returning to partial or completely remote learning at K-12 schools this fall, and the potential blow to the economy could be big enough to rival a small or medium-size recession. According to research that Brevan Howard Asset Management recently shared with its investors, about 4.3 million U.S. workers could find themselves staying home unless they find other child-care arrangements. If those parents are counted among the unemployed, it would boost the unemployment rate by 2.6 percentage points, according to Brevan Howard. That would be a sharper increase than occurred in both the 1990-91 and 2001 recessions, though smaller than what occurred in the 2007-09 downturn, the researchers said.
Health disaster and class conflict on horizon as millions of students return to US schools - Following the Labor Day holiday, the vast majority of K-12 public schools have now begun their fall semester across the United States. Millions of students and educators have been forced back into overcrowded and dilapidated schools, which will induce a massive spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. Yesterday, the US surpassed 6.5 million COVID-19 cases and is on track to soon reach the gruesome death toll of 200,000.The nation’s roughly 13,600 school districts have been left to their own devices, reopening either fully in-person, or fully remote instruction, or under the “hybrid” model combining the two. Given the rapid level of community transmission of COVID-19 and the porousness of district and state boundaries, the latest science makes clear that the only safe method of instruction at present is full remote learning.A study released in July found that the transition to remote learning in the spring prevented 1.37 million infections over a 26-day period and saved roughly 40,600 lives in the US over a 16-day period. Another study last month found that aerosolized particles containing COVID-19 can travel up to 16 feet through indoor settings, exposing the utter fraud that a “hybrid” model with minimal social distancing can be done safely.Democratic and Republican politicians nationally are consciously implementing a policy of “herd immunity” that they know will lead to a catastrophic loss of life for the most vulnerable sections of the population. They do so in order to reduce pension and health care obligations, and to force parents back into factories and other workplaces where they face ramped-up exploitation in order to service the unprecedented levels of debt produced by the CARES Act bailout of Wall Street and major corporations.There are no national or state bodies aggregating reopening plans for all school districts in the country, a damning testament to the contempt of the ruling class for educators and the entire working class.The most comprehensive list of reopening plans has been compiled byEducation Week, which reports plans for 888 districts across the country, including the 100 largest districts. Of these districts, 219 are providing fully in-person instruction involving 2.54 million students; 246 are reopening under the “hybrid” model involving 3.84 million students; and 423 are reopening fully online involving 13.2 million students.Based on this list, roughly a third of all public school students have returned to classrooms at least part-time. If these figures are extrapolated for all 50.8 million students in the US, then roughly 6.6 million have now resumed fully in-person learning and another 10 million have resumed partial in-person learning under the hybrid model.
West Virginia schools return to in-person instruction - As West Virginia public schools reopen Tuesday, September 8, all but nine of the state’s 55 counties are scheduled to begin instruction in person. Thousands of teachers, staff and students will be put in danger of contracting COVID-19 and spreading it through their communities. The counties ordered by the state Department of Education to open online-only include Kanawha around the capital city of Charleston and nearby Putnam; and Morgantown’s Monongalia County. Six southern counties—Fayette, Logan, Mercer, Mingo, Monroe, and Wayne—are also included in the order. In Mingo County, the school superintendent tested positive for COVID-19 and the high school football and golf teams were exposed during practice in late August. In Cabell County, where the state’s second largest metro area of Huntington is located, schools are scheduled to start in person. The Department of Health and Human Resources’ (DHHR) tracking of COVID-19 in the county does not include the student population of Marshall University, where 26 students and staff were confirmed positive with the virus in the past week. Although the campus is located in downtown Huntington, it is not being included in the area numbers or the school district considerations. The state was the last in the US to report a case of COVID-19 back in the spring, partly due to a lag in testing. West Virginia has trailed behind surrounding states in the numbers and rate of coronavirus, a fact Republican Governor Jim Justice has touted as evidence the state will escape the worst of the pandemic. In reality, the state’s population is vulnerable to a severe outbreak. West Virginia has the third oldest population in the US, and residents are among the poorest and in worst health. Residents suffer from obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and pulmonary diseases at high rates, making complications and death more likely from infection. Over the weekend, the DHHR issued an updated COVID-19 map in which counties reporting fewer than 10 cases per 100,000 were considered safe to reopen the schools. The DHHR’s assessment uses a seven-day trend, rather than a 14-day trend, and a color-coding to indicate whether a county can open up schools to in-person teaching after a week of downward trending cases.
Largest Texas school districts slated to open without testing anyone - It has recently been revealed that major school districts in the largest cities in Texas, including Dallas Independent School District (ISD), Houston ISD, Austin ISD, and El Paso ISD, have no requirements or plans for COVID-19 testing for “anyone at any point,” as the Texas Tribune put it. Students who are symptomatic will simply be asked to go home for 14 days or until they seem to improve, meaning that students who are still sick could be sent back to school. Schools that have already reopened, such as Dumas ISD in Dumas, Texas have seen cases since the district first reopened, with the school administration flaunting social distancing measures. The superintendent for the district, Monty Hysinger, said, “We can’t promise, and we haven’t promised, our parents that we can socially distance.” He cited space restrictions applicable to all districts in the state, saying, “I don’t know of a district in the state that has the space.” All of the major school districts mentioned which are not going to test students are situated in densely populated areas that are also COVID-19 hotspots with rampant community spread, producing thousands of new cases daily. Texas has the second-highest number of cases of any state in the US at roughly 668,787, and the third-highest number of deaths at 13,819. Harris County, where Houston ISD is located, has a population of 4.7 million and has seen over 111,000 cases and 2,327 deaths. Saturday saw 928 new cases added. Houston ISD has already had multiple outbreaks, with a staff member testing positive after handing out laptops over the summer and student athletes becoming infected during summer training. Dallas County has an estimated population of almost 2.4 million, and has over 73,000 recorded COVID-19 cases and 944 deaths. On Saturday, 398 additional cases were added, partially due to a backlog of tests. Travis county, where Austin ISD is situated, has a population of almost 1.3 million, with 26,931 cases recorded in total. AISD has already seen an outbreak over the summer, with nearly 700 staff quarantined and at least 51 infected. El Paso, population 839,238, has recorded 6,265 cases and 157 deaths, with 334 additional cases recorded Saturday. In all of these counties, youth made up a significant portion of the case numbers. In Harris County, the 10-to-19-year-old age group made up almost 10,000 cases, with children aged 0-9 accounting for over 4,000 cases. In Travis county, the same age groups had more than 2,000 and 800 cases, respectively. Given community spread, all counties where schools are reopening are going to have significant numbers of COVID-19 cases among school-aged children.
Coronavirus cases spike among school-age children in Florida, while state orders some counties to keep data hidden - One month into the forced reopening of Florida's schools, dozens of classrooms — along with some entire schools — have been temporarily shuttered because of coronavirus outbreaks, and infections among school-age children have jumped 34 percent. But parents in many parts of the state don't know if outbreaks of the virus are related to their own schools because the state ordered some counties to keep health data secret.Volunteers across Florida have set up their own school-related coronavirus dashboards, and one school district is using Facebook after the county health department was told to stop releasing information about cases tied to local schools. Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has pushed aggressively for schools to offer in-person classes, even when Florida was the hot spot of the nation, and threatened to withhold funding if districts did not allow students into classrooms by Aug. 31. In the state guidelines for reopening schools, officials did not recommend that coronavirus cases be disclosed school by school. In fact, the DeSantis administration ordered some districts, including Duval and Orange, to stop releasing school specific coronavirus information, citing privacy issues.
First school in New York City closes due to positive COVID-19 cases - P.S. 811x The Academy for Career and Living Skills, a district 75 school in the Bronx, is the first public school to close after two staffers tested positive for COVID-19 in seven days, the Department of Education announced on Friday. The department also confirmed that seventeen more Department of Education employees have tested positive for COVID-19 since school buildings reopened for teachers on Tuesday, officials said Friday. So far, about 15,000 staffers have taken advantage of expedited testing, according to the DOE. The turnaround time for test results is 48 hours for 97% of tests. After mounting pressure to delay the start of in-person classes, Mayor Bill de Blasio pushed back the start of the school year until Sept. 21. But teachers returned to buildings on Sept. 8, to prepare for their students’ return. Reports of instructors testing positive for the virus a day after buildings reopened caused panic among some teachers and parents frazzled by the constant worry of outbreaks linked to schools. The Justice caucus of the city’s United Federation of Teachers, also known as MORE UFT, alleged on Wednesday that three teachers had self-reported testing positive to their higher-ups and colleagues. Miranda Barbot, a spokesperson for the Department of Education, confirmed two Brooklyn employees—a staffer at P.S.001 in Sunset Park and another at M.S. 88 in Park Slope—had indeed tested positive for the virus. More reports began to circulate online a day later and the President of the UFT Michael Mulgrew told reporters 16 of its members self-reported testing positive for the virus on Thursday. After a day of radio silence, the DOE confirmed at least 17 other staffers in 17 different buildings have tested positive for the virus.
Trump Says Schools Teaching NY Times' 1619 Project "Will Not Be Funded" - - President Donald Trump on Sunday warned the Department of Education is investigating the use of the New York Times’ “1619 Project” in schools, saying that institutions that use the alternative narrative of U.S. history could lose federal funding. The “1619 Project,” created by Nikole Hannah-Jones and widely panned by historians and political scientists, attempts to cast the Atlantic slave trade as the dominant factor in the founding of America instead of ideals such as individual liberty and natural rights. Some critics have said that it is an attempt to rewrite U.S. history through a left-wing lens. Some historians have criticized the project over inaccuracies such as the American Revolution having been fought to preserve the institution of slavery rather than for seeking independence from Britain. “Department of Education is looking at this. If so, they will not be funded!” Trump wrote on Twitter Sunday, responding to a post that said California has “implemented the 1619 project into the public schools,” and that “soon you won’t recognize [A]merica.” California’s Department of Education came up with a draft model last month to include some of the project in history classes. It echoes the sentiment of a bill that was proposed by Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) introduced in July that proposes denying funds to a school that uses the 1619 Project. Schools in places like Washington D.C. and Chicago have modified their curriculum for the project. Controversy erupted earlier this year when a professor at Northwestern University who helped fact-check the project said that she alerted Hannah-Jones about inaccuracies contained in the project but got no response.“On August 19 of last year I listened in stunned silence as Nikole Hannah-Jones, a reporter for the New York Times, repeated an idea that I had vigorously argued against,” wrote professor Leslie Harris in Politico. Harris also said she “vigorously disputed” the claim that protecting slavery was a major reason why the American Revolution was fought.“Far from being fought to preserve slavery, the Revolutionary War became a primary disrupter of slavery in the North American Colonies.
Sick Students Flee College Campuses As COVID Outbreaks Rage - The notion that the US will experience a resurgence in COVID-19 cases this fall is almost starting to look like a self-fulfilling prophecy. A couple of weeks ago, as coronavirus cases were just starting to climb in the state of Iowa, the Daily Iowan, the student newspaper at the University of Iowa, published a harrowing account of one student's trip through the campus quarantine procedure after testing positive for COVID-19 on campus. The student described confusion and disorder every step of the way, apathetic staff, and substandard living conditions in the "quarantine" dorms. She eventually decided to walk away from it all and return home to Illinois. The student's story wound up in the press after going viral after being shared on student life social media pages. "I felt like a guinea pig," she told the Daily Iowan. Since then, Iowa has become host to one of the fastest growing outbreaks in the US. Outbreaks on college campuses have received growing national attention in recent weeks as more universities opt to send students home, despite a growing scientific consensus that sick students would be better off remaining on campus. Ravina Kullar, epidemiologist and spokesperson for Infectious Diseases Society of America, said schools should quarantine students on campus, and that students shouldn't be sent home. Amazingly, schools have rejected this guidance seemingly en masse, risking a repeat of one of the dynamics that definitely helped spread COVID-19 across the country. As Bloomberg reports, schools around the country are increasingly sending students home, often due, it appears, to their own inability to effectively execute hastily organized plans to deal with sick students. Instead of taking responsibility and risking more financial losses. Some schools have seen infection rates north of 1% for their student populations. Ohio State saw 1.6% of students test positive during the latter half of August. At Ohio State University, President Kristina Johnson sent an email to the more than 60,000 students, faculty and staff Thursday urging them all to “act as though you are positive” going into Labor Day weekend. Between Aug. 14 and Sept. 1, about 1.6% of the public flagship’s student population — 1,052 students — contracted the disease. Deans “can pretty much trace” the spread from party to party, and the ability of the university to provide in-person education will rely on students’ restraint, Governor Mike DeWine said at a news conference. “No one is telling students to hibernate for nine months or the whole year,” he said. “Look, this is the reality: If the numbers get too high and the spread is too much, these schools are going to have absolutely no choice but to pull back.”
Colleges Send Students Home as Outbreaks Worsen. Are They Creating a New Coronavirus Threat? - Administrators at California State University, Chico, determined late last month that coronavirus outbreaks in classrooms and residence halls could be catastrophic at the school. Its response: to send students back home. Many schools have made similar decisions, including James Madison University, North Carolina State University, Colorado College and the State University of New York in Oneonta. Public-health officials worry that dispatching students to their hometowns, often without testing them before departure, could lead to new outbreaks around the country. “Shipping the problem back to the community, where they can further spread, just doesn’t seem like the right answer,” said A. David Paltiel, a professor at the Yale School of Public Health. “Just because a kid is asymptomatic doesn’t mean it’s safe to send that kid home. They could be exposed and incubating. They could be in fact a ticking time bomb.” Dr. Paltiel said the viral load rises steeply in the few days following exposure, and someone infected can transmit the virus to others starting around day three after exposure—before symptoms may present, if they ever present. “Even where you have test positivity on campuses, we want to encourage universities to have students remain on or near campus and minimize the potential exposure to the wider community,” he said, according to a recording of the call reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. At Chico State, more than 90% of classes were already online, and the school had just about 750 students in residence halls. Another 8,000 to 10,000 are living near campus. The school didn’t test students on arrival, and testing of potentially symptomatic individuals has been led by local health officials.By Aug. 30, there were nearly 30 cases on campus, with additional exposures “that could have an exponential and devastating effect on campus,” President Gayle Hutchinson wrote to the school community, announcing plans to reduce campus housing significantly.
Kaitlin Bennett: Pro-Trump 'Gun Girl' chased off Florida college campus when trying to 'interview' students - Kaitlin Bennett came to the University of Central Florida to defend President Trump to college students – and incited a protest while she was there. 24-year-old Bennett is also known as 'Kent State Gun Girl' after a stunt in 2018 in which she attended her university graduation carrying an AR-10 rifle. She has been a popular figure among the Trump administration and his supporters because of the fact that she’s young and conservative. Bennett was previously linked to Alex Jones of InfoWars, and despite a lot of other controversy – including leaked anti-Semitic group texts – she's still incredibly popular. Bennett seemed to have been invited to the university by a group on campus, but was quickly criticised for not wearing a mask and saying that she didn’t have to – despite the fact that the University of Central Florida actually has a policy on mask wearing. Bennett then accused the university of lying, saying that she had gone to the campus to ask students if they thought Trump would be a good president. Bennett has her own website and is incredibly active on social media, where she often posts 'vox pops' – short clips speaking to people about an issue. She also alleged that her head of security – who she had not previously mentioned – had spoken to UCF police Commander Freeman about the situation, and that they had given her and her team reassurances that they would not be forced to wear masks. Even so, it seems like Bennett did actually comply, with a pro-Trump face mask, as she walked around the school for the rest of the day. She also seemed to tweet about the university after, saying that she had a message for Donald Trump – which was to defund public universities, saying that they are centers for left-wing indoctrination.
Trump says Big Ten could play football without schools in three states -President Trump suggested Sunday that the Big Ten conference could go ahead with its football season without participation from schools in three states as some players and parents have called for the season to resume. In a tweet, Trump took aim at the governors of Illinois, Michigan and Maryland for what he called a "ridiculous lack of interest or political support" for games to go on, and suggested that the league could go on without them. Trump's tweet comes about a month after the Big Ten moved officially to cancel its football season, set to begin this fall, over ongoing concerns due to the coronavirus pandemic. Some players and others involved with the conference have called for the decision to be reversed. University of Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh is among those who has called publicly in recent days for the season to resume, even as colleges around the country that have returned to on-campus learning have battled clusters of outbreaks in student housing and Greek Life residences. "Everybody has been, we want to play as soon as we possibly can. And we're ready to play, we could be ready to play a game in two weeks," Harbaugh said this week. "Just get the pads on and our guys have trained without a pause since June 15. That's our position, we're ready to play as soon as we possibly can play." Presidents of a dozen universities voted in favor of halting the Big Ten's season last month, with just two members of the conference, Nebraska and Iowa, voting to go forward with games.
University of Michigan grad students reject administration offer, continue strike against unsafe conditions - In an act of tremendous courage, striking graduate student instructors at the University of Michigan voted by more than 700 to 400 to reject a proposal from the university administration and continue their strike to demand the shutdown of in-person learning amidst the coronavirus pandemic. The “offer” from the university administration failed to meet the strikers’ main demands. On the demand for a universal right to work remotely, the university’s only offer was that grad students could work remotely during a period of arbitration if they were required to work in-person against their will. On the demand for the demilitarization of the campus, the university agreed only to have two meetings per term to hold further discussions. The university also agreed to disclose the methodology it had adopted for testing, but would not increase its testing capacity. The struggle at the University of Michigan is part of a broader fight against the reopening of campuses. In an indication of the catastrophic impact of school reopenings throughout the country, the University of Wisconsin-Madison announced Wednesday that it is moving all classes online after a surge of COVID-19 cases, with more than 1,000 infections over the past several days. Similar outbreaks have occurred on other campuses, endangering the lives not only of students, but also the broader community. The vote was held in the face of blackmail from the UM Board of Regents, made up of powerful Democrats, including billionaire Little Caesars owner Denise Ilitch and Jordan Acker, the former assistant to Obama’s secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano. The university threatened to take retaliatory action against striking students if they rejected the deal, saying it was “considering all options available,” according to the Michigan Daily. The administration also said its offer would “explode” if it was not immediately accepted, meaning any guarantees against retaliation in it would no longer be on the table.
US Revokes Chinese Graduate Student Visas On Fears Of Research Theft - The Trump administration confirmed in a statement Wednesday that it is "blocking" many students from China from obtaining visas to America, specifically graduate students focusing on research in scientific and medical fields over fears they could steal sensitive research. Citing the acting head of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Chad Wolf, Reuters reports: “We are blocking visas for certain Chinese graduate students and researchers with ties to China’s military fusion strategy to prevent them from stealing and otherwise appropriating sensitive research,” he said in a speech in Washington. This comes after longtime allegations that Beijing is seeking to obtain sensitive coronavirus data and research from American pharmaceutical companies, labs and academic institutions amid the global race for a vaccine. In the past few years Chinese students have made up the largest contingent of visas issued to foreign graduate students and researchers. For example, DHS lists that for the 2018-2019 academic year, American universities had a whopping 272,470 undergraduate and graduate students enrolled.It's as yet unclear how many students are currently banned from travel to the US under this latest DHS policy. But already students who completed their undergraduate programs in China at schools linked to the PLA Army are seeing their visas canceled. Apparently some are just now finding out, as Reuters details:Earlier, some Chinese students enrolled in U.S. universities said they received emailed notices from the U.S. embassy in Beijing or U.S. consulates in China on Wednesday informing them that their visas had been canceled.Nearly 50 students holding F-1 academic visas including postgraduates and undergraduates said in a WeChat chatroom the notices stated they would have to apply for new visas if they wanted to travel to the United States.
A pain reliever that alters perceptions of risk -While acetaminophen is helping you deal with your headache, it may also be making you more willing to take risks, a new study suggests. People who took acetaminophen rated activities like "bungee jumping off a tall bridge" and "speaking your mind about an unpopular issue in a meeting at work" as less risky than people who took a placebo, researchers found.Use of the drug also led people to take more risks in an experiment where they could earn rewards by inflating a virtual balloon on a computer: Sometimes they went too far and the balloon popped. "Acetaminophen seems to make people feel less negative emotion when they consider risky activities - they just don't feel as scared," said Baldwin Way, co-author of the study and associate professor of psychology at The Ohio State University. "With nearly 25 percent of the population in the U.S. taking acetaminophen each week, reduced risk perceptions and increased risk-taking could have important effects on society."
Common cold combats influenza - As the flu season approaches, a strained public health system may have a surprising ally -- the common cold virus. Rhinovirus, the most frequent cause of common colds, can prevent the flu virus from infecting airways by jumpstarting the body's antiviral defenses, Yale researchers report Sept. 4 in the journal The Lancet Microbe. The findings help answer a mystery surrounding the 2009 H1N1 swine flu pandemic: An expected surge in swine flu cases never materialized in Europe during the fall, a period when the common cold becomes widespread. A Yale team led by Dr. Ellen Foxman studied three years of clinical data from more than 13,000 patients seen at Yale New Haven Hospital with symptoms of respiratory infection. The researchers found that even during months when both viruses were active, if the common cold virus was present, the flu virus was not. "When we looked at the data, it became clear that very few people had both viruses at the same time," said Foxman, assistant professor of laboratory medicine and immunobiology and senior author of the study. Foxman stressed that scientists do not know whether the annual seasonal spread of the common cold virus will have a similar impact on infection rates of those exposed to the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.
White rice linked to diabetes, especially in South Asia, says 21-nation study done over 10 yrs - An analysis of over 1,30,000 adults from 21 countries over nearly a decade has indicated a high risk of diabetes linked with the consumption of white rice. The risk is most prominent for the South Asian population, according to findings from a new, large-scale, long-term study.The study was an international collaboration between researchers from various countries — including India, China, and Brazil — in Asia, North and South America, Africa and Europe.Led by Bhavadharini Balaji of the Population Health Research Institute, Hamilton Health Sciences and McMaster University, Canada, the study was a part of the institute’s Prospective Urban Rural Epidemiology (PURE) project.The findings were published in the Diabetes Care journal in its September issue. White rice is milled rice that has its germ (the part that sprouts), bran (hard outer layer), and husk (outer covering) removed. The polishing of rice further results in a bright and shiny appearance. While white rice has an appealing appearance and can be stored longer, the milling and polishing process remove nutrients such as vitamin B. White rice has been linked to an outbreak of beriberi in Asia, caused by vitamin B-1 deficiency. It also causes the blood sugar levels to spike upon consumption due to its high glycemic index.Globally, 42.5 crore people currently have diabetes, and this number is expected to increase to 62.9 crore by 2045, according to the International Diabetes Federation.
Post-COVID syndrome severely damages children's hearts -- Multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C), believed to be linked to COVID-19, damages the heart to such an extent that some children will need lifelong monitoring and interventions, said the senior author of a medical literature review published Sept. 4 in EClinicalMedicine, a journal of The Lancet. Case studies also show MIS-C can strike seemingly healthy children without warning three or four weeks after asymptomatic infections, said Alvaro Moreira, MD, MSc, of The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. Dr. Moreira, a neonatologist, is an assistant professor of pediatrics in the university's Joe R. and Teresa Lozano Long School of Medicine. "According to the literature, children did not need to exhibit the classic upper respiratory symptoms of COVID-19 to develop MIS-C, which is frightening," Dr. Moreira said. "Children might have no symptoms, no one knew they had the disease, and a few weeks later, they may develop this exaggerated inflammation in the body." Another finding from the case studies: Almost half of patients who had MIS-C had an underlying medical condition, and of those, half of the individuals were obese or overweight. "Generally, in both adults and children, we are seeing that patients who are obese will have a worse outcome," Dr. Moreira said. The team reviewed 662 MIS-C cases reported worldwide between Jan. 1 and July 25. Among the findings:
- 71% of the children were admitted to the intensive care unit(ICU).
- 60% presented with shock.
- Average length of stay in the hospital was 7.9 days.
- 100% had fever, 73.7% had abdominal pain or diarrhea, and 68.3% suffered vomiting.
- 90% had an echocardiogram (EKG) test and 54% of the results were abnormal.
- 22.2% of the children required mechanical ventilation.
- 4.4% required extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO).
- 11 children died.
Sturgis motorcycle rally was a 'superspreader event' - — In early August, more than 460,000 motorcycle enthusiasts converged on Sturgis, S.D., for a 10-day celebration where few wore facial coverings or practiced social distancing. A month later, researchers have found that thousands have been sickened across the nation, leading them to brand the Sturgis rally a “superspreader” event. “The Sturgis Rally was one of the largest in-person gatherings since the outbreak of COVID-19 in the United States,” said Joseph J. Sabia, one of the study’s authors, a professor of economics and the director of the Center for Health Economics & Policy Studies at San Diego State University. He described the “public health costs” of the rally as “substantial and widespread,” which could have infected as many as 266,796 people. He and his co-authors estimate that dealing with the fallout from the rally will involve more than $12 billion in health care costs. “The spread of the virus due to the event was large,” the authors write, because it hosted people from all over the country. But the severity of the spread was closely tied to the approaches to the pandemic by Sturgis attendees’ home states. In some places, any spread related to people returning from the rally was blunted by strong mitigation measures, like a face-mask mandate or a prohibition against indoor dining. The findings come in a new paper, “The Contagion Externality of a Superspreading Event: The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally and COVID-19,” published by IZA — Institute of Labor Economics, a German think tank. Its four authors are all researchers affiliated with American universities. In aggregate, the data “provide strong evidence that the Sturgis Rally appears to have been a superspreader event,” the authors conclude. The estimate of 266,000 additional cases comes from those county-by-county infection rate increases; some epidemiologists have shown skepticism about that figure, though there is little argument about the rally having been a dangerous event.The new findings come just days after a Minnesota man became the first Sturgis attendee to die from COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.The researchers found that the rally, which hosted 462,182 people between Aug. 7 and 16, “generated substantial public health costs,” totaling $12.2 billion. (That calculation is based on figures on health care costs associated with the coronavirus from another IZA study.) The authors note that the cost was “enough to have paid each of the estimated 462,182 rally attendees $26,553.64 not to attend.”
Singing can spread COVID-19 - Singing doesn't need to be silenced, however, but at the moment the wisest thing is to sing with social distancing in place. The advice comes from aerosol researchers at Lund University in Sweden. They have studied the amount of particles we actually emit when we sing - and by extension - if we contribute to the increased spread of Covid-19 by singing. "There are many reports about the spreading of Covid-19 in connection with choirs singing. Therefore, different restrictions have been introduced all over the world to make singing safer. So far, however, there has been no scientific investigation of the amount of aerosol particles and larger droplets that we actually exhale when we sing", says Jakob Löndahl, associate professor of Aerosol Technology at Lund University. Aerosols are small airborne particles. To get a better understanding of the amount of aerosols and virus particles we actually emit when we sing, 12 healthy singers and two people with confirmed Covid-19 took part in a research project. Seven of the participants were professional opera singers. The study shows that singing - particularly loud and consonant-rich singing - spreads a lot of aerosol particles and droplets into the surrounding air. "Some droplets are so large that they only move a few decimetres from the mouth before they fall, whereas others are smaller and may continue to hover for minutes. In particular, the enunciation of consonants releases very large droplets and the letters B and P stand out as the biggest aerosol spreaders", says Malin Alsved, doctoral student of Aerosol Technology at Lund University.
New CDC research shows young children can spread COVID-19, even if asymptomatic - Children infected with COVID-19 can still transmit the virus and infect adults, even if they are asymptomatic, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). According to the CDC, children older than 10 can efficiently transmit SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. However, limited data is available on SARS-CoV-2 transmission from young children, particularly in child care settings. The researchers analyzed data from 184 people with links to three child care facilities in Salt Lake County, Utah, from April to July. According to the report, two of the facility outbreaks began with staff members who had household contacts with the virus but still went to work. Using contact tracing data, the CDC found that 54 percent of infections across three separate facilities occurred in children. Researchers found 12 children contracted the virus, with an average age of 7. Those children spread the virus to at least 12 additional people outside the centers, who were mostly members of their households. Six of these cases occurred in mothers, and three cases occurred in siblings of the infected children. At least two of the children who spread the virus were asymptomatic. The CDC said one mother who was presumably infected by her asymptomatic child was subsequently hospitalized. Among the seven cases in which children were symptomatic, a fever was the most common sign, followed by a headache and sore throat. The CDC said mitigation measures like wearing masks can likely help reduce transmission, especially for staff working with children under the age of 2, who may be too young for a mask. But young children can still transmit the virus, as seen in one of the facility outbreaks where an 8-month-old transmitted the virus to both parents.
COVID-19 patients in earlier stages exhaled millions of SARS-CoV-2 per hour (PDF) Abstract: Exhaled breath samples had the highest positive rate (26.9%, n=52), followed by surface swabs (5.4%, n=242), and air samples (3.8%, n=26). COVID-19 patients recruited in Beijing exhaled millions of SARS-CoV-2 RNA copies into the air per hour. Exhaled breath emission may play an important role in the COVID-19 transmission. […] For the first time, we here report that the SARS-CoV-2 is released directly into the air via breathing by COVID-19 patients. The detection limit for SARS-CoV-2 by the RT-PCR was reported to be approximately 100 RNA copies per µL [9]. Using the equation described in Supporting Information, the observed Ct values show that SARS-CoV-2 levels in exhaled breath could reach 105 -107 copies/m3 if an average breathing rate of 12 L/min is assumed. The SARS-CoV-2 breath emission rate is affected by many factors such as disease stage, patient activity, and possibly age. We found that the SARS-CoV-2 breath emission rate into the air was the highest, up to 105 viruses per min, during the earlier stages of COVID-19. This finding was in line with a previous report that the highest SARS-CoV-2 load in throat swabs was observed at the time of symptom onset [10]. Another significant discovery from this Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciaa1283/5898624 by guest on 09 September 2020 Accepted Manuscript 7 work is that SARS-CoV-2 emission was not, however, continuous at the same rate, but was rather a sporadic event. For example, two EBC samples (EBC-1, EBC-2) collected from the same patient E, but on different dates, using the same method returned different test results (Table S2).
CDC report: Dining out increases risk of contracting coronavirus more than other activities Dining out is one of the riskiest possible activities during the coronavirus pandemic, according to a report issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Thursday, citing the fact that masks are not used while people are eating and drinking. CDC officials interviewed about 314 people who experienced symptoms of the virus and got tests, about half of whom were positive. Both the positive and the negative subjects said they had engaged in activities such as attending church and in-person shopping. However, people who tested positive were about twice as likely than those who tested negative to say they had dined at a restaurant. People who tested positive but could not identify a specific occasion when they were exposed to the virus were also more likely to have recently visited a bar or coffee shop. “Eating and drinking on-site at locations that offer such options might be important risk factors associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection,” the report states. “Efforts to reduce possible exposures where mask use and social distancing are difficult to maintain, such as when eating and drinking, should be considered to protect customers, employees, and communities.” With every state in some form of reopening, numerous localities and states are currently resuming dine-in services. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) announced Wednesday that reduced-capacity indoor dining can begin Sept. 30 in New York City.
COVID-19 Vaccine Trial Put on Hold Over Safety Concerns - One of the leading candidates for a COVID-19 vaccine has been stopped after a study participant had a serious adverse reaction that is suspected to have been caused by the vaccine, as STAT News reported. The vaccine from the pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford was in the late stages of a phase 3 trial, meaning it was being tested for safety at several sites around the country and in Europe. After a study participant in the United Kingdom fell ill, AstraZeneca said in a statement that it would review safety and efficacy data. Then the company released a second statement, saying it initiated the pause even though the study participant is expected to make a full recovery, according to STAT News.Despite the pause, adverse reactions are very common in clinical trials as is pausing for a safety and efficacy review. It also does not mean the vaccine candidate is a failure. However, it does make it increasingly unlikely that the vaccine will be approved and ready for distribution by Election Day, as President Trump has often said a vaccine would be.In a statement, according to The New York Times, AstraZeneca described the pause as a "routine action which has to happen whenever there is a potentially unexplained illness in one of the trials, while it is investigated, ensuring we maintain the integrity of the trials."AstraZeneca was not clear about how long the pause in the vaccine trial will last. The late-stage vaccine trial so far has included 17,000 people in Europe, the U.S., Brazil and South Africa, according to The Guardian. Phase 3 trials include a large number of study participants for exactly this reason; only by testing a large number of people do rare side-effects emerge. "This is the whole point of doing these Phase 2, Phase 3 trials," said Dr. Phyllis Tien, an infectious disease physician at the University of California, San Francisco, as The New York Times reported. "We need to assess safety, and we won't know the efficacy part until much later. I think halting the trial until the safety board can figure out whether or not this was directly related to the vaccine is a good idea."
Oxford University Covid vaccine trial put on hold due to possible adverse reaction in participant - The development of a promising Covid-19 vaccine has been put on hold due to a possible adverse reaction in a trial participant. A spokesman for AstraZeneca, the company working with a team from Oxford University, told the Guardian the trial has been stopped to review the “potentially unexplained illness” in one of the participants. The spokesman stressed that the adverse reaction was only recorded in a single participant and said pausing trials was common during vaccine development. “As part of the ongoing randomised, controlled global trials of the Oxford coronavirus vaccine, our standard review process was triggered and we voluntarily paused vaccination to allow review of safety data by an independent committee,” the spokesman said. “This is a routine action which has to happen whenever there is a potentially unexplained illness in one of the trials, while it is investigated, ensuring we maintain the integrity of the trials. In large trials illnesses will happen by chance but must be independently reviewed to check this carefully. “We are working to expedite the review of the single event to minimise any potential impact on the trial timeline. We are committed to the safety of our participants and the highest standards of conduct in our trials.”The vaccine, which had been expected to be publicly available as early as January, is one of two projects on which the Australian government plans to spend $1.7bn as part of a deal to ensure free vaccines for all citizens.On Monday, the Morrison government committed to buying 33.8m doses of the vaccine if it was proved to be effective.The BBC reported this is the second time this particular vaccine has been paused since trials began in April.
Oxford Covid vaccine trial suspension: what happens next? - One of the volunteers in the UK has become ill and it is crucial that the researchers find out whether this could be related to the vaccine. This is not uncommon in vaccine trials – and in fact it is said to be the second time it has happened with this vaccine . Very large trials are essential to pick up any rare side-effects. Something that affects one in 10,000 people, for instance, will probably not be detected in the early trials of just a few thousand. It is said to be transverse myelitis, although AstraZeneca has not confirmed that. That is inflammation of the sheath containing the nerves of the spinal cord. It can be treated by steroids to reduce the inflammation but the condition can be permanent. Transverse myelitis has been associated with vaccination before, but only very rarely. A study in 2018 looking at more than 30 years of data from the US vaccine adverse event reporting system found 119 cases in 29 men and 90 women, which is a tiny number compared with the numbers vaccinated. However, they were clustered in the first weeks after vaccination, which made the researchers think it could be a rare vaccination-related event. Nearly half the cases followed a hepatitis B vaccination. Investigators will be examining the details of the illness and the person who contracted it to find out if there is a link. They will also look at the dose of vaccine they received, their state of general health and so on. They will hope this event can be explained and is not a risk to others. If so, the trial will soon resume. Researchers in other vaccine trials – there are nine now in phase 3, which is the last stage – will be looking to ensure they are not seeing a similar issue. Given the huge amount of attention being paid to Covid-19 vaccine trials, it is possible the pause will dent public confidence. In previous vaccine trials, we would not have noticed pauses of this sort, because the outcome was less immediately critical to global public health. There are anti-vax movements talking about the supposed dangers of vaccination and there are some who argue that it is better for healthy people to catch Covid-19 and recover from it. However, that is by no means necessarily the safer route. As we know, in rare cases, young and apparently healthy people can also become severely ill and there are long-term effects of the virus.
Anthony Fauci calls pausing of Oxford coronavirus vaccine trial 'unfortunate' - The White House coronavirus adviser Anthony Fauci said on Wednesday that AstraZeneca’s decision to pause global trials of its experimental coronavirus vaccine was “unfortunate” – but not an uncommon safety precaution in a vaccine development process. The UK drugmaker AstraZeneca said on Tuesday it had voluntarily paused trials, including late-stage ones, after an unexplained illness in a participant. The company said it was working to expedite a review of safety data by an independent committee to minimize any potential impact on the trial timeline. “This particular candidate from the AstraZeneca company had a serious adverse event, which means you put the rest of the enrollment of individual volunteers on hold until you can work out precisely what went on,” Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the top public health expert on the coronavirus, said in an interview with CBS News on Wednesday morning. “It’s really one of the safety valves that you have on clinical trials such as this, so it’s unfortunate that it happened,” Fauci added. “Hopefully, they’ll work it out and be able to proceed along with the remainder of the trial but you don’t know. They need to investigate it further.” The vaccine, which AstraZeneca is developing with the University of Oxford, has been described by the World Health Organization as probably the world’s leading candidate and the most advanced in terms of development. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University school of public health said via Twitter that the significance of the interruption was unclear. “We have no idea whether this is a big deal or not. Science is hard. This is why we have to let the trials play out. I remain optimistic we will have a vaccine found to be safe and effective in upcoming months,” he said, but cautioned: “Optimism isn’t evidence. Let’s let science drive this process.” AstraZeneca’s announcement was seen as dimming prospects for an early rollout, which has become a political flashpoint in the presidential election.
One Doctor's Own Practice Charged Him $10,984 For A COVID Antibody Test - One doctor in Austin literally got a taste of his own medicine after going to his own practice to get a Covid antibody test. Assuming he would get one for free because he worked for the company, his insurance instead wound up getting a bill from Physicians Premier ER for $10,984. His insurance paid it all. But the doctor in question, Dr. Zachary Sussman, became so dismayed, he quit his job, according to ProPublica. Now, the parent company of Sussman's insurer is investigating the case. Sussman was working part time at four Physicians Premier ER centers, making $4,000 per month to oversee antibody testing. The job was a temporary gig between permanent jobs in Austin and New Mexico. He decided he wanted to take his own test in May, before visiting his family, because he had developed a headache. He went to his own company for a test and, knowing "the materials for each antibody test only amounted to about $8, and it gets read on the spot " - and that he could even administer the test, figured costs would be minimal. He said he had a quick talk with the ER doctor and there was no physical exam. After 30 minutes, he tested negative. He received his EOB in the mail about a month later showing the charges came to $2,100. “It may as well say Gucci on the outside,” he said about the ER. Several weeks later, a second EOB arrived for the Physicians Premier facility charges - these amounted to $8,884.16. He said he felt "spooked" after seeing the bill and realizing his employer had charged his health plan a total of $10,984.16 for the 30 minute visit. He tendered his resignation weeks later, stating: “I have decided I can no longer ethically provide Medical directorship services to the company. If not outright fraudulent, these charges are at least exorbitant and seek to take advantage of payers in the midst of the COVID19 pandemic.”
Key coronavirus forecast predicts over 410,000 total U.S. deaths by Jan. 1: ‘The worst is yet to come’ --The U.S. will top more than 410,000 Covid-19 deaths by the end of the year as the country heads into the fall and winter, according to a new forecast from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington.Covid-19 has already killed at least 186,800 people in the U.S., according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. The model by IHME, whose models have previously been cited by the White House and state officials, forecasts that the death toll will more than double by Jan. 1 and could reach as high as 620,000 if states aggressively ease coronavirus restrictions and people disregard public health guidance."The worst is yet to come. I don't think perhaps that's a surprise, although I think there's a natural tendency as we're a little bit in the Northern hemisphere summer, to think maybe the epidemic is going away," Dr. Christopher Murray, director of IHME, told reporters on a conference call Friday.In June, IHME predicted that the death toll in the U.S. would reach 200,000 by October, which appears to be on track. Some epidemiologists and mathematicians, however, have criticized IHME for making predictions too far into the future. IHME previously projected 317,697 deaths by Dec. 1. The model now predicts that the daily death toll could rise to nearly 3,000 per day in December, up from over 800 per day now, according to Hopkins data. IHME released three new projections based on different assumptions: a worst-case scenario, a best-case scenario and a most likely scenario. The most likely scenario estimates that Covid-19 will kill 410,450 people in the U.S. by Jan. 1. The worst-case scenario, which assumes that restrictions and mask directives will ease, projects up to 620,028 people in the U.S. will die by then and the best-case scenario, which assumes universal masking, predicts that 288,380 people in the U.S. will die from Covid-19 in 2020.
New York infection rate stays below 1 percent for 30 straight days -The coronavirus infection rate in New York state has remained below 1 percent for 30 consecutive days, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) announced Sunday, a significant milestone for a state that was once the epicenter of the outbreak in the U.S. The announcement came as New York continues to move ahead with a gradual reopening of its economy. Cuomo, however, struck a cautious note while revealing new data on the virus, saying that New Yorkers needed to continue following health guidelines and social-distancing practices in order to keep the infection rate low. "We know based on experience that an incremental, data-driven reopening is the best way to protect the health and safety of all New Yorkers," Cuomo said. "As this virus continues to be a national crisis, it's clear that caution is a virtue, not a vice." "Our actions today determine the rate of infection tomorrow, so as the Labor Day weekend continues, I urge everyone to be smart so we don't see a spike in the weeks ahead," he added. In addition to the low infection rate, hospitalizations in New York from the virus have dropped to 410, the lowest since March 16, Cuomo's office said. New York has reported more than 439,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 throughout the pandemic. The state was once reporting thousands of cases per day at the peak of its outbreak in the spring. However, health officials are now reporting an average slightly above 700 new cases per day, according to a New York Times database. The state reported 729 cases and nine deaths caused by the virus on Sunday. As parts of New York move forward with a reopening of businesses and schools, concerns have grown about whether the state is adequately prepared. In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) temporarily delayed the reopening of schools after unions representing teachers demanded more time to get ready for in-person classes amid the pandemic.
Covid-19 death rate among African Americans and Latinos rising sharply - The death rate in the US from Covid-19 among African Americans and Latinos is rising sharply, exacerbating the already staggering racial divide in the impact of the pandemic which has particularly devastated communities of color. New figures compiled by the Color of Coronavirus project shared with the Guardian show that both total numbers of deaths and per-capita death rates have increased dramatically in August for black and brown Americans. Though fatalities have also increased for white Americans, the impact on this group has been notably less severe. The latest figures record that in the two weeks from 4 to 18 August the death rate of African Americans shot up from 80 to 88 per 100,000 population – an increase of eight per 100,000. By contrast the white population suffered half that increase, from 36 to 40 per 100,000, an increase of 4 per 100,000. For Latino Americans the increase was even more stark, rising from 46 to 54 per 100,000 – an increase of nine per 100,000. The new batch of statistics is a cause for concern on a number of levels. The death rate for all racial and ethnic groups had been falling through the summer but after the virus began surging through the south and midwest in July it produced a time-lagged spike in deaths in August that has driven the human suffering back up to previous grim heights. “We are seeing more deaths among African Americans and Latinos than at any time this summer. So as we go into the fall, with schools and colleges reopening and other new avenues for exposure, it portends a very frightening future,” said Andi Egbert, senior researcher with APM Research Lab, the non-partisan research arm of American Public Media that compiles the data. On 18 August, the latest date on which the researchers have crunched the numbers, almost 36,000 African Americans had died from Covid-19. The new uptick means that 1 in 1,125 black Americans have died from the disease, compared with 1 in 2,450 white Americans – half the rate. That striking disparity underlines a major failing at the heart of the US response to Covid. It has been known now for several months that the virus is exacting an especially punishing toll among communities of color, yet federal and state governments have not taken steps effectively to ameliorate the disaster.
The Mask-Defying Church at Center of Disastrous Maine Wedding Linked to 3 Deaths, 144 Virus Cases - Maine’s biggest COVID-19 outbreak is linked to a wedding officiated by the pastor of a distancing-defying church who says masks are part of a “socialistic platform.” Now more than 144 COVID-19 patients have been linked to the event, and three people are dead.Todd Bell is pastor of the Calvary Baptist Church in Sanford, Maine. Famous for flying between ministries in multiple states on his private plane (God “burdened” his heart to do airplane ministry, he says), Bell flew in to officiate a rural Maine wedding on August 7.That wedding is the nexus of 144 COVID-19 cases, including three that resulted in deaths, Maine officials said Friday. One of the deceased, an 83-year-old woman, did not even attend the wedding, but contracted the virus from a guest. None of this appears to be stopping Bell from doing business as usual in his church, calling on worshippers to trust “God, not government” as the pandemic progresses.The August 7 wedding in Millinocket, Maine was a super-spreader event. Sixty-five guests attended the event at the Big Moose Inn, a violation of the state’s limit on large gatherings. Officiated by Bell, the celebration went on to sicken guests, some of whom in turn passed it on to people in particularly vulnerable communities.COVID-19 outbreaks at a local rehabilitation center, a senior living facility, a county jail, and a school have all been traced back to the wedding. The number of cases linked to the event has doubled in the past week.One of the victims, 83-year-old Theresa Dentremont, did not attend the wedding, but caught COVID-19 from someone who had. A mother of six, Dentremont was described in an obituary as the “anchor of her family” and someone who was “unwaveringly positive and...always found the good in every person and every situation.” Six Calvary Baptist families also attended the wedding, Bell confirmed in a sermon last Sunday, reported by the Penobscot Bay Pilot. But despite a warning from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that Calvary Baptist-goers should voluntarily quarantine, the church was still in full unmasked operation last week.
Teen in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania linked to 40 new COVID-19 cases - Officials from Allegheny County Health Department reported September 2 that 40 COVID-19 cases over a two-week period had been traced back to one teenager. This revelation by health officials is a deadly warning about the ability of COVID-19 to spread throughout the country that includes the city of Pittsburgh as it prepares to open for in-person learning on September 9. As part of a monthly department briefing, Dr. Debra Bogen, the health department director, said, “This teenager developed symptoms and within two weeks … it had spread to family members, to the coworkers of family members, to other people in that teen’s community.” According to the data, the teen—who was not named—began showing symptoms on August 14. In subsequent days, individuals the teen had interacted with began to show symptoms of the virus. These people went on to spread the virus to another layer of people before the spread was able to be identified and contained. As a result, 40 people contracted COVID-19, including two elderly individuals. In the monthly department briefing, Bogen elaborated on the now well-known fact that young people are just as capable of spreading the virus as adults: “You start out with young, healthy people who get the infection and, unfortunately, they spread it to more vulnerable populations.” Furthermore, health officials reiterated that young people are themselves not immune to the effects of the virus. In fact, there have been 14 children in the county who have needed hospitalization because of COVID-19, two of whom had to be placed in intensive care units. While it is true that youth are statistically less likely than adults to have fatal complications from the virus, many young people who contract it require hospitalizations and some die. In addition, hundreds of very young children have become extremely sick with an inflammatory disease after contracting the virus.
The Opioid Crisis, Already Serious, Has Intensified During Coronavirus Pandemic – WSJ - When Covid-19 struck, the U.S. was already in the grip of an expanding drug-overdose crisis. It has only gotten worse since then. Counties in states spanning the country, from Washington to Arizona and Florida, are reporting rising drug fatalities this year, according to data collected by The Wall Street Journal. This follows a likely record number of deadly overdoses in the U.S. last year, with more than 72,000 people killed, according to federal projections. The pandemic has destabilized people trying to maintain sobriety or who are struggling with addiction during a time of increased social isolation and stress, according to treatment providers and public-health authorities. In a survey of U.S. adults released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 13% of respondents in June said they had started or increased substance use to deal with stress or emotions related to Covid-19. The drug deaths are adding to the pandemic’s toll, which includes more than 188,000 infection-related fatalities, but also other deaths linked to factors such as disruptions in health care and economic dislocation. “It’s a pretty stark reality here,” said David Sternberg, clinical-services manager at the nonprofit group HIPS in Washington, D.C., which helps keep drug users safe and find treatment. “We’ve lost a lot of clients, a lot of patients.” Moreover, social-distancing limitations are complicating treatment for people who struggle with addiction and for the organizations that provide services to them. Drug-treatment providers say the federal government has helped amid the pandemic by loosening restrictions to make it easier to access addiction medication remotely, and are using telemedicine to reach people in need where possible. But people in recovery also often rely on in-person support services like group meetings, advocates say.The Journal, through data and public-records requests, asked the 50 largest counties by population for information on overdoses this year. Among the 30 that provided numbers, 21 of them showed overdose deaths trending up from last year. Among the other jurisdictions, several had only prepandemic data, and some said overdose tallies were flat or trending lower. Federal overdose data has yet to catch up to the pandemic months. Counties in Nevada, California, Ohio, Indiana, Minnesota and Michigan are among those showing increases. Authorities in other places, including traditional hot spots for opioid deaths like parts of Appalachia and New England, are also reporting more drug deaths. The spread of fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid, and increased use of methamphetamines were contributing to the worsening overdose problem before the pandemic. Many counties and states say the pandemic is amplifying the threat from these drugs.
