week ending Jan 22

The Fed’s Preliminary Financial Statement for 2021 Is Out --by Wolf Richter - The Federal Reserve’s balance sheet is a gigantic pile of assets on one side and liabilities and statutory capital on the other side. That balance sheet, which is released weekly and which we discuss frequently, generates a lot of income and a lot of expenses. In addition, the Fed gets income from fees. It has a ton of operating expenses. It pays dividends to its shareholders. And it remits to the Treasury Department what’s left over. On Friday afternoon, the Fed released its unaudited preliminary financial statement for 2021. For what it’s worth: The Fed’s audit firm, KPMG, has been entangled in innumerable scandals – such as using stolen regulatory information to cheat on audit inspections – and massive audit failures, such as of UK outsourcing giant Carillion, which suddenly collapsed at the beginning of 2018. So there’s nothing to worry about. The Fed is a very profitable organization. For 2021, it reported “net income” of $107.8 billion. But the Fed’s term “net income” is somewhat bizarre for an organization that buys trillions of dollars of securities with money that it itself created. The Fed doesn’t pay income taxes, but it remits nearly all of its “net income” to Treasury Department, as required under the Federal Reserve Act. The Fed’s total Revenues: $123.1 billion, from:

• $122.4 billion in interest received on its holdings of securities, mostly Treasury securities and MBS that it purchased as part of its QE.
• $275 million in net income from its pandemic era emergency programs that are being unwound, such as the corporate bond and bond ETF holdings that it sold by November 2021.
• $457 million in fees from services, mostly paid by the banks.

The Fed’s total Expenses of $15.5 billion, from:

• $5.3 billion in interest on reserves, paid to the banks; the Fed pays 0.15% interest on cash that the banks put on deposit at the Fed.
• $1.9 billion in foreign currency revaluation losses
• $414 million in interest paid to counterparties of its reverse repos.
• $1 billion in costs related to producing, issuing, and retiring currency (the paper dollars).
• $5.3 billion in operating expenses of the 12 regional Federal Reserve Banks, including the salaries of the luminary traders that run these FRBs.
• $970 million in expenses of the Board of Governors (the federal agency, of which Powell is the chair)
• $628 million to fund the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

The Fed paid $583 million (with an M) in statutory dividends to the shareholders of the 12 regional Federal Reserve Banks. The amount represents about 0.55% of its net income. These 12 FRBs include the New York Fed, the St. Louis Fed, the San Francisco Fed, the Dallas Fed, etc. Their shareholders are the largest financial firms in their districts. Nearly all of the net income was “remitted,” as the Fed calls it, to the Treasury Department, as required under the Federal Reserve Act. The $107.4 billion for 2021 was the second-highest amount, behind the record in 2015. The remittance of $107 billion to the Treasury Department means that the portion of the US debt that the Fed purchased (currently $5.68 trillion) is essentially interest free for the Treasury Department.

 After Its President Created the Biggest Trading Scandal in Fed History, Dallas Fed Chair Calls Robert Kaplan’s Tenure “Great Leadership” By Pam Martens - Last Thursday evening, at 5:00 p.m. Dallas time and 6:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, when millions of folks on the East Coast are sitting down for dinner, the Dallas Fed held a virtual Town Hall.Given the fact that the President of the Dallas Fed, Robert Kaplan, had to step down in disgrace in September, after trading like a hedge fund kingpin in 2020 while simultaneously having access to confidential market-moving information as a voting member of the Fed’s Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), there was a very good reason for the Dallas Fed to hold a Town Hall.But stunningly, the tone-deaf Dallas Fed did not focus the Town Hall on how its Board and management had negligently supervised Robert Kaplan, allowing him to trade in and out of S&P 500 futures in over $1 million trades during a year of a national pandemic crisis. Instead, the Dallas Fed attempted a public relations stunt, and focused the Town Hall on how it wanted the public to engage in its search for a new President. It was clearly a Town Hall ginned up in an effort to quiet the pitchforks.The Dallas Fed did not take one question on former President Robert Kaplan’s outrageous trading. It did not take one question on why its General Counsel and Ethics Officer, Sharon Sweeney, signed off on these trades. It did not take one question as to why the former and current Board Chairs, Greg Armstrong and Thomas Falk, respectively, lied to the American people in their official statement regarding Robert Kaplan severing his ties to the banks supervised by the Fed.Instead, the newly appointed Chair of the Dallas Fed Board, Thomas Falk, called the tenure of Robert Kaplan at the Dallas Fed “great leadership.” We could hardly believe our ears. Fortunately, the Dallas Fed put up a video of the Town Hall so that we could double check what we heard. We’ve set the video clip below to the question from the moderator that triggered the “great leadership” response from Thomas Falk.

Q4 GDP Forecasts: 5% to 6% - The advance estimate of Q4 GDP will be released on Thursday, January 27th. The consensus estimate is for 6.0% real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate).

• From BofA: We expect the advance estimate of 4Q GDP to show a pickup in growth to 5.0% qoq saar. [January 21 estimate]
• From Goldman Sachs: We left our Q4 GDP tracking estimate unchanged at +6.5% (qoq ar). [January 20 estimate]
• And from the Altanta Fed: GDPNow: The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the fourth quarter of 2021 is 5.1 percent on January 19, up from 5.0 percent on January 14. [January 19 estimate]

Six High Frequency Indicators for the Economy - These indicators are mostly for travel and entertainment. The TSA is providing daily travel numbers. This data is as of January 16th.This data shows the 7-day average of daily total traveler throughput from the TSA for 2019 (Light Blue), 2020 (Black), 2021 (Blue) and 2021 (Red). The dashed line is the percent of 2019 for the seven-day average. The 7-day average is down 23.9% from the same day in 2019 (76.1% of 2019). (Dashed line) Air travel had been off about 20% relative to 2019 for most of the second half of 2021 (with some ups and downs) - but picked up over the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays (solid leisure travel) - and has declined in early 2022 (weak business travel). 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 January 15, 2022. Dining was mostly moving sideways, but there has been some decline recently, probably due to the winter wave of COVID. The 7-day average for the US is down 27% compared to 2019. This data shows domestic box office for each week and the median for the years 2016 through 2019 (dashed light blue). Black is 2020, Blue is 2021 and Red is 2022. The data is from BoxOfficeMojo through January 13th. Movie ticket sales were at $83 million last week, down about 62% from the median for the week. This graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four-week average. The red line is for 2022, black is 2020, blue is the median, and dashed light blue is for 2021. This data is through January 8th. The occupancy rate was down 14.9% compared to the same week in 2019. Although down compared to 2019, the 4-week average of the occupancy rate is close to the median rate for the previous 20 years (Blue). 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." This data is through January 13th 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 at 86% of the January 2020 level. Here is some interesting data on New York subway usage. This graph shows how much MTA traffic has recovered in each borough (Graph starts at first week in January 2020 and 100 = 2019 average).Manhattan is at about 29% of normal (impacted by holidays too).This data is through Friday,January 14th.