How Miners with Black Lung Disease Are Navigating the Pandemic -Living with black lung disease is hard on patients and their families. Not being able to breath or do simple tasks saps the energy of former miners, and the treatment is time consuming and expensive. The social distancing with COVID-19, and its potential to compromise the respiratory system, makes living with black lung that much harder. Jerry Coleman, a third-generation coal miner, worked for 37 years, mostly underground, near Cabin Creek, West Virginia. But at 68 years old, he has complicated black lung disease, meaning, his lungs are permanently and irreversibly scarred by coal dust.“Black lung, it doesn’t get better, it gets worse,” Coleman said.Black lung is in a way, a death sentence — the lungs gradually deteriorate until the person can no longer breathe.And in the middle of a pandemic, it is only more complicated, Coleman said. He is also the president for the Kanawha County Black Lung Association.“You gotta wear a mask, and with your breathin’ problems and stuff, it’s hard to walk around and breath through the mask. It’s like sucking in hot air,” he said. “But I don’t have no choice, with the condition of my lungs and stuff, I can’t take a chance.”COVID-19 is classified as a respiratory virus. It can affect and even be deadly to the healthiest of people, but the most vulnerable are those with high-risk conditions, such as lung disease and old age — which represent much of West Virginia’s former coal miner population.“Each different lung disease kind of takes away some of your lung function,” said Carl Werntz, an occupational medical specialist in southern West Virginia.Werntz administers black lung exams, a crucial step to apply for federal black lung benefits.“So that person if they get COVID it bothers their lungs,” he said. “They’re going to run out of usable lung much faster than somebody who starts out with healthy lungs.”
September 9 COVID-19 Test Results - The US is now mostly reporting over 700,000 tests per day. Based on the experience of other countries, the percent positive needs to be well under 5% to really push down new infections, so the US still needs to increase the number of tests per day significantly (or take actions to push down the number of new infections). There were 584,412 test results reported over the last 24 hours.There were 30,983 positive tests.See the graph on US Daily Deaths here. This data is from the COVID Tracking Project. The percent positive over the last 24 hours was 5.3% (red line). For the status of contact tracing by state, check out testandtrace.com. And check out COVID Exit Strategy to see how each state is doing. The second graph shows the 7 day average of positive tests reported.The dashed line is the June low.Note that there were very few tests available in March and April, and many cases were missed (the percent positive was very high - see first graph). By June, the percent positive had dropped below 5% (lower than today). If people stay vigilant, the number of cases might drop to the June low by the end of September (that would still be a large number of new cases, but progress).
Dr. Fauci Warns "We Need To Hunker Down To Get Through This Fall And Winter Because It's Not Going To Be Easy" - In his latest round of interviews and appearances since reports emerged earlier this week that forces within DHHS were trying to muzzle the good doctor, Dr. Fauci said Thursday that despite the ongoing decline in daily COVID-19 cases, Americans shouldn't let up on the battle against the pandemic. During a round table discussion at Harvard Medical School on Thursday, with the US closing in on 200,000 deaths and 6 million cases, Dr. Fauci warned that "we need to hunker down and get through this fall and winter, because it’s not going to be easy," Fauci said. Regarding the emerging newest "hot spot" in the Midwest, and the looming threat of a second wave in the US like what's happening right now in France and Spain, Dr. Fauci warned that "it’s really quite frankly depressing to see that because you know what's ahead." Fauci, one of the world's leading AIDS researchers since the 1980s, warned about the dangers of underestimating the virus. He compared the pandemic to the early days of HIV, in terms of how it escalated, and, in COVID-19's case, how it might continue to escalate. "We've been through this before," he said. "Don't ever, ever underestimate the potential of the pandemic. And don't try and look at the rosy side of things."
Michigan coronavirus (COVID-19) cases up to 111,524; Death toll now at 6,591 - – The number of confirmed cases of the coronavirus (COVID-19) in Michigan has risen to 111,524 as of Saturday, including 6,591 deaths, state officials report.Saturday’s update represents 692 new cases and 13 additional deaths. On Friday, the state totals were 110,832 cases and 6,578 deaths.The state also reports “active cases,” which were listed at 22,600 Friday. Michigan’s 7-day moving average for daily cases was 758 Saturday. The state’s fatality rate is 6.0 percent.New COVID-19 cases and deaths remain flat in Michigan. Testing has remained steady, with an average of more than 30,000 per day, with the positive rate between 3 and 4 percent. The state reported its highest one-day testing total with more than 41,000 diagnostic tests on Aug. 21.Hospitalizations have increased slightly over the last month but remain lower than in April. Ventilator use is at its lowest point since tracking.According to Johns Hopkins University, more than 2.4 million have recovered in the U.S., with more than 6.4 million cases reported across the country. More than 193,000 have died in the U.S.Worldwide, more than 28.5 million people have been confirmed infected and over 916,000 have died, according to Johns Hopkins University. The true numbers are certainly much higher, because of limited testing, different ways nations count the dead and deliberate under-reporting by some governments.
Are US Covid-19 Fatalities Declining? Probably - Menzie Chinn - I read some triumphalist claims that Covid-19 fatalities are declining. I want to remind readers about the hazards of interpreting (1) administrative data, and (2) data revisions.First, there are official tabulations of fatalities due to Covid-19. We should worry about suppression of data in, for instance, Florida, but let’s take the CDC data (which compiles the data provided by authorities) at face value. It’s not clear that all fatalities attributable to Covid-19 are caught by the tracking system. Then we might use “excess fatalities” as a check on the administrative tabulation. Figure 1 below shows how the CDC data on Covid-19 deaths matches the deviation from the fatalities we expect (“excess fatalities”). Figure 1: Weekly fatalities due to Covid-19 as reported to CDC for weeks ending on indicated dates (black), excess fatalities calculated as actual minus expected (teal), fatalities as tabulated by The Covid Tracking Project/Atlantic (dark red). Light green shading denotes CDC data that are likely to be revised. Source: CDC 9/5/2020 vintage, Covid Tracking Project/Atlantic accessed 9/10/2020 and author’s calculations.Note that excess fatalities far exceed the officially designated Covid-19 fatalities for most of the sample.Further note that both of the CDC series – Covid-19 Fatalities and Excess Fatalities – drop off dramatically in recent weeks. If you didn’t read the notes attached to the CDC spreadsheet, you’d conclude that we’ve won! But inspection of the spreadsheet reveals notes that indicate that the most recent data is incomplete. In fact, as I show in this post, about the four most recent weeks worth of data are going to be substantially revised. I shade this period in green in the above graph. A hint that this is a substantial problem is provided by comparing the trajectory of the unofficial tally compiled by the Our World in Data project of the Atlantic group, which indicates a much smaller decline. That means it is possible that “excess fatalities” — our proxy measure for Covid-19 fatalities — is still increasing (although officially designated Covid-19 fatalities are probably declining, as the Our World in Data series not subject to really large revisions).
Global coronavirus death projections point to policy of herd immunity being pursued with impunity - On September 4, the number of new cases of COVID-19 surpassed 300,000 globally for the first time. After a brief peak in mid-August, the seven-day running average is climbing again, with over 267,500 infections each day. There have been over 27 million cases since the start of the pandemic in December 2019, a period of nine months. The first 10 million cases were reached on June 27 and the first 20 million on August 9. Cases are expected to exceed 30 million in the second half of this month, after which the number of new cases is set to increase its pace, according to the global projections made by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), based in Seattle, Washington. According to Worldometer Dashboard, on September 6, 2020:
- * Globally: total cases 27,234,299; total deaths 886,192
- * Europe: total cases 3,797,637; total deaths 209,970
- * North America (including Mexico and Central America): total cases 7,658,021; total deaths 280,295
- * South America: total cases 6,688,579; total deaths 211,692
- * Asia: total cases 7,755,652; total deaths 152,104, with India at the epicenter
- * Africa: total cases 1,304,400; total deaths 31,332
- * Oceania: total cases 29,289; total deaths 784
Based on IHME’s current global projections, by December 1, 2020, the cumulative number of deaths will exceed 1.92 million, an additional million victims over the next three months. By various regions, the figures are as follows:
- * East Asia and Pacific: 131,736 deaths, with a peak of 4,820 deaths per day
- * South Asia: 404,016 deaths, with daily deaths at 9,716
- * Europe and Central Asia: 406,204 deaths, with 5,441 deaths per day peaking in the last week of December at 9,670 daily deaths
- * Latin Americas and Caribbean islands: 478,124 deaths, with a peak of 1,600 daily deaths
- * North America (the US and Canada): 339,647 deaths, with a peak of 3,137 daily deaths
- * North Africa and the Middle East: 113,839 deaths, with an initial peak of 1,671 followed by a second surge mid-December
- * Sub-Saharan Africa: 50,033 deaths, with a peak of 809 deaths per day
Lockdown 2.0 - "There's Going To Be Hell To Pay" - by Raul Ilargi Meijer - Of course, because I’m a dreamer, I start off an essay like this with the idea that I should do an all-encompassing idea of COVID19, all around the world no less, for the rest of 2020, and beyond. Only to find that nobody, including me, even if I have a few advantages over most, could possibly do such a thing. So of necessity there’ll be this essay and many more to come. As the US elections set the world on fire.I did make a list of what every government, every society and community should be ordering by now (and that would be already very late) Here they are: A billion rapid tests, a billion doses of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), a billion doses of zinc, a billion doses of Vitamin D, and a zillion N95 facemasks. (I am not a doctor, but we do have doctors on this platform.)Rapid tests: these things have been available for months, but have been obstructed by guidelines that say every test must be PCR, which take a long time to produce results, which test positive on dead virus etc. etc. Whereas rapid tests (there are several options) detect a virus load when it’s most likely to infect a third person (the no. 1 thing you want to find!, and moreover show a result in minutes and cost a few pennies each (don’t fall for the $5 a test thing!). You can do a paper test for everyone every single day.We have this, we got this, but we’re not doing it. The answer from the politicians who have failed to grasp this reality will be: another lockdown! But there won’t be another lockdown. Or, there will be in some locations, but what good is that if neighbors don’t lock down? More on that in a bit. Hydroxychloroquine (or ivermectin) and zinc -combined if you will with an antibiotic- for those who are infected or close to it, combined with a substantial increase in everyone’s vitamin D levels in your population -right now, you already lost half a year!- will bring down death and suffering enormously. Don’t listen to your doctor, listen to us.A bit of -potential- harsh reality came to us today through a report from Washington University’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. They predict total deaths to triple globally, and double in the US, in less than four months from today. Total COVID19 Deaths Projected To Double In US, Triple in World By Jan. 1 U.S. deaths from the coronavirus will reach 410,000 by the end of the year, more than double the current death toll, and deaths could soar to 3,000 per day in December, the University of Washington’s health institute forecast on Friday. Deaths could be reduced by 30% if more Americans wore face masks as epidemiologists have advised, but mask-wearing is declining, the university’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation said. The U.S. death rate projected by the IHME model, which has been cited by the White House Coronavirus Task Force, would more than triple the current death rate of some 850 per day. No, I won’t take back one word of what I’ve been saying about the best ways to tackle COVD19 over the past 8 months, for instance in April 15’s The Only Man Who Has A Clue about Nassim Taleb. He was still right, and that’s not going to change. But that doesn’t mean nothing has changed. Actually, a lot has.
UK Reports Most New COVID-19 Cases Since May; India Sees New Record Surge: Live Updates- The UK just reported the highest number of new cases in a single day since May (the latest sign of a coronavirus comeback in Europe) while India cemented a new global daily record after reporting more than 90k new cases. Britain reported 2,988 new cases on Sunday, its largest daily tally since May 23. The country also saw 2 new deaths, bringing Britain's death toll to 41,551, and its confirmed case total to 347,152. A day earlier, the UK reported just 1,813 cases. Daily hospitalizations, meanwhile, have hardly budged from their lows. Elsewhere in Europe, France placed seven more departments covering major cities including Lille, Strasbourg and Dijon on high alert as the country's latest outbreaks accelerate. Of France's 101 mainaland and overseas "departments", 28 are now considered "red zones." This comes amid a surge in new cases seen over the past week, but especially over the past 2 days. On Sunday, India topped its own world record when it reported 90,632 daily new cases, the largest daily tally reported anywhere in the world. The new cases brought India's total confirmed caseload to 4.11 million. Meanwhile, the number of deaths in the world's second-most-populous country rose by 1,065 to 70,626. India is set to pass Brazil on Monday as the second-most affected country by total infections. After that, it will be behind only the US in terms of total cases. While a recent testing campaign has been blamed for the country's record-beating numbers, testing isn't the only issue. India is in second place worldwide when it comes to overall tests administered, with 47,831,145, behind the US, with 86,763,797. But its rate is 35,322 per million compared with the global average of 69,512, the US with 261,844 and Brazil with 67,696. Despite fervent protests that led to hundreds of arrests the other day, Australia's coronavirus hotspot state of Victoria on Sunday extended its "hard" lockdown once again, adding another two weeks, which extends it until the end of September as infection rates have declined more slowly than hoped. State Premier Daniel Andrews on Sunday extended the hard lockdown, in place since August 2, to September 28 with a slight relaxation, and explained how restrictions would gradually decline over the coming two months. The extension comes after Australia slumped into its first recession in decades. Victoria, Australia's second-most populous state, has been the epicentre of a second wave of the novel coronavirus, now accounting for roughly 75% of the country's 26,282 cases and 90% of its 753 deaths. The state on Sunday reported 63 new COVID-19 infections and five deaths, down from a peak of 725 new cases reported on Aug. 5. Finally, as Philippines and Indonesia cement their status as the worst outbreaks in Southeast Asia, Al Jazeera reports that a cemetery in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta is reportedly running out of space as the number of deaths linked to the coronavirus continues to rise. Unfortunately, in swampy Jakarta, using portable refrigeration trucks might not be feasible, like it was in New York. Indonesia has reported roughly 190,000 cases, and roughly 8,000 dead.
India Overtakes Brazil As Home To World's Second-Worst COVID-19 Outbreak- Live Updates Following its latest global record for most new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in a single day on Sunday, India has overnight finally surpassed Brazil as the country with the second-largest outbreak in the world. As expected, the record 90,802 new cases India reported on Sunday were enough to push its total past Brazil's. India also reported 1,016 deaths, with Maharashtra, home to the financial capital, Mumbai, remaining India's worst-affected state. It had nearly 25% of India's total infections on Sunday as it reported 23,350 new cases. As promised, Delhi’s metro rail system reopened on Monday morning, despite the city having a five-day rolling average of cases over 2,500. The rail, which is seen as vital to Delhi's economy, had been shuttered for more than 5 months, and its reopening is part of the broader loosening of COVID-19-related restrictions as PM Narendra Modi shifts his focus to saving India's battered economy, which has been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic, contracting nearly 24% in the three months to June, its worst performance since records began in 1996. The metro in Lucknow, capital of India’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh, also reopened on Monday for the first time since India's lockdown was initially imposed back in March. India now as 4.2 million cases, compared with Brazil's 4.12 million. India's death toll is just over 71,000, leaving it behind Brazil's, which is just under 125k. As new cases in Victoria decline while officials extend a lockdown, Australian officials announced that a vaccine would be delivered by January 2021. After the UK reported nearly 3,000 new cases yesterday, its biggest daily tally since May., Environment Secretary George Eustice warned Monday that the country would seek to avoid another lockdown "at all costs" during an interview with Sky News, where he emphasized testing, tracing and localized lockdowns as the key tools in the kit. As Australia extends a lockdown in Melbourne even as cases finally start to decline, the country announced Monday that it expects to receive batches of a potential COVID-19 vaccine by January 2021. Over in Russia, which remains in 4th place worldwide for most cases, officials told the TASS newswire that testing on the next batch of subjects would begin this week as Russia seeks international approval of its vaccine. On Friday, the Lancet, a British medical journal, ruled that the Russian vaccine appeared to be "safe and effective." Globally speaking, COVID-19 cases topped 27 million on Monday in the US, with global deaths hitting 883,339, per JHU.
India now second only to US in number of COVID-19 cases, yet continues to expand “reopening” - After recording over 90,000 new infections on Monday, India surpassed Brazil as the country with the second highest number of COVID-19 cases in the world. Despite the calamitous situation, which includes approximately 1,000 daily deaths, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his far-right Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the various state governments are pushing ahead with the reopening of the economy. This includes the state governments led or supported by the opposition Congress Party and various regional and caste-ist parties, and their Stalinist collaborators in the CPM (Communist Party of India, Marxist) and the CPI (Communist Party of India).According to figures released by India’s Ministry of Health, the country reported a new single-day world record for new infections with 90,802 Monday, pushing India’s official total above 4.2 million. For about a month, India has reported the highest number of daily cases in the world. The death toll has climbed to 71,642. The pace at which the virus is spreading has dramatically accelerated over the past month. Whereas around 55,000 new daily cases were being recorded in the first week of August, India is now averaging well in excess of 80,000 new cases per day. The total number of confirmed COVID-19 infections in India has doubled from 2 million to more than 4 million within just one month. It took just 13 days for infections to increase by one million, from 3 million on August 22 to 4 million on September 4.Horrific as these figures are, they are a substantial underestimation of the true scale of the crisis. Virtually all experts agree that due to a miserably low testing rate, only a fraction of COVID-19 infections are being identified. Some have even suggested that India has already surpassed the United States to become the worst impacted country in the world. The callous and criminal policies of the Modi government at the center and the various state governments have produced enormous social suffering, in addition to the health catastrophe.Modi’s ill-conceived and ill-prepared coronavirus national lockdown, which was implemented on March 25 with less than four hours’ notice, was a total failure. The Indian ruling elite refused to use the time bought by the lockdown to implement a comprehensive system of mass testing and contact tracing, or to pour resources into the country’s chronically under-resourced public health care system.Moreover, the BJP government provided the tens of millions of impoverished workers who lost their jobs overnight due to the lockdown no more than famine-style relief programs, resulting in widespread destitution, homelessness and hunger. The lockdown and the government’s refusal to provide social support have produced an unprecedented economic collapse. In the quarter ending in June, India’s GDP declined by 23.9 percent, the largest recorded drop among major economies.
Skyrocketing Indian virus cases could eclipse U.S. outbreak - The novel coronavirus seemed like a distant problem in Boisar, a small factory town about two hours from Mumbai, until Daniel Tribhuvan died. The 35-year-old tutor started feeling feverish in April, while bringing his father home from a chemotherapy appointment in the Indian financial capital. When a test confirmed Tribhuvan was infected, the local health system’s reaction was shambolic. After he checked into a public hospital, the first thing they did was try to palm him off to a private facility in Mumbai. The ambulance turned around halfway when they discovered he couldn’t pay. Back at the public hospital, a doctor didn’t see him for three days, and when an elderly man occupying a bed nearby died, his body wasn’t collected for 12 hours. After a week, Tribhuvan’s blood-oxygen levels were dangerously low. He died on May 17, becoming Boisar’s first confirmed fatality from covid-19. “I think he would have survived if the system was good,” Samuel Tribhuvan, Daniel’s older brother, said in a recent interview at Boisar’s local administrative office, inside a rundown building that also houses a liquor store and a portrait studio. “This is the worst place where we could get the coronavirus.” Six months after the start of the pandemic – as the developed world tries to restore some semblance of normalcy – the virus is arriving with a vengeance in India’s vast hinterland, where 70% of its more than 1.3 billion citizens live. The country is now adding more than 80,000 confirmed infections per day, with about 71,000 deaths so far, numbers experts say are likely being under-counted. On Monday it galloped past Brazil to become the world’s second-biggest outbreak, a sobering preview of what could happen once the coronavirus spreads in earnest across other poor, densely populated places from Nigeria to Myanmar. With such a vast reservoir of potential hosts and minimal ability to contain infections, it seems inevitable that India will at some point overtake the U.S. to have the most cases globally. The result is likely to be a human and economic catastrophe, risking untold numbers of deaths and the reversal of years of rising incomes and living standards – developments that helped lift millions of people from grinding poverty into something like the middle class. The broader effects won’t be confined to the subcontinent. With a gross domestic product last year of almost $3 trillion, India is the world’s fifth-largest economy and a crucial node in global supply chains. Despite the troubled state of its own medical system, it is by far the largest producer of both vaccines and the generic drugs that healthcare systems around the world rely upon. And with Asia’s economic giant, China, turning increasingly inwards, companies from Walmart to Facebook had been investing heavily in India, betting on its rising consumer market. India’s trouble containing the virus, therefore, could weigh on any global recovery from the coronavirus – either epidemiological or economic.
Ukraine sees new record: 2,836 people fall ill, 50 die from COVID-19 over past day – NSDC - Ukraine has another record: as of Saturday morning, 2,836 cases of COVID-19 were detected over the day, while 1,036 people recovered, 50 died, according to data posted on the website of the National Security and Defense Council's (NSDC) coronavirus epidemic monitoring system. A day earlier, on September 4, there was the previous anti-record with 2,495 new infections per day, on September 3 some 2,430 cases were reported, on September 2 there were 2,495 new infected persons, and on September 1 some 2,088 cases. The number of infected since the beginning of the pandemic was 133,787 people on Saturday morning, 2,811 people have died since the beginning of the pandemic from COVID-19, some 61,649 people have recovered. Now in Ukraine there are 69,327 people sick with COVID-19, which is 1,750 more than the day before. The largest number of detected cases of COVID-19 over the past day was recorded in Kharkiv (380), Ternopil (226), Odesa (222), Lviv (195) regions, as well as in Kyiv (315). In addition, over the past day, 3,110 suspicions of COVID-19 disease were recorded in Ukraine as a whole. ..
Ukrainian church leader who blamed COVID-19 on gay marriage tests positive for virus - A prominent religious leader in Ukraine who earlier this year blamed the coronavirus pandemic on same-sex marriage has tested positive for the virus, his church announced. Patriarch Filaret, 91, who leads the large Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate, contracted COVID-19 and was subsequently hospitalized, the church confirmed Friday in a statement shared on its website and on Facebook. In a follow-up statement shared Tuesday, the church said its leader’s health is “stable” as “treatment continues.”
UK government blames young people as COVID-19 surges - Late Tuesday night, as has become standard for coronavirus statements, the UK government announced that social gatherings, indoors or outdoors, would be limited to six people from next Monday, September 14. Down from 30 previously, the measure is designed to disguise the fact that the government’s reopening policy proceeds unchanged even as infections rise exponentially, and to provide it with an opportunity to shift responsibility for its crimes onto young people. The six-person rule does not apply to workplaces or schools, and groups of six can continue to visit pubs, bars, and restaurants. As if to underscore the tokenistic character of the measure, organised sporting fixtures are also exempt. Wherever there are profits to be made, or children who need minding so their parents can return to work, public health concerns disappear. The six-person limit will be accompanied by a new asinine government health slogan, “Hands-Face-Space,” supposedly encouraging hand-washing, the wearing of face masks and social distancing. This comes on the heels of the infamous “Stay Alert-Control the Virus-Save Lives” message. The real political intentions behind these new interventions were summed up by Conservative government Health Secretary Matt Hancock, who noted in an interview on Monday that cases were rising fastest among young people, before saying, “The question is, how much are you willing to risk the lives of yourself and others by breaking the social distancing rules?” and, “Don’t kill your gran by catching coronavirus and then passing it on.” The outrageous misrepresentation perpetrated by this callous statement is that the renewed spread of the virus is down to failings of individual responsibility. Limiting gatherings to six has been justified with reference to incidents of illegal raves and house parties—given pages and pages of coverage in the press. In a circle that cannot be squared, the government simultaneously expresses “concern” over the “sharp rise” in cases amongst young people, while pushing forward its drive to reopen schools that have already become a breeding ground for the virus.
Spain Breaks COVID-19 Record for Western Europe With 500,000+ Cases - Spain set a dubious record Monday when it became the first country in Western Europe to pass half a million coronavirus cases. The Spanish Ministry of Health reported 525,549 cases Monday, up more than 26,000 from Friday's confirmed caseload of 498,989, according to Reuters. The news came the same day as six regions in Spain were set to begin in-person schooling. "They aren't taking adequate measures," 25-year-old Madrid resident Lux Marin told Reuters. "Look, people are walking around without face masks, the government is opening schools and that is not fair to children or to adults." Spain was one of the hardest hit European countries during the first wave of the pandemic, The New York Times pointed out, and it imposed strict lockdown measures in response. People were only allowed outside to walk their dogs or buy groceries. But, starting in July, the country reopened restaurants, bars, shops and beaches and welcomed international visitors. It restarted activities like nightlife and group gatherings faster than the rest of Europe, something that has contributed to the latest surge in cases. Joan Ramon Villalbi of the Spanish Society for Public Health and Sanitary Administration told Reuters that the country emerged from lockdown before adequate test and trace measures were in place. He also blamed the country's high population density, different rules in different Spanish regions and the difficult circumstances faced by low-wage workers. "For these vulnerable workers, whether in agriculture, domestic service or in restaurants, you can tell them to stay at home for two weeks but it's not clear they can afford that," he told Reuters.
France Suffers Record Jump In COVID-19 Cases As Europe's Second Wave Builds- Live Updates -France just reported 9,843 new COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours, a new record jump, as the country leads Western Europe in the "second wave" of infections. The number is higher than the 8,577 new cases reported yesterday and higher than the 8,975 record reported on Friday. It brings the total to 392,181 cases.The new figures come as the French gov't prepares to discuss on Friday whether to impose new local lockdowns as the country struggles with the largest numbers it has seen since the outbreak began. The number of new COVID-19 cases reported in Europe over the last 24 hours has surpassed the US for the first timeThe 27 countries in the European Union plus the U.K., Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein recorded 27,233 new cases on Wednesday, compared with 26,015 for the US, according to the latest tallies from JHU. It comes as Spain, France and - to a lesser degree, Italy and the UK - lead a resurgence as more businesses and schools reopen.Yet another case of COVID-19 reinfection has been confirmed Thursday after a man who traveled from the US to the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing reportedly tested positive for the coronavirus, after two negative tests in less than a month, the local government said.The man was confirmed as infected on Sept. 9, and had been previously tested twice since his Aug. 11 arrival. The individual has been described as asymtpomatic. On Thursday, China reported seven new cases for the past 24 hours, up from just two a day earlier. All of the new cases were described as imported, including the case mentioned above, since they all allegedly involved travelers from overseas. China has gone 25 consecutive days with no local transmissions. Though South Korea raised important questions about China's numbers earlier this week.A few weeks ago, Hong Kong confirmed the first case of reinfection anywhere in the wold. Since then, others have been confirmed in Asia and Europe.In other news, Australia's state of Victoria reported 51 new cases and seven deaths from the virus, compared with 76 cases and 11 deaths a day earlier, in the latest sign that the outbreak is finally waning.Once again, India reported a record single-day spike in cases and fatalities, with 95,735 infections and 1,172 deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing its COVID-19 total to more than 4.46 million and extending its lead over Brazil.
Quebec City Says It Will Isolate "Uncooperative" Citizens In Secret Corona Facility Authorities in Quebec City, Canada have announced they will isolate “uncooperative” citizens in a coronavirus facility, the location of which remains a secret. During a press conference, Dr. Jacques Girard, who heads the Quebec City public health authority, drew attention to a case where patrons at a bar were ordered to wait until their COVID-19 tests came back, but disregarded the command and left the premises before the results came back positive. This led to them being deemed “uncooperative” and forcibly interned in a quarantine facility. “[W]e may isolate someone for 14 days,” Girard said during the press conference. “And it is what we did this morning…forced a person to cooperate with the investigation…and police cooperation was exceptional.” The health official then outlined how the state is also tracking down people for violating their home quarantine and forcibly removing them to the secret facility. “Because we have had people isolated at home. And then, we saw the person was not at home. So, we went to their home, and then told them, we are isolating you where we want you to be,” said Girard. “Six other Quebec City bars “known to have been frequented by Kirouac regulars” are now being examined by public health officials,” reports the RAIR Foundation. “It should be noted that it is not being claimed that anyone is actually sick from the coronavirus. But the state has the power to force a citizen into isolation anyway.” As we previously highlighted, the government of New Zealand announced similar measures, saying that they will put all new coronavirus infectees and their close family members in “quarantine facilities.”
China Injects Hundreds of Thousands With Experimental Covid-19 Vaccines – WSJ - A Chinese pharmaceutical company has injected hundreds of thousands of people with experimental Covid-19 vaccines, as its Western counterparts warn against administering mass vaccinations before rigorous scientific studies are complete. China National Biotec Group Co., a subsidiary of state-owned Sinopharm, has given two experimental vaccine candidates to hundreds of thousands of people under an emergency-use condition approved by Beijing in July, the company said this week. Separately, Chinese drugmaker Sinovac Biotech Ltd. said it has inoculated around 3,000 of its employees and their family members, including the firm’s chief executive, with its experimental coronavirus vaccine. The three vaccine candidates are still undergoing Phase 3 clinical trials, which involve testing a vaccine’s safety and effectiveness on thousands of people. Six other leading Covid-19 vaccine candidates are also in this final phase, according to the World Health Organization. Regulators in individual countries usually determine whether to let the broader public use a vaccine only after its testing is complete. The U.S., U.K. and Germany, where some of the leading candidates originate, haven’t yet approved any Covid-19 vaccine for use outside of clinical trials. Public-health experts say front-line medical workers should be given priority in any emergency use of unapproved vaccines. The Chinese government gave approval for members of the military to receive an experimental vaccine developed by CanSino Biologics Inc. in June, then authorized emergency use of other vaccine candidates for medical workers and border inspectors in July. Nine Western pharmaceutical companies promised in a joint statement this week not to file for regulatory approval or authorization of their experimental Covid-19 vaccines until formal clinical testing was complete.
'Bubonic Plague Warning' Issued In Lake Tahoe After Fleas Test Positive - After new cases of the bubonic plague were found in Los Angeles, Colorado, and in Mongolia near the Russian border this summer, it appears the infamous plague strain responsible for killing tens of millions of Europeans during the 14th Century continues to surface, this time, in South Lake Tahoe, California. The US Forest Service, Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit, issued a "plague warning" on Thur. (Sept. 3) ahead of Labor Day weekend, informing the public that fleas in the area tested positive for the bubonic plague. "Visitors should take the following precautions when visiting areas where active Bubonic Plague has been found. Remember to stay on trails, and if you must bring your pet, keep them on a short leash and do not let them investigate rodent burrows," the Forest Service wrote in a recent Facebook post. [Forest Service warning embedded] The post continued, "Bubonic Plague is naturally occurring in many parts of California, including the Sierra Nevada, and can be transmitted through bites from infected fleas." Forest Service's Lisa Herron told CBS13 Sacramento that people throughout the Lake Tahoe "should be on the lookout for unusual things like a rodent acting unusual, or a rodent that is dead with no visual signs of trauma." The California Department of Health confirmed to CBS13 that fleas tested positive for the plague in the resort area of the Sierra Nevada mountains, more specifically, around the Tallac Historic Area and the Taylor Creek Visitor Center.To mitigate the spread, the area has been treated for "active plague," the California Department of Health told ABC7 News. Fears of the plague have shown up in US internet search results, hitting record highs this summer. A handful of cases of the plague have surfaced this year as the coronavirus pandemic continues to rage across the world.
Tear gas sprayed on Portland protesters revealed to contain toxic metal compounds - The city of Portland recently sent the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) information they requested about the chemicals contained in the crowd control agents that have been sprayed on Black Lives Matter protesters by law enforcement since May — and their documents reveal that the tear gas contains chemicals that are apt to pose a health risk to those exposed, particularly given the high quantities sprayed. The documents provide insight into the potential health and environmental hazards posed by the tear gas that has blanketed protesters in the streets of downtown Portland nearly every night for months. The documents also confirm that the city of Portland sources its tear gas from Safariland, LLC, a "security products" manufacturer that has faced scrutiny for its role in supplying tear gas used by law enforcement to suppress protests over the death of George Floyd. The documents sent to DEQ by Portland include a Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) for "Flameless Tri-Chamber Grenade, CS" and a Safety Data Sheet for "Skat Shell 40 mm Multiple Projectile Round, CS," both manufactured by Defense Technology, a subsidiary of Safariland, LLC. These types of technical documents are required to be written for industrially produced chemicals and substances, and explain the hazards that said substances pose to human health as well as environmental health. CS gas refers to the active ingredient in tear gas, 2-chlorobenzalmalononitrile, the incapacitating agent that causes tearing and burning sensations in the eyes, mouth, nose and sinuses.The material safety data sheet for the brand of tear gas used by Portland Police reveals that the chemicals in Safariland's "Flameless Tri-Chamber Grenade, CS" (meaning containing CS gas)" include barium chromate, manganese powder, lead chromate, nitrocellulose, red iron oxide, titanium powder, zirconium powder, potassium chlorate, sugar, magnesium carbonate and CS gas itself. Barium chromate is known to be toxic; upon heating, lead chromate releases toxic lead fumes.
How Chemicals Like PFAS Can Increase Your Risk of Severe COVID-19 - Nearly a year before the novel coronavirus emerged, Dr. Leonardo Trasande published "Sicker, Fatter, Poorer," a book about connections between environmental pollutants and many of the most common chronic illnesses. The book describes decades of scientific research showing how endocrine-disrupting chemicals, present in our daily lives and now found in nearly all people, interfere with natural hormones in our bodies. The title sums up the consequences: Chemicals in the environment are making people sicker, fatter and poorer.In the U.S. and abroad, the chronic disease epidemic that was already underway at the start of 2020 meant the population entered into the coronavirus pandemic in a state of reduced health. Evidence is now emerging for the role that environmental quality plays in people's susceptibility to COVID-19 and their risk of dying from it.Endocrine-disrupting compounds, or EDCs, are a broad group of chemicals that can interfere with natural hormones in people's bodies in ways that harm human health. They include perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, better known as PFAS, flame retardants, plasticizers, pesticides, antimicrobial products and fragrances, among others.These chemicals are pervasive in modern life. They are found in a wide range of consumer goods, food packaging, personal care products, cosmetics, industrial processes and agricultural settings. EDCs then make their way into our air, water, soil and food.Research has shown that people who are exposed to EDCs are more likely than others to develop metabolic disorders, such as obesity, type 2 diabetes and high cholesterol, and they tend to have poorer cardiovascular health.EDCs can also interfere with normal immune system function, which plays a critical role in fighting off infection. Poor immune function also contributes to pulmonary problems such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn's disease; andmetabolic disorders. Many EDCs are also associated with different cancers.Researchers are only just beginning to paint a picture about how environmental quality contributes to COVID-19 susceptibility, and there is much we still don't know. However, scientists suspect that EDCs can play a rolebased on clear scientific evidence that EDCs increase people's risk of developing chronic diseases that put people at greater risk from COVID-19.
Paint: The Big Source of Ocean Microplastics You Didn't Know About - Until recently, microplastics that enter the ocean from paint have not received a lot of attention. There has been very little focus on the fact that unless paint residuals are collected during surface preparation and the maintenance process, they will largely end up in the ocean as microplastics. The most quoted source of data on how much microplastics from paint enters the ocean each year gives a figure of 60,000 tons per annum. While this is still a big figure – the equivalent of six billion empty plastic bottles being dumped in the ocean every year – it falls short of the real size of the problem. This is because:
- It only includes marine coatings, representing 4% of all paint volume, and does not include Industrial Maintenance (IM) and Protective Coating (PC) which represent another 11% of all global paint volumes sold;
- It works with the 2009 OECD estimate that assumes 1 % of paint applied falls off each year (meaning an average paint life of 100 years), while industry experience shows that, in fact, industrial and marine paints have an average life of approximately 20 years or about 5% of paint falls off each year.
For these reasons, the real level of paint microplastics entering the environment and ocean each year could be much, much higher than 60,000 tons. Other reports also conclude that paint is the second-largest source of microplastics in the ocean. What are the risks from all of these paint microplastics? Ingested microplastic particles can physically damage organs and leach hazardous chemicals – from the hormone-disrupting bisphenol A (BPA) to pesticides – that can compromise immune function and stymie growth and reproduction. Both microplastics and these chemicals may accumulate further up the food chain, potentially impacting whole ecosystems, including the health of the soils in which we grow our food. Microplastics in the water we drink and the air we breathe can also hit humans directly.
Mosquitoes Driven From Louisiana Swamps by Hurricane Laura Kill Cattle and Horses - Thick swarms of mosquitoes pushed out of southwestern Louisiana's marshes by Hurricane Laura are killing cattle and horses."The population just exploded in the southwest part of the state," Jeremy Hebert, a Louisiana State University AgCenter agent in Acadia Parish, said in a news release.Dr. Craig Fontenot, a large-animal veterinarian based in Evangeline Parish, told the Associated Press 300 to 400 head of cattle have been lost since Laura hit the state on Aug. 27.The hordes of mosquitoes bite the animals so many times the horses and cows are left anemic and bleeding under their skin, Fontenot said. The animals also become exhausted trying to get away from the swarms, he told the AP."They're vicious little suckers," Fontenot said. Vince Deshotel, a regional livestock specialist with LSU's AgCenter, said cattle deaths from mosquitoes are widespread."I lost a bull Friday night," he said.He met four other cattle producers over the weekend who were having to dispose of carcasses.Fontenot said the deaths are happening in a five-parish area east and northeast of the area where the hurricane came ashore.He said only a few deaths have been reported among horses, which often are kept in stalls that can be sprayed with insecticide. Fontenot said a rancher who raises deer lost about 30 of his 110 animals.Some parishes have begun mosquito-spraying programs, Hebert said."The spraying has dropped the populations tremendously. It’s made a night-and-day difference," he said.Calcasieu and Jefferson Davis parishes are still seeing problems, the AP reported. Fontenot said mosquitoes have killed livestock before, including after Hurricane Lili in 2002 and Hurricane Rita in 2005. He also said Florida and Texas saw similar problems after hurricanes.
‘That’s the Way It Is’: Trump’s Dismissal of Hurricane Laura and Climate Crisis Echoes Remarks on COVID-19 Deaths - At an August 30 briefing in Orange, Texas, during a visit to tour damage from Hurricane Laura, President Trump answered a question about climate change and hurricanes. Texas has had big storms for a long time, he said, and “that’s the way it is.”The phrase carried echoes of his remarks on COVID-19 — made at a time when the coronavirus had killed over 156,000 and infected over 4.7 million in the U.S. — that the virus’s death toll “is what it is.”In the month since Trump spoke those words to Axios, over 26,600 more people have died in the U.S. from COVID-19,federal numbers show. Each death represents its own specific tragedy for those close by and, for those tasked with responding to the pandemic, each one represents another difficult reminder that the novel virus’s death toll yesterday is not what it is today.Similarly, when it comes to the climate crisis, the questions the world faces aren’t only about what natural hazards like droughts and hurricanes looked like yesterday. Nor are they simply about how those hazards, now worsened by the climate crisis, are affecting us today — as wildfires continue to blaze in California and forecasters keep tabs on tropical storms Nana and Omar. The question President Trump was asked in Texas was about the risks that stronger hurricanes pose to the fossil fuel industry and the ways that climate change is beginning to endanger the oil refineries and petrochemical plants clustered along the U.S. Gulf Coast, that is, the industry responsible for a sizable contribution to the climate emergency itself. “Mr. President, one question about Laura,” a reporter can be heard asking off-camera in press conference footage aired by C-SPAN. “So, in June of this year, NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration] issued a report indicating that climate change is at least in part responsible for increasing sea temperatures, which then, in turn, lead to storms like Laura and Harvey. In an area where petrochemicals and the energy industry are so critical, how do you balance that with, at the same time, attacking climate change so that storms like this don’t continue to ravage the Gulf Coast?”The President's answer was short. “Well, I tell you, you’ve had tremendous storms in Texas for many decades and for many centuries, and that’s the way it is,” he said. “We handle them as they come. All I can do is handle them as they come, and that’s what we do, and nobody has ever done a better job of it.”
Shorter lifespan of faster-growing trees will add to climate crisis, study finds - Live fast, die young is a truism often applied to rock stars but could just as easily describe trees, according to new research. Trees that grow rapidly have a shorter lifespan, which could spell bad news for tackling the climate crisis. Trees grow faster in warmer conditions, and this should act as a natural brake on global heating, as they take up and store more carbon dioxide from the air as they grow. But the new study casts doubt on this beneficial cycle, finding that the faster trees grow, the sooner they die – and therefore stop storing carbon. Some fast-growing trees, including conifer species in cold regions, have long been known to show shorter lifespans, but what was not known was the impact of warmer conditions that can spur growth as global heating accelerates. An international team of researchers, publishing their work on Tuesday in the peer-review journal Nature Communications, has found that the relationship between faster growth and shorter lifespan appears to hold good across tree species and latitudes. “We started a global analysis and were surprised to find that these trade-offs are incredibly common. It occurred in almost all species we looked at, including tropical trees.” Trees growing faster in warmer conditions reach their maximum size sooner, and that appears to increase their chance of dying. Trees that grow more quickly may also be more vulnerable to factors such as drought, disease and pests. When trees die, they give up their stored carbon gradually, in the form of methane, a greenhouse gas. This means that many standard climate change models of how we can use forests as carbon sinks, to absorb the carbon dioxide we produce from fossil fuel burning, are likely to overestimate the benefits. This study suggests that although the forests of the future might grow faster as temperatures increase, they could also store less carbon as the trees die off sooner. “Our findings indicate that there are traits within the fastest-growing trees that make them vulnerable, whereas slower-growing trees have traits that allow them to persist,” said Steve Voelker of the department of environmental and forest biology at Syracuse University New York, a co-author of the study. “[The] carbon uptake rates of forests are likely to be on the wane as slow-growing and persistent trees are supplanted by fast-growing but vulnerable trees.”
Humans exploiting and destroying nature on unprecedented scale - report - Wildlife populations are in freefall around the world, driven by human overconsumption, population growth and intensive agriculture, according to a major new assessment of the abundance of life on Earth. On average, global populations of mammals, birds, fish, amphibians and reptiles plunged by 68% between 1970 and 2016, according to the WWF and Zoological Society of London (ZSL)’s biennial biennial Living Planet Report 2020. Two years ago, the figure stood at 60%.. The research is one of the most comprehensive assessments of global biodiversity available and was complied by 134 experts from around the world. It found that from the rainforests of central America to the Pacific Ocean, nature is being exploited and destroyed by humans on a scale never previously recorded. Experts said the LPI was further evidence of the sixth mass extinction of life on Earth, with one million species at risk because of human activity, according to the UN’s global assessment report in 2019. Deforestation and the conversion of wild spaces for human food production have largely been blamed for the destruction of Earth’s web of life. The report highlights that 75% of the Earth’s ice-free land has been significantly altered by human activity, and almost 90% of global wetlands have been lost since 1700. A separate study released today by Newcastle University and BirdLife International says that at least 28 bird and mammal extinctions have been prevented by conservation efforts since the UN Convention on Biological Diversity came into force in 1993.
Colorado Wildfires: Latest Updates On Active 2020 Fire Season - Four major wildfires have burned an area of more than 217,000 acres across Colorado in recent weeks, causing evacuations, highway closures and potentially hazardous levels of smoke and other forms of air pollution in many parts of the state.Amid hot, dry weather that has left 100% of the state under an official drought classification for the first time in seven years, the 2020 wildfire season is on track to be among the most active in state history.
- The Pine Gulch Fire has burned an estimated 139,007 acres in an area north of Grand Junction. It was ignited by a lightning strike on July 31, and is 87% contained.
- The Grizzly Creek Fire has burned an estimated 32,464 acres along Interstate 70 and the Colorado River east of Glenwood Springs since igniting on Aug. 10. Its cause remains officially undetermined, though officials suspect it was caused by a passing vehicle on the interstate, and the fire is 83% contained.
- The Cameron Peak Fire has burned an estimated 34,289 acres near Chambers Lake in western Larimer County since igniting on Aug. 13. Officials say the fire is human-caused, and it is 5% contained.
- The Williams Fork Fire has burned an estimated 12,125 acres near the Williams Fork Reservoir in Grand County since igniting on Aug. 14. Officials say the fire is human-caused, and it is 10% contained.
Colorado's changing climate has increased the risk of dangerous wildfires. Rising concentrations of heat-trapping gases in the earth's atmosphere — mostly the result of fossil-fuel combustion — have caused many parts of the state, especially on the Western Slope, to warm by an average of more than 4 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels. All of Colorado's 20 largest wildfires on record have occurred since 2002, during a 20-year "hot drought" that scientists say is driven largely by higher temperatures.
One of the Earliest Snowstorms on Record to Blanket Front Range of Rockies With September Snow, Including Denver --An unusually early September snowstorm will blanket the Rockies and Front Range through Wednesday from Montana to northern New Mexico, including Denver, followed by an abrupt change to widespread record cold through the Plains following searing record heat this past weekend. A deep southward plunge of the jet stream will bring in a sharp drop in temperatures to the Rockies and Plains over the next few days. There will be a disturbance diving through that jet stream, which will allow snowfall or a mix of rain and snow to spread southward through the Rockies and Front Range now through Wednesday.That front has already plunged out of Canada into the northern Rockies, changing precipitation to snow in Glacier National Park and along the Rocky Mountain Front. This lead to the bizarre sight of fire and smoke in southwest Montana, and snow in northern Montana on Labor Day morning.The National Weather Service has issued the winter weather alerts in the map below for this early-season snowfall, including winter storm warnings and winter weather advisories, from the Canadian border with Montana to the high country of northern New Mexico.These winter alerts include the entire Denver metro area, Cheyenne and Casper, Wyoming. Snowfall or a mix of rain and snow will begin in the northern Rockies on Monday. By Monday night, snow or a mix of rain and snow will expand southward into much of Wyoming, northern Colorado, western South Dakota and western Nebraska. This precipitation will arrive with rapidly dropping temperatures and gusty winds.
Significantly colder temperatures are setting the stage for the first heavy snow of the 2020 - 2021 winter season, U.S. - Significantly colder temperatures are setting the stage for the first heavy snow of the 2020-2021 "winter" season, NWS Weather Prediction Center reported early September 8, 2020. These conditions are caused by a powerful cold front plunging into the south-central Plains, producing a number of hazards, including an early-season snowstorm for the Central Rockies. Expect significant accumulations with gusty winds in the higher elevations of Wyoming and Colorado. Snow has already been reported across much of Wyoming. A highly dramatic shift in weather conditions will sweep through the northern to central portions of the country during the next couple of days as the persistent record heat over the western U.S. to the central High Plains will be drastically replaced by a surge of extremely cold air mass from Canada for this time of the year, NWS forecaster Kong noted at 20:00 UTC on September 7. "The most dramatic changes will transpire during the next 12 hours over the central High Plains where record high temperatures in the 90s to around 100 °F (32 - 38 °C) will plunge all the way to near freezing Tuesday morning behind an 'arctic' cold front," Kong said. "The Dog Days of Summer this afternoon will literally turn into Old Man Winter Tuesday morning with blustery northerly winds and areas of snow squalls possible from Wyoming down into central Colorado!" Snow is forecast to accumulate for 150 mm (6 inches) or more at many locations with the highest totals reaching 610 mm (2 feet) possible on the highest elevations. "Temperatures are forecast to stay in the 30s (-1 to 4 °C) on Tuesday in these areas, which are as cold as 28 °C (50 °F) below normal at the coldest spots," Kong said. In addition to the cold and snow, a swath of heavy rain can be expected across the upper Midwest north of the sharp front. The strong dynamics associated with the front will also trigger heavy rain and thunderstorms Tuesday night into Wednesday across western to central Texas.
Cameron Peak fire update: 14 inches of snow dampened wildfire's growth - The Cameron Peak fire remained static overnight Tuesday, as the late-summer snowstorm dampened the wildfire’s growth after days of uncontrolled expansion.The fire is still burning 102,596 acres — or 160 square miles — with 4% containment, said Paul Bruggink, spokesman for the fire response.Areas of the fire received as much as 14 inches of snow, Bruggink said, though it’s still smoldering underneath the powder. “This is not a season-ending event by any means,” he said. “We need a succession of these to do it.” But the dampened activity will allow fire crews Wednesday to assess hot spots and plan courses of action for later in the week, when the weather is expected to warm and dry out, Bruggink said.An assessment of damage from the fire’s growth over the weekend still has not been completed, he said, as roads remain impassable in some areas. The Cameron Peak fire remains the fifth-largest in Colorado’s recorded history. All 10 of the largest fires in the state have come since 2002.