Biden resets BBB: 'I think we can break the package up' - President Biden said yesterday he would support breaking up or paring down the "Build Back Better Act," pointing specifically to the $555 billion in climate spending as a key area of agreement. "I think we can break the package up, get as much as we can now and come back and fight for the rest later," Biden said yesterday during a news conference marking nearly one year in office. "I’ve been talking to a number of my colleagues on the Hill," Biden added. "I think it’s clear that we would be able to get support for the 500-plus billion dollars for energy and the environment." The comments outlined a potential path out of a logjam that has vexed Democrats for weeks. Many have been hesitant to endorse breaking up the bill into smaller chunks, insisting that top priorities like the child tax credit stay in the package. But Biden’s embrace of that strategy could point them toward a bill that focuses on climate change and whatever else the White House can get moderates to agree to. The $1.7 trillion legislation has been stalled since last month, when Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chair Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) announced his opposition, citing high inflation, issues with how the expanded child tax credit was structured and a blowup with aides during talks with the White House (E&E Daily, Dec. 21, 2021). Manchin has indicated that he has relatively few objections to the bill’s $555 billion in climate spending, telling reporters this month that "the climate thing is one that we probably can come to agreement much easier than anything else." And other congressional Democrats say those provisions, namely the $325 billion in clean energy tax credits, are largely negotiated and agreed to, save for some outstanding talks with Manchin on a methane fee and a new credit for union-made electric vehicles. Most provisions extend for 10 years and are fully paid for: two top Manchin sticking points. "I support President Biden in his effort to pass a Build Back Better Act that can get 50 votes," Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) said in a statement last night. "The climate and clean energy provisions in Build Back Better have been largely worked through and financed, so let’s start there and add any of the other important provisions to support working families that can meet the 50-vote threshold." Notably, however, Manchin told reporters yesterday he is not actively negotiating and had not heard anything directly from the White House about potentially breaking up the bill.

Splitting up budget package carries procedural risks - — Democrats face procedural obstacles in any attempt to break up their clean energy and social safety net expansion bill and pass it in “chunks” — a path suggested by President Joe Biden on Wednesday. It’s not such an easy task if party leaders want to maintain the special status afforded the measure under budget reconciliation rules, which enable the majority to get around the Senate’s 60-vote threshold to cut off a legislative filibuster. Speaker Nancy Pelosi nodded to the problems inherent in what Biden suggested at her weekly press conference Thursday. “Remember this, this is a reconciliation bill,” she said, “so when people say, ‘let’s divide it up,’ they don’t understand the process.” There are a few pathways to breaking up the existing $2.2 trillion package, with an initial tranche moving first followed up by pieces Biden pledged to come back and push for later. All of them pose complications for Democrats and the White House in one form or another, which will make it difficult for the party leadership to get another shot before the November midterms. The initial fiscal 2022 budget resolution paving the way for the filibuster-proof bill included “instructions” to about a dozen committees in each chamber to agree on provisions totaling no more than $1.75 trillion in deficit spending. The initial plan was for gross spending and tax breaks worth about $3.5 trillion, with half of it paid for. Of course that didn’t work out, thanks to Sens. Joe Manchin III, D-W.Va., and Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., so the bill was scaled down closer to $2 trillion overall, with all but roughly $160 billion offset. So in theory, there is substantial room under the existing budget instructions for a separate package. However, in practice it doesn’t quite work that way, according to budget experts who spoke on condition of anonymity to speak candidly. For one thing, there’s longstanding guidance from the Senate parliamentarian’s office, going back two decades, that says for each budget resolution, there can only be one set of reconciliation bills — one for spending, one for tax revenue, and one for the debt limit. Alternatively there could be a combination bill with two or more of those kinds of provisions, like the current package. Related to that requirement, if lawmakers intend to carve up a budget’s reconciliation instructions into separate bills, the budget resolution needs to spell that out. Tthe fiscal 2022 resolution assumes just one combined reconciliation bill. Democrats would have to make a convincing argument to Elizabeth MacDonough, the current Senate parliamentarian, to cast aside precedent and allow the existing budget instructions to be used for more than one bill.A second option would be to revise the fiscal 2022 budget resolution to create a new set of reconciliation instructions, using section 304 of the 1974 Congressional Budget Act. Senate Democrats contemplated that little-used path last year to pass chunks of Biden’s agenda, and briefly considered it during last year’s debt ceiling impasse. Amending a prior budget resolution in such a fashion would trigger a new set of reconciliation bill options, in which Democrats could specify taxes, spending or both. But there are problems with the section 304 approach as well, which MacDonough laid out in guidance to Senate Democrats last year. One big hurdle for example is in order to amend a budget resolution, MacDonough opined that Democrats would have to go through the normal Senate Budget Committee markup process. That’s different from an original budget resolution, which can be automatically discharged from committee and brought to the floor after April 1 each year if the panel hasn’t acted yet. The Senate’s power-sharing rules in the evenly divided chamber stipulate that Democrats could make a motion to discharge the resolution from committee in the event of a tie vote. But Senate Budget Committee Republicans could simply deny Democrats a quorum in committee, forcing them to scrap the markup.