Thanks to snow and additional resources, firefighters can launch 'more direct' attack on Cameron Peak Fire — Between 8 and 14 inches of heavy, wet snow fell on the Cameron Peak Fire Tuesday and overnight into Wednesday, according to fire officials. Cass Cairns, spokesperson with the Cameron Peak Fire, said Wednesday morning the snow had accumulated at the fire, keeping the ground and most fuels damp. The fire has not grown since the snow started Tuesday, she said. It's currently 102,596 acres and 4% contained. The fire won't likely grow much in the coming days as the snow melts. It's not clear how the snow affected the fire's perimeter since, for the most part, crews were not able to get near the fire Tuesday and aerial crews couldn't fly over it. Cairns said flurries will fall over the fire Wednesday, but they won't see the dumping that happened Tuesday. Winds will stay relatively calm in the area as well, though there is some concern about snags coming down, she said. Fire crews weren't able to get close to the fire on Tuesday, so that is the goal today — to get an idea of where the fire's hottest areas are, Cairns said. This will include planning containment lines on the northern and eastern edges of the fire, including the Green Ridge, Highway 14, Pingree Park Road and Buckhorn Road areas. She said there's a strong possibility firefighters will be able to get right up to the fire's perimeter in some of those places. The wet snow made travel on the roads difficult on Tuesday. Crews are preparing for warmer temperatures that will arrive Friday into next week, and are taking full advantage of this cold, wet weather, she said. In a Tuesday evening update on the fire's Facebook page, Planning Operations Section Chief Tom Barter said because the three other large wildfires in Colorado have started to decline, resources are being diverted from those areas to the Cameron Peak Fire. Prior to that, fire officials had to rank priorities and possible success rate to determine where to send the resources, Barter said. Cairns said they gained a "surge force" of 48 engines and two more hand crews. There were 1,057 personnel working the fire as of early Wednesday afternoon. "We're now getting more resources, we're getting some moderate weather and this fire is in some other terrain that's a little more favorable for us to get to," Barter said. "So we will be looking at other areas where we can get more direct on this thing."
Record Heat and Fire, Cold and Snow Blanket the West -- In the past 48 hours, the region has swung through a series of record-setting weather extremes. The West Coast is a fiery mess as toxic smoke blankets California and Oregon. But residents of the interior parts of the West from Wyoming to Colorado are waking up to record-setting cold and snow, as well as some areas still on fire from this weekend’s heat onslaught. The source of the multifaceted misery is a huge whip in the jet stream, which we’ll get into more in a bit. But the real shock is what’s happening on the ground. In brief, the West had itself a weekend with unprecedented heat across every square inch of the region. We’re talking all-time records in California, where temperatures reached 121 degrees Fahrenheit (49.4 degrees Celsius) in Chino, located roughly 35 miles east of Los Angeles. That’s an all-time record west of the San Bernardino Mountains. Even areas normally insulated from heat along the coast reached blistering new heights; San Luis Obispo, for example, cracked 120 degrees Fahrenheit (48.9 degrees Celsius). The heat shows how even the seemingly minor boost in the global average temperature driven by the climate crisis can play out in regional extremes.Heat provided the backdrop for fires, which exploded across California. The Creek Fire is the largest out-of-control fire in the state, raging over 135,000 acres. The blaze spurred one of two unprecedented helicopter evacuations of people trapped by flames at Mammoth Pools Reservoirs. The image below gives you a sense of the scale of the evacuation and the reality that the Creek Fire sprung up so quickly, leaving more than 200 people stranded. Flames also lapped up huge swaths of land in Washington, engulfing 80% of a town in the eastern part of the state. An estimated 300,000 acres burned in the span of a day as winds stirred up some of the most extreme fire behavior imaginable. I mean seriously, look at the black streak in eastern Washington on this satellite loop: And in Colorado, record heat helped the Cameron Peak Fire double to 60,000 acres in a day. But things shifted gears in Colorado overnight on Monday into Tuesday. Temperatures plummeted from record highs in the 120s (yes, you read that right) to lows in the teens as Arctic air plunged into the region. Record-setting snowfall followed there and across other parts of the Mountain West and Northern Plains. Lead, North Dakota, has picked up a record 10 inchesof snow already, and 18-24 inches of snow have fallen in Wyoming’s Wind River Mountains, according to National Weather Service data. More than a foot of snow is expected in the Colorado foothills outside Denver and Boulder alone as the storm drops into the area.
Record-early winter storm brings much below-average temperatures and record snow from Montana to New Mexico, U.S. - One of the earliest snowstorms on record swept through parts of the United States, from Montana to New Mexico on September 8 and 9, 2020, bringing record-early snow and record-cold temperatures to much of the region. The weather system hit the region after record-breaking heat, producing a drastic 33 °C (60 °F) drop in temperatures within just 24 hours.The slow-moving mid to upper level low that has been responsible for the early season winter storm through the Rockies and Central High Plains is winding down on Thursday, September 10."Winter weather will be confined to the Central Rockies tonight into Thursday where additional heavy snows are possible," NWS forecaster Oravec said.The much below-average temperatures that this system has also been responsible for, from the Rockies into the Plains, will continue to moderate over the next two days.The weather started shifting in Montana as early as Sunday, September 6. Before the event was over, the city of Red Lodge - a gateway to Yellowstone National Park -- received 266.7 mm (10.5 inches) of snow.Some of the greatest snow totals were recorded in Wyoming, where up to 431.8 mm (17 inches) of snow fell just south of Casper, Natrona County. Casper recorded 58.4 mm (2.3 inches) on snow on September 7, and 132 mm (5.2 inches) on September 8, breaking its previous earliest measurable snow by one day (September 8, 1962).Rapid City, South Dakota recorded 25.4 mm (1 inch) on September 7, breaking its previous record early snow by 4 days (September 11, 2014). On September 8, Cheyenne, Wyoming tied its earliest measurable snow with 27.9 mm (1.1 inches).Earliest-snow records were also broken in Ft. Collins, Colorado, Pueblo, Colorado, North Platte, Nebraska; Goodland, Kansas; Yuma, Colorado; and Las Vegas, New Mexico.Aside from the snow, this storm brought strong winds and very cold to record-breaking low temperatures throughout the region.Denver, Colorado registered 25.4 mm (1 inch) of snow, just days after the city hit an all-time September high of 38.3 °C (101 °F) on September 5.The city tied a record-low temperature of -0.5 °C (31 °F) on September 8 and 9. The last time it was this cold in the city on September 8 and 9 was in 1962.
National Guard rescues 200 from California wildfire -More than 200 people were rescued by the National Guard from a wildfire in a recreational area in California, officials said Sunday. The Madera County Sheriff’s office said in a Facebook post that officials had rescued people sheltering-in-place at Mammoth Pool, a reservoir on the San Joaquin River about 45 miles north of Fresno, during the wildfire which was named the Creek Fire. Twenty of those rescued have been transported to area hospitals and “any others in need of medical attention are being treated,” the sheriff’s office said. A National Guard spokesman told CBS San Francisco a Chinook helicopter airlifted the first 50 to 60 evacuees to Fresno Airport, adding that some had “been injured by the flame of the fire.” “A Blackhawk helicopter is also involved in the rescue,” Lt. Col. Jonathan Shiroma said in an email to the outlet. “At the airport, emergency response, fire and medical elements from the 144th Fighter Wing are on hand to assist. Both rotary wings are returning to the fire site to evacuate more people immediately.” The California National Guard tweeted photos and video of the evacuees on and exciting the helicopter. The Creek Fire started Friday and by Saturday afternoon head spread to 56 square miles. It cut off the only road into the Mammoth Pool Campground, national forest spokesman said, according to KTLA 5. Tune said campers were told to shelter in place until fire crews could gain access to the site, KTLA 5 reported.
California faces record-setting ‘kiln-like’ heat as fires rage, causing injuries - Heat and red-flag warnings are in effect statewide into the coming week as the heat will continue to fuel the fires already burning and could cause any new blazes to rapidly grow out of control.The most serious wildfire situation developed with the Creek Fire in the Sierra National Forest, about 290 miles north of Los Angeles, which was first detected Friday night and rapidly grew to at least 45,500 acres by Sunday morning.That fire trapped about 1,000 people near Mammoth Pool reservoir as flames crossed the San Joaquin River, including about 150 people who became stranded at a boat launch, the Associated Press reported.According to the AP, 200 people were rescued from the Mammoth Pool Campground by military helicopters. Two of them were severely injured, 10 had “moderate injuries” and others had minor or no injuries. According to the California Air National Guard, this was the largest wildfire-related air evacuation in recent memory. On Sunday, the National Weather Service office in Sacramento tweeted that more than 99 percent of California’s population was under an Excessive Heat Warning or Heat Advisory. In addition to the Creek Fire, firefighters are still battling the second-, third- and fourth-largest fires in state history that erupted during a mid-August heat wave and unusual thunderstorms north of San Francisco. Although those fires are better contained, the heat, dry weather and shifting, strong offshore winds are causing an uptick in their activity.Since Aug. 15, the state has seen more than 1.6 million acres burned, 900 new fires started, along with eight deaths and nearly 3,300 destroyed structures. In an average California fire season, about 310,000 acres are burned, according to Cal Fire, the state firefighting agency. Daniel Swain, a climate researcher at UCLA, said the state may set a record for the “most acres burned in the modern era” as soon as Monday. In a sign of the heat to come, temperatures did not drop below the 90s on Saturday night and into early Sunday in some locations from the San Fernando Valley to parts of L.A. County. Two temperature stations in the L.A. area were still hovering above the century mark [100F] at 3:02 a.m. local time, the Weather Service said. High temperatures in Southern California on Sunday ranged from 105 to 115 degrees near the coast to up to 120 degrees in inland areas, which would edge past all-time-high temperature records in some locations. Some noteworthy temperature records that have already fallen include:
Creek Fire Explodes To 73K Acres, Triggers Dramatic Evacuations — An explosive brush fire in the Sierra National Forest cut off evacuation routes near a popular reservoir Saturday, forcing multiple dramatic rescues. The blaze had ripped through 73,278 acres as of 8:41 p.m. Sunday night according to a San Francisco Chronicle report.The Creek Fire exploded from 2,000 acres to 36,000 acres Saturday, trapping 207 people at the Mammoth Pool Reservoir. At one point, they expected to have to ride out the flames by diving into the reservoir, but the California National Guard flew in using a CH-47 Chinook helicopter to airlift people to safety, according to the National Guard. Two people suffered major injuries, and at least 10 others were hurt.It continued to rage out of control overnight, growing to 45,500 acres by Sunday morning, according to the U.S. Forest Service. "The fire burned actively overnight," according to a statement by the U.S. Forest Service. "Crews will be challenged today by steep rugged terrain, heavy fuel loading and high temperatures." The fire broke out Friday evening near the communities of Big Creek and Huntington Lake and exploded Saturday amid intense heat, eating up dense and parched trees and brush in steep terrain. By Sunday morning, the fire was still at 0% containment. A second dramatic rescue was underway Sunday night. Two military Chinook helicopters were headed to China Peak near Huntington Lake early Sunday evening to rescue about 120 people early Sunday evening trapped by the blaze, GV Wire℠ reports. The publication cited a person on ground, who said the air rescue was needed because the fire was burning on both sides of Highway 168. The cause of the fire remains under investigation.
"Wildfire Crisis" - Record-Breaking Heat Sparks 23 Fires, Rolling Blackouts Across Golden State -- As of Monday morning on the West Coast, at least 15,000 firefighters were battling 23 wildfires raging across the Golden State, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CalFire). Of these, three were deemed "major blazes", burning in Fresno, San Bernardino, and San Diego counties. On Sunday, California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency in San Diego, San Bernardino, Fresno, Madera, and Mariposa countries, the worst-affected by what's shaping up to be another brutal wildfire season, exacerbated by a shortage of prisoners to press into service fighting the blazes. But in his speech, Newsom prattled on about "the realities of climate change". "California has always been the canary in the coal mine for climate change, and this weekend's events only underscore that reality," Newsom said. "Wildfires have caused system failures, while near-record energy demand is predicted as a multi-state heatwave hits the West Coast for the second time in a matter of weeks."Newsom also spoke about the record-high temperatures on Saturday, which were piling on the pressure to the state's power grid. "Californians are rising to the occasion to meet these unprecedented challenges for our energy grid, and I want to thank all of the businesses and individuals who are conserving energy. Californians should heed (California Independent System Operator's) warnings and flex their power to shift energy consumption to earlier in the day." The heatwave added fuel to the wildfires and strained electrical grids, though rolling blackouts weren't as massive as the ones seen in August. As of Monday morning, 50,000 homes and businesses had no power, according to Poweroutage.US. The California Independent System Operator (CA ISO), which operates a large chunk of the state's power grid, announced a Stage 2 Emergency on Sunday, where it took steps to 'defend the grid, manage transmission loss and avoid outages'. CA ISO said it "has taken all mitigating actions and is no longer able to provide its expected energy requirements. A Stage 2 warning requires ISO intervention in the market, such as ordering power plants online." The Stage 2 Emergency is expected to be reissued on Monday from 3 p.m. through 9 p.m. as wildfires and hot temperatures persist.
Wildfires burn through record area in California as blazes continue to spread - BBC News -- Wildfires have burned through a record number of acres in California this year as firefighters continue to battle several large blazes across the state.The state's department of forestry and fire protection, Cal Fire, says more than two million acres have burned, more than the size of Delaware.One fire, El Dorado, which has spread over 7,000 acres, was started by a gender reveal party, officials say.California is currently experiencing a record heatwave.Los Angeles County reported its highest ever temperature of 49.4C (121F) on Sunday. Although temperatures are expected to drop from Tuesday onwards it may bring strong winds which could fan the flames, the National Weather Service warns.More than 14,000 firefighters continue to battle 24 fires across the state, Cal Fire said. The largest blaze, known as the Creek Fire, has burned more than 78,000 acressince it broke out in the Sierra Mountains on Friday, and the authorities said none of it had been contained. The fire has burned at least two dozen dwellings in the town of Big Creek, the Los Angeles Times reports. More than 200 hikers had to be airlifted out of the popular Mammoth Pool Reservoir after becoming trapped by flames on Saturday.Valley Fire in San Diego County has burned through more than 10,000 acres, and prompted the evacuation of the remote town of Alpine; while Bobcat fire in Angeles National Forest has destroyed nearly 5,000 acres and saw the evacuation of the Mount Wilson Observatory. Cal Fire blamed a "smoke-generating pyrotechnic device, used during a gender reveal party" for starting the The El Dorado fire in San Bernadino County. Gender reveal parties are celebrations announcing whether expecting parents are going to have a girl or a boy. In recent years, several large-scale parties have gone wrong, even resulting in the death of a woman in 2019. "Cal Fire reminds the public that with the dry conditions and critical fire weather, it doesn't take much to start a wildfire", the tweet read. People who cause fires "can be held financially and criminally responsible", it added.
California Wildfires Scorch Land the Size of Delaware During Record Heat -On a Labor Day weekend when the temperature hit 121 degrees in Los Angeles County, fire crews around California struggled to contain ongoing and growing blazes that have so far consumed more than 2 million acres this summer. That's equal to the entire state of Delaware going up in flames, according to the BBC.The record heat coupled with dry and windy conditions is making the 22 fires in the state difficult for crews to contain. In a preventive measure, the state's power authority shut off electricity to 172,000 homes and businesses in 22 counties in Northern California. The power will not be fully restored until Wednesday evening, according to CNN.The small mountain town of Big Creek in the Sierra Nevada mountain range saw trapped campers airlifted to safety while the fire burned through the town, destroying roughly two dozen homes, according to NBC News.While a hydroelectric plant owned by Southern California Edison was destroyed, three propane tanks with 11,000 gallons of the flammable gas exploded and an elementary school caught fire.The school's superintendent, Toby Wait, evacuated with his family, but his home was destroyed after they fled."Words cannot even begin to describe the devastation of this community," he said to The Fresno Bee, as NBC News reported.The fire started on Friday and grew to burn nearly 80,000 acres Monday, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. It is zero percent contained."This one's in a class by itself," said U.S. Forest Service Supervisor Dean Gould during a Monday night press briefing, as CNN reported.Farther south, Los Angeles and Ventura county are under a red flag warning as the cooling temperatures after the weekend's record heat are expected to usher in high winds, which may fan the flames of ongoing fires.The state's fire authorities are currently battling 24 fires across the state, according to the BBC.
2 million acres burned by wildfires in California, surpassing all-time record set in 2018 - This season's wildfires in California, U.S. have burned more than 809 000 million ha (2 million acres) of land by September 7, 2020, surpassing the all-time record of 793 180 million ha (1.96 million acres) set in 2018. Cal Fire began tracking the numbers in 1987. "We haven't even got into the October and November fire season and we've broken the all-time record," Cal Fire Capt. Richard Cordova told CNN on Sunday, September 6. In the San Francisco Bay Area, more than 14 000 firefighters are currently battling two of the three largest fires in the history of the state. However, these are just 2 of dozens of currently active fires across the state.On September 7, the U.S. Forest Service announced it was closing all 8 national forests in the southern half of the state. In addition, campgrounds at all national forests in the state were also closed. The decision will be re-evaluated each day, officials said. "Existing fires are displaying extreme fire behavior, new fire starts are likely, weather conditions are worsening, and we simply do not have enough resources to fully fight and contain every fire," said Randy Moore, regional forester for the Forest Service's Pacific Southwest Region. "The wildfire situation throughout California is dangerous and must be taken seriously."Lynne Tolmachoff, Cal Fire spokeswoman, told AP that it's 'unnerving' to have reached a record for acreage burned when September and October usually are the worst for fires because vegetation has dried out and high winds are more common. On Saturday, September 5, National Guard rescuers in two military helicopters airlifted 214 people to safety after flames trapped them in a wooded camping area near Mammoth Pool Reservoir. Two people were seriously injured and were among 12 hospitalized. On September 6, Chinooks airlifted dozens of people trapped by the Creek Fire near Lake Edison. Injured people filled up both helicopters on the first airlift. This season's wildfires in California, U.S. have burned more than 809 000 million ha (2 million acres) of land by September 7, 2020, surpassing the all-time record of 793 180 million ha (1.96 million acres) set in 2018. "We haven't even got into the October and November fire season and we've broken the all-time record," In the San Francisco Bay Area, more than 14 000 firefighters are currently battling two of the three largest fires in the history of the state. However, these are just 2 of dozens of currently active fires across the state. On September 7, the U.S. Forest Service announced it was closing all 8 national forests in the southern half of the state. In addition, campgrounds at all national forests in the state were also closed. Since August 15, California witnessed more than 900 wildfires, most of them started by an intense series of thousands of lightning strikes. To date, 8 people have been killed and more than 3 300 structures destroyed.
A Gender-Reveal Party Started a Wildfire That Burned Nearly 10,000 Acres -A couple hosting a gender-reveal party on Saturday set off a smoke bomb to reveal the baby's gender when the device lit the nearby dry grass and sent partygoers scrambling. That mishap has now led to the El Dorado wildfire in Southern California's San Bernardino County, according to The Washington Post.According to a statement from CalFire, the fire started in El Dorado Ranch Park, about 80 miles east of Los Angeles. On Monday, official said that it had burned 9,671 acres and was only 7 percent contained, accordingCNN. Officials added that it's "one of the most dangerous fires" they've seen in the area. The family and partygoers tried in vain to put out the fire with water bottles, but the rapid spread in the four-foot tall dry grass was too much for the small amount of water they had. The family did call 911 to report the fire and shared photographs with investigators, according to The New York Times. Captain Bennet Milloy of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection added that no decision had been made yet as to whether or not the family will face criminal charges. A decision will wait until after the fire is extinguished. In the meantime, though, as firefighters battle the blaze, evacuations were ordered, including in parts of Yucaipa, a nearby city of nearly 54,000, according to The New York Times."In my 30 years as a citizen in Yucaipa, I have never seen such a large fire," Yucaipa Mayor David Avila said during a Monday news conference. "As a retired firefighter with 32 years of experience, I can assure you I witnessed one of the most dangerous fires that we can have in this area." This actually isn't the first time a gender-reveal stunt led to a dangerous and costly wildfire. Three years ago, in 2017, a similar event led to a fire that burned through 47,000 acres in Arizona's Santa Rita Mountains. That event caused millions of dollars in damages, when an off-duty U.S. Border Patrol agent shot a high-powered rifle at a target packed with an explosive to reveal the baby's gender, according to CNN. The patrol agent pled guilty and was fined $8.2 million in restitution.Similarly, a gender-reveal party ignited a Florida brush fire last year. Others claimed the life of a grandmother when shrapnel hit her. Another caused a plane crash in Texas, as The Washington Post reported.
Thousands lose power in Northern California amid roll out of PG&E blackouts Some Northern California schools have canceled classes due to planned blackouts from PG&E.While some decisions are still being made, others were decided on Monday. Two districts in El Dorado County, Camino Union School District and Placerville Union School District, announced school closures for Sept. 8."We will need... to make tomorrow a no school day," said Eric Bonniksen, Placerville Union School District superintendent. "This is more of an issue since we have students attending class on site and they will be missing one of their on-campus days." The Plumas County Office of Education told parents to plan for school closures in Chester and Greenville. Officials don't know if portions of Quincy will lose power, but they intend to have schools open in Quincy until they hear differently. More information can be found on their website.In Nevada County, Twin Ridges Elementary School District also announced a closure for Sept. 8.Up to 172,000 customers across 22 counties in Northern California are expected to be impacted by the PG&E power outages through the night.The utility plans to restore power on Wednesday once weather conditions improve.Community resource centers will be available during the planned blackouts, where people can charge their items, get information, get water, snacks, and other essentials. A full list of community centers is available on the PG&E website.View the map below to see what areas could be impacted by the blackouts. Click HERE to see if your address is in the affected areas. To download a full list of locations, click HERE.
New Blackouts Darken California – WSJ - PG&E Corp. said late Monday it started cutting power in parts of Northern California to reduce wildfire risks, a day after the state narrowly averted rolling blackouts to relieve strain on its electric grid during a heat wave. The San Francisco-based utility, which serves 16 million people in Northern and Central California, said the outages will affect about 172,000 customers in 22 counties, stretching from wine country to the Sierra foothills. “PG&E will be able to use temporary generation and islanding to enable about 69,000 customers and several medical facilities to stay energized,” the company said. The exact number of people potentially affected is uncertain but would likely top more than 500,000, based on census data on people per household in California. PG&E said the progressive shutoffs started about 9 p.m. Monday in some areas. The company said the decision was based on forecasts of widespread, severely dry conditions and strong, gusty winds that create critical fire weather with high ignition risk. The outages could last through Wednesday in all affected areas. California utilities in recent years have resorted to public safety power shutoffs in which they cut off electricity to certain areas to reduce the risk of their power lines sparking wildfires when wind speeds pick up. PG&E last year relied on such measures after its equipment sparked a series of deadly wildfires in 2017 and 2018. Last October, it pre-emptively cut power to more than two million Californians across 34 counties, some for days at a time. It is the only U.S. utility to have ever initiated a weather-related shutoff of such size and duration. The Monday shutoffs were the first of their kind since California wildfire season began earlier this summer. PG&E has been working to reduce the scope of its safety-related outages by installing technology to limit their size and improving its ability to detect weather threats.
Surreal Photos As San Francisco Sky Turns Orange --- Eerie, dark orange clouds enveloped San Francisco and the Bay Area on Wednesday as a result of nearby wildfire smoke entering the atmosphere. Stunning photos were posted by SF Gate on Wednesday showing what looks like a Martian sky, which was yellow on Tuesday, but darkened in color overnight to orange as a result of smoke being pushed inland off the Pacific Ocean. According to the, at 10:45 AM local time, "it looked as if it were dawn".UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain said on Twitter: "Extremely dense & tall smoke plumes from numerous large wildfires, some of which have been generating nocturnal pyrocumulunimbus clouds ('fire thunderstorms), are almost completely blocking out the sun across some portions of Northern California this morning."Another user responded: "I don’t remember orange skies growing up in in the Bay Area, California. Now we have days of not being able to walk outside."Jan Null, a meteorologist, said that north winds were "bringing lots of smoke from Oregon." Oregon had declared a statewide emergency on Tuesdy as a result of the fires many of which were also causing smoke in Northern California. In some spots, soot and falling ash were reported to be hitting the ground. National Weather Service forecaster Roger Gass said: "They reported a significant amount of ash. Almost to the point where it looked like moderate to heavy snow." Chinatown, San Francisco 09.09.20 pic.twitter.com/tZFL2gEn09 The haze in the East Bay got the worst of it, while the rest of the Bay Area had air quality "ranging from good to moderate" on the ground. The fire is actually getting further from the area, but the smoke was pushed inland by a marine layer over the Pacific Ocean. "That's the reason it doesn’t smell smoky but the sky is a different color," Gass commented.
Western US ravaged by catastrophic fires, record heat - Fires are raging across the US west coast states and in the Canadian province of British Columbia, triggered by a combination of lightning storms, high winds and extreme heat. On Monday, a wind-driven fire destroyed the community of Malden, Washington, home to 200 people. About 100 homes, nearly every house in the town, along with the downtown area, was consumed by flames. The fire station, post office, city hall, the municipal library and other downtown structures were destroyed. “The scale of this disaster really can’t be expressed in words,” Whitman County Sheriff Brett Myers said in a statement. “The fire will be extinguished, but a community has been changed for a lifetime. I just hope we don’t find the fire took more than homes and buildings. I pray everyone got out in time.” As of Tuesday, there were no reports of fatalities or injuries. Elsewhere in Washington, and the neighboring state of Oregon, blackouts affected nearly 250,000 households, as trees, knocked down by the high winds, toppled electrical cables. Washington Commissioner of Public Lands Hilary Franz tweeted that “we’re still seeing new fire starts in every corner of the state.” East of Oregon’s Willamette River Valley, a wildfire swept through the communities of Blue River and Vida on Monday. Hundreds were evacuated, and 150 homes were burnt, and at least one person was reported killed. Both communities were reported to be a “total loss,” according to report by local news station KVAL. Evacuations also took place east of Salem, the state capital, where residents were evacuated from many of the small communities in the foothills of the Cascade Range. The air above the city of Portland was covered by a thick layer of smoke and ash. Residents with respiratory problems were strongly advised to stay in their homes. As of Tuesday, the Doctor Creek wildfire in southeast British Columbia, not far from the Idaho-Montana border, had burned 7,937 hectares (19,613 acres) and was out of control. High winds and steep terrain make this wildfire difficult to control.
Oregon wildfires destroy five towns, as three fatalities confirmed in California (Reuters) - An unprecedented spate of fierce, wind-driven wildfires in Oregon have all but destroyed five small towns, leaving a potentially high death toll in their wake, the governor said on Wednesday, as initial casualty reports began to surface. Hundreds of miles away in northern California, three fatalities were confirmed on Wednesday from a lightning-sparked conflagration that raged with renewed intensity this week after firefighters had made significant headway containing it. While more than two dozen major blazes continued to wreak havoc across wide swaths of California, the neighboring state of Oregon bore the latest brunt of wildfires plaguing much of the western United States over the past week.Winds of up to 50 miles per hour (80 kilometers per hour) sent flames racing tens of miles within hours, engulfing hundreds of homes as firefighters fought at least 35 large blazes in Oregon with a collective footprint nearly twice the size of New York City. Several Oregon communities, including the town of Detroit in the Santiam Valley, as well as Blue River and Vida in coastal Lane County, and Phoenix and Talent in southern Oregon, were substantially destroyed, Governor Kate Brown told a news conference. “This could be the greatest loss in human lives and property due to wildfire in our state’s history,” Brown said, without providing details.
‘Unprecedented’ Wildfires Scorch Oregon and Washington, Force Thousands to Flee - Wildfires raged through Oregon and Washington Monday and Tuesday, prompting evacuations, blanketing Seattle in unhealthy levels of smoke and destroying nearly all of a small Washington farming town.The town of Malden in eastern Washington lost 80 percent of its structures including its fire station, post office, City Hall and library after a fast-moving blaze roared through on Monday, NPR reported."The scale of this disaster really can't be expressed in words," Whitman County Sheriff Brett Myers said in a statement reported by NPR. "The fire will be extinguished, but a community has been changed for a lifetime. I just hope we don't find the fire took more than homes and buildings. I pray everyone got out in time." As of early Tuesday, there were no reports of injuries from the fire.In the rest of Washington state, fires consumed more than 330,000 acres in a 24-hour period, fueled by strong winds and dry vegetation, NBC News reported. "More acres burned yesterday than in 12 of the last entire fire seasons in the state of Washington," Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said in a Tuesday press conference, as NBC News reported. The two largest fires burning in the state are the 174,000-acre Pearl Hill Fire, in Douglas County, and the 163,000-acre Cold Springs Fire near Omak. Neither was contained at all as of Tuesday's press conference. The Babbs-Malden Fire, the blaze that destroyed Malden, had spread to 8,943 acres and was also not contained.West of the cascades, a fire burned through Graham, Washington Monday, destroying six homes and forcing around 100 people to evacuate, The Seattle Times reported."You didn't have time to pack clothes, it was like, get out, now," 55-year-old construction worker Tim VanBrocklin told The Seattle Times. "It was pretty nasty here, embers flying around our faces."The wind that drove the fires also carried their smoke into the Seattle area Monday night and Tuesday morning."It was so smoky you couldn't see across the water, you couldn't see the ferry boats coming across until the last few moments," Andy Lipscomb, who works in Seattle, told KOMO News Tuesday.Puget Sound Clean Air Agency scientists predict that air quality in the area will remain at "unhealthy" or "unhealthy for sensitive groups" levels through Wednesday and possibly into Thursday as easterly winds continue to blow. In neighboring Oregon, wildfires have prompted thousands to flee their homes, ABC News reported. "Fire on both sides, winds blowing, ash flying — it was like driving through hell," Evans told NewsChannel 21. "Did you lose everything, or is the only thing you saved yourself?" There were 35 active fires burning more than 367,279 acres in the state, ABC News reported early Wednesday morning. The fires prompted Oregon Gov. Kate Brown to issue an emergency conflagration declaration. This frees up state resources to battle blazes too big for local crews to handle on their own, USA TODAY explained.
'Unprecedented' wildfires force evacuations and emergency responses throughout Oregon (videos) Oregon Governor Kate Brown declared a wildfire emergency on Tuesday, September 8, 2020, after raging wildfires forced evacuations and burned through at least two towns. State officials said they've never seen conditions so conducive to destructive fires. This is proving to be an unprecedented and significant fire event for our state, Brown said in a news conference on Tuesday afternoon (LT). "We do not have context for this amount of fire on the landscape," said Doug Grafe, chief of fire protection at the Oregon Department of Forestry. Strong wind gusts on Monday afternoon, September 7, gave new life to wildfires in central and eastern Marion County for weeks, creating what officials are now calling the Santiam Fire, OPB reports. The fire quickly swept through canyons west of the cascades, forcing evacuations in a number of communities east of Salem. Elsewhere across the state, intensifying wildfires near Eugene, Ashland, and along the coast prompted evacuation orders in towns and state prisons. Lane County officials said wildfires have caused 'catastrophic loss' in the town of Blue River where the Holiday Farm fire destroyed between 80 and 100 buildings. When you combine strong winds, some of the driest conditions in decades and a cold front sweeping across the area, you have a supreme alignment for destructive wildfires, said Doug Grafe, chief of fire protection at the Oregon Department of Forestry. "That's exactly what we've seen... Seeing them run down the canyons the way they have carrying tens of miles in one afternoon and not slowing down through the evening. There’s absolutely no context for this environment," Grafe said. "Both Santiam and the Lionshead fires have together burned more than 200 000 acres [80 940 ha] so far and we’re seeing over 30 000 acres [12 140 ha] burned by the Holiday Farm fire. Thousands of Oregonians have been evacuated from their homes and many more are at risk," Gov. Brown said.
Nearly 100 Large Wildfires Burning Across the West; Tens of Thousands Evacuated in California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho - Hundreds of homes, businesses and other buildings have burned to the ground, a firefighter was critically injured and tens of thousands of people have been forced to evacuate as hot, dry and windy weather across the West left parts of California, Oregon and Washington under siege from what's being called an unprecedented fire season.More than 96 large wildfires are currently burning over 5,400 square miles of land, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. About half of the fires are in Oregon, Washington and California.Residents in and around Medford, Oregon, fled their homes in darkness as fire burned through the towns of Talent and Phoenix.Daylight video showed some of the destruction left behind by the blaze, known as the Glendower or Almeda Fire.Many of the blazes started on Monday and Tuesday amid record heat, drought and sometimes windy conditions. “It took an extreme confluence of weather factors to lead to the magnitude of this latest wildfire siege," weather.com senior meteorologist Jon Erdman wrote Wednesday. Those factors include worsening drought and the hottest August since 1895 in some western states, including California. Then came the extreme heat over Labor Day weekend, followed by high winds that created red-flag fire conditions and fueled the flames of both new and existing fires. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown called the fires "a once-in-a-generation event. “This could be the greatest loss of human life and property due to wildfire in our state’s history,” Oregon Gov. Kate Brown told reporters Wednesday. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee tweeted that more than 500 square miles of land burned in his state in a single day, more than the total consumed during 12 of the last 18 fire seasons.In California, at least 20,000 people were told to evacuate Wednesday morning after the Bear Fire exploded in size Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, the Sacramento Bee reported. The fire is burning near Oroville in Yuba and Butte Counties, not far from Paradise and other areas destroyed by the Camp Fire two years ago. Here's a look at some of the major fires raging in parts of the West:
Wildfires in California, Oregon, Washington turn deadly: 'I never want to see California again' – Wildfires raced through more than a dozen Western states Thursday, incinerating homes, forcing hundreds of thousands of evacuations, and burning a swath of land almost the size of New Jersey.At least 23 people have died and hundreds of homes have been destroyed by more than 100 major fires that have consumed nearly 7,000 square miles. Authorities in Oregon say more than 500,000 people statewide have been forced to evacuate because of wildfires - over 10% of the state’s 4.2 million population."Unprecedented weather conditions have created emergency situations near wildfires throughout California, Oregon, Washington and other states," the National Fire Information Center warned. "Almost half of the large fires reported today have evacuation orders in place."Nineteen deaths have been reported in California, three in Oregon and one in Washington state. In Northern California's Butte County, Sheriff Kory Honea said at least 10 people have died, including seven more added to the death toll Thursday. Dozens are missing and hundreds of homes were feared destroyed by a series of blazes 125 miles northeast of San Francisco called the North Complex fires.Several people have been critically burned and thousands more homes were threatened. At least 20,000 people were under evacuation orders or warnings in Plumas, Yuba and Butte counties. John Sykes, a 50-year resident, fled with his car and some clothes. He watched the town of Berry Creek burn from about a mile away. “The school is gone, the fire department’s gone, the bar’s gone, the laundromat’s gone, the general store’s gone,” Sykes told the Sacramento Bee. “I’ll never go back. ... I never want to see California again.”The fire also threatened Paradise, a town devastated in 2018 by the deadliest inferno in state history, the Camp Fire. More than 80 residents died and almost 20,000 buildings were destroyed in that blaze. In the Sierra National Forest, authorities say it will likely be at least a week, and possibly a month, before the Creek Fire is controlled sufficiently to permit residents to return. The fire has displaced tens of thousands of Californians, and the Red Cross was helping evacuees find hotel rooms because group shelters are prohibited during the coronavirus outbreak.
Oregon Faces "Greatest Loss Of Life In State History" From Wildfires As La Nina "Threatens Bigger Blazes, Storms" - As wildfires move north from California, the state of Oregon is being engulfed in dangerous wildfires - some of the most destructive in its history - as La Nina conditions drive some of the worst wildfires seen in the American West in years. The weather pattern has also been blamed for the latest string of hurricanes that have hammered Gulf Coast and East Coast states over the past several months. As of late Wednesday, 47 active fires have burned 374,522 acres in the Beaver State, according to the Oregon Office of Emergency Management. Gov. Kate Brown said the communities of Blue River and Vida in Lane County had been devastated by wildfires this week, while Phoenix and Talent, in the southern part of the state, have reported "significant damage," the Portland Tribune reported.Brown said, "this could be the greatest loss of life and structures due to wildfire in state history. "The state's fires remain largely unchallenged Thursday morning as emergency personnel continues to evacuate thousands of people to safety. Doug Grafe, with the Department of Forestry, said the fire situation in the state is "zero percent containment." "The largest blaze is the Santiam/Beachie Creek Fire, at 132,450 acres burned east of Salem. It is zero percent contained. The Lionshead Fire has burned 109,222 acres. Fire officials said they expected the fires in the Santiam River area to combine into one large blaze about 3,000 firefighters are deployed," The Tribune said. The wildfires burning on Oregon come as "historic" wildfires burn out of control across California. Gov. Gavin Newsom said Tuesday that as many as 3,400 building structures had been destroyed with at least 2.3 million acres burned. As the following chart shows, air quality across California and Oregon is at an extremely dangerous level... Volatile U.S. weather this summer could be explained by an ultra-cool water pattern in the Pacific known as La Nina. The U.S. Climate Prediction Center (CPC) confirmed La Nina in the Northern Hemisphere was formed in August.La Nina "triggers an atmospheric chain reaction that stands to roil weather around the globe, often turning the western U.S. into a tinder box, fueling more powerful hurricanes in the Atlantic and flooding parts of Australia and South America," Bloomberg said. The CPC said La Nina produces broad changes to weather patterns that create 'bigger wildfires' and more tropical activity in certain parts of the Northern Hemisphere. "We're already in a bad position, and La Nina puts us in a situation where fire-weather conditions persist into November and possibly even December," said Ryan Truchelut, president of Weather Tiger LLC. "It is exacerbating existing heat and drought issues."
500 000 forced to evacuate as massive wildfires rage through Oregon, U.S. -The number of people forced to evacuate their homes in Oregon rose to an estimated 500 000 by Friday, September 11, 2020. This is more than 10% of the state's 4.2 million people and the number keeps growing.
- The fires have so far consumed a record 364 000 ha (900 000 acres) of land.
- The public is urged to check local county websites for information on evacuation orders, which may include email, cell phone text messages.
Governor Kate Brown said Thursday they have never experienced this amount of uncontained fire across the state."These fires are unprecedented," Brown said, adding that the state has seen an average of 202 000 ha (500 000 acres) burned each year. "We've [now] seen nearly double that in three days."37 fires remained active as of Thursday evening, September 10, down from about 50 earlier in the week. Office of Emergency Management Director Andrew Phelps said the extensive number of fires, and their severity, have tapped out statewide resources. The agency is reaching out to emergency management agencies across the country for resources, assistance, and support. A state of emergency has been declared in Portland on Thursday, September 10, closing city parks and activating evacuation sites. At least 3 people have lost their lives - one in the Almeda Drive Fire, which devastated the towns of Phoenix and Talent. According to the Jackson County Sheriff Nate Sickler, the body was found near the fire's point of origin. The cause of death is under criminal investigation.Two people died in Marion County where a complex of fires has burned whole canyons east of the Willamette River. According to local media reports, the victims were a 13-year-old boy and his grandmother. The boy's mother is reportedly in a critical condition.
Death toll jumps to 15 as record wildfires continue raging in California, Oregon, and Washington, U.S. - At least 15 people have been killed in record-breaking wildfires burning through the western U.S. as of Friday, September 11, 2020, with California, Oregon, and Washington bearing the brunt of the blazes. According to the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC), there are 102 active large fires burning across over 1.6 million ha (4.3 million acres) of land.There are 24 massive fires reported in California, 16 each in Washington and Oregon, 11 in Idaho, 9 in Montana, 7 in Arizona, 6 in Colorado, 5 in Utah, 4 in Alaska, 2 in Wyoming, and 1 each in Nevada and New Mexico.Authorities retrieved seven bodies in Northern California on Thursday, September 10, raising the total number of fatalities in the state to 10. However, authorities feat the death toll in the state will rise as there are 16 people still missing.The August Complex Fire-- one of the blazes in the area-- is now considered the largest in the state's history, according to Cal Fire.It has so far devoured over 190 000 ha (470 000 acres) of land and has only been 24 percent contained since it was triggered by lightning in mid-August.
Apocalyptic Scenes In Several States As Skies Turn Blood Red Like Mars -- (video, pictures) Fires in Oregon, Washington, San Fransico, and other western states have caused the skies to be blood red giving off an apocalyptic glow across the Pacific states. Photos and videos shared across social media show the nightmarish conditions that the record-breaking fires have been causing in states including California, Oregon, and Washington: A Youtube video of a drone shows footage depicting areas destroyed by the fires with a red sky in San Francisco Bay, California. Drone Footage of California Wildfires Smoke 2:30pm San Francisco Bay Area CA - 9/9/20 – YouTube Another picture shows Oregon with a similar red tint in its skies hazy from the fires and smoke. Many are comparing the skies to the planet Mars, as thousands upon thousands of firefighters work to fight the thousands of fires, CBS News reported. Parts of Washington, Oregon, California, Idaho, Nevada, Arizona, and Utah are currently under critical and elevated risk according to the National Weather Service. Air quality in some regions has even reached hazardous levels. The New York Times reported on the fires, too: “In Oregon, thousands of people have evacuated their homes. In Washington State, a fire hit the town of Malden so quickly that deputies drove through the streets screaming for residents to leave. In Colorado, a 100,000-acre blaze was slowed only by a rare September snowstorm. And in California, residents are coping with the worst wildfires on record. Smoke blotted out the sun yesterday in San Francisco, and ash fluttered down from the sky. ‘The sky had a faint orange glow that some said evoked a nuclear winter,’ , ‘The smoke and the poor air quality are just oppressive.” According to NASA, the skies painted with a tint of red are a result of smoke particles, which block certain wavelength colors from the sun. “The smoke particles from the fires allow sunlight’s longer-wavelength colors like red and orange to get through while blocking the shorter wavelengths of yellow, blue and green,” NASA said. “Those longer wavelengths give the sky a red or orange tinted appearance. Similarly, during sunrise and sunset times when the sun is near the horizon, sunlight has to travel through more of Earth’s atmosphere to get to you. The additional atmosphere filters out the shorter wavelengths and allows the longer wavelengths to get through, providing reds and oranges during those times.” A regional air pollution control organization the Bay Area Air District. collaborated NASA’s claims stating that the apocalyptic skies are due to light being filtered through smoke from California’s worst fire season on record. Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California, Los Angeles Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, shared a video on Twitter that shows what he guesses to be a “smoke cyclone.” Swain called it “a meteorological feature I don’t think I’ve seen before.” Wildfires have already burned a record 2.3 million acres in the state of California, making this wildfire season the most severe in modern history. Several other areas, including Washington, Oregon, and Colorado, also continue to experience uncontrollable blazes. According to data from the National Fire Interagency Center in an update posted on September 10th, there are currently, 102 large fires that have burned 4.4 million acres of land in 12 states. For a full list of large fires see the National Fire Interagency website here.
Wildfire burning ‘out of control’ at Vancouver Island ecological reserve -- Firefighters are battling a wildfire that has erupted in an ecological reserve south of Nanaimo on Tuesday. The fire was discovered Tuesday afternoon in the Woodley Range Ecological Reserve. As of approximately 5:45 p.m., the fire was roughly 0.15 hectares large and considered “out of control,” according to Coastal Fire Centre information officer Donna MacPherson. MacPherson says that seven BC Wildfire Service firefighters and three helicopters are at the scene, as well as local fire departments. At this point, there is no estimate as to when the fire may come under control. Firefighters are expected to be “working until dusk” at which point they will reassess the situation, said MacPherson. The BC Wildfire Service suspects that the fire was human-caused. No structures are threatened because of the fire, said MacPherson.
Beirut Residents Warned Toxic Smoke Has Settled Over City Following New Port Fire - Coming a little over a month after the deadly Aug.4 ammonium nitrate blast which destroyed Beirut's busy port and leveled entire neighborhoods in the surrounding downtown area, Thursday's fire reportedly centered on an oil and tire storage depot at the same location sent residents panicking as they thought they were in for a repeat of the earlier blast which left over 190 dead and more than 6,000 injured.As of early Friday, Lebanese military and firefighting units have put out the blaze, but health organizations are now warning that the black smoke which thickly settled over the city is likely toxic. Residents are being told to protect themselves, and avoid venturing outdoors until the fumes clear. "Burning tires produce a lot of fine particulates, visible smoke and ash but also a lot of volatile organic pollutants that can be inhaled even outside the smoke plume," the environmental Greenpeace said, according to local media."The smoke can include highly toxic and carcinogenic compounds, black carbon and other particulates and acid gases," the statement warned.The Beirut fire still not under control. The toxic fumes wrap around the city, 180 degrees, then head out to sea pic.twitter.com/tiCPv4Ldm5— Liz Sly (@LizSly) September 10, 2020The Washington Post's Liz Sly also observed that "the toxic fumes wrap around the city, 180 degrees, then head out to sea."Lebanese atmospheric chemistry specialist Najat Saliba is also warning residents that given continued storage of unknown chemicals in the port area, the air is now potentially dangerous. Found at the port are explosives, highly corrosive hydrofluoric acid and "unknown" chemicals stored in open spaces without any high safety measures. Who is the person responsible and why did ministries of industry, environment and health allow this to happen? @khadditbeirut pic.twitter.com/nOLqxlRuBj
La Niña forms, could worsen hurricanes and wildfires - La Niña, the cooler sibling of El Niño, has arrived.And it could provide an additional boost to the already active Atlantic hurricane season, forecasters said, as well as extend the disastrous fire season in the West.The La Niña climate pattern – a natural cycle marked by cooler-than-average ocean water in the central Pacific Ocean – is one of the main drivers of weather in the U.S. and around the world, especially during the late fall, winter and early spring.Federal government forecasters from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced La Niña's formation Thursday. NOAA said this year's La Niña (translated from Spanish as “little girl”) is likely to persist through the winter. It's the opposite pattern of El Niño (little boy), which features warmer-than-average ocean water. “La Niña can contribute to an increase in Atlantic hurricane activity by weakening the wind shear over the Caribbean Sea and tropical Atlantic Basin, which enables storms to develop and intensify,” said Mike Halpert, deputy director of NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center.“The potential for La Niña development was factored into our updated Atlantic hurricane season outlook issued in August,” he added. In that outlook, forecasters predicted that as many as 25 storms could form in the Atlantic. Already, 17 have formed, including Hurricane Laura, which ravaged portions of southwestern Louisiana in August. As for its impact on the western fires, La Niña tends to bring dry weather across portions of California and much of the Southwest. “We’re already in a bad position, and La Niña puts us in a situation where fire-weather conditions persist into November and possibly even December,” Ryan Truchelut, president of Weather Tiger LLC, told Bloomberg News. “It is exacerbating existing heat and drought issues.” Already, over half of the state of California is in a drought, according to Thursday'sU.S. Drought Monitor. A typical La Niña winter in the U.S. brings rain and snow to the Northwest and unusually dry conditions to most of the southern tier of the U.S., according to the prediction center. The Southeast and Mid-Atlantic also tend to see warmer-than-average temperatures during a La Niña winter. Globally, La Niña often brings heavy rainfall to Indonesia, the Philippines, northern Australia and southern Africa.
New York City Residents Document Flooding for Community Project - Many of New York City's coastal residents are plagued by flooding – during storms and on sunny days."There are certain times of the year associated with the new and full moons where it brings higher-than-normal high tides. And with that, those tides can bring flooding into communities," says Helen Cheng, a former coastal resilience extension specialist with New York Sea Grant and with the Science and Resilience Institute.She says in the Jamaica Bay watershed, flooding can block access to the subway station that people need to get to work from day to day."Even services, sometimes – you know, the delivery of mail – can get impacted by water on the streets."Cheng says tidal flooding is getting worse as sea levels rise, and it's important to know how people are affected. So as part of the Community Flood Watch Project, residents document and report flooding."There's a lot of value in on-the-ground information and community data, right? Because they're living in these places and experiencing these events 24/7," she says. Cheng says the data improves flood warnings and sea-level-rise predictions, and it helps city leaders understand how flooding affects people's lives.
River Nile in Sudan at highest levels since records began - A 3-month state of emergency has been declared in Sudan amid severe flooding described by Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok as "catastrophic and painful." More than 100 people have died, over 100 000 homes have been damaged or destroyed, and about half a million residents have been displaced since the start of the rainy season. On the island of Tuti, where the Blue Nile and White Nile meet to form the main Nile, water levels reached 17.57 m (57.6 feet) last week -- the highest since records began more than 100 years ago. Sudan minister of labor and social development Lena el-Sheikh reported Saturday, September 5, that aside from more than 100 fatalitiesdue to severe flooding this year, around 46 people were injured and more than 100 000 houses partially or totally collapsed. Among the worst affected areas is the Eltomaniat Village in Khartoum, which has been completely submerged in floodwaters, according to the National Council for Civil Defense. The village had about 350 households, and all residents have been left homeless. "This isn't the first time the Nile has flooded its banks, but those affected say it's the worst they've ever seen," Al Jazeera's Hiba Morgan said, adding that almost half a million residents have been displaced as a result.The Defense and Security Council was prompted to declare a three-month national state of emergency, designating Sudan a "natural disaster zone" due to the devastating floods. Meanwhile, PM Hamdok, who called the floods "catastrophic and painful," said his administration is proactively working on how to deal with the floods in the future. Heavy rains are forecast to continue in Sudan through the month of September, as well as in neighboring Ethiopia.
At least 21 dead, thousands of homes destroyed or damaged after severe flooding hits Nigeria - At least 21 people have lost their lives while around 51 000 families have been displaced after severe flooding struck Nigeria following last week's heavy downpours, the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) reports. Heavy rains struck the state of Jigawa last week, damaging or destroying thousands of homes and displacing 51 000 families. The death toll has risen from 16 to 21, SEMA executive secretary Yusuf Sani reported Monday, September 7, noting that most of the victims were children. "We were providing all the necessary emergency reliefs to the affected victims, including, food, medicine, sugar, canoes, and temporary shelter," he added. 17 of 27 local government areas of the state have been affected, with Gwaram, Birnin Kudu, Kirikasamma, and Gumel as the worst-hit. Wide swaths of farmlands were also washed away, and the crops that have been lost were worth billions of naira. At least 21 people have lost their lives while around 51 000 families have been displaced after severe flooding struck Nigeria following last week's heavy downpours, the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) reports. Heavy rains struck the state of Jigawa last week, damaging or destroying thousands of homes and displacing 51 000 families. The death toll has risen from 16 to 21, SEMA executive secretary Yusuf Sani reported Monday, September 7, noting that most of the victims were children. "We were providing all the necessary emergency reliefs to the affected victims, including, food, medicine, sugar, canoes, and temporary shelter," he added. 17 of 27 local government areas of the state have been affected, with Gwaram, Birnin Kudu, Kirikasamma, and Gumel as the worst-hit. Wide swaths of farmlands were also washed away, and the crops that have been lost were worth billions of naira. "Even though we are yet to ascertain the extent of damage by the flood to the farmlands, we have on record that the farmers at the affected areas incurred colossal of their crops," said Sani. "We have already deployed our assessment teams who are working round the clock to assess the extent of the loss incurred by our farmers and to report back to our office for further action." Authorities assured that the state government has accommodated many victims in camps, and relief materials are being provided on a regular basis. The items include food, blankets, rubber mats, tents, clothes, buckets, and cooking utensils.
Deadly floods hit Burkina Faso and Ghana, West Africa (video) Severe flooding struck parts of Burkina Faso and Ghana this week, resulting in extensive property damage and at least 8 fatalities. Heavy rainfall has been affecting the West African countries since mid-August, displacing many residents. In Burkina Faso, heavy rainfall from September 4 triggered flooding in Kaya, Center-Nord, killing at least four people. Earlier flooding affected Ouagadougou following heavy downpours from August 30, which damaged numerous houses and properties. In Ghana, flooding swept through roads, bridges, homes, and farmland in the Northern and North East regions due to heavy rainfall and spillage from the Bagre Dam in Burkina Faso around mid-August. Electricity company SONABEL, which manages Bagre Dam, said the releases were necessary due to high water levels. Residents near the banks of the Black and White Volta rivers in Ghana were urged to evacuate. Floods from heavy rains around September 5 to 6 have caused property damage and at least four deaths in the North East. Two of the casualties were reported in the Bunkpurugu District and one each in the municipalities of West Mamprusi and East Mamprusi. Areas of Mamprugu Moagduri District have also been severely affected.
Deadly flash floods paralyze north Algeria, more than 800 homes inundated - Heavy rains from September 7 to 8, 2020, triggered flash floods in Algeria's northern provinces, killing at least one person and leaving more than 800 homes inundated. A number of road accidents were also reported, causing major traffic disruption in at least five municipalities.One person, who was believed to be a child, died after being swept away by floodwaters in Mila, according to the Algeria Civil Protection.The flooding came as torrential rains hit the north, with Baraki recording 63 mm (2.5 inches) of rain in a 24-hour period.Elsewhere, rescue teams saved three people from a stranded vehicle in an inundated tunnel in Oum El Bouaghi. The civil protection also rescued several others trapped in floodwaters in Batna. Around 800 houses were affected by flooding in Boumerdes and 40 in Khenchela.In the capital Algiers, numerous road accidents were reported, paralyzing traffic across the city. Local media said torrential rains led to "congestion across Algiers' main roads network." Tunnels, residential buildings, and shops were flooded, "restricting people's movement around the city." Severe traffic disruption impacted at least five municipalities, including Sidi M'Hamed where two buildings partially collapsed.
200 000 people homeless after severe floods hit Far North, Cameroon - About 200 000 people remain homeless as of September 10, 2020, after severe floods struck the Far North Region of Cameroon. At least five fatalities have been reported, livestock and crops have been affected, and thousands of houses have been damaged or destroyed. Flood victim Souley Amadou told Koaci that the affected people have no shelter and sleep outside on the ground, asking the government to come to their aid. Another victim said they have nothing left to eat, and children were suffering the most. Some locals had to build their own makeshift camps. "We're losing people, animals, onions, grain, the chickens, everything. The floods just take everything. We are left with nothing here in Merem." Flooding has swept away livestock and damaged plantations. An embankment along the Logone River has also been washed away. Many bridges have collapsed, isolating some residents. Around 200 000 people have been left homeless as floods destroyed thousands of houses. Electricity has also been disrupted for days. "Today, we ask the public authorities to help the population of Merem, which is underwater and flooded. We even have displaced people, some of them have been resettled in Youma, Congeleo, Wideo, even in Kairoum," local Issa Nassifou appealed. Further heavy rains are expected in Cameroon this week.
Exceptional rainfall and record floods hit African Sahel - Exceptionally heavy rains and record floods across West, Central, and East Africa have affected millions of people in recent weeks, with more than 200 people dead and hundreds of thousands left homeless. Unprecedented rainfall has destroyed homes and crops, adding to the already extremely difficult situation caused by historic locust outbreak and violent conflicts. Among that worst-hit this year by severe flooding are Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Ghana, Niger, Mali, Nigeria, Congo Republic, Sudan, and Senegal. At least 110 people were killed in 11 countries of West and Central Africa, and more than 760 000 affected. Of those, 71 have been killed in Niger. The worst affected country is Sudan, with at least 102 fatalities and tens of thousands of houses damaged or destroyed, the interior ministry reported. The Eltomaniat Village in Khartoum has been badly hit as floodwaters completely submerged the area. Around 350 families resided in the village, who have all been left homeless when the flooding struck. "There has never been so much destruction," said one resident from the state.
Widespread floods affect 2.5 million people, over 1 million acres of crops in Sindh, Pakistan - (video) Record rainfall and resulting floods in Pakistan's Sindh Province have affected nearly 2.5 million people and over 405 000 ha (1 million acres) of crops since the start of the rainy season. In total, 15 000 villages were inundated, more than 77 000 homes destroyed and over 137 000 damaged.According to Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah, the most affected district in the province is Mirpurkhas, with 931 901 people affected, followed by Umerkot, with 697 900 people. Mirpurkhas is dependent on agriculture and livestock, with most of the population living in extreme poverty.Heavy rains caused the Chenab and Indus rivers to burst their banks, forcing residents in districts such as Khaipur, Jamshoro and near the Guddu Barrage to evacuate. In Rahim Yar Khan, more than a dozen villages were submerged after the Indus River became swollen.In Khairpur, more than 1 000 people were trapped and forced to help themselves as government aid reportedly did not reach the area on time. People in Jamshoro also suffered the same situation. Provincial management officials warned that floods in Guddu Barrage are expected to increase on September 10. "A high alert has been issued, camps have been formed, and patrolling in these areas has been increased," said engineer Aftab Khoso.It’s not just that people’s homes have been destroyed," Jahangir Junejo, a landlord in the Sindhri tehsil of Mirpurkhas district, told Dawn.com."Standing crops on thousands of acres have been wiped out. Now, the landlords have suffered heavy losses and the farmers have no work," he explained, adding that villagers were literally dying of hunger.In addition to floods, the region is now battling huge mosquitos. "They are killing our livestock," another resident said. "They are unlike any you may have seen. They are bigger than the house fly and don't even move when you shoo them away." "This is a sorry sight," said a resident of Abu Bakr Junejo village, Mirpurkhas. "The people of this region always buried their dead, even the livestock. But now they are dying in such numbers that they are forced to abandon the bodies on the roadside."
Tropical Storm "Rene" moving across Cabo Verde Tropical Storm "Rene" formed at 21:00 UTC on September 7, 2020, as the 17th named storm of the 2020 Atlantic hurricane season. Rene is also the earliest forming 17th Atlantic named storm on record, breaking the old record set by Rita on September 18, 2005. The storm is moving across Cabo Verde today, bringing locally heavy rain and life-threatening surf and rip current conditions. At the time Rene was officially named, its center was located about 180 km (115 miles) E of the Cabo Verde. The storm had maximum sustained winds of 65 km/h (45 mph) and was moving WNW at 19 km/h (12 mph). Tropical Storm Warning was issued for the entire state.
Seven 'Disturbances' Swirl In Atlantic As Experts Brace For Active Late Season - On Thursday, we outlined the La Nina weather pattern has likely been the culprit behind dangerous wildfires in the western U.S., and, as we highlighted as early as Aug. 13, the 'super active' hurricane season. As Bloomberg describes, La Nina "triggers an atmospheric chain reaction that stands to roil weather around the globe, often turning the western U.S. into a tinder box, fueling more powerful hurricanes in the Atlantic and flooding parts of Australia and South America." While we have covered the wildfire situation in the western U.S. - it's now time to turn our attention back to a meteorological dilemma developing in the Atlantic basin. The National Hurricane Center (NHC) is tracking seven systems - yes - seven systems - which were highlighted in their Thursday morning tropical update: "This is what September 10, the peak of the hurricane season, looks like! We are monitoring 7 systems in the Atlantic, including Tropical Storms Paulette and Rene. The tropical waves in the eastern Atlantic have the highest chances of formation," NHC said in a Twitter post.Two of the disturbances are named storms, called Paulette and Rene, are both traversing the central Atlantic Ocean heading west-north-west. The other five systems are described as disturbances that have yet to become storms but should be watched carefully over the next five days. Three of the disturbances, located on the map below, are highlighted in yellow, situated near the U.S. The Atlantic hurricane season tends to peak around Sept. 10, but with La Nina conditions formed, it suggests the back half of the season could remain very active. "Typically, what ends Atlantic hurricane seasons is that vertical wind shear gets too strong," said Phil Klotzbach, a research scientist at Colorado State University, who spoke with CNN. "So, El Niño, via its impacts on vertical wind shear, has a stronger impact on September and especially October hurricanes than it does on August hurricanes. With La Niña, vertical wind shear tends to be lower, and consequently, we end up with more active late seasons. Some are likening this year's La Nina as the 'La Nina from hell.'
Hurricane Watch Issued for Parts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama as T.S. Sally Leaves Florida -- Tropical Storm Sally is moving through the southeastern Gulf of Mexico and will bring heavy rain and gusty winds to Florida and the Gulf Coast through the weekend and into next week, potentially as a hurricane. A hurricane watch has been issued from southeastern Louisiana to the Alabama/Florida border, including Lake Pontchartrain, Lake Maurepas, and metropolitan New Orleans. Hurricane conditions are possible in this area by early Tuesday. A tropical storm watch has also been expanded westward to the Alabama/Florida border and currently includes the Florida panhandle eastward to the Ochlockonee River in the Florida Big Bend, including Apalachicola and Panama City. Tropical-storm-force winds are possible there by Sunday night or Monday morning. Tropical storm watches also are in effect for portions of central Louisiana and southwestern Mississippi. Sally has been producing scattered showers and thunderstorms over central and southern Florida with bands of rain expected through the evening and overnight hours. Lower Matacumbe Key in the Middle Florida Keys has received 8-12 inches of rain since early Saturday morning. Marathon, Florida set a new September daily rainfall record by 5 p.m. Saturday with more than 6 inches of rainfall. The record has been in place for more than 60 years. Key West set a daily rainfall record dating back to 1924. These bands of rain are bringing gusty conditions to South Florida. Wind gusts of 40-55 mph were recorded from Boca Raton to Miami Beach Saturday morning.
New Tropical Depression Forms in an Active East Atlantic Ocean- Two areas in the eastern Atlantic also being watched for the possible formation of a tropical depression this week. One of them may cross the Atlantic and become a threat to the northeastern Caribbean We're watching a new tropical depression and one other tropical wave moving westward from the coast of Africa. Tropical Depression 20 formed Saturday evening around 2000 miles east of the Lesser Antilles. It is expected to intensify but will move into the open Central Atlantic over the next five days. When this system becomes a tropical storm, it will gain the name "Teddy." Another tropical wave is located near the Cabo Verde Islands, which will get drenched over the next day or two as the wave moves through.Conditions may be favorable for some gradual development of this system as it moves slowly northwestward over the far eastern Atlantic early next week. We're also watching Tropical Storm Sally in the Gulf of Mexico. The forecast for this potential hurricane threat for the Gulf Coast can be found here.. The 2005 hurricane season previously held the record earliest "P", "R", "S" storms, Philippe on Sept. 17 and Rita on Sept. 18 and Stan on Oct. 2, respectively. After Sally, only three names are left in the 2020 Atlantic hurricane season names list. Additional storms after "Wilfred" would be named after letters in the Greek alphabet starting with "Alpha". That has happened only once before, in the 2005 hurricane season.
Think 2020's disasters are wild? Experts see worse in future - A record amount of California is burning, spurred by a nearly 20-year mega-drought. To the north, parts of Oregon that don’t usually catch fire are in flames. Meanwhile, the Atlantic’s 16th and 17th named tropical storms are swirling, a record number for this time of year. Powerful Typhoon Haishen lashed Japan and the Korean Peninsula this week. Last month it hit 130 degrees in Death Valley, the hottest Earth has been in nearly a century. Phoenix keeps setting triple-digit heat records, while Colorado went through a weather whiplash of 90-degree heat to snow this week. Siberia, famous for its icy climate, hit 100 degrees earlier this year, accompanied by wildfires. Before that Australia and the Amazon were in flames. Amid all that, Iowa’s derecho — bizarre straight-line winds that got as powerful as a major hurricane, causing billions of dollars in damages — barely went noticed. Freak natural disasters — most with what scientists say likely have a climate change connection — seem to be everywhere in the crazy year 2020. But experts say we’ll probably look back and say those were the good old days, when disasters weren’t so wild. “It’s going to get A LOT worse,” Georgia Tech climate scientist Kim Cobb said Wednesday. “I say that with emphasis because it does challenge the imagination. And that’s the scary thing to know as a climate scientist in 2020.” “I strongly believe we’re going to look back in 10 years, certainly 20 and definitely 50 and say, ‘Wow, 2020 was a crazy year, but I miss it,’” Waleed Abdalati, NASA’s former chief scientist, said. That’s because what’s happening now is just the type of crazy climate scientists anticipated 10 or 20 years ago. “It seems like this is what we always were talking about a decade ago,” said North Carolina State climatologist Kathie Dello.
Earth May Temporarily Pass Dangerous 1.5℃ Warming Limit by 2024, Major New Report Finds -- The Paris climate agreement seeks to limit global warming to 1.5℃ this century. A new report by the World Meteorological Organization warns this limit may be exceeded by 2024 – and the risk is growing. This first overshoot beyond 1.5℃ would be temporary, likely aided by a major climate anomaly such as an El Niño weather pattern. However, it casts new doubt on whether Earth's climate can be permanently stabilized at 1.5℃ warming.This finding is among those just published in a report titled United in Science. We contributed to the report, which was prepared by six leading science agencies, including the Global Carbon Project.The report also found while greenhouse gas emissions declined slightly in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, they remained very high – which meant atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have continued to rise.Concentrations of the three main greenhouse gases – carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄) and nitrous oxide (N₂O), have all increased over the past decade. Current concentrations in the atmosphere are, respectively, 147%, 259% and 123% of those present before the industrial era began in 1750. Concentrations measured at Hawaii's Mauna Loa Observatory and at Australia's Cape Grim station in Tasmania show concentrations continued to increase in 2019 and 2020. In particular, CO₂ concentrations reached 414.38 and 410.04 parts per million in July this year, respectively, at each station. Growth in CO₂ emissions from fossil fuel use slowed to around 1% per year in the past decade, down from 3% during the 2000s. An unprecedented decline is expected in 2020, due to the COVID-19 economic slowdown. Daily CO₂ fossil fuel emissions declined by 17% in early April at the peak of global confinement policies, compared with the previous year. But by early June they had recovered to a 5% decline.We estimate a decline for 2020 of about 4-7% compared to 2019 levels, depending on how the pandemic plays out. Although emissions will fall slightly, atmospheric CO₂ concentrations will still reach another record high this year. This is because we're still adding large amounts of CO₂ to the atmosphere.
UN report: Increased warming closing in on agreed upon limit - The world is getting closer to passing a temperature limit set by global leaders five years ago and may exceed it in the next decade or so, according to a new United Nations report. In the next five years, the world has nearly a 1-in-4 chance of experiencing a year that’s hot enough to put the global temperature at 2.7 degrees (1.5 degrees Celsius) above pre-industrial times, according to a new science update released Wednesday by the U.N., World Meteorological Organization and other global science groups. That 1.5 degrees Celsius is the more stringent of two limits set in 2015 by world leaders in the Paris climate change agreement. A 2018 U.N. science report said a world hotter than that still survives, but chances of dangerous problems increase tremendously. The report comes on the heels of a weekend of weather gone wild around the U.S.: Scorching heat, record California wildfires and two more Atlantic storms that set records for earliest 16th and 17th named storms.Earlier this year, Death Valley hit 130 degrees (54.4 degrees Celsius) and Siberia hit 100 degrees (38 degrees Celsius). The warming that has already occurred has “increased the odds of extreme events that are unprecedented in our historical experience,” Stanford University climate scientist Noah Diffenbaugh said.
Svalbard experienced hottest summer on record - Glaciers are melting, permafrost thaws and buildings are sagging. What scares the scientists most is studies of decomposing carbon from beneath the ground being emitted to the atmosphere as CO2 or methane. These greenhouse gases will then contribute to further climate changes, causing more Arctic permafrost to melt. Such self-reinforcing cycle, called the permafrost carbon feedback, is now studied at several locations at Svalbard. “Core samples from Janssonhaugen shows an increase in temperatures of more than 2°C at a depth of 10 meters. Measurements of the temperatures show a steady increase over the last 20 years,” Isaksen tells. The researchers have made one drilling to 102 meters depth and another 15 meters down in the permafrost. “This summer has been extreme,” Average temperatures for June, July and August have varied from year. Until about 1990, this variation was typically 0,5 to 1°C with some single years 1,5°C over or under the normal. In the 1990s, a clear change was observed, and after 1997 the researchers have not registered a single summer with a mean temperature under the normal. The summers are getting warmer and warmer and 2020 was exceptional. New all-time high was measured at Longyearbyen airport on July 25 with 21,7°C. Permafrost at Svalbard has entered the era of megamelt, and together with Russia’s Arctic coast, no other places on the earth warms faster. Also the sea ice in the surrounding Arctic Ocean experiences melting at a rate much faster than previous climate models predicted. As of September 1, Arctic sea ice extent stood at 4,26 million square kilometers, the second lowest extent for that date in the satellite recordings that started in 1979, according to the National Snow & Ice Data Center. International climate scientists are following developments on Svalbard with scare. Permafrost contains twice as much carbon as the atmosphere, and with thawing permafrost, more and more of the CO2 and methane are emitted as the organic material previously frozen start to decompose. Releasing of carbon from the permafrost will contribute additionally to warming climate.
Growing Underwater Heat Blob Is Speeding Demise of Arctic Sea Ice - A recent Science Magazine feature blamed an underwater heat blob for exacerbating sea ice loss as it proclaimed what many Arctic scientists already know: Arctic sea ice is racing toward its demise.Even without the blob, ice levels were already catastrophically low."There can be little doubt that the vast majority of Earth's ice loss is a direct consequence of climate warming," UK scientists from Leeds and Edinburgh universities and University College London researching the massive ice loss wrote in their review paper, The Guardian reported.One study from the University of Copenhagen determined that Arctic sea ice is melting faster than climatemodels had predicted because they use a "slow and steady" temperature increase model for the Arctic, but warming is actually happening at a more rapid pace, reported Barron's. The Arctic is warming at least twice as fast as the rest of the globe, a different study found, and this is speeding sea ice loss."We have been clearly underestimating the rate of temperature increases in the atmosphere nearest to the sea level, which has ultimately caused sea ice to disappear faster than we had anticipated," University of Copenhagen professor and researcher Jens Hesselbjerg Christensen told Barron's.The last time the Arctic Ocean saw such unusually high temperatures was during the previous ice age, Barron's reported. Christensen warned that scientists had yet to realize the significance of this steep temperature rise, Futurity reported."We have looked at the climate models analyzed and assessed by the UN Climate Panel. Only those models based on the worst-case scenario, with the highest carbon dioxide emissions, come close to what our temperature measurements show over the past 40 years, from 1979 to today," Christensen told Futurity.
Monitoring the Arctic Heatwave: Alarmingly High Temperatures, Extreme Wildfires and a Significant Loss of Sea Ice - Over the past months, the Arctic has experienced alarmingly high temperatures, extreme wildfires and a significant loss of sea ice. While hot summer weather is not uncommon in the Arctic, the region is warming at two to three times the global average – impacting nature and humanity on a global scale. The Northern Hemisphere saw its hottest July since records began — surpassing the previous record set in 2019.The Russian town of Verkhoyansk, which lies above the Arctic Circle, recorded a staggering 38°C. Extreme air temperatures were also recorded in northern Canada. On 11 August, Nunavut’s Eureka Station, located in the Canadian Arctic at 80 degrees north latitude, recorded a high of 21.9°C – which were reported as being the highest temperature ever recorded so far north. The image above shows the land surface temperature recorded on 11 August around Eureka. Although heatwaves in the Arctic are not uncommon, the persistent higher-than-average temperatures this year have potentially devastating consequences for the rest of the world. Firstly, the high temperatures fuelled an outbreak of wildfires in the Arctic Circle. Images captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-3 mission show some of the fires in the Chukotka region, the most north-easterly region of Russia, on 23 June 2020. Wildfire smoke releases a wide range of pollutants including carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and solid aerosol particles. In June alone, the Arctic wildfires were reported to have emitted the equivalent of 56 megatonnes of carbon dioxide, as well as significant amounts of carbon monoxide and particulate matter. These wildfires affect radiation, clouds and climate on a regional, and global, scale. According to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Special Report, permafrost temperatures have increased to record-high levels from the 1980s to present. Although satellite sensors cannot measure permafrost directly, a recent project by ESA’s Climate Change Initiative (CCI), combined in situ data with satellite measurements of land-surface temperature and land cover to estimate permafrost extent in the Arctic. The thaw of permafrost is also said to have caused the collapse of the oil tank that leaked over 20,000 tonnes of oil into rivers near the city of Norilsk, Russia, in May.
'Zombie Fires' fuel sky-high carbon emissions in the Arctic - "Zombie" wildfires that were smoldering beneath the Arctic ice all winter suddenly flared to life this summer when the snow and ice above it melted, new monitoring data reveals, making this summer's wildfires the worst on record. In early May, just as the spring thaw was beginning in the northern reaches of Siberia, Mark Parrington spotted something strange on images captured by instruments aboard NASA’s Terra satellite. Lots of red dots stood out, indicating some kind of thermal anomaly on a vast white expanse. Thomas Smith, an assistant professor in environmental geography at the London School of Economics, quickly noticed that the hot spots were located in areas that had burned in last year’s epic Arctic fires. “Whatever they are (land clearance? natural?) they were occurring at the same time last year,” Smith wrote, posting a picture of the same location from 2019. “Zombie fires?” Parrington replied. And thus was born a new "catchier" name for what is usually called "holdover or overwintering fires" by fire managers. The name is synonymous with the real danger these fires are causing, though. Once the fires are extinguished at the surface, they can continue to smolder underground, burning through peat and other organic matter. Fueled by methane and insulated by the snow - they can burn all winter long. As temperatures begin to climb in the spring and the soil dries out, the fires can reignite aboveground.This has been the worst year on record for Arctic wildfires, dating back to when monitoring began 17 years ago. In the first half of July, as much carbon was released as a nation the size of C uba or Tunisia releases in a year. The smoke plumes were so large, they covered the equivalent of more than one-third of Canada."The destruction of peat by fire is troubling for so many reasons," Dorothy Peteet, a a senior research scientist at NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, said. "As the fires burn off the top layers of peat, the permafrost depth may deepen, further oxidizing the underlying peat."Copernicus estimates that between January and August of 2020, the fires released 244 megatonnes of carbon. That is more carbon than was released in Vietnam for the whole year in 2017.
Land in Russia’s Arctic Blows ‘Like a Bottle of Champagne’ — A natural phenomenon first observed by scientists just six years ago and now recurring with alarming frequency in Siberia is causing the ground to explode spontaneously and with tremendous force, leaving craters up to 100 feet deep.When Yevgeny Chuvilin, a Moscow-based geologist with the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, arrived this summer at the rim of the latest blast site, called Crater 17, “it left quite an impression,” he said.The pit plunged into darkness, surrounded by the table-flat, featureless tundra. As Mr. Chuvilin stood looking in, he said, slabs of dirt and ice occasionally peeled off the permafrost of the crater wall and tumbled in.“It was making noises. It was like something alive,” Mr. Chuvilin said.While initially a mystery, scientists have established that the craters appearing in the far north of western Siberia are caused by subterranean gases, and the recent flurry of explosions is possibly related to global warming, Mr. Chuvilin said.Since the first site was found in 2014, Russian geologists have located 16 more on the Yamal and Gydansk peninsulas, two slender fingers of land stretching into the Arctic Ocean.Mr. Chuvilin said the conditions causing the explosions, which are still not fully understood, are probably specific to the geology of the area, as similar craters have not appeared elsewhere in Siberia or in permafrost zones in Canada and Alaska that are also affected by global warming.The explosions occur underneath small hills or hummocks on the tundra where gas from decaying organic matter is trapped underground.Contained beneath a layer of ice above and permafrost all around, the gas creates pressure that elevates the overlying soil. The explosions occur when the pressure rises or the ice layer thaws and breaks suddenly. Though the Russian government is encouraging oil, natural gas and mining ventures in the far north, the area is still too sparsely populated for the explosions to pose much risk, Mr. Chuvilin said. Reindeer herder communities had passed along tales of such eruptions before 2014, said Mr. Chuvilin, but Soviet and later Russian scientists had not documented any instances in earlier years. They have likely been rare occurrences until recently. Global warming is heating the Arctic faster than the rest of Earth. “The permafrost is actually not very permanent, and it never was,” Mr. Chuvilin said. Within a year or two of erupting, the craters fill with water and appear no more suspicious than small lakes.
Greenhouse gases hit new record despite lockdowns, UN says - (Reuters) - Concentrations of greenhouse gases in the Earth’s atmosphere hit a record high this year, a United Nations report showed on Wednesday, as an economic slowdown amid the coronavirus pandemic had little lasting effect. The sharp, but short, dip earlier this year represented only a blip in the build-up of climate-warming carbon dioxide, now at its highest level in 3 million years. “We have seen a drop in the emissions this year because of the COVID crisis and lockdowns in many countries ... but this is not going to change the big picture,” Petteri Taalas, head of the World Meteorological Organization, a U.N. agency based in Geneva, told Reuters Television. “We have continued seeing records in atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide.” While daily emissions fell in April by 17% relative to the previous year, those were still on a par with 2006 – underlining how much emissions have grown in recent years. And by early June, as factories and offices reopened, emissions were back up to within 5% of 2019 levels, according to the report by several U.N. agencies. Even if 2020 emissions are lower than last year’s output by up to 7%, as expected, what is released will still contribute to the long-term accumulation since the industrial era.
IEA calls for 'dramatic' scaling up of clean energy tech to meet climate goals --A "dramatic" scaling up of clean energy technologies will be required if the world is to reach its climate and energy goals, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). In a report published on Thursday, the Paris-based body said that while calls to cut greenhouse gas emissions were "growing louder every year," emissions were still at levels it described as being "unsustainably high." "Global CO2 emissions are set to fall in 2020 because of the Covid-19 crisis, but without structural changes to the energy system, this decline will be only temporary," the IEA added. The Energy Technology Perspectives 2020 report explained that solely focusing on moving the world's power sector to clean energy sources would not be enough to achieve net zero emissions. Sectors ranging from transport and industry to buildings would also be required to transition toward these types of technologies, it said. A focus on electrification would be needed alongside other technologies such as bioenergy, carbon capture and hydrogen, it added. In a statement issued alongside the report on Thursday, the IEA emphasized the importance of hydrogen. The organization said it was, "expected to play a large and varied role in helping the world reach net-zero emissions by forming a bridge between the power sector and industries where the direct use of electricity would be challenging, such as steel and shipping." The IEA's report came on the same day that data out of the United States showed how the coronavirus pandemic continued to affect the renewable energy sector in some parts of the country. The U.S. Solar Market Insight Q3 2020 report, citing data compiled by the Solar Energy Industries Association and Wood Mackenzie, said 3.5 gigawatts of solar photovoltaic capacity was installed in the second quarter of 2020, a 6% fall compared to installations in the first three months of the year. Breaking the figures down, installations in the residential section of the industry saw a drop of 23%, while the non-residential sector saw a quarter-over-quarter decline of 12%. In an announcement, the SEIA put these drops down to "restrictions and shelter-in-place orders imposed to curb the pandemic." Austin Perea, a senior analyst at Wood Mackenzie, noted that the impact of the pandemic on residential installations had "varied substantially by geography." "States with more restrictive stay-at-home orders saw significant declines in quarterly solar additions, whereas states with less restrictive stay-at-home directives – such as Arizona and Texas – saw marginal if any decline in quarterly installations," Perea added.
Delaware sues Exxon, Chevron and BP for role in climate change -The Delaware attorney general on Tuesday sued 31 fossil fuel companies, including Exxon, Chevron and BP, accusing them of deceiving the public about the role their products play in causing climate change and damaging the state's environment....Attorney General Kathy Jennings said at a press briefing the companies engaged in a decadeslong coordinated campaign to mislead the public out of greed. The complaint filed by Jennings says the companies have known for more than 50 years that pollution caused by their products would adversely impact the Earth's climate and sea level. It seeks compensation for current and future damages and penalties of $10,000 for each instance in which the defendants violated the Consumer Fraud Act since the mid-20th century. "This is not about stopping climate change," Jennings said. "This is about Delaware surviving it." As the country's lowest-lying state, Delaware is particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change wrought by an increase of greenhouse gas pollution and increased concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere over the past several decades.
Hoboken, New Jersey Sues Oil Industry for Climate Impacts From its ‘Deceptive Actions’ -- New Jersey has now joined the wave of lawsuits seeking to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for climate impacts. The city of Hoboken today filed a case against major oil and gas companies and the American Petroleum Institute (API), a powerful industry trade group which has played a major role in promoting “uncertainty” about climate science.The lawsuit seeks to recover costs associated with climate impacts like extreme flooding and sea level rise. Like other climate liability lawsuits targeting fossil fuel companies, Hoboken’s suit alleges that the oil and gas companies and their lobbying group not only knew early on about the climate harms resulting from their products, but actively engaged in campaigns of deception to undermine climate science and avoid policy responses.“Here in Hoboken, we are now paying the price for these deceptive actions,” Hoboken Mayor Ravi S. Bhalla said during a press conference held Wednesday, September 2. “We cannot sit idly by and let Big Oil continue profiting at the expense of Hoboken residents.”Defendants named in the Hoboken lawsuit include BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, Shell, and Phillips 66, plus the largest trade association in the U.S. for oil and gas, API. This lawsuit is the second climate case in recent months targeting API specifically. The Big Oil trade association is also a defendant in a lawsuit filed June 24 by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison. Hoboken’s lawsuit points to the long history of the oil and gas industry’s knowledge of the potentially damaging impacts of its products on the climate, and the differences between what they came to say about the issue publicly versus privately over time. It cites Frank Ikard, API President in 1965, when he delivered a dire warning about a report on climate change during an oil industry conference: ”[T]here is still time to save the world’s peoples from the catastrophic consequences of pollution, but the time is running out.”
Two dozen N.J. elected officials urge Murphy to sue oil companies - - A bipartisan group of two dozen New Jersey elected officials, from a former governor to small town council members, are urging Gov. Phil Murphy to sue oil and gas companies over the impacts of climate change. The group took out a full-page ad in Thursday’s editions of The Star-Ledger in an effort to publicly pressure Murphy into taking action. The ad argues that New Jersey will need $25 billion to protect against sea level rise alone — a figure that comes from the advocacy group Center for Climate Integrity — and pushes for the governor to force oil companies to pay up. “Our state will need to spend $25 billion to protect our families, homes, and businesses from sea level rise — and that’s just the beginning,” the ad reads. “New Jerseyans want Governor Murphy to take oil and gas companies to court to make them pay their fair share.” The message is lead by former Gov. Richard Codey, a Democrat who now represents parts of Essex County in the state Senate, and seven other state lawmakers: [...] The state lawmakers are joined by freeholders from Atlantic and Union counties; the mayors of Dunellen, Kenilworth, Roselle Park, Garwood and Fanwood; and local council members from nine different towns. The officials were joined by 68 different organizations, including religious groups and environmental advocates.
CARBON CAPTURE: EPA hands Wyo. authority over CO2 injection wells -- Tuesday, September 8, 2020 EPA has granted Wyoming new authority to regulate carbon dioxide injection wells as the state looks for ways to capture emissions from coal-fired power plants.
The Fed Invested Public Money in Fossil Fuel Firms Driving Environmental Racism - Alexis Goldstein -In April, the price of oil fell so far so fast that oil futures contracts went negative. Oil prices have recovered somewhat, but not enough to ever return the industry to its prior state. Analysts predict the U.S. has reached peak oil production and will never again “return to the record 13 million barrels of oil per day reached in November 2019.” ExxonMobil, which has been a part of the Dow Jones Industrial Average market index for 92 years, was removed last week and replaced with the software firm Salesforce. But while financial analysts sound the alarm about this dying industry, the Federal Reserve has been buying up the debt of fossil fuel companies through a pandemic emergency program. We the public, together with the Fed, now own over $315 million in bonds of fossil fuel firms, including those with a track record of environmental racism.Among the many Fed rescue programs is the Secondary Market Corporate Credit Facility (SMCCF), which buys corporate debt of companies. The program is supporting fossil fuel corporations in notably disproportionate numbers: More than 10 percent of the Fed’s bond purchases are fossil fuel companies, even though fossil fuel firms only employ 2 percent of all workers employed by firms in the S&P 1500 stock market index.These bonds are effectively a public investment because the Fed is leveraging $25 billion from the CARES Act as a down payment for the SMCCF’s bond purchases. Together with the Fed, the public now holds the corporate bonds of ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, Phillips 66 and Noble Energy. And it seems likely the Fed will be holding these fossil fuel bonds until they mature — up to five years into the future for some of them — based on comments Fed Chair Jerome Powell made to Congress.
Governor awaits info on rumored Trump announcement on ethanol - Radio Iowa - Governor Kim Reynolds says she cannot confirm what the Trump Administration may be planning to announce regarding oil company waivers from ethanol blending requirements. During a stop in Atlantic this afternoon, Reynolds said she saw the Reuters report on Tuesday evening that indicated Trump has directed the EPA to deny waivers the oil industry requested in previous years. “We’re waiting for verification, so I hope it’s true,” Reynolds said. “It’s good news, but we’re waiting to see.” The EPA has yet to announce its decision on dozens of oil industry requests to be excused from the federal mandate that a certain amount of ethanol be blended into gasoline each year. These so-called “gap year” waivers date back to 2011. The oil industry just filed a request for the U.S. Supreme Court to review a circuit court decision that the EPA has failed to follow federal law when granting past waivers. There’s also a separate batch of ethanol waivers for 2019 and 2020 and Reuters reporting does not indicate the president’s rumored directive would apply to those.
Connecticut weighs options for making electric vehicle rebates more equitable - The new board overseeing Connecticut’s electric vehicle rebate program is grappling with how best to restructure the program to incorporate used vehicles and attract more low- to moderate-income purchasers.A proposal currently under consideration maintains the current point-of-sale rebates of $1,500 for new electric vehicles with a battery range of more than 200 miles, and $500 for all others. For the first time, a supplemental rebate of $1,500 to $2,000 would be available to income-eligible households. But many of the 100-plus public comments submitted last month in response to that proposal argued that the base rebate amounts are too low, especially as compared to neighboring states. “They’re terrible,” said Barry Kresch, one of the leaders of the EV Club of Connecticut. Those levels have been in place since last October, when funding for the program, called the Connecticut Hydrogen and Electric Automobile Purchase Rebate Program, or CHEAPR, was running low. The state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection decided to lower the rebates to stretch the funding out until 2020.
More Vermont solar companies looking to help pollinators — Vermont’s solar farm developers are becoming more enamored with having sites double as habitat for bees and other pollinators. According to Renewable Energy Vermont, this summer, Green Lantern Solar built its 20th pollinator-friendly site on a 4.5 acre property in New Haven. The company worked with Bee the Change, an organization based around Middlebury that works with solar developers to plant wildflowers and the like around solar farms. “When we started in 2015, there really wasn’t much of a sense that pollinators were important or in trouble,” said Bee the Change founder Mike Kiernan. He said the hardships being faced by well-known “ambassador” species, such as honeybees and monarch butterflies, helped change that, along with studies and surveys backed by the United Nations showing troubling declines in bee populations in North America and Europe. Kiernan said that 25 years ago one could find 17 species of bumblebee in Vermont, the most prevalent among them being the rusty patched bumblebee, which is endangered along with several others. “Of those 17 species we had 25 years ago now we’re down to 10, and of the seven that are endangered four are gone,” said Kiernan. “It doesn’t matter what you build for habitat, they’re not coming back, and that’s an unprecedented rate of loss during the human time on this planet.” Pollinators like bees are considered a “keystone” species, meaning they fill a role that many other species benefit from or depend on. “This U.N. survey indicates this crisis is of equal importance as climate change when you look at the future of our food security and quality of life on the planet,” said Kiernan. He said he’s pleased solar developers are interested in doing this work, since the longer it takes to become widespread, the fewer pollinators there will be to benefit from it.
Ohio sets hearing for $214 million Pickaway Solar Project — The Ohio Power Siting Board has scheduled an Oct. 22 public hearing on a 199.6-megawatt solar farm in Pickaway County in south-central Ohio, Kallanish Energy reports. The $214 million project will occupy about 1,375 acres within a larger 2,276-acre tract for the alternating current facility. The solar farm is being developed by Atlanta Farms Solar Project LLC, a subsidiary of Savion LLC. It will be located in Deer Creek and Perry townships near the village of Williamsport. The facility is expected to begin service in 2022. It will produce enough electricity to power about 70,000 homes. The project will create 575 construction jobs and up to five full-time permanent jobs.
Wisconsin lawmakers seek review of power line impact on Upper Mississippi refuge - Two Wisconsin lawmakers are calling on federal officials to reexamine the impacts of a controversial power line on the Mississippi River and surrounding national refuge. In separate letters, U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Madison, and U.S. Rep. Ron Kind, D-La Crosse, questioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s plans to grant an easement through the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge for the Cardinal-Hickory Creek transmission line.The high-voltage line would use 14 towers — up to 20 stories high — to carry wires along a 260-foot-wide corridor through the refuge from the Turkey River bottoms in Iowa to the site of a former power plant north of Cassville.The project would disturb about 39 acres of the 240,000-acre refuge.Baldwin said her primary concern is the harm to migratory birds and that the chosen route does not minimize the impacts. “The final Environmental Impact Statement notes that the Fish and Wildlife Service did not have a preferred environmental alternative,” Baldwin wrote. “There were no route alternatives in the final selection that would have avoided the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife Refuge, so the managers of this natural resource were selecting among options with negative impacts.”Kind noted the refuge’s status as an internationally recognized flyway for migratory birds and its popularity with the public, attracting more than 3.7 million visitors a year.Kind called on the Fish and Wildlife Service to conduct a “full and fair analysis” of routes that don’t cut through the refuge.“The purpose of Congress creating Refuges is to provide protection against development and incursions,” Kind wrote. The Fish and Wildlife Service has determined the power line is a “compatible use” of the refuge, and the right-of-way permit is expected to be signed in the coming weeks.
Utilities: Mandating outage fixes within three days would drive up electric rates - Connecticut’s largest electric utilities warned Tuesday that forcing them to pay refunds to customers after prolonged outages would dramatically drive up rates for all households. Eversource and United Illuminating also warned the legislature’s Energy and Technology Committee that to restore most major outages within 72 hours would require significant staffing increases — another recipe for higher consumer costs. “It’s going to have devastating cost impacts on customers going forward,” James J. Judge, chairman, president and CEO of Eversource Energy, testified via teleconference Tuesday. “The consequences are very daunting.” And if utilities were forced to reverse most major outages within 72 hours — or face more financial penalties — it would have to add thousands of staffers, also at ratepayers’ expense. Tuesday’s committee hearing was to review a bill drafted in response to Tropical Storm Isaias — the August 4 event that caused nearly 1 million power outages in Connecticut — and the major utilities’ handling of the recovery. The measure freezes electric rates while directing the state’s Public Utility Regulatory Agency to craft new “performance-based regulations” and rates by September 2022.
What’s Ailing California’s Electric System? - California made headlines for all the wrong reasons recently with widespread rolling power outages in the middle of a heat wave and a pandemic. These blackouts were not an accident—they were intentionally scheduled by the grid operator, the California Independent System Operator (CAISO), due to a shortage of resources available to keep the lights on.The California blackouts led to a frenzy of hot takes and finger-pointing based on instant diagnoses of the problems. The situation is like a Rorschach test on which people superimpose their preconceptions about energy. Opponents of renewable energy, including President Donald Trump, blame the outages on California’s use of solar and wind to decarbonize their power supply. Others have jumped to the conclusion that this must be a recurrence of Enron-type market manipulation as in the 2001 energy crisis. Still others have offered silver bullets based on whatever they are selling.It is important to diagnose the problem correctly so that we don’t administer the wrong medicine. While a full examination should be done, some causes can preliminarily be ruled out. There is no evidence so far that market manipulation was afoot. There is also no evidence that California’s solar and wind generation did not perform as designed. Wholesale markets in other regions of the country are delivering increasing amounts of renewable energy and keeping the lights on. I think California has four “preexisting conditions” that need to be addressed to avoid this happening again.
- 1. Lack of clear accountability for having the resources to keep the lights on. In California, the roles of the CAISO and the state regulators to keep the lights on are quite tangled. CAISO has the job of dispatching power plants but has little authority to ensure they get built. Lining up enough resources is largely under the supervision of state regulators. In other words, the buck stops nowhere.
- 2. Lack of resources to balance solar and wind power. These “balancing” resources can be gas-fired plants, pumped water or battery storage, hydroelectric power, or the collective actions of homes and businesses to move their consumption to different times of the day. California does not have enough of these resources. See problem #1—someone needs to be in charge.
- 3. Closing disfavored resources before opening the new ones. California has been decisive about what resources it doesn’t want anymore, including many of its gas-fired power plants and its last nuclear power plant. It has been much slower to actually construct resources to take their place. I
- 4. Operating in a silo. California would benefit from a regional market that took advantage of different weather, time zones, and resources to keep the lights on at least cost. California legislators have repeatedly considered legislation to change CAISO to allow regional operation, but have preferred in-state control. I believe that decision should be reexamined to take California into the future.
Duke Energy plans rapid growth for battery storage across Carolinas - Charlotte Business Journal - Duke Energy Corp. owns a little under 10 megawatts of battery storage on its Carolinas grid now that its 8.8-megawatt battery in Asheville is online. It plans about 300 megawatts within five years. Within 15 years, the company projects it will have anywhere from 1,050 to 5,800 megawatts of battery installed and in operation.“It’s all very doable,” Zak Kuznar, Duke’s managing director for energy storage and microgrid development, says of even the most ambitious plans. “You will just see us deploying batteries that act a lot more like power plants — maybe as large as 500 megawatts in some cases.”The technology, he says, is essentially already available. The most important immediate need is for commercial-scale production of batteries that increase storage capacity from four hours to six. Duke (NYSE: DUK) is currently testing a small six-hour battery at its McAlpine microgrid in south Charlotte. “Everyone in the industry is interested in the R&D going on for long-duration batteries,” he says. “The transition to six hours-plus … that is where you can start supplementing peaker plants.”Duke also has ambitious plans for battery storage in Florida. The immediate plans largely call for using batteries to improve the quality of power on the system, regulating fluctuations and to some degree complementing solar development by offsetting the intermittent nature of solar projects.Current storageDuke Energy Carolinas and Duke Energy Progress currently have about 9 additional megawatts under construction. They are a 4-megawatt battery attached to a microgrid for the remote Hot Springs mountain community and a 5-megawatt battery in Anderson County, South Carolina, as part of a microgrid there. All are largely power quality and microgrid related. Duke operates small batteries in pilot projects and has a 95-kilowatt battery in a very small microgrid for a ranger observation tower on Mount Sterling. But in the next few years, Kuznar says, Duke has plans for larger batteries. That includes some that would be attached to the transmission system and large enough to operate as power plants to quickly meet short-term peaks and reduce the need to run traditional turbine gas plants and other peakers.In the Carolinas, the 15-year plan for increased use of storage is included in the Integrated Resource Plans filed in North and South Carolina last week. Duke proposes six scenarios, with a broad range of potential use of battery capacity.Under what is essentially a business-as-usual scenario, Duke would expect to have 1,050 megawatts worth of batteries in the Carolinas by 2035. If the federal or state governments put some kind of price on carbon dioxide emissions — with a tax or cap-and-trade system, for example — Duke would expect to more than double that to 2,200 megawatts by 2035. Duke also would need that much capacity if it were to decide — or be required — to close its remaining coal plants as quickly as possible.
Opponents challenge Duke Energy as it seeks to pass on coal-ash costs to customers - Charlotte Business Journal - Duke Energy Carolinas is seeking what would amount to a 2.1% rate hike for two years. That rate, if no new rate cases are held in the next several years, would eventually rise to 7% as Duke completes repaying customer excess taxes it collected before state and federal governments cut corporate tax rates.
CAMPAIGN 2020: Climate heresy in Wis. as Democrats call for 'clean coal' -- Thursday, September 10, 2020 -- A union leader on Joe Biden's transition team yesterday pitched the Democratic presidential nominee's climate plan as an "all of the above" energy strategy, while an additional union official used the same campaign event to tout "clean coal."
Climate: Natural Gas is the Rich World’s New Coal - Even the cleanest fossil fuel is losing its appeal to rich nations. Just a few years ago, natural gas was hailed as vital for the transition toward an economy that runs on renewable energy. But sentiment is changing and the fuel is going the same way as coal, its dirtier sibling shunned by governments, utilities and investors. The cancellation of the giant Atlantic Coast pipeline in the U.S. and Ireland’s decision to scrap backing for an import terminal this summer are the latest signs that gas is falling out of favor with everyone from regulators to asset managers. As countries intensify efforts to meet climate obligations, the fuel used for heating, cooking and power production is poised to lose out to solar, wind and private and public energy efficiency measures. While natural gas only emits about half the carbon dioxide of coal, flaring and methane leaks have tarnished its reputation across the globe, according to Nick Stansbury, head of commodity research at Legal & General Investment Management Ltd. in London. Many investors are also shying away to instead allocate funds to projects aligned with objectives of the Paris Agreement, he said. “Gas companies have underestimated that the public opinion is changing rapidly,” said Stansbury. “Coronavirus lockdowns have had a role in that change, as investors are also stepping back and rethinking how things should be done.” More than 1,200 institutions managing over $14 trillion in assets have committed to divest from fossil fuels, up from 181 managing $50 billion five years ago, according to a report from Fossil Free, an international environmental movement.
Coal’s Moment in the Sun, Courtesy of Natural Gas – WSJ - Coal is on its way out of the electrical grid, but not without some dying flickers. Cheap, cleaner natural gas had been eating away coal’s market share for some time. But with natural gas prices edging toward $2.5 per million British thermal units, nearly 70% higher than the lowest point this year, the tables are about to be turned. Natural gas prices are being propped up by stronger-than-expected power demand—lots of air conditioners running in homes helped offset losses in commercial usage—as well as muted supply. Energy companies halting production from oil wells due to low oil prices have shut off associated gas in the process. Despite the price rally so far, producers are cautious about ramping up production, having weathered so many lean years. As a result, the U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that coal’s share of electricity generation will tick up to 22% in 2021 from 18% this year while natural gas-fired power’s share will decline to 35% from 40%. That comes after more than a decade over which coal gradually lost share. What do you see in the near future for the natural gas market? Join the conversation below. RBC analyst Christopher Louney estimates that natural gas burn for electricity could decline 2% year over year in 2021 while coal generation picks up 6%—at the conservative end of his forecast. Despite cheerleading from the White House, the reversal will do little to salvage coal’s bleak future. But it reveals how cutthroat the natural gas business has been in recent years. There have been other surges—in 2018 natural gas prices struck close to $4 and temporary gas-to-coal switching was observed—but those rallies weren’t as sticky as analysts predict this one will be and were never enough to shift the annual share of electricity away toward coal. Luke Jackson, team leader for North American natural gas at S&P Global Platts, expects natural gas prices to average $2.90 for the remainder of 2020 and $3.30 for 2021, while RBC’s Mr. Louney estimates prices will edge up to $2.60 in the fourth quarter and gradually move up to $2.80 by the end of 2021. The shift will vary significantly by region. The Midwestern and Southeastern power markets, which need to bring in natural gas through pipelines, already are seeing signs of natural gas-to-coal switching, according to Mr. Jackson. Pipelines are running at full capacity, leading to regional gaps in natural gas prices. As an example, prices for the Chicago Citygate index in the Midwest averaged $2.05 in August, while the price in Dominion South—a hub close to the gas-producing Marcellus and Utica basins—was $1.21. The Midwest and the Southeast also still rely on coal for a substantial share of their electricity generation: The hydrocarbon accounted for 49% and 44% of electricity generated in the respective markets as of midday Friday. The Northeast, on the other hand, is closer to dry gas basins and hasn’t seen signs of coal switching yet. That could change in winter months when heating demand surges. Yet none of this portends a lasting comeback for coal-fired power. Already, many coal plants are unable to operate enough hours to cover costs and some have evaluated plans to run only during seasons with high demand. This may not be the last time that market forces temporarily reverse the tide. Coal’s fade to black could be a long one.