Pelosi: Build Back Better may need to be 'more limited,' renamed - Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) conceded Thursday that to revive President Biden’s stalled Build Back Better package, Democrats may need to rebrand and scale back the massive climate and social spending package. Biden, in a marathon news conference a day earlier, had suggested that the House-passed Build Back Better Act may need to be broken up into “chunks” and then pieced back together to see what could win support from Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), whose opposition derailed the $2.2 trillion package last month. Pelosi took issue with Biden’s use of the term “chunks” but largely agreed with his assessment that the package would need to be slimmed down. “‘Chunks’ is an interesting word,” Pelosi joked at a news conference marking the one year anniversary of Biden’s inauguration. “So what the president calls ‘chunks’ I would hope would be a major bill going forward. It may be more limited, but it is still significant.” Pelosi rattled off the major pieces that she would like to see preserved in a revamped spending package, which she said Democrats may have to “rename.” First on her list: hundreds of billions in provisions to combat climate change, something Biden said Wednesday that he believes he can push through the Senate. Pelosi also pointed to provisions expanding health care coverage for millions of Americans and lowering the cost of prescription drug prices. The Speaker said she also doesn’t want to give up on provisions that help children, including universal preschool and the expanded child tax credit. “We have to have care at home, whether it’s for children or older siblings or parents,” she said. “There are big chunks of the bill that have to be contained in the [new] bill.” But after Manchin voiced concerns about some high-earning families receiving the monthly tax credit payments, Biden on Wednesday suggested that prized provision may need to be dropped in a future package. Free community college and the child tax credits are two features that Biden said he’s “not sure” he can get in the package. However, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.) told reporters Thursday that he’s received no word from Biden or the White House that the enhanced child tax credit — which expired for millions of families this month — is being cut out. “We need to determine what Joe Manchin is in favor of,” Neal said. “I certainly am not ready to throw in the towel on it.” Pelosi also appeared to push back on a proposal by some of her vulnerable moderate members who have suggested House Democrats should break apart the massive Build Back Better bill and hold a series of votes on individual pieces. The Speaker pointed out that would be a meaningless exercise: Those individual bills would easily be blocked by a GOP filibuster. The Build Back Better bill is being brought up through the reconciliation process, allowing Democrats the chance to push it through with help from all of the party’s 50 senators.

Climate advocates argue against breaking up BBB, call it a 'mistake' for Democrats and the planet - House Democrats facing tough reelection fights are urging party leaders to break up President Biden's sprawling Build Back Better bill into a series of narrow measures and pass them individually, The Washington Post's Marianna Sotomayor reported yesterday. These swing-district members have argued to House leaders in recent days that holding votes on politically popular provisions in the bill, such as curbing prescription drug costs and extending the child tax credit, would help Democrats survive a potential Republican wave in the midterm elections. But the potential strategy has prompted concern from some Democrats and climate advocates, who say the party should keep fighting for the entire roughly $2 trillion package, including its $555 billion in climate spending, rather than splintering the bill simply because of the looming midterms.“Everything in Build Back Better should be done. Frankly, I'm an advocate for the original $3.5 trillion Build Back Better, which, by the way, is spending $350 billion a year. I mean, heck, that's half of what we spend every year subsidizing the fossil fuel industry,” Rep. Sean Casten (D-Ill.), who will face off in a primary against Rep. Marie Newman (D-Ill.) following congressional redistricting, said in a phone interview with The Climate 202 yesterday evening.“We're sitting here right now having a conversation about inside-the-Beltway politics while the world is on fire,” Casten added. “Shame on us. Forget about voters in the midterms — who gives a crap? How do we look our kids in the eye?” Faiz Shakir, an adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) who managed the senator’s 2020 presidential campaign, said he thinks breaking up BBB would be a “mistake” both for Democrats politically and for the planet.“If you've moved in a direction of cutting this up where you left climate out, you have failed by definition,” Shakir said in a phone interview yesterday. “You've just failed because climate is an urgent threat to our well-being and our children, and we have this great opportunity in front of us to do something about it.”

It's Manchin's climate bill now. Here's what might be in it - It’s Build Back Manchin time on Capitol Hill. When President Biden acknowledged for the first time Wednesday that he would break up his signature $1.7 trillion spending plan, it was a recognition that he had to cede the field to Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.). For months, Biden and most Democrats on the Hill have prodded, pressured and pushed Manchin to sign on to the "Build Back Better" package, to no avail. Manchin drove a stake through the heart of that plan on Fox News in December when he rejected the legislation. But it’s a new year and a new last-ditch chance for Democrats to get something passed that they can offer to voters in the upcoming midterm elections, which are expected to be brutal for the party. Biden’s public acknowledgment this week that he could still win smaller, albeit piecemeal, legislative victories was a sign that the White House is finally going to rally around whatever Manchin will support. Manchin said earlier this month that it would be easier to pass the $500 billion in climate provisions tucked into the "Build Back Better" plan as a stand-alone bill, and Biden said Wednesday that he is now prepared to do that. Biden recognizes that his only choice is to get as much policy done through the budget reconciliation process as possible, since that doesn’t require any Republican votes, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said yesterday. “He also recognizes that nothing is going to get done without 50 votes, so we’re not confronting a choice between what can happen and our ideal," she said. "It’s a choice between do we make critical progress for the economic well-being of middle-class families and in tackling the climate crisis, or not.” What Manchin wants now is anybody’s guess. He made it clear to reporters yesterday that he expects to start with a clean slate and that previous offers are no longer on the table. He said he wants to deal with inflation, the national debt and Covid. "We will just be starting from scratch," Manchin told CNN, adding that it will be a "clean sheet of paper." Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.), who crafted key climate provisions in "Build Back Better," sounded optimistic yesterday about the road ahead, noting that she and other lawmakers have worked for months with Manchin on climate programs. She expects that negotiations won’t have to start from scratch because “just a couple of weeks ago, there was agreement." “You’ve got to be able to take Sen. Manchin at his word and proceed to negotiate in good faith on these things,” she told E&E News. “I just would note that Sen. Manchin also said he was concerned about the debt and concerned about inflation and concerned about what more we need to do about Covid. Those are all very reasonable things to be thinking about and easy to address in a reconciliation bill that could get 50 votes in the Senate.”