Residents weigh in on future of Bull Run site - At a recent Zoom conference of the group Bull Run Neighbors, residents of Oak Ridge, Powell and Claxton weighed in on the future of Bull Run Fossil Plant and its coal ash storage. While many expressed a desire to make sure everything stayed safe with the site’s fly ash, bottom ash and gypsum, collectively called coal combustion residuals or CCR, they differed on whether it is safer to keep it in place or move it to another location. At present, these materials are in various places around the plant, including storage areas near the Clinch River and near Claxton Community Park. They also had different ideas on how best to use the area after the plant's planned closing. New Market resident Axel Ringe, a member of the Harvey Broom Group Sierra Club, as well as Bull Run Neighbors, started the meeting by saying the future ownership and development of the Bull Run Fossil Plant site will depend on “what you as a community want.” TVA has previously stated it plans to close the Bull Run Fossil Plant by 2023. The utility recently presented what it called a “potential” re-development timeline, with decisions on coal ash storage “under the direction” of the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation happening in 2022 and 2023. In 2024, the demolition and deconstruction would start and the final closure of coal ash, “if stored in place,” would be in 2028. The utility stated this schedule would be longer if TVA decides to ship the coal ash from its current areas to somewhere else, rather than sealing it where it is currently located. TVA has yet to formally commit to any plan for these materials. Bull Run Neighbors, which hosted the Zoom conference, is a group that has, in its newsletter and official statements, been critical of TVA. No representatives from TVA were present at the meeting. However, Adam Hughes a community organizer with Statewide Coalition for Community eMpowerment (SOCM) showed screenshots from the utility’s recent virtual open house on Bull Run's future, which included TVA statements. Chuck Head, the TDEC Bureau of Environment assistant commissioner, explained at the Zoom conference that TDEC, a state environmental regulatory agency, required that TVA study the effects of these coal-burning byproducts on the environment. He said TDEC is collecting duplicate samples alongside TVA, but won’t make any decisions until the study is complete.
Trump EPA guts tough standards for toxic metals dumped into US waterways by coal-fired power plants, including biggest polluter on Lake Michigan - Chicago Tribune Towering above Lake Michigan north of the Wisconsin border, the Oak Creek coal-fired power plant is one of the largest sources of toxic metals dumped into American waterways.Only six other power plants nationwide released more arsenic, lead, mercury and other metals into lakes and rivers last year, according to a Chicago Tribune analysis of federal records. On the shores of Lake Michigan, no other polluter comes close. By now the coal plant’s owner should have dramatically reduced its pollution. In 2015, theU.S. Environmental Protection Agency adopted stringent limits on metals that stick around in the environment and become more dangerous as they move up the food chain. But President Donald Trump’s political appointees stalled the regulations soon after taking office in 2017, and last week they gutted the Obama-era standards for Oak Creek and other fossil fuel plants. The Trump EPA’s alternative fails to require the most effective treatment methods, pushes back deadlines and exempts many power plants from doing anything at all. Buried in the fine print of the Republican administration’s new regulations is a stunning admission: Benefits for energy companies would come at the expense of more than 20 million Americans who drink water and eat fish from lakes and rivers polluted by coal plant discharges. Low-income Black and Latino communities face disproportionate risks from the pollution, the Trump EPA also acknowledges in its regulatory documents.“There is just no way anyone can justify that trade-off,” said Betsy Southerland, who led an EPA team that drafted the Obama-era rule and became a vocal critic of the agencyafter retiring in 2017.
Illinois House Panel Investigating Possible Disciplinary Action Against Speaker Madigan Will Consult With Feds Before Calling Witnesses (CBS) — An Illinois House committee weighing possible disciplinary action against Speaker Michael Madigan over the ComEd bribery scandal will coordinate with federal prosecutors before calling any witnesses or seeking any documents in the case.The House Special Investigating Committee held its first hearing Thursday in Springfield as lawmakers on the panel consider whether to recommend Madigan face any political sanctions over his dealings with ComEd, which has been charged with a years-long bribery scheme that sought to influence the nation’s longest-serving House Speaker.Republicans who are seeking disciplinary charges against Madigan provided a preliminary list of witnesses they’d would like to testify, but chairman Emanuel “Chris” Welch (D-Hillside) said the committee first will consult with the U.S. Attorney’s office in Chicago to avoid interfering with the ongoing federal investigation.“It is imperative that this committee communicate and consult with the U.S. Attorney’s office,” Welch said. “Before we take any substantive action, we must consult with the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District. This committee must avoid taking any action that can be an interference with an ongoing federal investigation.”
Dominion Energy applies for additional 20-year license for its North Anna Power Station nuclear reactor units - Dominion Energy, Virginia’s largest utility company, is seeking approval from federal regulators to continue operating its two nuclear reactor units in Louisa County until the years 2058 and 2060. The Richmond-based company said Friday it has filed an application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to renew the North Anna Power Station’s operating licenses for additional 20-year terms. An approval of the license would allow the company to operate the two reactors beyond a current license extension that was granted in 2003, which enabled the company to run the reactors until 2038 and 2040. The original licenses for the two North Anna reactor units were granted in 1978 and 1980. As with all U.S. nuclear power plants, the original licenses were granted for 40 years. “Our application to renew North Anna Power Station’s licenses for another 20-year period is good news for our customers, the regional economy, and the environment,” said Dan Stoddard, Dominion Energy’s Chief Nuclear Officer, in a statement on Friday. “Our customers will benefit from continuing to receive safe, reliable, affordable, and carbon-free electricity from the station through 2060.” Dominion has said for several years that it intended to seek a license renewal for North Anna, but a spokesman for Dominion said the company only recently entered the period when it could file for renewal because the original license for the North Anna Power Station Unit 2 would have expired this year.
Hogg Warns of Possible Nuclear Catastrophe in West Texas — “If there was an accident the immediate contamination radius is 50 miles,” said Jon Mark Hogg, the Democratic Party candidate for congress, district 11. Hogg is talking about the proposed high level nuclear waste storage in Andrews that is working its way through the federal and state agencies right now. Andrews is a town near Midland. Hogg sat down for an interview on camera after the candidate forum at the San Angelo Home Builders Association luncheon in San Angelo on Wednesday. There, he faced his two opponents, Wacey Alpha Cody, the Libertarian candidate; and August Pfluger, the Republican candidate. Hogg opposes storage of highly radioactive waste in CD-11 and this has become one of his signature issues. Hogg explained that to get the radioactive waste here, from over 100 nuclear power plants, it will be transported by rail through Dallas/Fort Worth, Abilene, Big Spring, and Midland. The cargo is very large, highly radioactive spent fuel rods from nuclear power plants. “It’s a big issue and not well-known across the district. But when people find out about it, they are surprised,” Hogg said. The facility also exposes the oil fields of the Permian Basin to a national security threat. Hogg claimed the nuke waste facility will become a terrorist target.
Nuclear power facility in Scotland will not be safe for other uses until the year 2333, report finds - In 313 years’ time, 378 years after it first opened in 1955, and 339 years after it ceased operations in 1994, the 178-acre nuclear power facility site at Dounreay will be safe for other uses, a new report has stated. Though the site on the north coast of Scotland was only home to functioning nuclear reactors for 39 years, the clean-up will take roughly ten times as long, with efforts already underway to clean up hazardous radioactive material. The facility, near Thurso, was used by the government for research and testing of various types of nuclear reactors, including a "fast reactor" and those intended for use on nuclear submarines. The first reactor at the site to provide power to the National Grid was the Dounreay Fast Reactor, which provided power between 1962 and 1977. A second reactor also pumped power into the grid between 1975 and 1994. A draft reportfrom the government’s nuclear decommissioning authority states the site will only be ready for other uses after the year 2333. Over the next two years, Dounreay Site Restoration Limited has said it will undertake assessments of “installations, current and future disposals, areas of land contamination, sub-surface structures and other discrete site conditions” to determine “credible options for the site end state”. But the report’s “Roadmap for Mission Delivery”, charts an endpoint of 2333 for Scottish sites. A process of demolition of buildings and waste removal is already underway at the site, which has previously been used to store dangerous radioactive material. Part of the demolition process has involved the use of a remote controlled robot nicknamed the “Reactosaurus”, a 75-tonne device with radiation-proof cameras, and robotic arms which are able to reach 12 metres into the reactors where they can operate an array of size-reduction and handling tools, including diamond wire and disks and hydraulic shears. One of the areas targeted for waste removal is a highly contaminated area called the Shaft. In 1977, a catastrophic leak allowed seawater to flood a 65-metre-deep shaft which was packed full of radioactive waste as well as more than 2kg or sodium and potassium. The water reacted violently with the sodium and potassium, throwing off the massive steel and concrete lids of the shaft, and littered the area with radioactive particles. All radioactive waste is due to be removed from the Shaft by 2029, the report states. The site also leaked radioactive fuel fragments into the sea in the local area for decades, between 1963 and 1984. The dangerous pollution affected local beaches, the coastline and the seabed. Fishing has been banned within a two-kilometre radius of the plant since 1997. Milled shards from the processing of irradiated plutonium and uranium, are roughly the size of grains of grains of sand. The most radioactive of the particles are believed to be potentially lethal if ingested. These small fragments are known to contain caesium-137, which has a half-life of 30 years, but they can also incorporate traces of plutonium-239, which has a half-life of over 24,000 years.
Nuclear Bailout Repeal Sparks Debate Over Electric Bill Costs | WOSU Radio - The Ohio House will begin to hold hearings on a possible repeal of a sweeping energy law that bailed out two nuclear power plants, among several other things. Supporters and opponents of the law, which is now at the center of a federal bribery investigation, are fighting over what the final cost would be on electric bills. On Thursday, the newly formed House Select Committee on Energy Policy and Oversight will convene to hear a Republican-backed proposal on how to repeal HB6 and revive the law it replaced. It will include sponsor testimony for HB746, which was introduced by GOP Reps. Laura Lanese and Mark Romanchuk soon after the arrest of former House Speaker Larry Householder. Under HB6, ratepayers will see new monthly charges of up to about $2.35 to pay for the nuclear, coal and solar subsidies. But supporters say electric bills will ultimately be lower due to the roll back of clean energy standards. Opponents of HB6, including Trish Demeter with the Ohio Environmental Council Action Fund, counter that claim by arguing that the energy efficiency standards ended up saving ratepayers an average of $7 a month, with an average net benefit of about $4. "The numbers that are being presented by HB6 supporters ignores the savings that are being enjoyed by Ohioans as a result of successful energy efficiency programs that were gutted in HB6," Demeter says. Chris Neme, principal of the Energy Futures Group, explains that the energy efficiency programs are required by law to be cost effective. Before a utility attaches an increased charge on electric bills for efficiency programs, it must be approved by the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio. "The programs are required to be cost effective, so if in fact you actually do reach a tipping point where you can't get savings that are worth more than the cost of the programs, the programs will be rejected by the commission," Neme says. The House and Senate are currently holding hearings to repeal HB6, which federal investigators say was the subject of a $60 million bribery scheme allegedly led by the former House Speaker. Householder and four associates have all pleaded not guilty to federal racketeering charges.
State watchdog seeks probe of utility tied to bribery scheme — Ohio’s consumer watchdog has asked a regulatory agency to conduct an independent investigation of the state’s largest electric utility, FirstEnergy Corp., that federal authorities have tied to a $60 million bribery scheme involving one of Ohio’s most powerful politicians. The Ohio Consumers’ Counsel in a motion filed late Tuesday with the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio has asked that outside investigators examine whether money collected from consumers “was improperly used for any activities in connection with HB6 instead of for electric utility service.” HB6 is now considered a tainted piece of legislation that, in part, created a $1 billion bailout of two Ohio nuclear power plants owned by a FirstEnergy subsidiary until early this year. The law requires a charge on all Ohio ratepayers’ electric bills to fund the nuclear bailout. The Consumers’ Counsel also asked that the investigation and a management audit determine whether FirstEnergy violated any state laws or regulations. The investigation should examine FirstEnergy’s corporate governance and its “corporate relationships” with other FirstEnergy subsidiaries, the motion said. HB6 was pushed through the Legislature last year by then-Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder. It also includes a provision potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars to FirstEnergy that customers would pay for.
Ohio House Bill 6 legislative opponents make case for repeal - cleveland.com— Ohio state lawmakers made their case for repealing House Bill 6 on Thursday before a legislative panel, noting the scandal surrounding its passage and questioning whether the owner of two nuclear power plants needs the law’s $1.3 billion public bailout.Republican state Reps. Laura Lanese and Dave Greenspan, as well as Democratic state Reps. Mike Skindell and Michael O’Brien, testified before the Ohio House Select Committee on Energy Policy and Oversight in favor of their respective bills that would repeal the controversial legislation.HB6 has come under severe scrutiny since state Rep. Larry Householder (the former House speaker) and four allies were arrested for an alleged $60 million bribery scandal to pass the legislation on behalf of FirstEnergy Corp., whose former subsidiary – now a separate company called Energy Harbor – owns the Davis-Besse and Perry nuclear plants that stand to receive bailout money starting next year.Lanese, who represents a suburban Columbus district, noted in her testimony that Energy Harbor, previously called FirstEnergy Solutions, moved earlier this year to buy back hundreds of millions worth of its stock, calling into question whether the company actually needs the bailout money in order to keep the plants in operation.Greenspan, of Westlake, questioned in his testimony whether the word “bailout” should be used to describe House Bill 6, saying the money for the nuclear plants should instead be called a grant with no accountability.“How many other Ohio businesses would like to qualify for a grant with those criteria?” Greenspan asked. “The answer is simple: All of them.”Both Republicans also questioned a separate part of HB6 called “decoupling,” which gives FirstEnergy Corp. and other Ohio utilities permission to collect a guaranteed amount of revenue per year through at least 2024.House Bill 746 would repeal all of HB6. “We must have a clean slate to start from,” Greenspan said.Skindell, a Lakewood Democrat who is sponsoring an identical repeal bill, House Bill 738, testified that “Legislation adopted by means of corruption, in and of itself, is corrupt.”He continued: “The confidence and trust of Ohioans cannot be restored until there is a complete and immediate repeal of legislation founded in corruption.”O’Brien, of Warren, called HB6 “corporate welfare” and “the worst energy legislation” passed by any state in the 21st Century.
Bill Seitz's FirstEnergy bailout bill is one target of a subpoena - Energy and Policy Institute -Records show Rep. Bill Seitz, the third-ranking Republican in the Ohio House, worked with FirstEnergy to draft a nuclear power plant bailout bill that’s now the subject of a federal subpoena. As part of the federal racketeering case against the now-former Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder and several associates, the FBI subpoenaed the Ohio House in July for records related to four bills. The bills, introduced between 2017 and 2019, all aimed to bail out nuclear plants owned by a subsidiary of FirstEnergy (FirstEnergy Solutions or FES) that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2018, and emerged this February as a separate new company called Energy Harbor. The last of those bills, House Bill 6, passed last year and is now at the center of the federal case against Householder and four other individuals, who are charged with secretly using $60 million from FirstEnergy to support the bill that will force $1 billion in subsidies for the nuclear plants on ratepayers. A front group employed in the alleged scheme also faces charges.Seitz has not been named or charged in the racketeering case, but before Householder’s return to the speakership in 2019, Seitz led the charge on several 2017-18 energy bills that paved the way for HB 6. Those earlier bills sought to separately subsidize coal and nuclear plants, and roll back Ohio’s renewable energy and energy efficiency standards. House Bill 6 packaged core elements of those earlier proposals together into what’s been called the “worst energy bill” of the century. Seitz, who has served as the House Majority Floor Leader since June of 2017, remains a staunch defender of HB 6. He’s refused to step down from his leadership position despite a request to do so from the new speaker Bob Cupp, and is said to be considering a run for the speakership next year.
Here’s what Bob Cupp intends to do -- and not do -- as Ohio House speaker - —Effective lawmakers have to master two different – and, sometimes, contradictory – skill sets: politics and policymaking. Bob Cupp, the new Ohio House speaker, is inclined toward the latter.Cupp, though hardly a household name, has been a part of Ohio government longer than other lawmakers have been alive. Quiet and deliberative, he’s a former Ohio Senate majority leader and Ohio Supreme Court justice.But now the lawyer from Lima faces the biggest challenge of his career: putting back in order a discombobulated House reeling from not only two speakers resigning amid scandal in two years, but also internal division both between parties and within Cupp’s own House Republican caucus (which chose Cupp as speaker by a margin of one vote).In spite of all this, Cupp has his sights set on some big-ticket agenda items – from dealing with the scandal-drenched House Bill 6 nuclear bailout law (exactly how is up in the air) to fixing Ohio’s perennially unconstitutional school-funding system.Oh, and he only has three months left in the middle of election season to get his agenda done before he’ll have to convince his colleagues to elect him speaker for a full term.Even two months ago, no one, Cupp included, imagined that he would be in this position. But that was before then-Speaker Larry Householder was federally indicted and accused of overseeing a $60 million bribery scheme to get HB6 passed. Nine days later, the GOP-led House voted Cupp in as speaker.“It’s not anything I wanted to do,” Cupp said in an interview. “My focus was just going to work on public policy. But with this situation occurring as it did, I thought that I could offer something to solve the problem with the House and restore it to credibility.”Cupp is widely considered an ethical politician whose leadership is unlikely to run afoul of the law.
Ohio sees gas production drop, oil production increase - Natural gas production in Ohio in the first quarter of 2020 dropped by nearly 4.6%, while crude oil production increased by 16.0%, according to new data released by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources. Natural gas production dipped from 609,451,574 Mcf in 1Q 2019 to 581,634,083 Mcf in 1Q 2020, Kallanish Energy reports. Crude oil production jumped from 5,073,536 barrels of oil in 1Q 2019 to 5,887,0322 barrels in 1Q 2020. The data reflects production from the state’s horizontal shale wells, mostly in the Utica Shale in eastern Ohio. The state’s quarterly report lists 2,573 horizontal shale wells in Ohio, of which 2,509 reported oil or natural gas production in the quarter. The typical well produced 2,346 barrels of crude oil in the quarter and 231,919 Mcf of natural gas in that time period. Ohio law does not require the separate reporting of natural gas liquids or condensate. The oil and natural gas reporting totals include those commodities. The report is available at https://oilandgas.ohiodnr.gov/production.
Drilling success in area only matter of time - Many of us remember the huge commitment BP, Consol, Halcon Energy and other big-name oil and gas companies made here in the form of mineral rights lease contracts with cash “signing bonuses” for many property owners in Trumbull, Mahoning and Columbiana counties.Hopes were high. Certainly, no big company like BP would invest here if it didn’t really believe it would pan out.The construction of pipelines began. Oil and gas industry suppliers began opening. Vallourec made a massive investment in a pipe factory near the Girard-Youngstown line. I researched the industry, learning about technology and “downstream” petro-chemical businesses that could develop here from byproducts of natural gas drilling. Months and even years later, drillers slowly pulled out of our area, explaining that the Utica shale play in this part of northeastern Ohio was simply too narrow or thin for their sometimes mile-long drill bits to maneuver.Most experts remained optimistic about the future, however, acknowledging that the oil and gas reserves indeed are here and that it’s only a matter of time — albeit years probably — until geologists perfect more advanced technology to access them.Last week, I was pleased to hear Steven Winberg, assistant secretary for Fossil Energy in the U.S. Department of Energy, talk about the drilling industry’s improving technology, the volume of resources and the potential to develop the petro-chemical industry that still exists here.He said, amazingly, if this region, including Appalachia, were an independent country, it would be the third largest natural gas producer on earth. Think about that.In respect to geology and thin shale formations, Winberg said developing technology in coming years will allow us to extract oil and natural gas from thinner formations. That will be possible due to artificial intelligence, high-performance computing and developing data with high-performance computers.It’s not going to happen tomorrow for northeast Ohio, Winberg said. But he is confident it’s going to happen. When it does, that will be a game-changer for our region and our economy.
Clock ticking on pipeline tax appeals - Time is almost up for two natural gas pipeline companies to appeal denials by the Ohio Department of Taxation for tax decreases they say are necessary due to cost overruns. Requests by both the NEXUS Gas Transmission and Rover pipelines for reductions in their public utility tax valuations were turned down by the state July 10. Both pipeline companies had argued in previous appeals that additional costs inflated the budgeted amounts of their projects in Ohio. Fulton County Auditor Brett Kolb previously reported that the NEXUS pipeline has appealed its value at approximately 40% of the original determination, and the Rover pipeline at approximately half of the original determination. Had their appeals been approved, pipeline revenue for county entities would have decreased from $6.7 million to $4.1 million for NEXUS and from $3.99 million to $2.28 million for Rover. Owned by DTE Energy and Canadian-based Enbridge Inc., NEXUS transports approximately 1.5 billion cubic feet of natural gas through 256 miles of 36-inch pipe. In Fulton County, it travels through Amboy, Fulton, and Swancreek townships.The original $2.2 billion cost of the project ballooned to $2.6 billion due to cost overruns that included an additional $120 million in scope reduction costs to decrease the pipeline size from 42 to 36 inches. NEXUS Gas Transmission has argued that Ohio’s tax commissioner should use the value estimated in the pipeline project’s appraisal as its true value. The company also argued that contractor costs and conditions and delays set forth by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission helped caused the project’s cost overruns.The Ohio portion of the pipeline constitutes approximately 83% of its entire length. In a 30-page ruling, the Ohio Department of Taxation noted the Ohio Revised Code’s required use of the capitalized cost of taxable property reflects the pipeline’s true value.Rover pipeline owners Blackstone Group, Energy Transfer Partners, L.P., and Traverse Midstream Partners similarly argued that additional costs are responsible for significantly inflating a budgeted project cost of $4.2 billion to $6.2 billion. The company previously asked Ohio for a reduction in true value due to its additional costs for right of way acquisition and drawing costs, among other overruns. The ODT similarly denied the company’s appeal in a 20-page ruling.
State investigating whether injection well waste affecting drinking water - Brine, a waste byproduct produced in fracking, from an injection well in Washington County has migrated to gas-producing wells at least five miles away, the Ohio Department of Natural Resources reported Friday, and officials want to make sure it’s not getting into drinking water. While state officials said it’s unlikely, it’s possible the brine from the Class II Saltwater Injection Well, Redbird #4 in Dunham Township, could affect drinking water of those in the area. As of Friday, the state has not received any reports affecting human health or safety associated with any of the wells, officials said. Ohio Department of Natural Resources Director Mary Mertz said the state is in the process of hiring an expert to assess groundwater issues. “You can never be too careful. Science evolves. We'll consult with some of the experts in the state like Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, Ohio Department of Health,” she said. “And we'll bring someone on to just take a closer look at groundwater issues and confirm that there's nothing to be concerned about.” If the groundwater does become contaminated, there would be no way to clean it, said Amy Townsend-Small, an associate professor of environmental science and geology at the University of Cincinnati who conducts research on fracking and its effects on groundwater. “That’s the biggest concern for people that live in shale gas producing areas,” she said. Abandoned wells could be source of the brine contaminating the water table, Townsend-Small said. “Abandoned wells are everywhere there. ... And the state does not even know where they all are. So it's a huge problem,” she said. The state released the report Friday “to make residents in the immediate area aware of our investigation and findings,” said ODNR spokeswoman Sarah Wickham. The state has already found 11 abandoned wells nearby, one of which contained the brine wastewater. “We've also compiled a list of all of the orphan and idle wells we can find in that two-mile radius. We're analyzing each one of them to see would it make a difference if we take action?” Ohio has more than 200 injection wells that are full of ingredients that many companies don’t have to disclose citing trade secret protections. “The wastewater from that injection well, was apparently migrating to the surface through an idling or an orphan well. Otherwise they wouldn't have been able to find it,” Townsend-Small said. “Ostensibly, they were pumping the water up (in the conventional gas wells.) Orphan/idle wells aren't pumping, so it's not active. The wastewater is very pressurized because they're injecting such high volumes of it.” Much of the brine waste injected in Ohio’s injection wells comes not only from fracking sites in Ohio, but from other states, such as Pennsylvania. The state plans to add additional conditions to recently issued permits for injection wells in that area that will include additional monitoring and give the state the ability to halt operations if more fluid is migrating, Mertz said. There were also two pending permits that have since been put on hold.
Despite Historic Drop in Crude Oil, Pure Gas Plays Set to Rise - Appalachian and Haynesville basins well positioned for near-term growth — Enverus, the leading oil and gas SaaS and data analytics company, has released its latest FundamentalEdge report which reviews upstream and midstream activity in two active natural gas basins: the Appalachian, composed of the Marcellus and Utica shales in Pennsylvania and Ohio, and the Haynesville, in Louisiana and Texas.Along with the overall economy, the energy industry was drastically impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Operators were forced to readjust their 2020 plans as prices fell due to oversupply in the market. These revised 2020 activity plans called for reduced rig activity and reduced production outlooks from most operators, particularly those in oil-directed plays.The oversupply in the crude market and the subsequent price drop have lowered activity in crude-directed plays. While this activity reduction is needed to help balance the crude markets, associated gas in these areas will also be taken off the market as a result. To offset the drop in associated gas, dry gas plays will need to fill the gap — and this will require higher prices to incentivize production.“While the Saudi-Russian price spat earlier this year, followed by coronavirus pandemic, rocked crude oil demand, gas-reliant industries like heating and power weathered much better,” said Rob McBride, senior director of Strategic Analytics at Enverus.“For all that happened to oil, to some degree the inverse is true for natural gas, and that’s evident in the Appalachian and Haynesville basins,” McBride said. “Natural gas is well poised for the near future. Since the historic crash a few months ago, gas has slowly crept up, but drilling rigs haven’t yet followed suit.”Members of the media can download a preview of the full report or contact Jon Haubert to schedule an interview with one of Enverus’ expert analysts. Key Takeaways: Appalachian — Marcellus and Utica:
- In terms of production, the Marcellus and Utica plays have held strong through the pandemic. Production dropped at the start of the year, and then dropped further in May as wells were shut-in. However, volumes have recovered to levels higher than the start of 2020.
- While production in the Marcellus and Utica has battled through the pandemic, rigs have fallen as a result of COVID-19. That yields the question: How can production be up if new wells aren’t being drilled? The answer is DUCs. The DUC inventory in the Appalachian has been drastically decreased as operators have chosen to complete wells that have already been drilled in the past, as opposed to running rigs and drilling new wells.
- Rigs have fallen off in the Appalachian, but there are still rigs running and new wells being drilled. Production is expected to continue to climb in the Marcellus and Utica. The Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) is expected to come online in early 2021, which will add 2 Bcf/d of takeaway capacity to the region and send gas to the Transco Zone 5 region. Should MVP meet the same fate as the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, which was canceled in early July, pipeline bottlenecks could be seen in the region as early as mid-2021. Enverus does not expect this to happen
Enverus report sees signs of optimism for Marcellus, Utica in 2021 - Pittsburgh Business Times -Signs are increasing that the battered Appalachian natural gas industry is poised for a comeback next year, according to a new report.Enverus, a Texas-based analysis company, reported that the Marcellus and the Utica have been in a relatively decent position during 2020 despite the social and economic upheavals over Covid-19 and rock-bottom commodity pricing. The crash in oil prices and oversupply has led to a drop-off in the natural gas that was produced with the oil in the Permian Basin, which has been a thorn in the side of Marcellus and Utica shale producers for several years.Enverus' FundamentalEdge report focuses on the Marcellus and Utica and another shale basin, the Haynesville in Louisiana and Texas, and said they're likely to benefit as predicted from the falloff in so-called associated gas, which was available in high quanities and cheaply with the rise in oil in the Permian.With that extra supply greatly diminished, that has shone the light on the dry gas from the Marcellus, Utica and Haynesville at a time when demand is likely to go up, said Rob McBride, senior director of strategic analytics at Enverus.The reason for higher natural gas demand? Cooler weather that leads to higher demand for natural gas to heat homes and create electricity at gas-fired power plants."It's not surprising that the dry gas plays are the ones that now look attractive to come back," McBride said. "At the end of the day, for natural gas, the seasonal demand going into winter, it's going to be there."The Covid-19 pandemic and a February price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia over oil prices crushed demand for months and with it, rig counts. Enverus counted 779 active rigs across the United States on March 1 and three months later only 277. That's happened in the Marcellus and Utica as well, falling from 46 rigs across the three-state region to 26 at the end of last month. Not only were the number of new wells and capital spending on drilling drastically reduced — from an already low number due to the commodity prices – but existing production was also cut back by well shutins.McBride said that drillers have this year gone back to drilled but uncompleted wells — known in the industry as DUCs — to finish and replace lost production. That adds production but at a lower cost than it would be to drill and hydraulically fracture a new well. Two producers, Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. and Chesapeake Energy Corp., have all but eliminated their inventory of DUCs by completing 34 wells between the two companies. "They're drawing down on their uncompleted inventory," McBride said. "A lot of these players are trying to be strategic."
Pa. shale gas permits decline YOY in August, despite EQT picking up its pace - After shutting in 1.4 Bcf/d of production volumes in May and pulling few permits for new wells over June and July, the largest U.S. natural gas producer, EQT Corp., is cranking up its machine to catch rising oil and gas prices this fall and winter, according to August shale gas permitting data from Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection. Pennsylvania issued 77 permits for shale gas wells in August, down 24% from the same month in 2019. Nearly half went to EQT, which pulled 38 permits compared to 12 in June and July combined. EQT's August activity was focused on Greene and Washington counties south of Pittsburgh, according to DEP data as of Sept. 4. The increase in permitting activity is a sharp turn for the Appalachian driller. As recently as the company's July 27 second-quarter earnings conference call, President and CEO Toby Rice told analysts that while EQT returned all of the gas it pulled from production in July, the company was ready to shut in gas in the fall if prices stayed low. Joining EQT in Greene County was CNX Resources Corp., which pulled eight permits in August, one more than in July. The state's other big permit puller in August was New York gas company National Fuel Gas Co., which pulled eight permits to drill in north-central Cameron County, acreage that is prospective to both the Utica and Marcellus shales. The state's four other large producers — Southwestern Energy Co., Cabot Oil & Gas Corp., Range Resources Corp. and Chesapeake Energy Corp. — accounted for only 10 permits in August, consistent with lower activity throughout the summer as commodity gas prices at the benchmark Henry Hub stayed below $2/MMBtu until starting to rise in August. Including EQT, the state's top five gas producers accounted for 62% of the state's August permitting activity, while publicly traded drillers accounted for 83% of activity. PennEnergy Resources LLC had seven of the 13 shale gas permits pulled by private drillers in August, according to DEP data. Backed by EnCap Investments LP, PennEnergy operates primarily in Butler County, north of Pittsburgh, on acreage acquired when Rex Energy Corp. went bankrupt in 2018.
Pin Oak Midstream Acquires Assets from Laurel Mountain Midstream in NW Pennsylvania --Pin Oak Midstream, a wholly owned subsidiary of Pin Oak Energy Partners LLC, announces the closing of a transaction with Laurel Mountain Midstream LLC ("LMM”), a joint venture between Williams Laurel Mountain, LLC and Chevron Northeast Upstream LLC, to acquire LMM’s Jackson Center assets. Jackson Center includes over 1,050 miles of natural gas gathering pipelines and five (5) gathering compressor stations with a gathering capacity of over 50 MMcf/d and multiple interstate pipeline interconnects (both National Fuel Gas and Tennessee Gas Pipeline) with total interconnect capacities of almost 100 MMcf/d. The transaction adds to Pin Oak Midstream’s growing asset base within the Appalachian Basin. Brent Breon, President of Pin Oak Midstream LLC and Chief Commercial Officer of Pin Oak Energy Partners LLC, stated, “These assets in Mercer, Lawrence, and Crawford counties of Pennsylvania are a great fit to our expanding footprint and further bolster the Company’s midstream assets in the oil and wet gas windows of the Utica play in northwestern Pennsylvania. The Jackson Center assets currently gather conventional and unconventional gas from third party operators in the area and will allow Pin Oak Energy to connect and produce Utica wells currently waiting on pipelines. Additionally, Pin Oak remains committed to our ongoing efforts of executing our growth strategy through acquisitions even during these difficult times.” Pin Oak Midstream’s Appalachian Basin position consists of nearly 1,200 miles of pipeline assets; 13 interstate pipeline interconnections; gathering, processing and transportation dedications on more than 150,000 dedicated net deep acres (Marcellus and Utica) and current flowing volumes more than 15 MMcf/d.
Frack Check: Trump inflates Pennsylvania fracking job figures by 3500 percent - PGH City Paper Yesterday, President Donald Trump held a campaign rally in Latrobe, Pa., just an hour east of Pittsburgh. There, he lobbed many insults and made many false claims, but arguably none more egregious than one about jobs inPennsylvania’s natural-gas, aka fracking, industry. According to WESA editor Chris Potter, Trump claimed during his speech that there are currently 940,000 natural-gas jobs in Pennsylvania. A gross exaggeration. According to multiple analysis and data from state and federal labor departments, there are around 26,000 jobs in Pennsylvania’s oil and gas industries. Trump inflated the amount of fracking jobs in Pennsylvania by more than 3500%. According to a March analysis of federal employment data by environmental group Food & Water Watch, there were approximately 636,000 jobs directly related to oil and natural gas extraction from 2016-2018 nationally. In Pennsylvania, there were 26,000 jobs in these industries during this time span. Since 2018, the fracking industry has struggled, as gas prices remain low. In the Pittsburgh region, hundreds of jobs have been lost, and large fracking companies are divesting from the area. Other analysis corroborate these figures. According to the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry, there are between 20,000 to 50,000 jobs in, and supported by, the state’s fracking industry. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2017, there were about 967,000 total jobs in the oil and gas and supported industries throughout America. But nothing close to those figures when just counting Pennsylvania jobs. In fact, it is hard to find job figures as high as Trump is claiming in any Pennsylvania sector. Only jobs in “Trade, Transportation, and Utilities” and “Education and Health Services” have figures over 940,000 jobs in the commonwealth. Conservatives and fracking boosters have been known to exaggerate the number of jobs in the natural-gas sector. Local congressional candidate Sean Parnell (R-Ohio Township) claimed in March that “over 100,000 oil and gas jobs in Western PA would vanish” under a plan proposed by Biden that would ban new permits for oil and gas drilling on federal land and off-shore. (Only about 2% of Pennsylvania is comprised of federal land.)Obviously, with only about 26,000 fracking-related jobs in the entire state, this is impossible.
Judge declines to toss charges against pipeline constables — The two state constables arrested last summer on charges of improperly using their official positions while working as private security guards along the controversial Mariner East Pipeline project will have to face trial on those charges after their attempt to have the cases against them thrown out failed. Common Pleas Judge Jeffrey Sommer denied the move by constables Kareem Johnson of Coatesville and Michael Robel of Northumberlnd County to have bribery and conflict of interest charge against them dismissed because they claimed that no actual crimes had been committed when they began working as security guards along the pipeline construction area in West Whiteland. The pair contended that there is no law against constables working for private companies such as the Sunoco Pipeline firm, Energy Transfers Partners, outside the judicial system, and that neither man represented that they were working for any court while they patrolled the pipeline in West Whiteland, as the law prohibits. Although Sommers ruled against them, he did so not on the merits of their claims but because of rules of criminal procedure in Pennsylvania that he agreed did not allow such a pre-trial move. The judge accepted the position of Deputy District Attorney Thomas Ost-Prisco, who argued the case on Monday, that Johnson and Robel had given up their right to argue the quality of evidence against them at this stage in the process because they had waived their right to challenge the case at a preliminary hearing. The pair’s trial is currently scheduled for Sept. 29. However, because of restrictions on criminal trials put in place by the courts due to the corona virus earlier this year, it is uncertain when any trial would be held. Both men remain free on bail, and continue to work as constables. They were arrested in August 2019 when Chester County Detective Ben Martin filed criminal complaints against them after witnessing them working as guards along the controversial pipeline project in West Whiteland, allegedly using their official badges and positions as state officials in doing so.
Pennsylvania DEP Orders Sunoco to Reroute Mariner East II Pipeline After Chester County Spill –- A natural gas liquids pipeline under construction in Pennsylvania will be rerouted after thousands of gallons of industrial waste spilled into a creek last month. The state Department of Environmental Protection ordered Sunoco to reroute the Mariner East II pipeline and divert it around the Marsh Creek Lake and wetlands, a DEP news release says.In August, more than 8,100 gallons of drilling fluid spilled into a tributary of the lake before flowing into the lake itself. 33 acres of the lake were closed off from boating and other recreational uses after the spill. Sunoco has proposed adjusting the pipeline route so it would cross under the Pennsylvania Turnpike and Conestoga Road.Secretary Patrick McDonnell of the DEP called the spill "yet another instance where Sunoco has blatantly disregarded the citizens and resources of Chester County with careless actions while installing the Mariner East II Pipeline.""We will not stand for more of the same," McDonnell added in the news statement. "An alternate route must be used. The department is holding Sunoco responsible for its unlawful actions and demanding a proper cleanup."The department says Sunoco hasn't turned over plans on how it will remediate the impacts of drilling fluid spills and sinkholes. The company told the state that spills are "readily contained and cleaned up with minimal affect to natural resources."
Pa. shale gas permits decline YOY in August, despite EQT picking up its pace - After shutting in 1.4 Bcf/d of production volumes in May and pulling few permits for new wells over June and July, the largest U.S. natural gas producer, EQT Corp., is cranking up its machine to catch rising oil and gas prices this fall and winter, according to August shale gas permitting data from Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection. Pennsylvania issued 77 permits for shale gas wells in August, down 24% from the same month in 2019. Nearly half went to EQT, which pulled 38 permits compared to 12 in June and July combined. EQT's August activity was focused on Greene and Washington counties south of Pittsburgh, according to DEP data as of Sept. 4. The increase in permitting activity is a sharp turn for the Appalachian driller. As recently as the company's July 27 second-quarter earnings conference call, President and CEO Toby Rice told analysts that while EQT returned all of the gas it pulled from production in July, the company was ready to shut in gas in the fall if prices stayed low. Joining EQT in Greene County was CNX Resources Corp., which pulled eight permits in August, one more than in July. The state's other big permit puller in August was New York gas company National Fuel Gas Co., which pulled eight permits to drill in north-central Cameron County, acreage that is prospective to both the Utica and Marcellus shales. The state's four other large producers — Southwestern Energy Co., Cabot Oil & Gas Corp., Range Resources Corp. and Chesapeake Energy Corp. — accounted for only 10 permits in August, consistent with lower activity throughout the summer as commodity gas prices at the benchmark Henry Hub stayed below $2/MMBtu until starting to rise in August. Including EQT, the state's top five gas producers accounted for 62% of the state's August permitting activity, while publicly traded drillers accounted for 83% of activity. PennEnergy Resources LLC had seven of the 13 shale gas permits pulled by private drillers in August, according to DEP data. Backed by EnCap Investments LP, PennEnergy operates primarily in Butler County, north of Pittsburgh, on acreage acquired when Rex Energy Corp. went bankrupt in 2018.
Joseph Otis Minott: EPA’s methane rollback is bad for Pa., nation | Pittsburgh Post-Gazette -- On Aug. 13, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator and former coal lobbyist Andrew Wheeler stopped in Pittsburgh to announce the finalization of another dangerous regulatory rollback. Amid the global pandemic and over 1,000 Americans dying every day from acute respiratory disease, EPA gutted commonsense air pollution standards that protect the public from methane leaks from fracked gas infrastructure. These methane controls, known as the 2016 New Source Performance Standards for the Oil and Natural Gas Industry (2016 NSPS), have been successfully implemented for years. They have already helped prevent hundreds of thousands of tons of industrial methane leaks. Methane, the primary component of fracked gas, is an extremely potent climate pollutant, up to 87 times as efficient at trapping atmospheric heat as carbon dioxide in the first 20 years after its release. Methane is responsible for roughly a quarter of the warming we’ve already experienced. The oil and gas sector is the nation’s largest industrial emitter of methane, and Pennsylvania is the second-largest fracked gas producing state in the country. The commonwealth has tens of thousands of oil and gas wells that emit over 1.1 million tons of methane pollution every year. Pennsylvania has already begun to experience vast and devastating impacts from climate change: higher temperatures, changes in precipitation and frequent extreme weather events, including large storms, flooding, heat waves, heavier snowfalls and periods of drought. This rollback represents terrible public policy, and the approach is particularly nonsensical because EPA identifies no practical or administrative problems in enforcing the 2016 NSPS. It identifies no burden whatsoever to industry in continuing to comply with these rules. It is simply mindless deregulation. Leading oil and gas operators do not even support it! Exxon, BP and Shell have all publicly supported the 2016 NSPS and opposed this dangerous rollback. The consequences would be severe: hundreds of thousands of oil and gas sources nationwide — including many here in Pennsylvania — will be allowed to continue pumping methane (and other harmful pollutants) into the atmosphere every year. Even EPA’s own analysis estimates this rollback will result in an additional 370,000 tons of dangerous methane emissions just over the next five years. This proposal runs directly counter to EPA’s obligations under the Clean Air Act and the enormous factual record demonstrating serious public health harms caused by pollutants from fracked gas infrastructure.
Cleanup of oil spill continues on Buffalo River - The Coast Guard and state Department of Environmental Conservation are investigating an oil spill discovered on the Buffalo River about a month ago near the former ExxonMobil refinery site on Elk Street. The release of oil was first reported Aug. 7 as a sheen on the Buffalo River near Babcock Street, prompting the start of an investigation. Although it's not known when the release began, a statement from the DEC said the amount of oil varies day by day but is generally considered to be two to five gallons, with most of it contained and recovered through mitigation efforts. The property is owned by Elk Street Commerce Park. ExxonMobil, the former owner, is under an agreement with the DEC to investigate and remediate Buffalo River sediments adjacent to its former refinery. The cleanup is being led by LaBella Associates, a Rochester-based environmental consultant. Kayakers and boaters are advised to avoid the northern half of the Buffalo River near the spill. A boom has been placed around the site to capture the petroleum discharge. An analysis indicated degraded light fuel and lubricating oil are entering the Buffalo River near a combined sewer overflow pipe located at the foot of Babcock Street.
Battleground State Poll Shows Voters Are Strongly Supportive of Oil and Natural Gas Development - The Heartland Institute - A new poll from the American Petroleum Institute (API) shows voters in energy-producing swing states support increasing access to oil and natural gas and the candidates who support those industries. The poll of more than 8,600 registered voters in 12 states—Arizona,Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico,Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Texas—was conducted by Morning Consult and found 64 percent of voters would “be more likely to vote for a candidate who supports policies that ensure consumers have access to natural gas and oil produced in the U.S.” Further, 82 percent of voters in these states say “natural gas and oil provide value to their lives,” while 73 percent believe oil and natural gas will be “a significant part of America’s energy needs” in 2040. And while 76 percent of respondents admit that the COVID-19 pandemic has significantly hurt their state’s economy, 63 percent said they expect the oil and natural gas industries to play an “important role” in any economic recovery.What’s more, 93 percent responded that it was important for the United States to not be reliant on other countries for oil, while 92 percent believe it is important to keep energy and gasoline prices affordable.
Gibbstown LNG Terminal Could Be Decided This Week Plans to build New Jersey’s first liquefied natural gas export terminal may get a final vote from the Delaware River Basin Commission this week, prompting a flurry of last-minute protests by opponents including environmentalists and public-health advocates. The interstate water regulator has left open the possibility that its governing body will vote on whether to approve the construction of a dock for LNG tankers on the Delaware River at Gibbstown in Gloucester County, and dredging of the river, even though the matter is not on the formal agenda for the Sept. 10 business meeting. “An action could occur, but it would be at the commissioners’ discretion,” said Kate Schmidt, a spokeswoman for the DRBC, referring to representatives of the governors of New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Delaware plus the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which represents the federal government on the commission’s governing body. The commission approved the project in June 2019 but then suspended its decision and agreed to hold a quasi-judicial hearing in May this year to hear the arguments of Delaware Riverkeeper Network (DRN), an environmental group, about why the dock should not be built. DRN and other critics are urging the commission to reject a recommendation to approve from an officer who presided over the hearing when friends and foes made their arguments over the project. The hearing officer, John Kelly, said in a report issued in July that he had heard no evidence to indicate that the commission should change its previous approval for the project, which would build a second dock for LNG tankers — “Dock 2” — at the planned Gibbstown Logistics Center. The center is being built on a former DuPont site where explosives were made. Kelly said the evidence presented by Delaware Riverkeeper Network and its witnesses had failed to meet their burden of proving that the dock should not be built. “It is recommended that the Dock 2 Docket should remain as previously approved by the commission,” Kelly said in the 102-page report.
Delaware River Basin Commission suspends approval of natural gas terminal — The Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) on Thursday, September 10 voted to hold off on either approving or denying the permit for the proposed Gibbstown Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) export terminal in New Jersey. The commission's decision temporarily prevents the limited liability company Delaware River Partners from constructing New Jersey’s first liquefied natural gas export terminal. Completion of the terminal would allow fracked gas from Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale, to be transported to a processing facility on the Susquehanna River, and finally hauled as liquefied methane to the Gibbstown, NJ. The DRBC originally approved the project in June of last year, however, was challenged by the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, an environmental advocacy group, which argued during an eight-day hearing last May that the dock presented health, safety and environmental risks. "The process of the appeal was concluded very recently, less than 2 weeks ago, and requires a vote by the commissioners about whether to reaffirm the original approval, which is what prompted the vote today," according to a statement from the Riverkeeper. "The voluminous record produced during the appeal process, the full year of legal filings, the eight-day adjudicatory hearing and the fact that legal submittals were made as recently as last week, were cited as the reason for the delay in the decision about the fate of the project." Representatives from New York, New Jersey and Delaware voted to abey approval, Pennsylvania abstained and the federal representative from the Army Corps of Engineers voted no. The representatives from New York and Delaware noted that they wanted to wait on approving construction until after the Riverkeeper's administrative appeal is resolved, but that this decision is "not intended to signal how the appeal will be resolved."
Brooke County commissioners concerned about power plant loan guarantee provision — While the West Virginia Economic Development Authority is expected today to consider a loan guarantee for the proposed Brooke County Power Plant, Brooke County Commissioners said Tuesday they are concerned about a provision that may be included with it.The commissioners said they have learned that Gov. Jim Justice’s office has asked for the Energy Solutions Consortium, the company building the plant, to formally agree to use some percentage of natural gas from West Virginia for the gas-fired plant.A website for the project states it will draw gas from existing pipelines. Equitrans, a Canonsburg, Pa.-based company, has announced plans to build a 16.7-mile pipeline from the Rover pipeline in western Pennsylvania to serve the plant.Once completed, the facility is expected to expected to consume $177.5 million in natural gas per year.Commissioner A.J. Thomas said he’s concerned the provision will deter its developers and others who may consider building in the state.He said the state Development Authority has written to ESC indicating its intention of supporting a $5.6 million loan guarantee for the project, a move he sees as an effort to calm prospective investors in the plant.The state board had been slated in August to consider the guarantee, which would involve the state in repaying the loan should the plant’s developers be unable to. But the board dropped it from its agenda after Gov. Jim Justice raised questions about the project. Some have argued Justice was swayed by interests who see the plant as a threat to the coal industry.
Development board approves loan guarantee for Brooke County Power plant — The West Virginia Economic Development Authority on Wednesday unanimously approved a $5.5 million loan guarantee for the proposed Brooke County Power plant project. The authority’s approval checked one of the final boxes the project needed before construction can begin, which the original proposal projected would be in 2022. A swarm of uncertainty surrounded the vote Wednesday. The authority was set to vote for approval of the loan guarantee during its Aug. 20 board meeting, but the item was pulled from the agenda without explanation and a clear reason was never given. Members of the trades union, oil and gas industry and public, lawmakers and county commissioners were afraid that $5,518,865 was going to derail the entire near-billion-dollar project. The coal industry tanked West Virginia’s first attempt to build the state’s first natural gas-fired power plant nearly four years ago, and some stakeholders said they feared it was going to happen again. Many of these stakeholders spoke in support Wednesday during the meeting’s public comment period. No members of the public spoke against the project. The board went into executive session for nearly an hour to discuss the project before returning for a vote. Authority board member Joe Eddy offered one amendment to the loan guarantee that altered one of the stipulations Gov. Jim Justice asked the authority to review, that the natural gas powering the plant must be from West Virginia. The project’s site, in Colliers, Brooke County, sits just miles from the border with Pennsylvania. The developer’s plan is to connect the plant to the existing Rover Pipeline in Pennsylvania, because there is no pipeline in West Virginia that can reach Colliers.
Trump Administration seeks to relax oil drilling rules through U.S. Forest Service rule change -(WOWK) — A new rule proposed by the U.S Forest Service has conservationists saying the Trump Administration wants to relax oil and gas drilling rules on Forest Service lands.There are currently 5,490 federal oil and gas leases covering about 4.2 million acres — or 2 % — of national forest system lands.The West Virginia Rivers Coalition does not want the Monongahela Forest with its many headwaters to be one of them.“It’s important for us to protect these headwaters which in turn protect not only drinking water and surface water for our state but also the region,” said Dr. Sarah Cross with the coalition.Although there are currently no active gas and oil wells in the Monongahela Forest, they say the plan, proposed on September 1st, could lead to this.“When it comes to this proposed rule, it would make it a lot easier to implement oil and gas drilling on our national forest service lands it would also reduce the public input on the process,” said Cross.Charlie Burd, the executive director of the Independent Oil and Gas Association of West Virginia says the rule is only streamlining the process.“They’re just really proposing to clarify all the processes that the Bureau of Land Management and others have in place,” he said.“It pretty clearly states that it doesn’t relieve the oil and gas operator from any responsibility to protect the land and the resources and the environment.”But Cross says up to a million gallons of water are used in hydraulic fracking. “There would be a lot more soil erosion, roads cut into our national forests, but also we’re very concerned about that much water being taken out of our streams then after the fracking process takes place you have a tremendous amount of water that has to be hauled out,” she said. The Forest Service is taking public comment on the rule proposal until November 2nd.
Mountain Valley Pipeline construction won't jeopardize protected species, federal review says -- Construction of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, should it continue, is not likely to jeopardize five endangered or threatened species of fish, bats and plants, a long-awaited federal authorization has concluded. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on Friday issued a revised biological opinion, which was essentially a rewrite of its finding in 2017. After a legal ch allenge was filed by Wild Virginia and six other environmental groups last August, a federal appeals court stayed the original opinion. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission then issued a stop-work order in October. Following a nearly year-long reconsideration, the Fish and Wildlife Service released a 226-page opinion that found the massive project — which has run into repeated problems with erosion on steep mountain slopes — would not jeopardize protected species. The finding applies to the Roanoke logperch, the candy darter — a second kind of fish that has been added to the endangered species list since 2017 — the Indiana bat, the northern long-eared bat and the Virginia spiraea, a flowering shrub native to southern Appalachia. With the renewed permit in hand, Mountain Valley says it will resume work once the stop-work order is lifted. “We look forward to resolving the few remaining permitting issues, resuming forward construction, and completing the MVP project in early 2021.” However, new legal challenges are likely for any authorizations given to the controversial 303-mile pipeline, which will transport natural gas at high pressure from the Marcellus and Utica shale formations to markets in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern parts of the country. “This dirty, dangerous fracked gas project is years behind schedule, billions of dollars over budget, and was sued by the Commonwealth of Virginia for violating common sense environmental protections hundreds of times,” Joan Walker of the Sierra Club said in a statement. “MVP has shown they can’t be trusted to build this pipeline anyway,” she said, “and they should wise up and walk away from this risky bet like Duke and Dominion did with the ACP [Atlantic Coast Pipeline].” Before completing the $5.7 billion project, Mountain Valley still must obtain a renewed permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for the pipeline to burrow under nearly 1,000 streams and wetlands. Permission from the U.S. Forest Service is also required before the pipe can pass through about 3.5 miles of the Jefferson National Forest. The permits were set aside after environmental groups filed legal challenges in the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. As a result, construction has been delayed by about two years, while costs rose by nearly $2 billion.
MVP One Step Closer to Resuming Construction After New Fish and Wildlife Permits -Crossing one of the items off Mountain Valley Pipeline LLC’s (MVP) regulatory checklist, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) has issued a new Endangered Species Act review of the 2 million Dth/d, 303-mile Appalachian natural gas conduit. Late last week, the USFWS notified FERC that it had finished drafting an up-to-date Biological Opinion (BiOp) and Incidental Take Statement (ITS) for the pipeline, part of federal requirements to review potential impacts to protected species from project construction. The newly issued opinion takes into account “new data” and ensures “that we continue using the best available scientific and commercial information,” the USFWS wrote in a memo to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. MVP first received a BiOp and ITS in 2017 as part of the FERC certification process. However, the BiOp and ITS came under the scrutiny of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, leading to a work stoppage last year while the USFWS reinitiated its consultation process and worked on reissuing the approvals. With the new USFWS permits in hand MVP has cleared “a key hurdle” in its efforts to place the 42-inch diameter pipeline into service, according to analysts at ClearView Energy Partners LLC. ClearView analysts said in a note to clients that they expect MVP to seek FERC approval to resume construction. The memo from USFWS “specifically states that this document replaces the BiOp and ITS issued in 2017,” the ClearView analysts wrote. “Therefore the Fourth Circuit order suspending the 2017 permits becomes irrelevant as FERC would be authorizing Mountain Valley to resume work on the basis of the new permits.” The delays over the USFWS permits are part of a series of regulatory hurdles MVP has faced in its effort to construct a route for Marcellus and Utica shale gas to travel southeast out of West Virginia to an interconnect with the Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line in southwestern Virginia.
Equitrans on track to finish Mountain Valley natgas pipe in early 2021(Reuters) - U.S. pipeline company Equitrans Midstream Corp said on Tuesday it remains on track to complete the $5.4-$5.7 billion Mountain Valley natural gas pipeline from West Virginia to Virginia early next year. That comment follows a decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to issue a new Biological Opinion on Sept. 4, which the project needs to resume construction. Mountain Valley is one of several U.S. oil and gas pipelines delayed by regulatory and legal fights with environmental and local groups that found problems with federal permits issued by the Trump administration. In February 2018 when Equitrans started construction of the 303-mile (488-km) pipeline designed to deliver 2 billion cubic feet per day of gas from the Marcellus and Utica shale, it estimated Mountain Valley would cost about $3.5 billion and be completed by the end of 2018. “We look forward to resolving the few remaining permitting issues, resuming forward construction,” Equitrans said. Equitrans has said it expects to receive new approvals soon from the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that will enable it to finish building the last 8% of the project. Analysts at Height Capital Markets said they expect FERC will lift its stop-work order in “coming days” and the Army Corps will reauthorize the project’s Nationwide Permit 12 to allow stream crossing “shortly thereafter.” “We expect environmentalists and other opponents will challenge each of these permit decisions ... within 1-2 weeks of issuance,” Height Capital Markets said, noting “FERC and FWS have had nearly a year to review the permit, so it should be relatively insulated from legal challenges.” Other projects similarly held up include TC Energy Corp’s $8 billion Keystone XL and Energy Transfer LP’s Dakota Access crude pipelines, which are still involved in court battles.
Second defendant in Franklin County pipeline protest is fined | Crime News - A Massachusetts woman charged last year at the scene of a Franklin County protest against the Mountain Valley Pipeline has resolved her case with a fine.Melissa Dubois, 28, of Worcester appeared at a plea hearing Wednesday in Franklin County General District Court and was found guilty of trespassing. A related charge of tampering with a vehicle was dropped through her agreement with prosecutors.Dubois was ordered to pay a $100 fine plus $152 in court costs, according to Franklin County Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Ashley Neese.The exact details of what led to Dubois’ arrest were not immediately available, but she was charged Aug. 15, 2019, at the same time protester Amory Lei Zhou-Kourvo, 21, of Ann Arbor, Michigan, locked himself to pipeline construction equipment for a little over four hours.Zhou-Kourvo faced the same charges as Dubois but pleaded guilty in June to tampering with a vehicle and paid $189 in fines and court costs. Although he served nine days in jail after he was taken into custody, Neese said records indicate Dubois bonded out the day of her arrest. Dubois’ lawyer, Sandra Freeman, a Denver attorney who has worked from Blacksburg representing pipeline protesters, did not respond to a request for comment and additional information Thursday.
In Virginia battleground, natural gas pipeline projects face reversals - In Virginia, the future of natural gas depends on a highly volatile present. Since June, one pipeline project has shut down, two others suddenly find themselves on shaky footing and the natural gas industry as a whole continues to reel from a series of setbacks, including the bankruptcy of one of its largest firms. Utility giants Dominion Energy and Duke Energy shocked environmentalists in early July when they abruptly canceled the highly contentious Atlantic Coast Pipeline. The ACP was a massive $5.5 billion effort announced in 2014 to convey fracked natural gas 600 miles from West Virginia’s bountiful shale fields through central Virginia and into North Carolina. The utilities had acquired easements along most of the route and had already laid more than 30 miles of pipe in West Virginia. In Virginia, they had clear-cut trees, but hadn’t yet dug trenches or installed pipe. From the start, the ACP battled stiff legal challenges — largely based on natural resources, public health and environmental justice concerns — that swelled the project’s estimated cost to $8 billion. Ultimately, Dominion and Duke decided that ongoing delays, ballooning costs and persistent legal fights were just too much.The demise of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline eliminated a potential competitor for a different pipeline. “It has to work in favor of Mountain Valley Pipeline,” said Sreedhar Kona, a senior oil and gas analyst with Moody's Investors Service. “That is, if MVP gets completed.” In August, the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality rejected a key water-quality permit for the pipeline’s extension into the central portion of that state. The primary section of the pipeline will travel more than 300 miles from northwestern West Virginia to southern Virginia. Though outside the Bay watershed, the project has raised regional concerns over supporting the conveyance of gas harvested through the controversial technique of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. “Resistance to this project is statewide,” Sims said.The pipeline’s developers were fined more than $2 million last year for environmental violations, and work has been largely halted since October 2019 while the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided whether the project violates the Endangered Species Act. In southeastern Virginia, another pipeline is fighting its own headwinds. The $346 million Header Improvement Project would add 24 miles of 30-inch pipe along segments of an existing route from Prince William County in Northern Virginia south to the city of Chesapeake. It would build two huge gas plants in Charles City County, expand a compressor station in Caroline County and build two more stations in Prince William and Chesapeake. But the Virginia State Corporation Commission has declined to approve the project until its developer meets certain conditions. That company, Virginia Natural Gas, must show by the end of the year that it has firm financing to build the C4GT gas plant, which the HIP’s new pipeline would service. It must show it can recover the costs of the project during the period of its contract with C4GT and agree to a strict cap on costs to its customers.
Bleicher and Rubin: Lessons for Corporate Leaders from the Death of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline | Columnists - In July, after “almost six years of effort” and “billions of dollars,” Dominion Energy and Duke Energy abandoned their joint effort to build the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP). Dominion CEO Thomas Farrell II said the decision reflects “the increasing legal uncertainty” for large pipelines even after the ACP’s recent victory at the United States Supreme Court. Farrell pointed to a Montana District Court decision throwing out water crossing permits issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, just the latest case in the continuing legal conflict between pipeline proponents and grassroots opposition. It seems more likely that Dominion finally recognized that the pipeline would soon be a worthless “stranded asset.” Consider the evidence: Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway just purchased Dominion’s natural gas transmission business, but wouldn’t take the ACP at any price. Why was the ACP such a fiasco? Because Dominion’s corporate leadership ignored the transformation of the business landscape by public dissatisfaction with government’s and industry’s failure to address climate disruption, destruction of natural habitat, and racial, economic, and environmental injustice. Its ACP demise announcement still asserts an inevitable future for “environmentally superior, lower cost natural gas-fired generation” and “widespread growing demand for residential, commercial, defense, and industrial applications of low-cost and low-emitting natural gas.” In 2020, those claims are manifestly incorrect. Natural gas is composed predominately from methane, a heat-trapping greenhouse gas 30 times more potent than carbon dioxide. New technology makes solar and wind electricity environmentally superior and more economical than natural gas. Residential and office building designers are phasing out natural gas. Heavy industry looks to reducing carbon emissions from making steel and cement. The Defense Department is pursuing efforts to reduce fossil fuels in its operations. Dominion’s indifference to the natural environment as it pushed the ACP provoked opposition everywhere. Dominion began buying and clearing forestland and farms even while other essential permits were still pending, using “quick take” laws to seize land from local landowners. Its operations fragmented pristine forests, ravaged prime farmland, and bulldozed sensitive and endangered species habitats – cleaving steep slopes, damaging waterways, and dramatically increasing landslide and water quality risks.Dominion’s obvious disregard for the environment and property rights led to fierce, well-organized, and highly visible opposition in rural Virginia, with irate environmentalists joining forces with community members outraged by the forcible taking of property and racial injustice. In the wake of the pipeline’s demise, questions of restitution to landowners and ecosystems loom large.
Weymouth compressor station starts testing - — The controversial natural gas compressor station in Weymouth has begun testing this week and, in the process, releasing natural gas into the atmosphere.The station, on the banks of the Fore River, is being built by Enbridge, a Canadian-based multinational energy transportation company. The compressor station is part of Enbridge’s Atlantic Bridge project, which would expand the company’s natural gas pipelines from New Jersey into Canada.The testing began on Tuesday and will run through Oct. 1. In addition to testing for leaks and calibrating piping, the station will complete an emergency shutdown test on Saturday. Enbridge said they will be venting the natural gas through a charcoal trailer to help reduce its characteristic smell. In order to test operation of the facility’s pipes, it has to purge air from the pipes using pressurized natural gas.“The testing activities will include occasional controlled venting of natural gas, testing the Emergency Shutdown System which is one of the many safety features designed to support safe operations, and testing and calibrating the turbine and other equipment and systems,” said Enbridge spokesman Max Bergeron in a statement. “These testing activities are a routine part of ensuring a newly-constructed compressor station is fit for service, and we are proceeding with health and safety as our priority.” Bergeron said during the testing of the emergency shutdown system, “there may be noise produced, similar to the sound of a jet engine, for a duration of several minutes on one or two occasions.”
U.S. natgas futures drop 7% with fall in crude prices, rising output (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas futures fell over 7% on Tuesday along with a similar drop in crude prices with an increase in gas output and forecasts for cooler weather and lower demand in late September. That gas price decline came despite a daily increase in liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports following hurricane shutdowns in late August and record sales to Mexico. Front-month gas futures fell 18.8 cents, or 7.3%, to settle at a two-week low of $2.400 per million British thermal units. That was the contract's biggest one-day decline since early May, leaving the front-month down 13% from an eight-month high of $2.743 on Aug. 28. Data provider Refinitiv said output in the Lower 48 U.S. states was on track to rise to 88.0 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) in September, up from a three-month low of 87.6 bcfd in August. That is well below November's all-time monthly high of 95.4 bcfd. With exports rising and temperatures expected to remain warmer-than-normal through mid September, Refinitiv projected U.S. demand, including exports, would rise from an average of 84.0 bcfd this week to 85.0 bcfd next week. That is higher than Refinitiv's forecasts on Friday before the long U.S. Labor Day weekend. In late September, however, demand is expected to decline as air conditioning use drops as the weather cools. The amount of gas flowing to U.S. LNG export terminals was on track to rise over 1.0 bcfd to 5.0 bcfd on Tuesday, the biggest one-day gain since March, as Cheniere Energy Inc's Sabine Pass plant in Louisiana continues to ramp up after shutting for Hurricane Laura. Pipeline exports to Mexico were on track to rise to 6.2 bcfd in September, topping August's 5.9-bcfd record high.
U.S. natgas little changed as rising output offsets jump in LNG exports (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas futures held steady on Wednesday as rising production and forecasts for lower air conditioning demand in late September offset a jump in liquefied natural gas exports and record sales to Mexico. After dropping over 7% on Tuesday, front-month gas futures rose 0.6 cents, or 0.3%, to settle at $2.406 per million British thermal units on Wednesday. Data provider Refinitiv said output in the Lower 48 U.S. states was on track to rise to 87.9 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) in September, up from a three-month low of 87.6 bcfd in August. That, however, was still well below November's all-time monthly high of 95.4 bcfd. With exports rising and expectations for warm weather through mid September, Refinitiv projected U.S. demand would rise from an average of 84.0 bcfd this week to 85.8 bcfd next week. That is higher than Tuesday's forecast. In late September, however, demand is expected to decline as air conditioning use drops with the weather forecast to turn seasonably cooler. The amount of gas flowing to U.S. LNG export terminals soared by a record 1.8 bcfd on Tuesday as Cheniere Energy Inc's Sabine Pass plant in Louisiana continues to ramp up after shutting in late August for Hurricane Laura. Average flows so far in September were 4.1 bcfd. That puts gas piped to LNG plants on track to rise for a second month in a row in September for the first time since February when average flows hit a record 8.7 bcfd. Coronavirus demand destruction caused U.S. LNG exports to drop every month from March to July when flows to plants fell to a 21-month low of just 3.3 bcfd as buyers canceled cargoes. U.S. pipeline exports to Mexico, meanwhile, were on track to rise to 6.1 bcfd in September, which would top August's 5.9-bcfd record.
US working natural gas volumes in underground storage rise by 70 Bcf: EIA | S&P Global Platts — US natural gas volumes in storage increased roughly in line with the five-year average last week, prompting a dip across the board in Henry Hub futures, as similar additions loom for the weeks ahead. Storage inventories increased by 70 Bcf to 3.525 Tcf for the week ended Sept. 4, the US Energy Information Administration reported the morning of Sept. 10. The injection was more than an S&P Global Platts' survey of analysts calling for a 64 Bcf build. Responses to the survey ranged from an injection of 54 Bcf to 72 Bcf. The injection measured less than the 80 Bcf build reported during the same week last year but just above the five-year average gain of 68 Bcf, according to EIA data. Storage volumes now stand 528 Bcf, or 17.6%, more than the year-ago level of 2.997 Tcf and 409 Bcf, or 13%, more than the five-year average of 3.116 Tcf. The last remaining summer contract this year, October, has come under downward pressure in the last two weeks as supplies continue to rise amid flagging demand. The October NYMEX Henry Hub contract was trading around $2.39/MMBtu following the release. This represents a drop of nearly 20 cents from where it closed last Friday, and more than 30 cents lower than the peak of $2.71 it hit on Aug. 27. The winter strip, November through March, has traded relatively steady around the $3.20/MMBtu level in the last several weeks but dipped slightly during Sept. 10 trading to $3.17/MMBtu. The injection doubled the 35 Bcf injection estimate reported by the EIA for the week ended Aug. 28. Total supplies came in 800 MMcf/d lower on the week at an average 90.1 Bcf/d. After accounting for offsetting movements between onshore and offshore production volumes, the supply decline was driven by a 900 MMcf/d drop in net Canadian imports, according to Platts Analytics. Total demand suffered sharper losses, with the gas-fired power sector shedding an average of 5 Bcf/d from the week earlier. S&P Global Platts Analytics' supply and demand model currently forecasts a 61 Bcf injection for the week ending Sept. 11. This would lower the surplus to the five-year average by 16 Bcf as about nine net weekly injections remain before the flip to the winter withdrawal season. Offshore production and LNG feedgas continue to make steady gains from the losses related to Hurricane Laura. However, cooler weather and falling power burn were the main factors contributing to bearish sample injections in the US Gulf Coast this week.
Record Southeast gas storage levels hit pause on rally in Henry Hub forwards | S&P Global Platts — Gas storage levels in the US Southeast are setting record highs recently as continued weakness in LNG feedgas demand and a rapid rebound in offshore production leave the region awash in supply. On Sept. 10, Southeast inventories were estimated at 585 Bcf – their highest on record for the third consecutive day, data compiled by S&P Global Platts Analytics shows. Within the US Energy Information Administration's South Central region, which includes Texas but omits states along the southeastern seaboard, storage inventories were estimated Sept. 10 at 1.24 Tcf as of the week prior – just 130 Bcf below their own record-high level recorded in November 2016. As many Gulf Coast and Southeast storage caverns test their capacity limits, forwards markets at the Henry Hub are taking notice, pausing the rally in balance-of-year gas prices. On Sept. 9, fourth-quarter strip prices at the benchmark hub pulled back to an average $2.84, down from an annual high in early September at $2.95/MMBtu, S&P Global Platts' most recently published M2MS forwards data shows. Elevated storage levels in the Southeast and flagging bullish sentiment in the forwards market come as US LNG feedgas demand remains well below pre-pandemic highs recorded in the first quarter. On Sept. 10, total US feedgas demand was estimated at 6.8 Bcf/d, its highest since early May, but still significantly below late-March highs at over 9.6 Bcf/d, Platts Analytics data showed. Heading into October, gas demand at export terminals in the Southeast and Texas should continue rising as cargo cancellations for the month dwindle to fewer than 10, according to prior reporting by S&P Global Platts. Still, over the past two weeks, total US feedgas demand, most of which is concentrated along the Gulf Coast, has averaged only about 4.1 Bcf/d as it comes under pressure from an estimated 26 cargo cancellations this month and from recent terminal shut-ins caused by Hurricane Laura. As the Gulf Coast region continues to recover from the storm, offshore production has also rebounded quickly, pushing additional supply onshore at a time when the region least needs it. On Sept. 10, output from the Gulf of Mexico edged up to an estimated 2.46 Bcf/d, now roughly at par to its pre-storm level, data from Platts Analytics showed.
U.S. natgas falls to 4-week low on cooler forecasts, normal storage build (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas futures fell on Thursday to a four-week low on forecasts for cooler weather and less air conditioning demand next week than previously expected. That decline came despite a continued increase in liquefied natural gas exports, record sales to Mexico and a report showing an expected, near-normal storage build last week. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said U.S. utilities injected 70 billion cubic feet (bcf) of gas into storage in the week ended Sept. 4. That was close to the 68-bcf build analysts forecast in a Reuters poll and compares with an increase of 80 bcf during the same week last year and a five-year (2015-19) average build of 68 bcf. Front-month gas futures fell 8.3 cents, or 3.4%, to settle at $2.323 per million British thermal units, their lowest close since Aug. 13. That is down 15% from an eight-month high of $2.743 on Aug. 28. Even though the weather is expected to turn cooler in mid-September, Refinitiv projected U.S. demand would rise to an average of 85.4 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) next week, from 84.0 bcfd this week, due to an increase in exports. That forecast, however, is lower than Refinitiv's projection on Wednesday. The amount of gas flowing to U.S. LNG export terminals was on track to rise for a second month in a row in September for the first time since February as Cheniere Energy Inc's Sabine Pass plant in Louisiana ramps up after shutting in late August for Hurricane Laura. Coronavirus demand destruction caused U.S. LNG exports to drop every month from March to July when flows to plants fell to a 21-month low of 3.3 bcfd as buyers canceled cargoes. U.S. pipeline exports to Mexico, meanwhile, were on track to rise to 6.1 bcfd in September, which would top August's 5.9-bcfd record.
U.S. natgas futures fall to fresh 4-week low on cooler forecasts (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas futures fell more than 2% to a fresh four-week low on Friday on forecasts for cooler weather and lower air-conditioning demand over the next two weeks than previously expected. That price decline came despite a continued increase in liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports and record sales to Mexico. Front-month gas futures fell 5.4 cents, or 2.3%, to settle at $2.269 per million British thermal units, their lowest close since Aug. 13 for a second day in a row. For the week, the front-month dropped about 12% in its biggest weekly decline since March. Data provider Refinitiv projected demand in the Lower 48 U.S. states would rise from an average of 84.0 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) this week to 84.9 bcfd next week as exports increase, before slipping to 83.6 bcfd in two weeks due to a seasonal cooling of the weather. Those forecasts are lower than Refinitiv's projections on Thursday. The amount of gas flowing to U.S. LNG export plants was on track to average 4.5 bcfd in September. That is the most in a month since May and is up for a second month in a row for the first time since hitting a record high of 8.7 bcfd in February. That LNG-export gain comes as Cheniere Energy Inc's Sabine Pass in Louisiana keeps ramping up after shutting in late August for Hurricane Laura and as global gas prices rise, making U.S. gas more attractive in Europe and Asia following months of U.S. cargo cancellations due to coronavirus demand destruction. Cameron LNG's export plant in Louisiana, however, has remained shut since Aug. 27 when Laura struck the southwestern Louisiana coast. U.S. pipeline exports to Mexico, meanwhile, were on track to rise to 6.1 bcfd in September, which would top August's record 5.9 bcfd.
Lower natural gas demand for US Midwest this winter looks to offset supply losses | S&P Global Platts — Elevated natural gas storage volumes and lower demand looks to offset decreased supply flowing into the US Midwest this winter, but Chicago prices could strengthen if the region pulls more gas from the Southeast to mitigate supply losses. Total Midwest supply is expected to fall in winter 2020-21 from the previous winter on declining Bakken Shale production and lower inflows. Total production in the region last winter averaged 2.3 Bcf/d, but should fall to 2 Bcf/d this coming winter, according to S&P Global Platts Analytics. While Bakken production has recovered much since March's price collapse, production is still expected to be 257 MMcf/d below winter 2019-20 levels, at 1.8 Bcf/d. Additionally, lower production in surrounding regions has reduced supply to the Upper Midwest. Of particular note is Oklahoma's SCOOP/STACK play, where production has not rebounded as initially expected after 2020's price and production plummet. Production is expected to average 5.9 Bcf/d, down 1.8 Bcf/d from last winter. Rockies production is expected to decline 1.3 Bcf/d year on year this winter to 7.7 Bcf/d. This is forecast to reduce inflows from the Rockies to the Midwest by 439 MMcf/d to 1 Bcf/d. Total inflows from the SCOOP/STACK, Rockies, Northeast and Western Canada are therefore expected to decline by a total of 1.8 Bcf/d this winter from last. Outflows to East Canada are expected to decline 750 MMcf/d, partially offsetting lower supply from surrounding regions. Net flows to the Midwest should falter to 10.9 Bcf/d from 12.2 Bcf/d last winter, according to Platts Analytics. Lower demand should help mitigate some of this supply loss. Total demand is forecast to average 17.9 Bcf/d this winter, down 522 MMcf/d year on year. While residential and commercial demand is expected to pick up from last winter by 153 MMcf/d, gas-fired power generation is expected to decline by 421 MMcf/d. Industrial demand is also expected to decline by 243 MMcf/d. The Midwest region can also rely more heavily on storage to resolve supply loss. With 924 Bcf in storage, working gas volumes stand 12% above the year-ago level as well as the five-year average at this time of the year, according to the US Energy Information Administration. If stocks in the region build at the five-year average rate, storage will peak at 1.136 Tcf, which is only 18 Bcf less than the all-time high set in 2016.
PAC challenging SC's Graham over offshore drilling stance (AP) — Offshore drilling, an issue that has created some bipartisan unity in South Carolina among opponents who argue such expansion would mar the state’s pristine coastline, is surfacing in a political action committee’s effort to oust U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham. As the state’s beaches teem with visitors on Labor Day, Lindsey Must Go PAC is flying a plane up and down the South Carolina coast, with a trailing banner reading ”L. Graham Will Drill 4 Oil Here.” Officials with the PAC say the plane expenditure and an accompanying digital ad decrying Graham’s support for drilling expansion legislation and alleged ties to the oil industry, are part of a six-figure buy over the next two weeks, now that the campaign has entered its final two months and voters are starting to tune in. “Graham has been all over the map on drilling. His position shifts as quickly as the tide shifts,” Jimmy Williams, a consultant who works with the PAC, told The Associated Press. “Jaime Harrison has had one position on drilling: Hell no.” Harrison is the Democratic opponent for Graham’s seat. “This false attack is an attempt to distract the people of South Carolina from Jaime Harrison’s record as a high-paid, liberal lobbyist for BP, the company responsible for the largest oil spill in U.S. history,” said Graham campaign spokesman T.W. Arrighi. “Harrison’s environmental record can be summed up in two words — dirty and oily.” Harrison, an associate chairman with the Democratic National Committee, lobbied for BP in 2010 while employed by the Podesta Group, according to filings with the Center for Responsive Politics.
Trump pauses oil drilling off SC, Georgia, Florida after years of support - President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday an oil drilling moratorium off the coasts of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, a reversal after stripping a drilling ban put in place by his predecessor. Trump signed an order in an afternoon event that he said would lengthen a drilling moratorium on the west coast of Florida and expand it to the Atlantic coasts of all three states. The text of the order says that it takes effect on July 1, 2022, and applies for the following 10 years, but it’s unclear what that means in South Carolina before that date.Like all presidential orders, it could be changed under a new president.“This protects your beautiful Gulf and your beautiful ocean, and it will for a long time to come,” the president said at the event, adding that the country had found a way to produce enough energy by other means, including hydraulic fracking for natural gas. Environmental advocates, however, are not taking Trump’s announcement at face value. “We’ll be looking for specific actions, in court or in federal agencies, to show that this is more than words,” said Alan Hancock of the Coastal Conservation League. Trump made his announcement in Florida, a battleground state for the presidential election where public opinion is staunchly against drilling. Floridians passed a constitutional amendment in 2018 banning rigs in state waters. An existing federal moratorium along its Gulf Coast was set to expire in 2022, and Trump expanded that prohibition with his Tuesday action. In South Carolina, 56 percent of the state opposes offshore drilling, according to a 2019 Winthrop University poll. Much of that opposition is focused at the coast, where businesses depend on natural beauty to bring tourists, and the memory of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico looms large.
Trump expands ban on new Florida offshore drilling sites - President Donald Trump brushed back critics of his record on the environment in the crucial swing state of Florida Tuesday during a visit to Palm Beach County by signing a presidential order that extends and expands a ban on drilling off the state’s coastline. The order — which Trump signed atop a stage not far from the mouth of the Loxahatchee River — extends by 10 years the life of a moratorium that prohibited drilling in federal waters off Florida’s Gulf Coast until 2022. He said it also expanded the ban to include the Atlantic Coast off Florida, Georgia and South Carolina. “Thanks to my administration’s pro-American energy policies, we can take this step and the next step while remaining the No. 1 producer of oil and natural gas anywhere in the world,” Trump said, appearing at the Jupiter Inlet Lighthouse and Museum. But even before Trump made the announcement, Democrats began criticizing his motives and warning that executive orders can be easily overturned. In a video conference with reporters Tuesday morning, Congresswoman Lois Frankel, D-West Palm Beach, said the expected Trump order banning drilling was a self-serving campaign ploy. “He obviously knows it’s a politically devastating issue to support drilling off of Florida,” she said. “You can not believe anything he says.” The order also drew criticism from the National Oceanic Industries Association, the offshore drilling industry’s lobbying arm. “Our preference should always be to produce homegrown American energy, instead of deferring future production to countries like Russia and Iran,” the association said in a statement.
Judge in SC wants explanation of Trump’s contradictory orders on offshore oil drilling - A federal judge wants to know how President Donald Trump’s order banning oil drilling off South Carolina affects five companies trying to search for fuels off the state’s coast. The answer could spell the end to a lawsuit that was put in motion, in part, by the president trying to open offshore exploration along the U.S. south Atlantic coast three years ago. Separately, an exploration company told the federal government last week it was no longer trying to search in the Atlantic. The lawsuit includes two consolidated cases, though both ask the judge to strike down federal permits for companies that search for oil. One suit was filed by nine environmental groups, and one was filed by 16 cities and towns around the state, along with the S.C. Small Business Chamber of Commerce. U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel asked the federal government to explain how Trump’s most recent move on Tuesday relates to a 2017 executive order directing federal agencies to “encourage energy exploration and production,” including in the federal waters off of South Carolina. The government has 10 days to respond. “The Government has disclosed no purpose for the proposed seismic testing other than to facilitate oil and gas development off the East Coast of the United States,” Gergel wrote. A spokeswoman for the federal fisheries agency being sued in the case declined to comment on the litigation. On Tuesday, the president moved in the opposite direction, saying he was putting the waters around Florida, Georgia and South Carolina under a drilling moratorium. His official memorandum says the ban will start in 2022 and end in 2032. Five companies had already received the first needed permit to do seismic air blasting, however, with pending applications for the second and final one. One of them, Texas-based WesternGeco, was further behind in the permitting process but told the Bureau of Ocean and Energy Management on Sept. 4 that it was withdrawing its application entirely, according to a letter the company wrote.
NC excluded from Trump moratorium on offshore drilling - President Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday in Florida imposing a 10-year moratorium on offshore drilling in waters from Florida to South Carolina, leaving North Carolina open to potential activity. Under the order, leases of areas along the coasts of Florida, Georgia and South Carolina for the purposes of offshore exploration or development are prohibited between July 1, 2022, and June 30, 2032. What is not clear is why the order omits North Carolina and Virginia, where residents have been vocally opposed to offshore drilling, often citing the potential impact to fisheries and coastal tourism. Sierra Weaver, a senior attorney in the Southern Environmental Law Center’s Chapel Hill office, said, “There has been no explanation for why to stop at the South Carolina line, and based on what we know, there is no basis for that decision at all. We all know there is every bit as much worth protecting here in North Carolina as below.” This week’s executive order is raising alarms among North Carolina environmental groups and the coastal communities that have almost unanimously stood in opposition to any proposal that would see exploration. The issue has largely been dormant since a March 2019 court decision. Erin Carey, the director of coastal programs for the Sierra Club’s North Carolina chapter, said, “I am very concerned, our allies are very concerned because we thought maybe we had a stay until after the (November 2020) election. ... I think that this is definitely a signal that they’re still thinking about the plan, they’re still considering where they’re going to open and that political favors are not out of the question.”
Company seeking to conduct offshore seismic testing for oil and gas withdraws application - In a surprise move, the company that was seeking to conduct a seismic survey off the coast of North Carolina and other states for potential oil and natural gas appears to have decided to call it quits. WesternGeco, LLC. sent a letter to federal officials on September 4, withdrawing their application submitted in 2014. “The application requested authorization to conduct a geophysical survey on the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf,” said Adil Mukhitov, vice president with WesternGeco in a one paragraph letter to the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. “BOEM has not yet granted or denied the application. Please consider the application withdrawn,” Mukhitov said. This comes two weeks after Governor Roy Cooper announced the state would appeal the decision in June by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce to override North Carolina’s objection to WesternGeco’s plan for offshore seismic testing. Opponents to offshore testing and drilling expressed cautious optimism. “This move is certainly gratifying, and adds to the feeling that the wheels may be coming off the grand Atlantic drilling plan – which just means we opponents need to redouble our efforts,” said Nags Head Mayor Ben Cahoon. “It’s not over until it’s over!”
Oil pollutes Chattahoochee River after fire at Smyrna power plant — Something between hundreds and thousands of gallons of oil were discharged into the Chattahoochee River as a result of the explosion and fire at a Smyrna power plant last weekend.The Chattahoochee Riverkeeper organization said on Facebook that as many as 1,000-4,000 gallons of oil were discharged into the waterway during the incident at Georgia Power's Plant McDonough-Atkinson on Sunday, as firefighters fought the blaze.The group shared with 11Alive a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Emergency Operations Center spot report from which it got the estimate. That report was published Tuesday morning.Georgia Power however contended it was a much lower figure, saying that, "our calculations indicate very conservatively that approximately 250 gallons of oil entered the river." 11Alive has reached out to the Georgia Department of Natural Resources and U.S. EPA to try and confirm an updated figure. Power transformers often have oil present for internal cooling and insulation purposes. A Cobb County Fire spokesman confirmed the oil present in the transformer was released and caught fire in the explosion and washed into the river through the firefighting efforts. Georgia Power said "most of the oil in the transformer was contained onsite." Georgia Environmental Protection Division and United States Environmental Protection Agency were on scene, and downstream drinking water plant operators were notified," the Chattahoochee Riverkeeper group wrote on Facebook. "Some firefighting chemicals, which included foam suppression product that was used due to the nature of the oil being on fire, also washed into the river. Georgia Power said that "comprehensive response activities began immediately once the fire was extinguished" and "the company aggressively began working to assess, limit and remove this oil from the river."
‘It was a huge explosion:’ Gas line rupture sparks massive fire in Sanford– A massive fire erupted early Thursday in Sanford when a gas line ruptured, prompting officials to evacuate more than 800 nearby homes. The fire broke out around 1 a.m. near Michigan Avenue and Oregon Street, west of I-4 near the St. Johns River. A ball of smoke and flames shot 200 feet into the sky for nearly two hours, with News 6 viewers saying they could see flames and smoke from miles away. Fire officials said they received so many calls about the fire that they had difficulty pinpointing the exact source of the blaze. Crews discovered the ruptured 12-inch gas line in a remote area near the Black Bear Wilderness Area. Seminole County officials said went to restore service at 10 p.m. on Thursday. The Florida Gas Transmission vented the line that was damaged. Officials said only air will be vented, not gas. This caused a loud hissing sound for approximately 30 minutes, according to officials.Multiple people called 911 to report the blast.“I don’t know if it’s a house on fire. It was a huge explosion,” one woman said.She told the operator she looked from her backyard and all she could see was flames.Another woman described the fire as a “massive blaze.”“ “You can’t miss it, it’s over the treeline,” she said. Florida Public Utilities Co. said the incident involved an interstate pipeline not owned by the company caused FPU to lose its natural gas feed service to customers in parts of Seminole County.“Areas impacted included Sanford, Longwood, Lake Mary, and Winter Springs. FPU had to proactively interrupt service to some sections of its system to ensure system integrity.
Hurricane hit oil storage site, but no shortages expected (AP) — Hurricane Laura caused significant damage at a site holding about 30% of the nation’s store of emergency crude oil, but three other sites still have plenty of petroleum, U.S. Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette said Wednesday. The damaged Strategic Petroleum Reserve site in West Hackberry, Louisiana, holds nearly 8.2 billion gallons (31 billion liters) of crude oil in 21 huge caverns deep underground. Brouillette did not specify the exact nature of the damage or say how much it would cost to fix it, but said he planned to tour it later Wednesday. More than any worries about damage to the federal repository, “My concern is with the people who work at that site” because so many homes were damaged and destroyed, Brouillette said during a livestreamed news conference with Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards. “Restoring power is our top concern right now,” Edwards said. He noted that 90% of Calcasieu Parish, the most populous parish in the southwest Louisiana area where the storm slammed ashore, remains without power. Brouillette also said that because the COVID-19 pandemic has reduced demand for oil and gas so much, there is no shortage of gasoline, jet fuel and other refined products, even though two large refineries in the Lake Charles area haven’t been able to reopen since the hurricane. Citgo and Phillips 66 have large refineries in the area; a third, run by Calcasieu Refining, is much smaller. Edwards and Brouillette spoke after a closed roundtable discussion with the owners of the large Lake Charles refineries and officials from the Port of Lake Charles, utility companies and three state agencies. Edwards said that one of those refineries shut down for the second time in 76 years. “But because they shut down the way they did, they did not suffer catastrophic damage,” he said. Brouillette said some refineries expect to resume operation as soon as power has returned. “We are still weeks away from total restoration,” Edwards said. He said the big problem is that Laura damaged or destroyed 1,000 or more power transmission towers. “These are very, very difficult things to replace,” he said.
Hurricane Laura’s Aftermath: Miles of Oil Sheen in Louisiana’s Wetlands | DeSmog - (photos) Almost a week after Hurricane Laura struck Louisiana's coast, which is studded with oil and gas industry pipes, tanks, wells, and rigs, I photographed from the sky oil sheen along at least 20 miles of marsh and bayous that absorbed the full strength of the storm. Scientists say warmer ocean waters due to human-caused climate change is making hurricanes like Laura stronger and causing them to intensify more rapidly; Hurricane Laura spun up to a Category 4 storm in just 24 hours. For miles along the western Louisiana coastline near the Texas border, I spotted large swathes of land and water that appeared coated with oil, visible as the floodwaters receded between the small communities of Grand Chenier and Cameron. On September 2 and 3, I also documented oil sheen in waterways along the bayous from Cameron north to the city of Lake Charles and as far east as New Iberia, roughly 130 miles west of New Orleans.How much oil did Hurricane Laura’s impact cause to spill with its powerful winds, rain, and storm surge? While the storm made landfall on August 27, Louisiana Department of Natural Resources (DNR) spokesman Patrick Courreges told DeSmog it is still too early to assess the storm’s damage. “We are just 10 days out,” Courreges said by phone on September 8.NOLA.com reported on August 27 that federal and state emergency responders would focus first on search-and-rescue operations before eventually pursuing oil spill inspections and possible cleanups.While the hurricane’s storm surge was not as high as initially predicted, its coastal flooding and 150 mile-per-hour winds still left a trail of devastation. Given the more than 1,400 oil wells in Hurricane Laura's path, I was not surprised to find slicks of oil along the coast after the storm. However, the vast area of coastline now shimmering with oil and crumpled metal was a reminder of what any strong storm can do when it collides with the area of the Gulf Coast dotted with oil and gas production sites. Louisiana has to worry not only about its active oil and gas wells, but also its thousands of orphaned wells, which are no longer in production and have been abandoned by their former owners. On September 2, I shot photos of some of the damage left in Laura’s wake for the Louisiana Environmental Action Network(LEAN), a nonprofit environmental advocacy group. The next day, David Levy, owner of Petrotechnologies and founder of the Free Iberian Press, took me on a flight to shoot impacts to the coast for DeSmog, covering some of the same ground.
Oil and gas companies try again for federal court venue – Oil and gas companies are asking a federal appeals court to reconsider its decision that parish lawsuits alleging damage of coastal wetlands should be heard in state court. A three-judge panel of the New Orleans-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in August unanimously rejected the companies’ argument that the case belongs in federal court. The defendants are asking the panel and the court as a whole to review that decision. In 2013, local governments in Louisiana’s coastal region filed lawsuits against more than 200 oil and gas companies, seeking compensation for damage they say the companies caused to the region’s wetlands. The companies say they followed their permits and the law as it stood at the time. The Fifth Circuit panel’s ruling last month only applied directly to lawsuits by Plaquemines and Cameron parishes, though it could have broader implications given the similarities shared by the various lawsuits, experts say. The decision focused on an expert report Plaquemines Parish produced in 2018 that notes some of the alleged damage dates back to World War II. At the time, the companies argue, they were under strict wartime regulation and essentially were acting as agents of the federal government. That raises a federal issue, which means the cases should be heard in federal court, they say.
State pols support rescinding Columbia Gas emergency While state lawmakers from the Merrimack Valley cheered Gov. Charlie Baker’s recent decision to rescind the state of emergency due to the Columbia Gas disaster, they cautioned that the region remains scarred and still needs help. On Tuesday, the Baker-Polito Administration terminated the state of emergency -- nearly two years after it was declared by Baker. On Sept. 13, 2018, overpressurized gas lines led to high pressure gas being injected into homes and businesses in Andover, North Andover and Lawrence. It led to fires, explosions, dozens of injuries and the death of Lawrence teen Leonel Rondon. The crisis resulted in the displacement of thousands of residents across the region, some who fled their homes on foot. Businesses in the impacted area were shut down for months as Columbia Gas replaced miles of gas pipeline and thousands of gas-powered furnaces, ovens, hot water heaters and other appliances. When it was safe to return, many residents lived for months in homes without working stoves, heat or hot water. The decision to rescind the state of emergency essentially hands responsibility for continued management of the incident to the Department of Public Utilities, or DPU, as it authorizes DPU chairman Matthew Nelson “to take any action necessary to ensure public safety and welfare and restore gas, electric, and water utility services,” according to a press release issued Tuesday by the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs.
New: Line 5 east leg not damaged, internal tests show ⋆ The eastern segment of the dual Line 5 oil pipeline in the Straits of Mackinac did not sustain damage during an incident that left an anchor support significantly bent, according to a court-ordered internal test. Canadian oil company Enbridge had been allowed to restart the east leg to complete an in-line inspection (ILI) on the segment on Aug. 24, thanks to a new amended temporary restraining order (TRO) ordered by Circuit Court Judge James Jamo. The east leg ILI was completed one day later. “The amended TRO allowed us to start the segment just to run the ILI. We submitted the results to PHMSA [Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration] and they are reviewing them now. The results showed no dents and no metal loss,” Enbridge spokesperson Ryan Duffy said Friday. The same test had been performed on Line 5’s west segment in early July. Those results had also come back without any indication of pipeline damage. The west line has been in operation since then, but the east portion under the Straits of Mackinac remains shut down until further orders from the court. “PHMSA has reviewed those results and issued a letter today stating that it has no objection to Enbridge restarting the line. However, the pipeline cannot be restarted until the Court also approves. Our office’s review of the test results is ongoing,” said Ryan Jarvi, spokesperson for Attorney General Dana Nessel.
Enbridge just wants a permit. Michigan critics want to bring down Line 5 -- Enbridge Energy had already won the blessing from Michigan’s Republican Legislature to build a tunnel beneath the Straits of Mackinac to keep oil flowing through Line 5, and survived a legal challenge that sought to unravel that plan. Now, a seemingly minor detail of the $500 million, multi-year tunnel project — getting a state commission’s permission to move a 4-mile segment of pipeline inside the tunnel— could give environmental activists and Native American tribes an opening to litigate broad objections to the pipeline and, they hope, shut it down completely. As the Michigan Public Service Commission begins a yearlong analysis of the relocation request, Line 5 opponents say they’re seeking a comprehensive review of the pipeline that has so far been missing from Michigan's deliberations over the 67-year-old pipeline’s fate. “What we’re really discussing is allowing this pipeline to continue to exist for the next century.” Gravelle and other Line 5 opponents want the commission’s deliberations to include everything from Michigan’s long-term energy needs to climate impacts from continuing to transport fuel through Line 5, to safety and environmental concerns tied to the existing pipeline and the planned tunnel.Building the tunnel itself will be complicated and costly: Enbridge has estimated it will cost $500 million and take until 2024 to complete, although state regulators expect it to take significantly longer. Enbridge had hoped the process of moving the pipe inside the tunnel would be far easier. This spring, as Enbridge sought state permits for tunnel construction, it asked the Michigan Public Service Commission to agree that the company doesn't need permission to move the pipeline inside the tunnel once it is built. The commission, which oversees the siting of pipelines within Michigan, rejected that argument. Instead, it launched a lengthy administrative review similar to a court proceeding, in which Enbridge and its opponents will litigate a key question the energy company thought it had moved past: Does Michigan need Line 5?
Judge- Enbridge can resume full operations on Michigan Line 5 pipeline - An Ingham County judge has given Enbridge Energy clearance to resume normal operations of Line 5 in the Straits of Mackinac, lifting a partial shutdown that had been in place for months after Enbridge discovered damage to an anchor support on the pipeline in June. Judge James Jamo approved the re-start in a revised restraining order issued Wednesday at Enbridge’s request. It came with the consent of state lawyers who had asked for the shutdown in the immediate wake of the damage, after federal regulators and an independent expert retained by the state concluded the pipeline was not structurally damaged. The order comes days after federal regulators with the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, or PHMSA, notified Enbridge on Sept. 4 that the agency and outside experts had reviewed inspection records for the east leg and “did not identify any integrity issues” on the east leg, where an anchor support had been wrenched out of place. As a result, William Rush, PHMSA’s acting director for the region encompassing Michigan, wrote that federal regulators had “no objection” to the company resuming operations on the east leg. Enbridge spokesman Ryan Duffy said the company plans to resume petroleum transports in the east leg by Thursday afternoon. In reality, the reopening may mean little for Enbridge’s customers. Enbridge had previously told Bridge the partial shutdown did not impact its ability to deliver petroleum, because the company was able to meet existing demand using only the west leg of the dual-span line. Duffy said that remains true today. The news comes more than two months after Jamo ordered the pipeline shut down June 25, acting on a request from Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel following revelations that an anchor support on the dual-span pipeline’s east leg had sustained damage from a then-unknown source. Enbridge and U.S. Coast Guard officials have since concluded that a contract vessel working for the company likely caused the damage. Nessel and other Line 5 opponents have long argued that the pipeline poses an unacceptable risk of an oil spill in the straits. Her temporary shutdown request is tied to a larger lawsuit in which she seeks to permanently shutter the pipeline by voiding the 1953 easement that gives Enbridge permission to operate Line 5 in the straits.
Coast Guard: Enbridge-contracted vessels likely responsible for scrapes to Line 5 - A U.S. Coast Guard official told environmental groups Friday that damage discovered to Line 5 earlier this year likely was caused by Enbridge-contracted vessels conducting work in the area to prepare for the construction of a utility tunnel. Enbridge earlier this year noted in a report that it had narrowed down to five the list of "small to moderately sized" vessels that could have dragged a cable in a north south direction over Line 5, scraped the east leg and damaged an anchor support. Four out of the five boats, Enbridge said at the time, had been contracted by the Canadian oil giant. Coast Guard Captain Anthony R. Jones of Port Sault Sainte Marie said his staff conducted its own review and came to similar conclusions. "I have concluded that the disturbances found by Enbridge Energy are reasonably attributed to incidental contact by cables or other equipment deployed or handled by vessels contracted by Enbridge to conduct work within the submerged pipeline area," Jones wrote Friday. Enbridge Energy still is reviewing the incident and hasn't reached a final determination about the cause, company spokesman Ryan Duffy said Tuesday. The company has implemented safety protocols to avoid vessel-induced damage to the line, including the identification of vessels traveling through the straits, patrol boats in the area, contact with at-risk vessels asking them to lift anchor or avoid crossing the straits, or a temporary shutdown of Line 5. "We have interviewed our own contractors working in the areas as part of our thorough investigation," Duffy said. "As of now we can’t rule out their involvement."
EPA fines Michigan injection well owner $73K for ‘significant’ violations — Federal regulators plan to fine a northern Michigan oil and gas company $73,755 for keeping inaccurate records on injection well operation in four counties. Paxton Resources of Gaylord failed to properly monitor and report pressure on seven injection wells spread across Antrim, Alcona, Oscoda, and Otsego counties, according to a proposed U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) consent order. Form May 2014 to August 2016, Paxton failed to record and report weekly injection pressure, failed to monitor weekly annulus pressure and record accurate measurements, according to the proposed EPA order dated Aug. 27. Paxton also allowed an unauthorized employee to sign monitoring reports for four years, the EPA alleged. The EPA says those actions violate the Safe Drinking Water Act. In a public notice statement, the EPA called the alleged violations “significant” because accurate injection well pressure monitoring and reporting is “vital to protecting underground sources of drinking water” and ensuring wells “have mechanical integrity, are not leaking, and are being operated for the purposes for which they were permitted.” Class 2 wells inject brine from oil and gas production deep underground, either as wastewater disposal or to displace fossil fuels for extraction in the hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, process. Pressure monitoring helps detect leaks that could allow injected fluids to spurt back up the well casing and reach the level where groundwater is used for drinking. “Failing to take weekly annulus pressure measurements and submitting inaccurate reports were potentially serious impediments to the discovery of potential leaks and threats to underground drinking water sources,” the EPA wrote.
The Value of Human Life Must Have Priority in Oil & Gas Policies - When Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick said “There are things more important than living“ about reopening businesses related to COVID-19, his comments quickly garnered national attention. Many people were shaken by the callous nature of the quote. However, Patrick was alluding to an often-taboo aspect of policy creation, the human cost of public policy. What made Patrick’s quote unique is that typically when talking about policy in this regard, politicians are not as forthcoming about the human collateral damage of their positions. For many who live near oil and gas operations, Patrick’s jarring comment betrays a mindset that feels tragically familiar. It is common to hear about how the benefits of relying on fossil fuels outweigh the risks posed by an inherently polluting form of energy. The part typically not said out loud is that “the risks” include health risks to real people – those who work for the industry who can be exposed to hazards with little or no protection as well as people who live close to, downwind, and downstream of wells, pipelines, processing plants, refineries, and more. Human life is often just another variable in a cost/benefit analysis. Texas lawmakers and oil and gas companies often tout the benefits of energy independence and free-market pursuit of a Texas-strong oil and gas industry. The implicit argument is that the people who become ill or die because of a polluter or a regulator’s actions (or lack thereof) are worth less than the upside benefits to the state and the nation. Energy independence is worth the rapid acceleration of climate change. Expanding a fossil fuel company’s profits is worth drilling next to a childcare center.Hearing a leader in Patrick’s position so casually put a value on human life can be disturbing, but it is clarifying. As a society, we are constantly evaluating the value of a human life when we make decisions on policies from the speed limit to acceptable side effects of medication. Many who live in the oil and gas “sacrifice zone” wonder how companies value a human life when they decide where to drill? How does the Texas Senate (of which Dan Patrick is the President) value a human life when they allocate money to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the Texas Railroad Commission (the state agencies that oversee the oil and gas industry) for regulation, monitoring, and enforcement?
Big Fund Managers Urge Texas to Ban Most Flaring - -- Investors managing more than $2 trillion are calling on Texas regulators to ban the routine burning of natural gas from shale fields, arguing that the energy industry hasn’t moved quickly enough to curb the controversial practice. AllianceBernstein, California State Teachers’ Retirement System and Legal & General Investment Management said they support eliminating gas flaring by 2025, according to a letter to the Texas Railroad Commission, which oversees oil and gas in the state. “Actions of leading operators demonstrate the financial and technical viability of ending routine flaring,” the fund managers said in the letter, which was seen by Bloomberg. “It is clear, however, that voluntary actions alone have been insufficient to eliminate routine flaring industry-wide.” Investors and environmentalists are increasingly drawing attention to flaring because of its wastefulness and contribution to climate change. Flaring is utilized around the world as a way to deal with gas that producers can’t -- or don’t want to -- transport or store. Much of what’s burned, especially in the shale fields of Texas, is so-called associated gas coming from oil wells. The sheer abundance of gas in the Permian Basin of West Texas and New Mexico means local prices for the fossil fuel are often so low that it’s cheaper for shale operators to burn it rather than pay for pipeline connections and storage. Last year the Permian flared enough gas to supply 5 million U.S. homes, according to Oslo-based Rystad Energy. The Texas Railroad Commission has come under attack for allowing companies to effectively flare at will over the past decade as shale production boomed and helped make the U.S. the world’s top oil producer. The commission allows companies to flare during the start-up of wells and during emergencies. It also issues waivers that can be utilized right through the early and most productive phase of a shale well’s operation. After more than a year of public pressure, the commission recently proposed requiring operators to provide information on why they need to flare, but it set no targets and resisted calls for an outright ban. Lower oil production due to the Covid-19 pandemic has meant flaring rates have dropped significantly this year, the commission said in a statement last month. “Strong and effective regulatory action -- beyond initial steps to improve data gathering and transparency -- is essential to build stakeholder confidence and solve this challenge across industry,” the investors said in the letter, which is part of the commission’s public consultation. LGIM, the U.K.’s biggest asset manager, oversees over 1.2 trillion pounds ($1.6 trillion). In May, LGIM said it would oppose the re-election of Darren Woods as Exxon Mobil Corp. chairman over what it called a lack of ambition on tackling climate change.
GOP Proposes Letting Fossil Fuel Firms Sue Sick Workers Seeking Compensation -Alexis Goldstein - Fossil fuel firms have long argued that addressing climate change will kill jobs — but the main entities killing oil and gas jobs lately have been fossil fuel firms.Rather than save jobs, oil firms have lined executive pockets just before declaring bankruptcy, and announced layoffs rather than cut into shareholder profits. Some oil workers are even dying on the job — and instead of increasing safety and transparency, oil companies have pushed Congress to make it impossible for workers and families to sue if they get sick due to unsafe conditions.We have seen this pattern before with the coal industry, which has long fought efforts to fund benefits to workers who contracted “black lung” in mines. Now, it’s oil and gas firms that are putting profits ahead of the lives of their own workers.The response of fossil fuel firms and the Trump administration alike to the potentially lethal working conditions for oil and gas workers has been to bury the data and prevent workers from suing. Fossil fuel giants like ConocoPhillips and Exxon lobbied Congress to grant them legal immunity should their workers get sick, as documented by Friends of the Earth. The liability shield proposed by Senate Republicans even allows firms to sue their own workers should they try and seek recompense if they get sick.
Crude oil pipeline expansion in Texas is canceled – Midstream operator Enterprise Products Partners LP on Wednesday announced it was scrapping its Midland to ECHO 4 pipeline expansion project in Texa, Kallanish Energy reports. The project was designed to move 450,000 barrels per day from the Permian Basin of West Texas and New Mexico to the Gulf Coast. The expansion project would have linked Midland in West Texas with Enterprise’s ECHO terminal in Houston, Texas. The cancellation comes as crude oil producers in North American have slashed production due to low prices and that has reduced demand for new pipeline capacity. Enterprise Products Partners said it has amended some contracts with customers to allow them to transport crude oil in its existing pipelines in the near term while extending the overall duration of the agreements. Last April, the company had pushed back the completion date for the project by six months to the second half of 2021, as part of a $2.1 billion cut to its 2020 budget. The company said the cancellation will reduce growth capital in 2020-2022 by about $800 million. The decision will also result in a $45 million impairment charge to third quarter 2020 earnings later this year, it said.
Oil Companies Rely On Controversial Firm To Rebut Colorado Health Study - One day after Colorado health officials briefed a state rulemaking panel on the potential health risks posed by oil and gas drilling, industry groups brought in an expert of their own to downplay the state's findings — and her comments were blunt. "My expert conclusion is that there's no credible, causal evidence that current setback distances need to be extended in order to minimize adverse health impacts," Tami McMullin, who previously served as a state toxicologist, told members of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission in a Sept. 4 hearing.Since 2018, McMullin has worked as a senior toxicologist for the Center for Toxicology and Environmental Health, an Arkansas-based consulting firm with a long history of working closely with the fossil fuel industry — and an equally long history of controversy during which its work has drawn conflict-of-interest accusations.McMullin's comments to the COGCC came on behalf of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association ahead of a pivotal decision by the commission on whether, and by how much, to extend mandatory "setback" distances between occupied buildings and new wells. Industry groups are staunchly opposed to increased setbacks, and testimony submitted to state regulators in advance of the rulemaking included a private study "prepared for" COGA by McMullin and other CTEH researchers to help bolster their case.
Advocates: 2020 presidential election presents clear choice on energy for Colorado, US --The outcome of the presidential election will have a big impact on the energy front in Colorado a nd other oil- and gas-producing states.If U.S. voters decide to stay the course, the current push for energy dominance through increased drilling will continue. If they elect a new president, the challenger has pledged to end new drilling on public lands and move toward a carbon-free future.Whoever wins Nov. 3, any executive-branch attempts to change existing policy are likely to face legal challenges.Democratic challenger Joe Biden has vowed to immediately start addressing climate change if elected. The former vice president has a $2 trillion plan that includes expanding clean-energy jobs and greatly reducing fossil fuel emissions.President Donald Trump, who was officially nominated in late August as the GOP presidential candidate, has targeted oil and gas regulations he sees as burdensome to the industry.“There couldn’t be a more clear divide between the two perspectives about American energy production, particularly coal, oil and natural gas,” said Thomas Pyle, president of the American Energy Alliance, an advocacy organization that has endorsed Trump.President Donald Trump, third from left, with Energy Secretary Rick Perry, left, Shell Oil company President Gretchen Watkins, second from left, and Shell Pennsylvania Vice President Hilary Mercer, fourth from left, tour the Shell Pennsylvania Petrochemicals Complex in Monaca, Pa., on Aug. 13, 2019.A new poll released by the American Petroleum Institute-Colorado found that 57% of Colorado voters would be more likely to vote for a candidate who supports providing access to oil and gas produced in the United States. Still, given Colorado’s changing demographics, most political experts don’t expect Trump to win here. The president lost Colorado by 6 points in 2016, and a recent poll by Morning Consult — the same firm that did the API poll — showed Biden leading Trump 52% to 39% in Colorado. The two campaigns fundamentally differ on their stances toward drilling on federally managed lands. Roughly 36% of Colorado is federal land, and the state is the seventh-biggest energy producer in the country.Colorado is also considered a leader on renewable energy, with Gov. Jared Polis and legislators setting goals to cut greenhouse gas emissions and get to a 100% carbon-free electric grid.
More than 40 groups call for coronavirus protections for oil and gas workers - A coalition of more than 40 organizations is urging the federal government to take steps to protect workers at oil and gas facilities, as well as the communities surrounding the sites, from the coronavirus. In a letter to the Interior Department, Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), Coast Guard and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the groups specifically call for monthly public reporting on COVID-19 testing and infection rates at oil and gas facilities. The coalition, which includes a number of environmental groups, also called for requiring companies operating the facilities to put forth coronavirus response plans and for the government to monitor and report on the implementation of these plains. The groups additionally asked OSHA to presume that some exposures are “work related” when reporting work-related illnesses. “The offshore oil industry presents a high risk for oil workers, as oil rig employees spend shifts working on site, sleeping and eating in tight quarters,” the groups wrote. “Onshore oil and gas workers, particularly those living in ‘man camps’ are also at risk from close contact on the job and in quarters.” “It is incumbent on federal regulators to investigate whether oil and gas operators are sanitizing workspaces, evacuating workplaces when necessary and adopting strict safety protocols such as temperature checks and frequent COVID-19 testing,” they added. Reports have shown that some oil and gas workers in the U.S. have tested positive for the virus. Meanwhile, other countries have seen significant impacts, including Mexico, whose state owned oil company has seen more than 200 employee deaths. The industry has also been hit by sinking prices because of a drop in demand linked to the pandemic. Asked for comment, Coast Guard spokesperson Brittany Panetta pointed The Hill to a March guidance issued by a regional office that has jurisdiction over the Gulf of Mexico coastline. The guidance states that operators "shall develop and be prepared to execute plans to evacuate offshore personnel exhibiting COVID-19 symptoms, and have them tested." It says they are "reminded to report the illness...or death to their respective Coast Guard Sector Command Center." OSHA and Interior, which oversees BSEE, didn’t immediately respond to The Hill’s request for comment.
Oil wells along Fort Berthold boundary subject of potential tax changes - More changes could be on the horizon regarding the way oil taxes are divvied up between the Three Affiliated Tribes and the state of North Dakota, as the tribe seeks revenue from all wells that straddle the boundary of the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation. Tribal Chairman Mark Fox, who has pushed to address this matter in the past, raised it again at a Friday meeting of the Tribal Taxation Committee at the state Capitol in Bismarck. At issue are 132 wells that begin outside the reservation and extend horizontally across the border. The tribe does not collect any tax revenue on those wells, as the money goes to the state. For wells that begin on the reservation and then cross the border, both the tribe and state share in tax revenue. Fox would like to see the tribe collect taxes from all wells at the border, not just the ones that begin on Fort Berthold. He told committee members, which include state lawmakers and the governor, that the issue is a matter of “realizing revenue for our government, just like you do for the wells that go both ways.” “The longer we wait, the more we lose,” Fox said. “That’s really a strong concern that we’ve got, that this needs to be resolved ASAP.” For wells that begin on the reservation and cross the boundary, the proportion of tax revenue that goes to the tribe and the state depends on whether the well passes trust or fee land. Trust land is held by the federal government in trust for the benefit of the tribe, and fee land refers to private land within a reservation. A major tax agreement struck in 2019 changed the percentage of taxes allocated for new wells drilled on Fort Berthold, depending on which type of land the well crosses. As committee members discussed the issue Friday, a potential solution emerged in which the tribe collects taxes on all wells that cross the border, but possibly not on the portion of a well that extends outside the reservation. Fox acknowledged that a solution might involve a “give and take,” in which the tribe loses some tax money collected on wells that reach land outside the boundary. He indicated that the tribe is researching how this matter is handled on oil-rich Indian reservations in other states. He said he would also like to see data showing how much money went to the state, historically, that could have gone to the tribe had an agreement been reached earlier allowing the tribe to share in tax revenue from wells that begin off the reservation.
Land Board again pushes back gas royalty payment deadline - The North Dakota Board of University and School Lands voted Wednesday to further push back the deadline dozens of oil patch companies face to pay the state for deductions taken from natural gas royalties.If a company wants to avoid penalties and owe just minimal interest, they must now pay by April 30, 2021. The money originally was due this past springuntil the Land Board voted to delay the deadline until Sept. 30 amid the oil downturn brought on during the coronavirus pandemic.Following a North Dakota Supreme Court ruling last year favorable to the state, officials estimated the state is owed tens of millions of dollars from companies that applied deductions for royalties stemming from mineral development on state-owned land. Royalty money collected by the state benefits education and public institutions. Gov. Doug Burgum suggested delaying the payment deadline againat the last Land Board meeting in August amid ongoing challenges facing the oil industry as low demand keeps oil prices down. Some oil producers are undergoing bankruptcy proceedings, and they face uncertainty over the Dakota Access Pipeline, he said Wednesday. A federal judge ordered the pipeline to stop operating this summer and although a higher court overruled that decision, litigation is ongoing. There also is uncertainty surrounding potential changes to the quality of natural gas accepted onto the Northern Border Pipeline, a major exporter for Bakken gas, Burgum said."Things are perhaps not better; they may be worse than they were last spring," he said.The Land Board voted unanimously to extend the deadline again following Wednesday's discussion, which took place in part during a closed session as the matter involves litigation.
PIPELINES: Tribes renew push to shutter Dakota Access -- Wednesday, September 9, 2020 -- Native American tribes opposing the Dakota Access pipeline are making a second bid for a federal court to shut down the crude oil pipeline.
Alaska Native tribes and 15 U.S. states file suits to stop oil drilling in Arctic refuge - Anchorage Daily News - Three Alaska tribal entities on Wednesday sued the Trump administration to stop the federal government’s first-ever oil and gas lease sale in the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The Neets’aii Gwich’in tribes of Venetie and Arctic Village named Interior Secretary David Bernhardt and several federal agencies in the suit, filed in federal district court in Alaska. The Native Village of Venetie Tribal Government, the Arctic Village Council and the Venetie Village Council, represented by the Native American Rights Fund, filed the lawsuit to protect important traditional resources there, such as the caribou that are sought after by subsistence hunters. They challenge Bernhardt’s signing last month that finalized a plan that puts all available land, or 1.6 million acres in the coastal plain, on the table for possible leasing after Congress in 2017 agreed to open the area to drilling.
Washington leads suit against Arctic Refuge drilling -Washington will lead a coalition of 15 states challenging the Trump administration’s decision to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil and natural gas production. State Attorney General Bob Ferguson said Wednesday a federal lawsuit filed in Alaska contends the decision to drill on the Coastal Plain violates federal laws, including the Administrative Procedures Act, which has been a basis of other successful suits he has filed. It also claims the decision violates the National Environmental Protection Act with a flawed environmental review. Opening the refuge to drilling is the latest example of president Donald Trump’s “assault on our environment,” Ferguson said. It would harm Washington by exacerbating the effects of climate change and devastate birds that migrate through the state, the lawsuit contends. Washington would also be impacted by refining the oil extracted in the refuge, increasing the risk of spills and potential worker hazards, it adds. Trump and his administration “unlawfully cut corners in their haste to allow drilling in this pristine, untamed wildlife refuge to oil and gas development,” Ferguson said in a news release announcing the lawsuit. An indigenous people’s community on the Coastal Plain also has filed suit against the plans to open the area to drilling. Interior Secretary David Berhardt announced in mid August the administration would open all 1.5 million acres of the Coastal Plain to oil and gas leasing, calling it “a new chapter in energy independence” and a way to generate thousands of jobs. Congress had mandated the leases, he said.
The Upcoming Release of Crude Oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve |- As the year 2020 wears on, it seems that every month brings a new surprise. In August, in addition to the ongoing pandemic and protests, a major hurricane was added to the mix. What comes next is anybody’s guess. A zombie apocalypse? An alien invasion? At this point, the possibilities seem boundless. And the energy industry has been no stranger to this year’s turmoil, what with COVID-related demand destruction, an oil-price collapse, and production shut-ins. Amidst the chaos, the Department of Energy (DOE) announced that for the first time, private-sector energy companies would be allowed to store crude oil in the U.S.’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), which resulted in the leasing of 23 MMbbl of capacity. Recently, those volumes have begun to be drawn back out. Today, we examine the factors influencing movements of crude oil into and out of the U.S. SPR. April was quite a month for crude oil, complete with the price of WTI dropping to unprecedented levels — even going negative for a day, as we discussed in One Way Out. Even before the bottom fell out though, in early April, the DOE was scrambling to cope with the fallout of the OPEC+ price war and rapidly deteriorating global crude demand due to COVID (see Things That Matter). In an attempt to stymie further price shocks and stabilize the market by absorbing some of the oil glut, the Trump administration directed the Secretary of Energy, Dan Brouilette, to fill up the SPR. To comply, the DOE announced on April 2 that it would lease up to 30 MMbbl of crude storage space in the SPR to private energy companies for the first time. It was a stunning decision to many in the industry; however, given the abundance of unceasing surprises which have occurred this year, this action was quite fitting with the what’s-next uncertainty that has ensued in 2020. The U.S. SPR is the largest emergency stockpile of crude oil in the world, with an authorized capacity of 714 MMbbl. It was established in the mid-1970s in response to the 1973 oil crisis to mitigate domestic supply disruptions. In the past few decades, it has been used to store crude for a rainy day — that is, to help deal with unpredictable events such as embargoes or devastating hurricanes that interrupt supply. There are currently four storage sites in operation. Moving from west to east in the map in Figure 1 below, they are:
Never Say Goodbye, Part 3 - Will Rebounding Canadian Crude Production Fill Up Pipelines? -Western Canadian producers have been deeply impacted by lower crude oil prices and the demand-destroying effects of COVID-19. This past spring, oil production in the vast region dropped by an estimated 940 Mb/d, or as much as 20% from the record highs earlier this year. Taking that much production offline helped in at least one sense: it eased long-standing constraints on takeaway pipelines like Enbridge’s Canadian Mainline, TC Energy’s Keystone Pipeline, and the government of Canada’s Trans Mountain Pipeline. Production has been rebounding this summer, however, and there are indications that pipeline constraints may be returning and apportionment of uncommitted space on some pipes may again become a persistent issue. Today, we continue a review of production and takeaway capacity in Alberta and its provincial neighbors with a look at apportionment trends on the biggest pipelines. As we explained in Part 1 of this series, oil producers in Western Canada responded to sharply lower oil prices and lower demand by reducing production by 940 Mb/d between February and the peak of the cutbacks in May. Three-quarters of the cuts occurred in Alberta’s oil sands in response to single-digit pricing for the heavy oil price benchmark of Western Canadian Select (WCS) during April. However, WCS prices recovered steadily through May and June, and have since been holding steady between $30/bbl and $35/bbl (all in U.S. dollars). As a result, production has begun to recover: we estimate that about half of the 940 Mb/d supply reduction had been restarted by early July, and there are indications that production has continued to rise as the summer wears on. In Part 2, we discussed how the sudden shifts in Western Canadian oil production have been affecting the region’s takeaway pipelines. It’s no secret that, despite the midstream sector’s best efforts to bring new pipeline capacity online, midstreamers failed to keep pace with production growth in the oil sands and other production areas through much of the 2010s. (See The Shape I’m In, How Long, and Canadian Pipedream for details.) The end result — at least until the production slowdown this spring — has been too many barrels competing for too little pipeline space.
Ukraine gas company to add Rick Perry pick to board – The Ukraine state-owned natural gas company caught up in President Donald Trump’s impeachment investigation has appointed a U.S. businessman pushed by former Energy Secretary Rick Perry to its board, two people with direct knowledge of the decision told POLITICO on Thursday.Houston-based oil and gas executive Robert Bensh is set join the board of Naftogaz, pending final paperwork, the two people said, adding that his appointment has drawn opposition from some other board members. They said the move has led at least one of them, Amos Hochstein, to prepare to resign.m The Ukraine government informed Naftogaz last week that it had approved Bensh, two people with knowledge said. The appointment adds to questions about Perry’s role in Ukrainian energy politics and whether the former Texas governor had pressured the government there to buy U.S. energy supplies to win favor with the Trump administration. Perry, as first reported by POLITICO, had originally pushed Naftogaz to accept Bensh and another Perry associate, Texas oil and gas executive with ties to Ukraine, Michael Bleyzer, onto its board.
Rick Perry’s Ukrainian Dream —Rick Perry came to Washington looking for a deal, and less than two months into his tenure as energy secretary, he found a hot prospect. It was April 19, 2017, and Perry, the former Texas governor, failed presidential candidate and contestant on “Dancing With the Stars,” was sitting in his office on Independence Avenue with two influential Ukrainians. “He said, ‘Look, I’m a new guy, I’m a deal-maker, I’m a Texan,’” recalls one of them, Yuriy Vitrenko, then Ukraine’s chief energy negotiator. “We’re ready to do deals,” he remembers Perry saying. The deals they discussed that day became central to Ukraine’s complex relationship with the Trump administration, a relationship that culminated in December with the House vote to impeach President Donald Trump. Perry was a leading figure in the impeachment inquiry last fall. He was among the officials, known as the “three amigos,” who ran a shadow foreign policy in Ukraine on Trump’s behalf. Their aim, according to the findings of the impeachment inquiry in the House, was to embarrass Trump’s main political rival, Joe Biden. Alongside this political mission, Perry and his staff at the Energy Department worked to advance energy deals that were potentially worth billions of dollars to Perry’s friends and political donors, a six-month investigation by reporters from Time, WNYC and ProPublica shows. Two of these deals seemed set to benefit Energy Transfer, the Texas company on whose board Perry served immediately before and after his stint in Washington. The biggest was worth an estimated $20 billion, according to U.S. and Ukrainian energy executives involved in negotiating them. If this long-discussed deal succeeds, Perry himself could stand to benefit: In March, three months after leaving government, he owned Energy Transfer shares currently worth around $800,000, according to his most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Perry appears to have stayed on the right side of the law in pursuing the Ukraine ventures. Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York, or SDNY, questioned at least four people about the deals over the past year, according to five people who are familiar with the conversations and discussed them with our reporting team on the condition of anonymity. “As far back as last year, they were already interested in events that had taken place in Ukraine around Rick Perry,” including allegations that Perry “was trying to get deals for his buddies,” says one of the people who spoke to the Manhattan prosecutors. Perry is not a target of their investigation, according to two sources familiar with the probes. But two ethics experts say Perry’s efforts were violations of federal regulations. Administration officials are not allowed to participate in matters directly relating to companies on whose board they have recently served. Other experts say Perry and his aides may have broken a federal rule that prohibits officials from advocating for companies that have not been vetted by the Commerce Department. “Even if it skirts the criminal statute, it’s still unethical,” says Richard Painter, the top ethics lawyer in the White House of President George W. Bush, with whom we shared our findings.
Mexico Is Cutting Pemex’s Oil Output Forecast in Latest Setback - Mexico is cutting its 2021 forecast for oil production at Petroleos Mexicanos by 8.4% as the state producer struggles under a $107 billion debt load and the impact of the deadly coronavirus. The country’s Finance Ministry lowered its preliminary estimate for output next year to 1.857 million barrels a day, down from 2.027 million in an April forecast, according to a draft of next year’s budget proposal obtained by Bloomberg News. Pemex, as the company is also known, has been hit hard by Covid-related deaths among its workers at a time when the oil-market crash only made the ambitions of Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to increase production more difficult. Even the revised output number looks “optimistic,” said [one analyst]. “It seems that they have not learned,” he said, predicting that Pemex will fail to meet the lower target. The Finance Ministry estimates oil prices will average $42.10 a barrel next year, up from a preliminary forecast of $30 a barrel at the start of April. The numbers are part of a budget proposal that would increase Pemex’s spending by just 0.6% next year, to 544.6 billion pesos ($25 billion).
Mexico to present projects open to private capital as it moves to undo energy reform | S&P Global Platts — Mexico will present a set of infrastructure projects in the energy sector where private companies will be invited to participate, while it prepares to undo the energy reform conducted by the previous administration. Stay up to date with the latest commodity content. Sign up for our free daily Commodities Bulletin. Sign Up Mexico will announce a set of infrastructure projects before Sept. 15, when Mexicans celebrate Independence Day, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said Sept. 7. The joint plan between the government and the private industry to reactivate the economy had originally been announced in November. According to a presentation filtered to the press, which presumably originated in the office of the presidency, the government's announcement will consist of 168 projects worth roughly $44.4 billion where the private industry will provide over 50% of equity. The announcement comes at a time when lawmakers from the president's party prepare to discuss a series of changes to the constitution that would effectively undo the energy reform carried out by former President Enrique Pena, which opened up the sector to private investment after over seven decades of monopoly. Senators from Morena, the party formed by the president and which currently has majority in both Houses of Congress, will discuss modifications to undo the 2013 energy reform, according to the party's legislative agenda for the next period, which began on Sept. 1 ends in January. The plan includes changes to Mexico's Hydrocarbon's law, Pemex's internal rules, the law of the energy regulators and the law for hydrocarbon revenues, the agenda shows. The main goal of the modification is to strengthen Pemex and CFE, the state hydrocarbon and power companies, respectively, for them to become economic engines for the country, the president has repeatedly said. The energy reform allowed private companies to participate in all areas of the energy sector for the first time in over 70 years and attracted over $200 billion in committed investments, including power generation and oil exploration. Lopez Obrador has touted with the idea of modifying the constitution to undo the energy reform for many years and even used it as a presidential campaign promise. Yet since he took office in December 2018, he promised to wait until his third year in office to do so. Sources have told Platts in recent months they see limits to the changes the current administration can make, because modifying many laws is a complex political process that needs coordination and therefore many of them expected the changes next year, after next year's elections, which could add strength to the president's party. In July, Mexico will renovate the lower House of Congress as well as 13 out of the 32 governorships in the biggest election process in modern history. Sources have also said undoing the reform is hard because many of the rules of the market are also included in the recently signed United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.
Mexico Shuts The Door To Foreign Oil Companies -There will be no new exploration and production contracts on the table for private or foreign companies in Mexico under a government plan set to be made public soon.“We don’t expect that there will be anything new in exploration and extraction in this infrastructure plan,” the head of Mexico’s oil industry association AMEXHI toldReuters in an interview.The infrastructure plan is the Mexican government’s attempt to stimulate economic growth, but according to AMEXHI’s head, Merlin Cochran, it will not involve a focus on the energy industry in the form of new projects. New joint ventures for Pemex are also unlikely, Cochran told Reuters.Earlier this week, it emerged that Mexico might have to cut its production target for 2021 as total output continued to fall steadily. President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has ambitious plans for reversing this fall, but this plan relies exclusively on state player Pemex, and the company has probably the highest debt pile in the oil industry, despite government efforts to help it prop up its finances. This has made the target of 2 million bpd even harder to achieve.According to government plans, Pemex was supposed to boost oil production by about half a million barrels in 2021. Instead, in July production fell to 1.54 million bpd because of a sharp drop in the output from Pemex’s largest offshore field, Maloob. Output from Maloob fell by more than 30 percent on the year. This meant Pemex’s total for July fell to a record low. Earlier this year, there were media reports that the Mexican state company would farm out some production to foreign companies. The head of the National Hydrocarbons Commission, the state industry regulator, said he expected farm-out deals to be announced soon. However, this has not happened to date even though, according to NHC’s Rogelio Hernandez, Pemex was actively looking for partners.
PdV sees no spill risk from floating storage vessel - The Venezuela-flagged floating storage tanker Nabarima is in sound operating condition and poses no risk of an oil spill, according to PetroSucre, an offshore joint venture controlled by Venezuelan state-owned PdV.The Nabarima, a small VLCC built in 2005, has been moored for a decade at the offshore Corocoro field in eastern Venezuela's Paria Gulf where it is used to store PetroSucre's production of 23°API crude. The joint venture's operations have been suspended since last year, leaving the storage unit at close to its full capacity of about 1.2mn bl."Representatives of the National Aquatics Institute (INEA) have boarded (the Nabarima) on different occasions to certify its optimum conditions," PetroSucre said in a 5 September statement. The last such visit was on 16 August, the company noted.PetroSucre workers reported early last week that the vessel was listing because of water flooding in the engine room and nearby compartments.Italy's Eni, which holds a 26pc stake in PetroSucre, said later in the week that the vessel had been stabilized, but the crude aboard would be transferredinto another tanker, once the US provided a "green light" to ensure sanctions compliance.PetroSucre dismissed complaints by workers on and off the unit as false information intended to hurt Venezuela's national oil industry and justify US sanctions.
Total to drop control of sensitive offshore Brazilian exploration blocks - — Total has decided to resign its operatorship of five exploration blocks, in the environmentally sensitive the Foz do Amazonas Basin, 120 km offshore Brazil, the French oil major said Sept. 7. Total said it notified its partners BP and state-run Petrobras of its decision on Aug. 19 of blocks FZA-M-57, FZA-M-86, FZA-M-88, FZA-M-125 and FZA-M-127. No reason was given for the decision but exploration projects in Foz do Amazonas have been facing strong resistance from environmental groups following the discovery of a previously unknown coral reef in the turbid waters of the Amazon River delta. Total has been looking to drill seven exploration well on the acreage in the area in a long-running struggle to secure approval from Brazilian federal environmental regulator IBAMA. Total first started licensing the exploration drilling project in 2014. The move also comes amid rising public sensitivity over new oil exploration. BP last month pledged to undertake no new oil exploration in new countries as part of its transition to cleaner energy. Total said it now has six months to appoint a new operator for the blocks, which it was awarded in 2013. Until then, Total said it has a duty to continue monitoring all regulatory processes on behalf of its partners Petrobras and BP. Total's portfolio in Brazil currently includes 24 blocks, with 10 operated. In 2019, its production in the country averaged 16,000 b/d.
Tanker Delfi causes oil spill again - The work on raising and stabilizing the Delfi tanker (owned by Mister Drake PC) that sank near Odesa again caused an oil spill. "The leakage of oil products occurred due to the fact that the vessel continues to be raised and stabilized. The State Environmental Inspectorate will be able to calculate losses for environmental damage only after the Delfi tanker is finally removed from the Black Sea," head of the State Environmental Inspection Andriy Maliovany wrote on Facebook on Friday. According to him, on Thursday, the State Environmental Inspection of Odesa region, examining the water area near the sunken ship, noticed spots and a gray slick of silvery color with a total area of 70 sq. m. Laboratory studies have shown an excess of normalized values of maximum permissible concentrations in water by 5.8 times. To promptly eliminate pollution, representatives of Odesa branch of the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority carried out urgent work near the flooded tanker using a sorbent. As reported, the specialists of Cranship LLC on August 26, 2020 put the Delfi tanker sunken near Odesa beach on an even keel. In November 2019, the tanker Delfi under the flag of Moldova sank in the Odesa Gulf.
Huge anti-govt demonstrations held across Mauritius in wake of botched oil spill response — -- Tens of thousands of Mauritians took to the streets of the capital to call for the resignation of Prime Minister Pravind Jugnauth and his cabinet for their botched handling of an oil spill which threatens the country’s economy. An estimated 75,000 people took to the streets of the capital Saint Louis over the weekend, the country’s largest anti-government protests in decades, following a slow and lackluster response to an oil spill in early August. The Japanese bulk carrier MV Wakashio struck a reef in southeast Mauritius and spilled roughly 1,000 tons of oil into the pristine Indian Ocean waters offshore the island. A 15 kilometer (9 mile) stretch of the coastline is now stained with oil as volunteers attempt to halt the spread of the slick. Environmental volunteers have erected makeshift oil barriers to stem the spread while experts from Japan and Britain are investigating the extent of the spill and its potential impact on the local flora and fauna, which include major mangrove forests filled with endangered species of animal. Meanwhile, some 34 melon-headed whales were found dead or seriously ill near the spill while the carcasses of roughly 40 dolphins are being examined for traces of oil in their system which may have contributed to their sudden and untimely deaths.
Mauritius oil spill ship operator to pay $9.4 million- The Japanese operator of a ship that leaked oil off the Mauritius coast pledged Friday to pay at least $9.4 million to help restore areas affected by the spill. Mitsui OSK Lines said in a statement that it planned "to contribute a total fund of about one billion Japanese yen over several years to support measures" to restore the marine environment. The measures include running mangrove and coral protection projects in partnership with experts and local NGOs, and setting up an environment recovery fund, it said. The company operates the MV Wakashio, which ran aground on July 25 off the coast of Mauritius, carrying 4,000 tonnes of fuel that began seeping into the island nation's pristine, coral-filled waters. After the boat split in two, the larger piece was towed out to sea and sunk, but the smaller section remains stranded on the reef. More than 1,000 tonnes of oil is believed to have leaked from the ship, with the rest siphoned out before it spilled. The oil has affected mangroved areas that are complicated to clean. Both the operator and the vessel's owner Nagashiki Shipping have apologised for the spill. Nagashiki last month pledged to "sincerely" respond to requests for compensation. It was not immediately clear if the funds promised by Mitsui would satisfy demands from the Mauritius government for compensation from the companies for "all losses and damages" caused by the spill and clean-up costs. Japan's Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said last week the country would continue supporting recovery efforts. The accident is still under investigation by Mauritian authorities. Japan's Kyodo News said last month the ship's crew had steered it close to shore because they wanted to find a mobile signal so they could contact family and ask about the coronavirus situation at home. It cited an unnamed judicial source, who also said an alcohol-fuelled birthday party had been held on board before the accident, though it was not clear if on-duty crew participated.
No real danger of oil spill from burning oil Tanker, Sri Lanka Navy Says - There is no real risk of a spill from a fully loaded supertanker that caught fire off the east coast of Sri Lanka, a senior official in the Indian Ocean nation's navy said on Friday. The fire that broke out in the engine room of the New Diamond on Thursday morning had spread to the bridge of the ship, carrying about 2 million barrels of oil, though it has not reached the cargo area, the Sri Lankan navy said. Director-General of Operations Rear-Admiral Y N Jayarathna told reporters it was the navy’s view that there was no real danger of a spill, because the fire on the ship has been contained in the rear section of the vessel. "The live flames have now died down and there is only white smoke emanating from the vessel," he told a televised press conference. A navy spokesman, Captain Indika de Silva, said there were 23 crew on board, one of whom is presumed dead. The rest have been taken off the ship by the Sri Lankan navy, with one injured crew member flown to the capital Colombo for treatment. Three tug boats, five Sri Lankan navy ships as well as two craft from the Russian navy and three from the Indian navy have been assisting in an operation to fight the fire and tow the ship away from the coast, after it began drifting towards land. At present the vessel is being held by the salvage team in deep sea 35 kms (21.7 miles) east of the Sri Lankan town of Pottuvil, de Silva said. Initially, the ship was stranded 38 kms (24 miles) east of the town of Thirukovil, but drifted within 25 kms of the coast after being abandoned. Authorities were now towing it eastward, away from the coast, de Silva said.
Oil spill fears dissipate as fire almost doused on Sri Lankan coast - The fears of an oil spill due to a fire in a crude laden vessel off the Sri Lankan coast appears to have dissipated with the authorities on Sunday saying here that the blaze has almost been doused.While intense fire-fighting efforts taken up by the Indian Coast Guard and Sri Lankan Air Force and Navy since September 3 had led to localisation of the fire in the ship, a defence release said no oil spill has been reported.“Fire appears to be doused and no flame and smoke is visible.Situation is being monitored for further action,” the release said, adding that the inertness of cargo was being maintained.The ship’s storage area, which has about three lakh tonnes of crude oil, is reported to be safe.The Panama registered MT (Motor Tanker) New Diamond, a Greek owned vessel and under charter by Indian Oil Corporation was carrying 2,70,000 tonnes of crude oil from Kuwait to India’s Paradip port when its engine room caught fire off Sangamankanda’s coast in Lanka’s eastern district of Ampara.Indian Coast Guard (ICG) and Sri Lankan ships, fast patrol vessels and tugs have been deployed in the fire fighting exercise.The oil tanker, which was taken to safe waters, is being held by a tug about 42 miles from the nearest coast for preventing drifting of the ship and to facilitate fire fighting.The various assets deployed are equipped with fire extinguishers like Dry Chemical Power and Aqueous Film- Forming Foam Concentrates besides Oil Spill Dispersants and oil skimmers to handle the situation in the event of an oil slick.
Fire Breaks Out Again on Stricken Supertanker Offshore Sri Lanka Firefighters are again battling flames aboard a fully loaded oil supertanker off Sri Lanka, the island's nation's navy said on Monday, four days after fire first broke out on the New Diamond."Fresh flames have risen in the funnel section of the MT New Diamond Supertanker and firefighters are battling the fire using foam to contain the blaze," said the Navy spokesman Captain Indika de Silva, adding that the fire had not reached the oil cargo of around 2 million barrels.A fire first broke out last Thursday in the engine room and spread to the bridge of the very large crude carrier, chartered by Indian Oil Corp for importing oil from Kuwait. That blaze was doused on Sunday.Tugs had been spraying water onto the ship on Monday to keep the metal cool, but high winds ignited the flames once again, de Silva said."We are spraying water on to the ship to keep it cool as there are several small fires still burning," he said.Several tugboats surrounding the Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) are keeping it about 30 nautical miles, or about 58 km, east of Sangaman point - Sri Lanka’s easternmost point in the Ampara district.The supertanker is adrift and has to be held in position by the tugboats.Salvage operations are expected to begin shortly, but "the ship will be allowed to be moved out of Sri Lankan waters only with our permission", de Silva said.
Sri Lanka towing stricken ship to deep sea, douses another fire (Reuters) - The Sri Lankan navy towed a stricken supertanker away from the Indian Ocean island’s east coast on Wednesday, while an Indian Coast Guard plane sprayed chemical dispersants on a long oil slick that trailed in its wake. A fire broke out in the engine room of the Greek-owned New Diamond tanker last Thursday. The blaze was believed to have been doused on Sunday but reignited a day later. Laden with 2 million barrels of crude oil, there are fears that the accident could cause an environmental disaster, but so far the slicks have resulted from escaping marine fuel oil rather than leaking crude. “This morning when we started moving the ship we noticed another slick trailing behind. It was about 1-2 nautical miles (1.8-3.6 kilometers), longer than the previous slick,” said Indika de Silva, spokesman for Sri Lankan Navy. The first slick, spotted on Tuesday, had been around a kilometer long. The slick, comprising marine fuel and residue from the fire, has been sprayed with chemical dispersants from a Dornier aircraft deployed by the Indian Coast Guard, de Silva said. Three members of a salvage team boarded the tanker on Wednesday to assess the damage, while a naval tug towed the vessel 41 nautical miles (76 kms) off Sri Lanka’s east coast. Greece-based Porto Emporios Shipping Inc is the registered owner of the 20-year old Panama-flagged very large crude carrier New Diamond, according to Refinitiv data. New Shipping Ltd is the manger of the vessel. There was no immediate comment from either company. Legal action would be filed against the owner under Sri Lankan laws protecting the marine ecosystem, Jagath Gunesekara, deputy general manager of the Marine Environment Protection Authority (MEPA) said. “We are deciding whether to claim criminal liability or civil liability or both,” Gunesekara said. Sri Lanka has deployed scientists and experts from MEPA, with one team examining the area around the ship and another surveying coastal areas for signs of pollution. “I have been informed there was some marine life, like turtles, closer to the incident, so this oil spill would have definitely damaged these species,” MEPA chairwoman Dharshani Lahandapura told Reuters.
Diesel fuel found in ocean near Sri Lanka oil tanker fire - An Indian coast guard aircraft sprayed a special chemical on a patch of diesel fuel near a large oil tanker off Sri Lanka's coast where firefighters are battling a new blaze that broke out two days after an earlier fire was extinguished, the navy said. The MT New Diamond is carrying nearly 2 million barrels of crude oil and officials have warned of possible massive environmental damage to Sri Lanka's coast if the ship leaks or explodes. Navy spokesman Capt. Indika de Silva said the new fire started Monday evening and reached the magnitude of the previous blaze. Firefighters have contained it but it is still burning, he said. High winds, extreme temperatures on the ship and sparks reignited it, the navy said, adding that so far there is no risk of a crude oil leak or of the fire spreading into the oil storage area. The navy said the initial fire began in an engine room boiler and did not spread to the oil storage area. However, it said "a diesel patch" had been spotted in the ocean about one kilometer (0.6 mile) from the ship. The patch is likely to be diesel fuel from the ship, it said. The ship has about 1,700 tons of diesel fuel to power its engines. An Indian coast guard aircraft sprayed a chemical on the patch to minimize damage to the marine environment, the navy said. Ships and helicopters from Sri Lanka and neighboring India are taking part in the firefighting efforts. The initial fire killed one Filipino crew member and injured another, but 21 other crew members escaped uninjured. Twenty were taken to the southern port city of Galle on Tuesday, while the captain remained on a ship near the tanker to help firefighting efforts, de Silva said. The tanker is about 30 nautical miles (55 kilometers) off the coast, the navy said.
Oil Supertanker Windfall Disappears -- Just six months ago, oil supertankers experienced a windfall as the pandemic slashed demand for crude and traders raced to book vessels to store the resulting glut. Now that season of good fortune for those ships has all but vanished. The tankers, which can haul 2 million barrels of oil across the world’s oceans, are now earning just $6,103 a day on the benchmark route from the Middle East to China, Baltic Exchange data show. That’s the lowest since May 2018. Back in March, they could make $250,000 a day on the same journey. The boom-to-bust comes as the recovery in oil demand stutters and the OPEC+ alliance continues to curb output, reducing the need for tankers. At the same time, China, the world’s largest crude importer, has slowed its purchases following a buying binge when oil was cheap. “The demand that was pushed forward is now not showing up anywhere in the market,” said Peter Sand, chief shipping analyst at industry group BIMCO. “There’s still a little bit of floating storage around, and that storage is easing mostly,” weighing on rates, he said. To help improve rates in the short-term, vessels can slow down in order to limit availability. Renewed interest from traders to store oil at sea on a temporary basis could also provide a boost. Shipowners usually prefer the former when rates are low so that they can capitalize on any future improvement in earnings. For now though, the outlook doesn’t look much better. More ships are starting to come available as congestion begins to ease at China’s ports following the buying spree earlier in the year, “The return of vessels from floating storage and reduced port congestion is putting pressure on rates,” the analysts said. “We expect an improvement of crude oil trade will have to wait until oil stock levels have come down before OPEC+ opens its tap.”
Russia must regain — and increase — its oil market share when demand returns, energy minister says - Russia and other major oil producers must regain, and even increase, their share of the oil market once demand returns, Russia's energy minister has said. "When demand begins to return to pre-crisis levels, it will be extremely important for Russia, like other oil-producing countries, to regain market share as soon as possible and, possibly, even increase it in the face of reduced competition between producers," Russia's Energy Minister Alexander Novak said in an article published in the ministry's in-house magazine Tuesday. OPEC, Russia and other non-OPEC producers — a group known collectively as OPEC+ — are currently cutting output by 7.7 million barrels per day (bpd) until December. The energy alliance agreed to impose the production cuts in response to lower demand due to the coronavirus pandemic and the global economic downturn. From January 2021, the cuts are expected to taper further to amount to 5.8 million bpd, with these expected to last until April 2022. Producers aim to rebalance supply and demand in the unstable market, and to support oil prices. Russia and other major oil producers have found themselves ceding market share to U.S. shale producers in recent years, with the U.S. becoming the largest oil producer in the world in 2018. Wary of the damage that lower output is doing to its own oil industry, both to producers and its oilfield services sector, the Russian government is looking to support the sector and could launch a scheme to encourage (and offer tax incentives) to oil companies to drill several thousand oil wells with the idea being that the wells are left unfinished but can quickly be put into use after the OPEC+ deal ends in 2022. Novak said that "work is underway to create conditions for the formation of a stock of unfinished wells" but did not specify if the scheme had been approved by the government. Such a scheme is designed to support Russia's oilfield services industry that focuses on services related to oil and gas exploration as well as the construction and maintenance of oil wells, for example. The industry employs 300,000 people in Russia, Novak said, and a lack of investment in the domestic industry could lead to mass redundancies, and it losing more market share to foreign companies.
Why Opec needs a plan to balance near-term prices against long-term market share - - It is easy to talk about when things return to normal. For the world oil market, there may be no such return. With demand still struggling, Opec needs a plan to balance short-term prices against long-term market share by the time its monitoring committee next meets on September 17.Various Covid-19 vaccines may be on the way, but doubts remain over the reliability of testing and their eventual efficacy.Meanwhile, the virus remains frustratingly resilient despite a fall in death rates. The growing rate of infections in India, Indonesia and Iraq appears unstoppable while Australia, Germany, Italy, Spain, Britain and, especially, France have registered a resurgence of cases after having managed to keep things under control.However, the US, Brazil and Iran were never really on top of the pandemic.Efforts to reopen schools and universities in many countries have led to a surge in new cases. Most office work continues remotely or at limited occupancy. As the US holiday season ebbs, these factors are causing a renewed slowdown in petrol demand. Air passenger travel is severely depressed, with continued confusion over regulations and the unpredictable appearance of quarantines and travel bans.Blanket lockdowns in most places will probably not return but rolling closures and depressed social and public activities continue. As companies run out of cash, temporary job losses become permanent and as government financial support winds down, many countries may now be entering a more conventional, shallower but still painful recession.China’s imports have been strong, although lower in July and August compared with the record hit in June, helping to support the market. But it is questionable how long this will continue as the country clears a backlog of deliveries bought when prices were weaker. Last month, the number of active US rigs began to increase after hitting its lowest level since 1940. The temporary shut-ins because of Hurricane Laura should shortly be reversed. Still, there is insufficient drilling to compensate for the fast declines in existing shale wells and the fall in US output will probably not be halted until next year, and until prices are above $50 per barrel.This points to the danger for Opec+ in assuming the pandemic is an aberration and that current policy only has to be maintained temporarily. To be fair to the group, it has laid out a path for sizeable but diminishing cuts of 5.8 million bpd against its baseline through next year and up to April 2022.
Oil Prices Face a Chill Autumn Wind - As the summer driving season fades in the rearview mirror, oil markets are taking on a distinctly chilly air.The recovery in demand has officially stalled, just as the OPEC+ countries are starting to taper their record output cuts. With spare capacity rife throughout the supply chain and huge stockpiles of crude and refined products, it may be some while yet before oil prices resume their upward path.After a strong initial rebound from the depths of the pandemic-induced slump, the comeback in demand slowed dramatically, as I’ve written hereand here. This is most obvious in those countries that publish detailed data at high frequency, such as the U.S., the U.K. and some other European nations.U.S. oil demand recovery has ground to a halt at around 85% of last year's level That oil demand in India remains muted is particularly bad news for those wishing oil prices higher. Before Covid-19 struck, it had joined China as one of the major centers of growth in liquid fuel consumption. Sales of transport fuels by the country’s three biggest fuel retailers — Indian Oil Corp., Bharat Petroleum Corp. and Hindustan Petroleum Corp. — were still down year-on-year by more than 20% in July and August. The one potential bright spot is China, which may yet prove a lifeline for the flagging demand. July’s apparent oil use in the world’s biggest importer was up by a whopping 19.5% year on year, according to Bloomberg calculations on data from the nation’s Customs General Administration. Air travel in the country’s vast domestic market is picking up. Passenger numbers for China’s biggest airlines — Air China Ltd., China Eastern Airlines Corp. and China Southern Airlines Co. — were up by about 25%month on month in July. Travel analytics company ForwardKeys predicts air travel in China will fully recover this month. But China’s already got plenty of oil on hand. It took advantage of rock-bottom prices in March and April to make purchases, leaving the country’s stockpiles brimming, both on land and in tankers anchored off its coast. The volume in so-called floating storage is coming down, but there are still some 50 million barrels of crude that have been in tankers off China’s Shandong province for more than 15 days, according to London-based consultants Energy Aspects. When it comes to getting oil out of the ground, the spare capacity may be even bigger. While U.S. shale oil production may never recover fully to its pre-virus peak, there is still plenty of room for output to pick up from current depressed levels. In the seven shale basins covered by the Energy Information Administration’s Drilling Productivity Report, there were still more than 7,600 drilled but uncompleted wells at the end of July, a number that has barely changed since February. That may reflect a lack of activity in the shale patch, but the wells provide a buffer from when demand picks up to the point that drilling crews return to the Permian and other shale basins.
IEA sees oil market stuck between no major slowdown but stalled recovery - (Reuters) - The global economy is likely not headed for any major slowdown due to COVID-19 but piled-up storage and uncertainty over China’s oil demand cloud oil markets’ recovery, an official with International Energy Agency (IEA) said. Keisuke Sadamori, IEA director for energy markets and security, told Reuters the outlook for oil was in the midst of either a second wave or a steady first wave of the coronavirus. “There is an enormous amount of uncertainty, but we don’t expect any additional serious slowdown in the coming months.” “Even though (the market is) not expecting real robust growth coming back soon, the view on demand is more stable compared with three months ago,” he said in an interview. Crude prices LCOc1 CLc1 plunged in spring to historic lows as the pandemic’s lockdowns crushed demand, and have pared losses but remained stuck near $40 a barrel. The IEA cut its 2020 oil demand forecast in its monthly report on Aug. 13, warning that reduced air travel would lower global oil demand by 8.1 million barrels per day (bpd). The Paris-based agency downgraded its outlook for the first time in three months, as the epidemic continues to wreak economic pain and job losses worldwide. With Brent crude registering its first weekly loss since June on Friday, markets have grown increasingly nervous over demand, poor refining margins and slow economic growth, reducing incentives to draw crude and products from abundant stocks. “It doesn’t seem like a massive stock draw seems to be happening yet,” Sadamori said. “We are not seeing a robust pickup in refining activity, and jet fuel is the big problem,” he added. China, the world’s largest crude importer, emerged from an economic lockdown sooner than other major economies and used its financial muscle to make record oil imports in recent months, a rare bright spot amid global demand destruction. But geopolitical tensions could call into doubt “to what extent it can be sustainable and last long”, Sadamori said. “There are so many uncertainties with regard to the Chinese economy and their relationship with key industrialized countries, with the U.S. and these days, even Europe. It’s not such an optimistic situation - that casts some shadow over the growth outlook”.
Big trade houses see persisting oil stocks bubble - (Reuters) - Trading firms enjoyed an unprecedented boom in the first half of 2020 due to extreme volatility caused by the COVID-19 pandemic but the market’s direction now looks less certain due to high stocks and tepid demand recovery. “The market is more complex and nobody knows when demand will come back. Financial investors are piling into second half of 2021 or December 2021 (oil futures contracts) on the assumption demand will be back then,” Marco Dunand, chief executive of Mercuria Energy Trading, told Reuters. “Coming into the fourth quarter, the expectation was that we should be drawing 3 to 4 million barrels per day of crude and products from stocks but the market is not drawing that.” During the peak period of lockdowns in March and April, traders were forced to hastily store an additional 1 billion barrels of crude and refined products as oil demand cratered. Eventually, OPEC and other major producers announced record output cuts that helped oil prices rebound. Economic activity began picking up in June but the recovery has flatlined. Some possible COVID-19 vaccines are undergoing trials but meanwhile, countries have been forced to re-impose some restrictions to stop the spread of the virus. “We see people starting to do floating storage again ... It will be a problem at some point as we have a massive overhang,” Dunand said. “Crude and distillate stocks in particular are building ... It’s a bubble mess.”
Oil skids after Saudi price cuts, demand optimism fades - Oil prices dropped more than 1% on Monday after earlier hitting their lowest since July as Saudi Arabia made the deepest monthly price cuts for supply to Asia in five months while optimism about demand recovery cooled amid the coronavirus pandemic. Brent crude was at $42.21 a barrel, down 45 cents or 1.1% by 0439 GMT, after earlier sliding to $41.51, the lowest since July 30. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude skidded 51 cents, or 1.3%, to $39.26 a barrel after earlier dropping to $38.55, the lowest since July 10. The world remains awash with crude and fuel despite supply cuts by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and their allies, known as OPEC+, and government efforts to stimulate the global economy and oil demand. Refiners have reduced their fuel output as a result, causing oil producers such as Saudi Arabia to cut prices to offset the falling crude demand. "Sentiment has turned sour and there might be some selling pressure ahead," Howie Lee, an economist at Singapore's OCBC bank said. The Labor Day holiday on Monday marks the traditional end of the peak summer demand season in the United States and that renewed investors' focus on the current lackluster fuel demand in the world's biggest oil user. China, the world's biggest oil importer which has been supporting prices with record purchases, slowed their intake in August, according to customs data on Monday. "Abundant supplies, fears of loosening OPEC+ compliance, the end of the U.S. driving season and stale long positioning have all combined to erode confidence in oil," OANDA's senior market analyst Jeffrey Halley said in a note. The world's top oil exporter Saudi Arabia cut the October official selling price for Arab Light crude it sells to Asia by the most since May, indicating demand remains weak. Asia is Saudi Arabia's largest market by region. In August, the OPEC+ group eased production cuts to 7.7 million barrels per day after global oil prices improved from historic lows caused by the coronavirus pandemic cutting fuel demand.
Oil Down After Saudi Price Cuts - -- Oil extended its retreat below $40 a barrel after Saudi Arabia cut pricing for October crude sales as the summer driving season winds down with many countries still struggling to control the coronavirus. Futures in New York dropped 1.5% in Asian trading after Saudi Aramco reduced its key Arab Light grade by a larger-than-expected amount for shipments to Asia in a sign that fuel demand in the largest oil-importing region is wavering. The kingdom also lowered prices to the U.S. for the first time in six months. West Texas Intermediate, the American crude benchmark, fell 7.5% last week in its biggest loss since June amid nervousness over demand and a rout in stocks. While infection rates in the U.S. are slowing, the pandemic appears to be staging a comeback in parts of Europe and cases in India are still surging. After trading in a narrow range for the past three months, crude is off to a poor start in September amid a still-tepid demand backdrop and a continued increase in output from the OPEC+ alliance. Chinese crude imports fell for a second month in August, and the world’s biggest importer is expected to purchase much less in September and October than it did in May and June as independent refiners run out of quota after a buying binge earlier this year. A price correction is overdue and weakening margins for major fuels such as diesel may potentially become a concern, said Howie Lee, an economist at Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp. in Singapore. Any rally in prices will “face headwinds as long as crude oil inventories remain materially high,” he said. WTI for October delivery fell 1.5% to $39.19 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange as of 7:48 a.m. in London after dropping 3.9% on Friday. It was down as much as 3.1% earlier on Monday. Brent for November settlement dropped 1.2% to $42.15 a barrel on the ICE Futures Europe exchange after declining 3.2% on Friday. Brent’s three-month timespread was $1.48 a barrel in contango - where prompt prices are cheaper than later-dated contracts -- compared with $1.09 in contango a week earlier. The change in the market structure of the global crude benchmark indicates concern about over-supply is increasing.
Oil prices fall as fuel demand concerns grow after end of U.S. summer driving season - Oil fell below $42 a barrel on Tuesday, its 5th session of decline, pressured by concerns that a recovery in demand could weaken as coronavirus infections flare up around the world. Coronavirus cases rose in 22 of the 50 U.S. states, a Reuters analysis showed on the Labor Day holiday weekend. New infections are also increasing in India and Britain. Brent crude fell $1.28, or 3.05%, to trade at $40.73 per barrel. West Texas Intermediate crude dropped $2.07, or 5.2%, to trade at $37.70 per barrel. On Monday, crude fell after Saudi Arabia's state oil company Aramco cut the October official selling prices for its Arab light oil, a sign demand may be stuttering. "The price weakness is continuing today," said Eugen Weinberg, analyst at Commerzbank. "We believe this is attributable first and foremost to demand concerns." Both oil benchmarks have dropped out of the ranges they were trading in throughout August. Brent has fallen more than 8% since the end of August. "The streak of losses is driven by a stalling crude demand outlook for the rest of the year," said Paola Rodriguez-Masiu, analyst at Rystad Energy. Still, oil has recovered from historic lows hit in April, thanks to a record supply cut by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies, known as OPEC+. The producers are meeting on Sept. 17 to review the market. Crude has also found support from a weaker U.S. dollar, although the U.S. currency was up on Tuesday. The market could rally beyond $45 later this year, said Norbert Ruecker, head of economics at Swiss bank Julius Baer. "Fundamentally, things have not changed," he said. "Demand is recovering, supply remains constrained, and the storage overhang is slowly disappearing."
Oil drops more than 7% to multi-month low on demand fears - Oil prices tumbled to their lowest level since June on Tuesday amid growing demand concerns as Covid-19 continues to spread. West Texas Intermediate crude, the U.S. oil benchmark, slipped $3.01, or 7.6%, to settle at $36.76 per barrel. During the session WTI traded as low as $36.13, a price not seen since June 15. International benchmark Brent crude dipped more than 5.3% to settle at $39.78, also its lowest level since June. "Today's oil price move is a clear sign that the market now seriously worries about the future of oil demand," said Paola Rodriguez-Masiu, senior oil markets analyst at Rystad Energy. "The streak of losses is driven by a stalling crude demand outlook for the rest of the year, with rising cases of Covid-19 and the end of the summer driving season in the U.S., as well as Asian refineries putting on [the] breaks," she added. Since WTI plunged into negative territory in April for the first time on record, oil prices have staged a big comeback. WTI jumped nearly 90% in May, and has posted monthly gains ever since. The gains were, of course, on the back of record lows, but prices moved higher as international producers scaled back production in an effort to counteract the demand drop-off caused by the pandemic. But in recent sessions prices have begun to trend lower. WTI fell during Monday's session after registering a 7.45% loss in the prior week, snapping a four-week win streak and posting its worst weekly decline since June. Tuesday's move lower followed Saudi Aramco cutting its official selling prices for October, which RBC's Helima Croft said triggered new demand concerns. In a recent note to clients, Bank of America said that it will take three years for demand to recover from Covid-19, assuming there's a vaccine or cure. The firm believes peak oil will come as soon as 2030 due in part to electric car proliferation. Rising U.S.-China trade tensions, as well as production coming back online also pressured prices on Tuesday, as did a stronger U.S. dollar. "The market has its eye on the big picture: where and when we see demand normalize globally and what happens with both US production and OPEC+ agreement over the medium term,
Oil prices reverse some losses but demand concerns persist - Oil futures clawed back some of the losses they sustained in the previous session, but a rebound in COVID-19 cases in some countries undermined hopes for a steady recovery in global demand. Brent crude was up 44 cents, or 1.1%, at $40.22 a barrel after dropping more than 5% on Tuesday to fall below $40 a barrel for the first time since June. U.S. crude was up 50 cents, or 1.4%, at $37.26 a barrel, having fallen nearly 8% in the previous session. Both major oil benchmarks are trading close to three-month lows. The global health crisis continues to flare with coronavirus cases rising in India, Great Britain, Spain and several parts of the United States. The outbreaks are threatening to slow a global economic recovery and reduce demand for fuels from aviation gas to diesel. "Short-term oil market fundamentals look soft: the demand recovery is fragile, inventories and spare capacity are high, and refining margins are low," Morgan Stanley said. Yet, the bank raised its Brent price forecast slightly higher to $50 a barrel for the second half of 2021 with the dollar weakening and rising inflation expectations, it said. Record supply cuts by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies, known as OPEC+ have helped support prices, but with grim economic figures being reported almost daily, the outlook for demand for oil remains bleak. China's factory gate prices fell for a seventh straight month in August although at the slowest annual pace since March, suggesting industries in the world's second-biggest economy continued their recovery from the coronavirus-induced downturn.
Oil prices finish higher, but concerns remain over outlook for demand - Oil futures finished higher Wednesday, with U.S. prices reclaiming less than half of the more than 7% drop suffered in the previous session as worries over the demand outlook, driven by the pandemic, continued to limit crude’s upside potential. “The bounce in oil prices reflects the market recovering from the oversold positions” Tuesday, said Manish Raj, chief financial officer at Velandera Energy, “As the flurry of panic-stricken traders was absorbed,” the market was balanced today, leading to a rebound. However, “this week’s volatility is a reflection of substantial uncertainty in oil demand,” Raj told MarketWatch. “Whereas gasoline demand has staged a handsome V-shaped recovery world-wide, and particularly so in the U.S., distillate and jet fuel demand is elusive to say the least.” West Texas Intermediate crude for October delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose $1.29, or 3.5%, to settle at $38.05 a barrel. November Brent crude, the global benchmark, rose $1.01, or 2.5%, to $40.79 a barrel on ICE Futures Europe. Weekly data on U.S. petroleum supplies will be released late Wednesday from the American Petroleum Institute and Thursday morning from the Energy Information Administration. The reports are each delayed by a day due to Monday’s Labor Day holiday. On average, the EIA is expected to report a decline of 500,000 barrels in crude supplies for the week ended Sept. 4, according to analysts polled by S&P Global Platts. Gasoline supplies are likely to have fallen by 2.5 million barrels, while distillates, which include heating oil, are expected to be up by 300,000 barrels, the survey showed.
Oil Inventories Rose by 2.9M Barrels Last Week: - U.S. oil stockpiles snapped six-straight weeks of declines on Wednesday at a time when the renewed spread of Covid-19 cases in some parts of the world threatens the demand outlook. U.S. crude inventories rose by 2.97 million barrels last week, according to an estimate released Tuesday by the American Petroleum Institute, after a draw of 6.36 million barrels the previous week. Crude Oil WTI Futures, the U.S. benchmark for oil, was up 2.64% after settling 3.5% higher at $38.05 a barrel on Wednesday. The surprise build comes a day ahead of the official government expected to show weekly U.S. crude supplies fell by 1.33 million barrels lasrt week.
WTI Holds Below $38 After Surprise Crude Build Raises Demand Fears - Oil prices are sliding once again this morning, with WTI unable to hold above $38 as concerns over rising American crude stockpiles pick up as global oil demand is expected to decline over 8 million barrels a day this year and likely won’t get back to 2019 levels before 2022, according to S&P Global Platts. At the same time, OPEC and its allies are unleashing crude back onto a market that’s still working through the inventory glut it built up earlier this year.“Uncertain oil-market fundamentals are holding prices back,” said Jens Pedersen, a senior analyst at Danske Bank. The “climb in U.S. crude stocks plays into the market worries over weak demand.” After last night's surprise build in crude stock s reported by API, all eyes are back on official data for signs of a growing glut. DOE:
- Crude +2.06mm (-806k exp)
- Cushing +1.838mm
- Gasoline-2.954mm
- Distillates -1.675mm
After 6 straight weeks of draws, US crude stocks built last week by over 2 million barrels US Crude Production barely bounced back after last week's storm-related shut-ins. WTI held below $38 on the official data... Finally, we note that Brent’s six-month timespread was $2.71 a barrel in contango - where prompt prices are cheaper than later-dated ones - compared with $1.97 at the end of August. The change in the market structure indicates growing concern about a glut and may also, together with falling tanker rates, incentivize floating storage.
Oil prices slip as growing stockpiles signal bumpy fuel demand recovery - Oil prices slid on Thursday after data showed U.S. crude stockpiles unexpectedly rose last week, stoking concern about a sluggish recovery in fuel demand as coronavirus cases continue to surge in many countries. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures fell 49 cents, or 1.3%, to $37.57 a barrel, after climbing 3.5% on Wednesday. Brent crude futures dropped 37 cents, or 0.96% to $40.39 a barrel, after rising 2.5% on Wednesday. The oil market is under pressure on the prospect of both subdued demand and rising supply, ANZ analysts said in a note. The U.S. Energy Information Administration will release official weekly inventory data later on Thursday, a day later than normal following this week's U.S. Labor Day holiday. "(Refinery) maintenance season and a cautious approach from refiners should keep crude oil demand soft," the bank said, referring to regular scheduled outages at oil processing complexes. ANZ also said China's imports are likely to level off as 'teapot,' or independent refineries, reach their maximum annual crude import quotas. With coronavirus cases rising in several U.S. states, the country's crude stockpiles rose by 3 million barrels in the week to September 4, data from the American Petroleum Institute showed on Wednesday. That compared with analysts' forecasts of a draw of 1.4 million barrels. "If the EIA confirms a crude oil build later today, it would be the first U.S. stock build since mid-July," ING analysts said. The EIA already cut its 2020 world oil demand growth forecast by 210,000 barrels per day to 8.32 million bpd. In a further bearish sign, leading commodity traders are booking tankers to store crude oil and diesel on the water, with supply outpacing consumption, according to trading sources and shipping data. The rising stockpiles come ahead of a meeting on September 17 of the market monitoring panel of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies including Russia, together known as OPEC+, which in August trimmed supply curbs from earlier this year on expectations demand would improve. "This issue will be front and center... next week, where we expect a strong statement that if markets continue to weaken, the producer group will be prepared to trim output further," Citi analysts said in a note.
It's Happening Again - Traders Store Oil At Sea As Recovery Falters - Crude prices slid Thursday as the stalled global economic recovery from the virus pandemic triggers a "second wave" of demand fears and sparks renewed interest in floating storage as the oil market flips bearish. Reuters said a "fresh build-up of global oil supplies, pushing traders including Trafigura to book tankers to store millions of barrels of crude oil and refined fuels at sea again."Floating storage, onboard crude tankers, comes as traditional onshore storage nears capacity as supply outpaces demand. Refinitiv vessel data shows trading house Trafigura has recently chartered at least five crude tankers, each capable of 2 million barrels of oil. The inventory build up, driving up demand for floating storage comes as OPEC+ recently trimmed supply curbs from earlier this year on expectations demand would improve. Though with the peak summer driving season in the US now over, demand woes and oversupplied markets are pressuring crude and crude product prices.Very large crude-oil carrier (VLCC) storage has started to rise once again. "Despite the recent slide in oil prices, we think that the OPEC+ leadership will continue to direct its efforts towards securing better compliance rather than pushing for deeper cuts at this stage," RBC analysts said.Another catalyst for the bearish tilt in crude markets is that China's oil imports are likely to subside as independent refineries have reached maximum annual oil import quotas.Reuters notes, in a separate report, that other top commodity traders are booking tankers to store crude products at sea, including diesel and gasoline. Refinitiv vessel data also shows Vitol, Litasco, and Glencor have been booking tankers in the last several days to store diesel for the next three months. "The market is soft and bearish, and floating storage is returning again," a market source told Reuters.
Oil prices slide near 2% after surprise U.S. crude stock build (Reuters) - Oil prices slid nearly 2% on Thursday after U.S. data showed a surprise build in crude stockpiles last week related in part to ongoing reductions at refineries along the Gulf of Mexico following Hurricane Laura. Brent futures fell 73 cents, or 1.8%, to settle at $40.06 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude fell 75 cents, or 2.0%, to settle at $37.30. After the market close, WTI briefly traded down over $1 a barrel and Brent was down as much as 99 cents. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said crude inventories rose 2.0 million barrels last week. That confirmed the direction of the 3 million-barrel increase reported by the American Petroleum Institute (API), but was a surprise compared with the 1.3 million-barrel decrease that analysts forecast in a Reuters poll. “Today’s crude data looked bearish ... with about the only supportive element being the fact that the 2 (million-barrel) build was less than that indicated by the API,” said Jim Ritterbusch, president of Ritterbusch and Associates in Galena, Illinois, noting prices could fall further unless Gulf of Mexico refiners fully restart soon after shutting for Hurricane Laura. Brent and WTI futures dropped to their lowest since mid June earlier this week and have remained in oversold territory over the past several days. Brent’s Relative Strength Index (RSI) was under 30 for a fifth straight day for the first time since March. In China, Bank ANZ said oil imports were likely to level off as independent refineries reach their maximum quotas. In a further bearish sign, leading commodity traders were booking tankers to store crude oil and diesel. The rising stockpiles come ahead of a meeting on Sept. 17 of the market monitoring panel of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and allies including Russia, a group known as OPEC+. “Despite the recent slide in oil prices, we think that the OPEC+ leadership will continue to direct its efforts towards securing better compliance rather than pushing for deeper cuts at this stage,” RBC analysts said.
Oil ekes out gain, but still posts second straight negative week - Oil prices edged higher on Friday as equities markets firmed, but crude remained on track for a second weekly drop as investors expected a global glut to persist if demand weakens further with rising COVID-19 cases in some countries. Brent crude rose 16 cents, or 0.4%, to $40.22 a barrel. U.S. crude settled 3 cents, or 0.08%, higher at $37.33. For the week, however, it declined more than 6%. Infections are growing faster in India than anywhere else, and the health ministry reported another record daily jump of 96,551 new cases on Friday, taking the official total to 4.5 million. U.S. stock markets rose, after a pullback in the previous session. Still, the three main U.S. stock indexes were also headed for a second straight weekly decline as recent economic indicators suggested a long and difficult recovery from the pandemic. "The financial markets are continuing to set the tone, including on the oil market ... fears about an oversupply have added to the general feeling of uncertainty," Commerzbank analysts said in a note. Also dampening the market mood, the U.S. Senate killed a Republican bill that would have provided around $300 billion in new coronavirus aid. In the United States, crude stockpiles rose last week, against expectations, as refineries slowly returned to operations after production sites were shut down due to storms in the Gulf of Mexico and the wider region. U.S. crude inventories rose 2 million barrels, compared with forecasts for a 1.3 million-barrel decrease in a Reuters poll. U.S. drillers also have started to slowly add oil and gas rigs after the rig count, an early indicator of future output, hit a record low of 244 in the week to Aug. 14. This week's data from Baker Hughes is due at 1 p.m.. In a further bearish sign, traders were starting to book tankers again to store crude oil and diesel, amid a stalled economic recovery as the COVID-19 pandemic continues. Increasing stockpiles are likely to be a subject at a meeting on Sept. 17 of the market monitoring panel of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and allies including Russia. The group known as OPEC+ has been withholding supply to reduce stockpiles, but analysts say the meeting is likely to focus on compliance among members, rather than deeper cuts. Following Saudi Arabia, Kuwait also lowered its official selling price to Asia for October, to counter slower demand. "The decline is triggered by a series of unfortunate events: a surge in COVID-19 cases worldwide, the end of the peak summer driving season, the slowdown of the Chinese crude importing machine, and major producers trimming the OSPs to Asia as refinery margins worsen," Rystad Energy's senior oil markets analyst Paola Rodriguez-Masiu said.
Oil ends lower for second week as stockpiles rise, demand weakens - (Reuters) – Oil prices were little changed on Friday, but posted their second straight weekly loss as stockpiles rise around the world and fuel demand struggles to rebound to pre-coronavirus levels.Both Brent and U.S. crude lost about 6% on the week after a series of signals that showed markets still have an abundance of supply. Saudi Arabia and Kuwait cut official selling prices to Asia, U.S. stockpiles rose and traders are booking vessels for storage. Brent ended the session down 23 cents, or 0.6%, at $39.83 a barrel while U.S. crude settled up 3 cents at $37.33 a barrel.Coronavirus infections are growing in several countries, led by India, where the health ministry reported a record daily jump of 96,551 new cases on Friday, taking the official total to 4.5 million.U.S. stock markets ended lower for a second week following several economic indicators that suggest a long and difficult recovery from the pandemic.“The financial markets are continuing to set the tone, including on the oil market… fears about an oversupply have added to the general feeling of uncertainty,” Commerzbank analysts said in a note.In the United States, crude stockpiles rose 2 million barrels last week. Refineries slowly returned to operations after production sites were shut due to storms in the Gulf of Mexico. Traders are starting to book tankers again to store crude oil and diesel, another signal of oversupply amid a stalled economic recovery as the COVID-19 pandemic continues.For a graphic on Oil Product Floating Storage in Europe Oil Product Floating Storage in Europe: https://graphics.reuters.com/GLOBAL-OIL/nmovaqzkdva/chart.png The market monitoring committee Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and allies including Russia, or OPEC+, will meet on Sept. 17 to consider how to deal with worldwide oversupply. The group reduced output in the spring to allow stockpiles to run down.In recent days, both Saudi Arabia and Kuwait lowered their official selling prices for crude to Asia for October, a signal of slower demand. Money managers cut their net long U.S. crude futures and options positions in the most recent week, a sign hedge fund managers expect further weakness in the oil markets.
Collapse in oil prices threatens social and political unrest in Middle East and North Africa - The collapse in oil prices earlier in the year, along with cuts in oil production and the world-wide recession following the COVID-19 pandemic, is having a devastating impact on economic and social conditions in the oil-producing countries of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The repercussions spread far beyond the oil producers’ borders. Oil prices, which started the year at around $60 a barrel—nearly half that of a decade ago—fell to $40 in March and plummeted into negative territory before rising again to around $40 a barrel in recent weeks. This year, oil revenues are expected to be around $300 billion, down from $575 billion in 2019 and more than $1 trillion in 2012. While oil production may just be profitable at $40 a barrel, none of the Arab states except Qatar can balance their budgets at this level. The worst affected, Algeria and Oman, need prices to rise to $157 and $87 a barrel, respectively. Even the largest oil producer, Saudi Arabia, which relies on oil for 70 percent of its budget, needs $80 a barrel to balance its books. In June, the International Monetary Fund estimated that the economies of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries—Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman and Qatar—would shrink by 7.6 percent this year, while Iraq’s economy is expected to contract by 7.5 percent and Iran’s by 6 percent, on top of a 7.6 percent decline in 2019 and 5.4 percent in 2018 due to Washington’s unilateral pull-out from the 2015 nuclear agreement. Since March, the Arab petro-states have slashed public expenditure—including the salaries of public sector workers, who form 90 percent of regular, full-time workers—raised sales taxes and petrol prices, all of which have fallen hardest on the poor. Subventions, which for the corporate sector have far exceeded any poverty relief measures, have been borrowed on the international money markets and are eating into foreign currency reserves. Even Saudi Arabia, which faces a budget deficit for 2020 equal to 16 percent of GDP, has only two years’ reserves left at current spending rates. More tax rises and privatisations are on the agenda, with its giant desalination plant, the world’s largest, up for sale.
Two decades of US “war on terror” responsible for displacing at least 37 million people and killing up to 12 million - A staggering new report coauthored by Professor David Vine at the Watson Institute at Brown University conservatively estimates that 37 million people, equivalent to the entire population of Canada, have been forced to flee their home country, or have become internally displaced within it by nearly two decades of unending US imperialist war. The analysis, published by the Costs of War Project, sought to quantify for the first time the number of people displaced by the United States military operations since President George W. Bush declared a “global war on terror” in September 2001 following the still unexplained attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon.Professor Vine and his coauthors note that the 37 million estimated displaced is a “very conservative estimate,” with the real number of people displaced since September 2001, “closer to 48-59 million.” That is as much as, or more than, all of the displaced persons in World War II and therefore more than any other war in the last century. It is difficult to articulate the levels of misery, poverty, hardship, strife, pain and death visited upon entire societies and endured by millions of people. The latest Costs of War report focused on eight countries that have been subjected to major US military operations: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, the Philippines, Iraq, Libya and Syria. The two countries with the highest number of displaced persons were Iraq and Syria, whose populations have suffered for decades under US-led regime-change operations and military occupations initiated by both Republican and Democratic administrations. The authors estimate that 9.2 million people in Iraq and 7.1 million in Syria have been displaced respectively, in both cases roughly 37 percent of the prewar population. The authors were careful to note that they only counted Syrian refugees and displaced persons post-2014, even though US-funded and supplied terrorist groups such as the Al Qaeda-affiliated Al Nusra Front, the Islamic State and other Islamist groupings began operations against the Syrian government as early as 2011. If the figures were to include the previous three years, the estimates exceed 11 million. Somalia, where US forces have been operating since 2002, has the highest percentage of displaced persons with 46 percent of the country or nearly 4.2 million people displaced. Throughout the “war on terror,” the authors estimate between 770,000 and 801,000 civilians and combatants on all sides have died in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Pakistan and Yemen since US forces began military operations in those countries. The number of “indirect deaths,” that is, those who weren’t confirmed killed by military weaponry, but died due to lack of healthcare, infrastructure, or food as a result of US military operations, embargoes and blockades may exceed 3.1 million, although the authors noted that credible estimates range in excess of 12 million.
Trump's Iraq Troop Draw-Down To Begin This Month, Top General Announces --Previously the Trump administration said it would aim for a major troop reduction in Iraq by the time of the November election. It appears that promise — part of the Trump campaign's longtime pledge to "bring Americans home" from unnecessary "endless" foreign wars and occupations abroad — is on track to be delivered. Head of US CENTCOM, Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, said while touring a US base in Iraq that troop numbers there will be cut down to 3,000 this month.Current American troops levels are at about 5,200 — though we should note the tens of thousands of US contractors and other privatized personnel that remain there.Gen. McKenzie underscored in statements that Washington feels confident that Iraqi forces are now trained to handle any threat from a potentially resurgent ISIS, now long driven underground."This reduced footprint allows us to continue advising and assisting our Iraqi partners in rooting out the final remnants of ISIS in Iraq and ensuring its enduring defeat," McKenzie said.US training of Iraqi military personnel had reportedly already been scaled back through the course of the coronavirus pandemic, given local as well as international lockdowns and travel restrictions. During a Labor Day news conference President Trump raised eyebrows in charging top Pentagon commanders of ultimately being beholden to defense contractors. Speaking of what sectors of the military are supportive of the Commander-in-Chief, Trump said Monday: “The top people in the Pentagon probably aren’t because they want to do nothing but fight wars so all of those wonderful companies that make the bombs and make the planes and make everything else stay happy.”
Turkey Escalates With Tanks & Armored Troop Carriers Deployed To Greek Border - Amid soaring Turkey-Greece tensions related to the eastern Mediterranean gas exploration spat, which has already resulted in rival fighter jets patrolling airspace off Cyprus, the Associated Press reports Ankara has deployed some 40 tanks and armored vehicles to the border with Greece. The AP/New York Times cites Turkish media reports on Saturday:Meanwhile, Turkish media reported that tanks were being moved towards the Greek border. The Cumhuriyet newspaper said 40 tanks were being transported from the Syrian border to Edirne in northwest Turkey and carried photographs of armored vehicles loaded on trucks.There was no immediate official confirmation of the deployment. Turkey deploys tanks to Greece border from Syrian border, Turkish private news agency İHA claims. Approximately 40 tanks. pic.twitter.com/nnDrEegXsj— Ragıp Soylu (@ragipsoylu) September 5, 2020 But confirmation has come after Turkish news agency İHA posted video showing APC armored troops carriers headed to the border point. However, tanks were not evident in the video of the large convoy on the Turkish highway, and the deployment could have been pre-planned, though will certainly be noticed and responded to by Athens. Meanwhile NATO leadership is attempting to mediate the inter-NATO member dispute, which could prove highly embarrassing, also given Russia is about to kick off naval war games around Cyprus, notably in the very disputed waters Turkey is claiming as its own.
China Parties Like It Is 2019 As Patrons Pack Pool Parties, Nightcubs & Bars From Wuhan To Beijing - A few weeks ago, we joked that the people of Wuhan were 'partying at ground zero' when a story about a massive pool party to celebrate the end of the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak went viral around the world, eliciting frustrated reactions from public officials and social-distancing-obsessed "Karens". But unlike in the US, the Communist Party defended the pool party by arguing that it was a much-needed release for the people of Wuhan. After suffering through one of the first, and most restrictive, global lockdowns, the people of Wuhan have defeated the virus, a party spokesman said. The party was one of their rewards. Now, the Financial Times is reporting on the return of the nightlife scene in China. Revelers have returned to China's nightclubs and bars at a faster pace than perhaps anywhere else in the world. In the US, bars and nightclubs have been closed and blamed for causing the outbreak across the Sun Belt that peaked over the summer. South Korea has also blamed its nightlife for an outbreak that, as it turned out, was largely the result of tests picking up asymptomatic people who were infected elsewhere. But in Beijing, partiers have reverted to the pre-pandemic tableau: bars are tightly packed, with revelers wearing little in the way of clothing, and no masks.The procedure is simple. Revelers must use their smartphones to show their COVID-19 testing status is negative. Then they're temperatures are taken, before being allowed in. Once inside, they can rest assured that the odds of being infected are minuscule. When asked, several revelers told the FT they felt like they had earned the "freedom to party".Analysts of the middle class in China have also bandied about the term "revenge spending", even as China's economic collapse was even worse than expected. "From restrictions [on movement] and shop closures to no restrictions and shops opening, there’s [going] to be a big rebound," said Tao Wang, chief China economist at UBS in Hong Kong. But while many middle-class professionals are engaging in "revenge spending" after months of being unable to splash the cash, lower-income workers are still suffering. Economists say China’s economy is stuck in two-track growth, widening the wealth gap. The most conspicuous sign of the return to confidence in China was the giant pool party held last month in Wuhan, the city where the outbreak originated.
Chinese Farmers Hoard Wheat In Hopes Of Creating Shortages That Push Prices Higher - The latest Chinese inflation data released overnight showed that consumer prices slowed again, dropping to 2.4% Y/Y, the lowest since early 2019, largely moderating on lower pork inflation (still over 50% y/y, but slowing), while producer price inflation remains negative. And while Chinese food inflation dropped in half from the record 20% Y/Y increase hit in March as Chinese supply chains were disrupted by the covid lockdowns... ... this decline may not last because as Caixin reports, China’s farmers are stockpiling more of their wheat harvest this year rather than selling to the government and the market as they expect prices to rise and want to hold onto their stocks in case of shortages stemming from the severe summer flooding and fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.Farmers in the country’s main wheat-growing regions sold only 49.3 million tons of their crop for commercial use and to state reserves as of Aug. 31, 20% less than in the same period last year, according to government data. Within that total, sales to the National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration, which stockpiles and manages the country’s strategic food reserves, sank by almost 70% to 6.2 million tons. Wheat purchased by market participants such as mills accounted for about 86% of the total in 2020, up from 70% last year, the official Xinhua News Agency reported on Aug. 14.Fears about food security in China have intensified this year amid the coronavirus pandemic and severe flooding that’s hit swathes of agricultural land since June. Speculation that shortages of basic foodstuffs like rice and wheat could emerge has sent prices soaring even as government officials have sought to reassure the population that the country is self-sufficient in staple crops and that the recent price fluctuations in the grain market are temporary."As state purchases of wheat dropped this year, market purchases accounted for a higher portion, increasingly becoming the main channel of wheat purchases," Tang Ke, senior official at Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said at a press conference on Aug. 26.In keeping with Chinese tradition of stockpiling strategic reserves across most commodities, since 2006 the government has purchased wheat at annual state-set prices to ensure that any dramatic decline in market prices would not discourage farmers from cultivating the crop. When market prices are low, farmers can opt to sell more of their crop to state purchasers to support their income.
China’s Nuclear Buildup Changes Balance of Power - It wouldn’t be a new cold war without an accelerating nuclear arms race. The Pentagon reported last week that China is undertaking a significant nuclear buildup, which will double the size of its arsenal by 2030. That development isn’t surprising, given China’s strategic situation. But it’s still distinctly challenging for the U.S., because it compounds the worsening military situation in the western Pacific. Since its first nuclear test in 1964, Beijing has possessed a relatively modest deterrent — an arsenal numbering first in the dozens and now in the low 200s of warheads. China is now rapidly expanding that deterrent, building more and better intercontinental ballistic missiles that will improve its ability to hit targets in the U.S. It is developing a more robust “triad” — a combination of long-range bombers, ballistic missile submarines and land-based missiles — that will make its nuclear capabilities more survivable against any potential attack. The Defense Department projects that in addition to the doubling of China’s nuclear warhead stockpiles over a decade, the number of warheads that can strike the U.S. will grow to roughly 200 by 2025. The People’s Liberation Army is also improving the readiness of its nuclear forces, by developing a launch-on-warning capability — a posture in which Beijing would respond to an incoming nuclear attack with a retaliatory strikebefore enemy warheads hit their targets. China’s nuclear buildup thus demonstrates two uncomfortable truths. First, that the requirements of strategic stability and American strategy are often at odds. In theory, the most stable situation is one of perfect mutual assured destruction, in which neither side has an incentive to use nuclear weapons first because neither side can escape a society-shattering response. But America’s global commitments require the advantage provided by strategic instability if the U.S. is to reinforce those commitments with the threat of nuclear escalation. This was why the U.S. never really accepted mutual assured destruction during the Cold War, and why the emergence of a still-inferior but more secure Chinese arsenal is troubling.Second, the dilemmas of defense in the western Pacific are only getting harder. The overriding thrust of Chinese military modernization for a quarter-century has been neutralizing the conventional advantages — long-range power projection, space-enabled precision-strike capabilities — that would allow Washington to intervene decisively in a war in China’s neighborhood. The People’s Liberation Army is narrowing the nuclear imbalance that backstops an eroding conventional edge. A revisionist state is getting closer to the point at which it might be able to expand its influence by force. That has, historically, been a formula for trouble.
India, China accuse each other of firing shots at tense border - China and India have accused each other of firing shots on their flashpoint Himalayan border in a further escalation of military tension between the nuclear-armed Asian rivals. The relationship between the two countries has deteriorated since a hand-to-hand combat clash in the Ladakh region on June 15 in which 20 Indian troops were killed. Experts fear the latest incident will intensify a months-long standoff between the Asian giants that erupted in late April. Beijing's defence ministry accused India of "severe military provocation", saying soldiers crossed the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the western border region on Monday and "opened fire to threaten the Chinese border defence patrol officers". "According to the Chinese side, Chinese troops approached the India side for negotiations, and then they say some Indian troops fired at the Chinese side," Al Jazeera's Katrina Yu reported from Beijing. "As a result, China's military said it was forced to take countermeasures - although we don't know what those countermeasures were, or if there were any casualties," she added. New Delhi was swift to give its own account, accusing Chinese border forces of "blatantly violating agreements" and firing "a few rounds in the air" to intimidate their Indian rivals. "It is the PLA that has been blatantly violating agreements and carrying out aggressive manoeuvres," the Indian army said in a statement on Tuesday. "Despite the grave provocation, (our) own troops exercised great restraint and behaved in a mature and responsible manner," the statement said. Al Jazeera's Elizabeth Puranam, reporting from New Delhi said that, according to India, "China's army was trying to close in on one of India's positions - and that when they [China] were dissuaded by their own troops, they fired in the air". The countries fought a brief border war in 1962 but, officially, no shots have been fired in the area since 1975 when four Indian troops were killed in an ambush. A spokesperson for the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) gave no specifics and did not report casualties, calling on India to investigate the incident.
Pakistan court sentences Christian to death on blasphemy charges -A Pakistani court on Tuesday sentenced a Christian man to death on blasphemy charges. Asif Pervaiz, a garment factory worker, had been accused by his supervisor of sending derogatory remarks about the Muslim Prophet Muhammad to him in a text message. Insulting the prophet carries a mandatory death penalty in Pakistan, a predominantly Muslim country. Pervais was convicted after a trial in Lahore that ran since 2013. His lawyer Saif-ul-Malook told Reuters he would appeal the sentence. The court order, seen by Reuters, said Pervaiz would first serve a three-year prison term for "misusing" his phone to send the derogatory text message. Then "he shall be hanged by his neck till his death." He was also fined 50,000 Pakistani rupees ($300), the order said.
Professor Dies of Coronavirus During Zoom Lecture - Paola Di Simone, an Argentinian professor, reported on August 28 that she had tested positive for the coronavirus and had been showing symptoms for four weeks. This week, she collapsed in the middle of a live virtual lecture. Her employer, the Universidad Argentina de la Empresa (UADE), has not yet explained why Paola was working while ill. Paola Di Simone, 45, taught political science at UADE, the University of Buenos Aires, and Torcuato Di Tella University. She died this Wednesday while giving a virtual class, which she was still teaching despite being positive for the coronavirus. Her students noticed that she was having trouble breathing and asked her to share her address so they could call an ambulance. She was only able to say “I can’t” before passing out. Her death occurred on Wednesday and was made public a day later via social media posts by her colleagues and students. The UADE released a condolences statement; however, the university said nothing about why Paola was still being asked to teach despite having been suffering from the coronavirus for four weeks. Her colleagues and students remembered her as professional, tireless, and above all as a wonderful, warm person. This incident is yet another example of how, despite the global pandemic, employers are prioritizing “normal” operations over the health and lives of their workers. Time and time again, they lack or fail to enforce safety protocols, continue business as usual despite pockets of infection, and conceal cases in order to keep their companies open. Clearly, the lives of workers do not matter to them.
Global Economic Recovery Shows Signs of Slowing – WSJ —The global economy is bouncing back strongly from the collapse it suffered in the spring, but fresh data suggest the early gains from the lifting of coronavirus lockdowns are already exhausted, adding to evidence that the world economy could take many months, if not years, to heal. Fresh figures from the U.K. provide valuable insight into the state of the continuing economic recovery. The country is one of a handful of economies to release month-to-month figures for economic growth and is also the largest to do so, offering a more up-to-date snapshot than quarterly gross domestic product figures provide. The U.K. economy grew 6.6% in July from June, having expanded by 8.7% in that earlier month. That puts the U.K. on track for a 15% gain in output in the third quarter, following a 20.4% drop in the second. However, output remained 11.7% lower than it was in February, the last month before the pandemic began to disrupt the economy. Output in the services sector, which relies more on face-to-face contact, was down 12.6% from February, while industrial output was down 7%. The figures strengthen the view of many economists that a return to pre-coronavirus levels of output will be painfully slow in most of the rich world, as the coronavirus deters everything from travel to entertainment to office work. Economic data that has a good record of anticipating growth indicates that strong growth in the third quarter will likely be followed by more modest expansion as companies, workers and governments adjust to what could be an extended period of uncertainty over the evolution of the pandemic and the availability of a vaccine. “As long as the major economies do not need to get into generalized lockdown, the economy should continue to mend, but cannot sustain the spectacular rebound seen upon reopening businesses a few months ago,” said Gilles Moëc, chief economist at the Axa insurance company. “The hard part starts now.” Economists don’t expect the British economy to return to its pre-pandemic size until 2022. The U.K. suffered the most severe decline in output among rich countries during the second quarter, but the month-to-month sequence of decline and recovery has been broadly similar in other countries, including the U.S.
Jan Kuciak murder case: Slovakian court acquits alleged masterminds - A Slovakian special court acquitted the alleged masterminds behind the murder of journalist Ján Kuciak last Thursday. The court in Pezinok near Bratislava based the acquittal of millionaire Marián Kočner and co-defendant Alena Zsuzsová on a lack of evidence. It could not be proven that the defendants had ordered the murder, Judge Ruzena Sabová explained when announcing the verdict, despite a key witness having testified against the two and there being a lot of other evidence against them.“If, despite all the evidence, reasonable and understandable doubts remain, then a defendant is found innocent and that is how the court proceeded here,” Judge Sabová said, justifying the verdict. The 27-year-old Ján Kuciak, who had researched corruption, tax evasion and the connections of high-ranking Slovak politicians to the Italian Mafia on the news portal Aktuality.sk, was shot in cold blood by a contract killer in February 2018. His fiancée Martina Kušnírová, who happened to be in the house with him, was also murdered. At the end of December 2019, the court had sentenced businessman Zoltan Andrusko to 15 years in prison. Andrusko had mediated the contract killing in return for payment. To obtain a lighter sentence, he agreed with the public prosecutor’s office to appear as a key witness. His testimony massively incriminated Kočner and his accomplice Zsuzsová in the trial, telling the court he had organised the crime for them and hired two men to carry it out. On April 6, the court then sentenced former soldier Miroslav Marček, who fired the fatal shots, to 23 years in prison and on September 3, his cousin Tomas Szabo, a former policeman who drove the assassin to Kuciak’s house, to 25 years. Both confessed and admitted to having received €35,000 to €40,000, respectively, for the contract killing. Kočner and Zsuzsová denied having commissioned the murder, although, in addition to the testimony of the key witness, they were severely incriminated by the record of their communications using the Threema messenger service.
Brexit: Pear Shaped - Yves Smith - It appears to have been a wee bit of good luck to have sat out the initial consternation over the revelation of the Government’s plan to pass legislation that would “overwrite” the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement. Recall that the Withdrawal Agreement, unlike the Political Declaration, is a treaty, even if it envisaged that portions would be superceded by a trade pact. For those of you not following this story closely, the state of play on Monday, courtesy the Financial Times: The UK is planning new legislation that will override key parts of the Brexit withdrawal agreement, risking the collapse of trade negotiations with Brussels. Sections of the internal market bill — due to be published this Wednesday — are expected to “eliminate the legal force of parts of the withdrawal agreement” in areas including state aid and Northern Ireland customs, according to three people familiar with the plans…. The UK internal market bill, outlined in a 100-page white paper in July, is designed to secure the “seamless functioning” of trade between England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland after the UK leaves the EU’s single market and customs union at the end of this year… Under the withdrawal agreement, the UK must notify Brussels of any state-aid decisions that would affect Northern Ireland’s goods market, and compel businesses in the province to file customs paperwork when sending goods into the rest of the UK. But clauses in the internal market and finance bills will force the UK courts to follow the new UK law rather than the EU deal, diluting the ability of the protocol to intrude on UK state-aid policy. The autumn finance bill…is also expected to overwrite a third aspect of the Northern Ireland protocol covering the payment of tariffs on goods entering the region, said those familiar with the plans. Officials say the plans risk poisoning the prospects of an eleventh-hour deal… A second person familiar with the impending bill said [the UK chief negotiator] Lord [David} Frost had personally driven the decision to take the “nuclear option” of overwriting the withdrawal agreement, despite progress being made in talks on implementing the Irish protocol. A simplified schematic of the sticking point:The Financial Times comments section, which normally has some fairly fo rceful Brexit defenders, had nearly 3000 comments, virtually all of them varying takes on the UK demonstrating itself as being not agreement capable.And recall that Boris Johnson can’t pretend to be victim of Theresa May’s handiwork. He came into office, determined to “get Brexit done,” negotiated this very same Withdrawal Agreement, which he also persuaded Parliament to approve. So he didn’t read the fine print and now has buyer’s remorse? Clive, who has become our house Brexit defender, argues that the Withdrawal Agreement was a mess. While that is no doubt true, parties enter into contracts with slipshod provisions all the time, and a treaty has more gravity than a garden variety commercial contract. It is bad faith to go off and say you’ll just make up your own provisions in place of inconsistent or overly vague or loose language. In the private sector, you’d amend the agreement. In the international context, you might enter into a side deal to clean up the defective parts.
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