If Build Back Better fails, federal climate policy may depend on Republican cooperation - Democrats are blowing the best shot they’ve had to pass a climate bill in a decade. That opportunity lies in the Build Back Better Act, or BBB, a sweeping “soft infrastructure” bill that contains about half a trillion dollars in climate funding. Democrats hoped they could pass the bill via the budget reconciliation process — a Senate procedure that allows the majority party to circumvent minority party opposition and pass legislation that pertains to the budget with 50 votes instead of 60 votes. The bill hit a wall when Democratic Senator Joe Manchin announced that he opposes it. With even one member of their caucus opposed, Senate Democrats can’t move forward with Build Back Better or any other major agenda item on President Joe Biden’s long list of presidential priorities. But Manchin isn’t against all of BBB, only certain parts of it. He hasn’t taken issue with the climate parts of the bill, which Democrats already watered down to appeal to his fossil fuel–friendly tastes. This week, Democratic leadership started thinking seriously about moving forward with BBB by breaking it up into pieces. “I’ve been talking to a number of my colleagues on the Hill,” Biden said at a press conference on Wednesday. “I think it’s clear that we would be able to get support for the $500 billion plus for energy and the environment.” A funny thing happens when you separate out the $500 billion climate portion of the Build Back Better Act from the rest of the package: It starts to look a lot like the kind of climate plan Republicans say they support. Even a few years ago, it would have been hard to imagine Republicans supporting a federal climate plan. The Republican party has eschewed climate action since the 1980s, when oil companies started lobbying Republican lawmakers to vote against climate legislation and making hefty financial contributions to the campaigns of politicians who ran on anti-environmental regulation platforms. But recently, some Republican politicians have realized that their hard line on climate change is alienating portions of their voter base, especially younger Republicans who are beginning to sound a lot like Democrats when it comes to this issue specifically. So some Republicans have been trying to show voters that they’ve turned a new leaf on climate change. They’ve stopped denying the reality of the issue and started to drum up conservative solutions to it instead, ones that they say focus exclusively on emissions — not the “laundry list” of progressive objectives Democrats want to accomplish. Republican Senator Mike Braun of Indiana serves as the co-chair of the Senate Conservative Climate Caucus, which was formed in 2019, and championed agreen agriculture bill that passed the Senate last year. Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska introduced climate legislation focused on sequestering carbon dioxide in oceans and has been reaching across the aisle to fund clean energy research and development. A cadre of House Republicans unveiled a swath of climate-related bills in 2020. There is clearly an appetite for modest climate action on the right that didn’t exist just a few years ago. What’s more, there’s actually quite a bit of overlap between Democrats’ climate plan in the BBB and Republicans’ preferred ways of fighting climate change. Democrats have been finessing the contours of their climate agenda for months, converting a transformative plan to decarbonize the nation’s power sector into a middle-of-the-road, don’t-rock-the-boat suite of incremental actions that jibe with Manchin’s centrist sensibilities. The bill contains $300 billion in clean energy tax credits, but those credits are technology neutral, so they can be applied toward nuclear energy, hydropower, and geothermal energy, all of which Republicans like because they say they’re more established than solar and wind power and have a proven track record of reliability. The bill also contains funding for capping abandoned oil wells, a method of cutting down on methane emissions that has been embraced in several Republican-led states, and money for advanced battery technology that looks similar to bills House Republicans recently introduced.

 Biden seeks to save what he can from Build Back Better - President Biden this week offered a new path forward for his signature policy proposal based on a harsh truth: Not all of it will survive.The president’s concession that some of the social spending and climate change package will need to be jettisoned marks a clear turning point for Democrats, some of whom have been insisting that something is better than nothing in a midterm year.“It’s clear to me that we are going to have to probably break it up,” Biden said during a nearly two-hour Wednesday press conference.Now, the clock is ticking for the White House to revive talks with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) to see what a revamped and pared-down Build Back Better bill will look like. Biden is planning to step away from the central role he has played thus far in the policy negotiations, a shift in strategy that will see him trading Oval Office phone calls for more engagements with the American public as Democrats look to boost their fortunes in the midterm elections. Up until this point, Biden has been directly involved in negotiating with Manchin by phone and in person, even hosting him and Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) at his Wilmington, Del., home. “No one is suggesting that he is not going to engage with members,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters Friday. “What we’re conveying, and what you heard from him the other night, is that as you look at the time he is going to spend over the next couple of months, it’s not going to be hours and hours behind closed doors in the Oval Office.” Biden on Wednesday conceded the public wants him to focus more on being president and less on being “President Senator.” “They want me to be the president and let senators be senators,” he said. That means that the negotiations are largely going to fall to Biden’s legislative emissaries, Louisa Terrell, Brian Deese and Steve Ricchetti, a team that has already spent plenty of time on Capitol Hill hammering out details of Biden’s proposals. Officials are also moving to avoid some of the pitfalls that befell the initial round of negotiations on Build Back Better. The White House is likely to conduct its negotiations behind closed doors moving forward, after each previous Biden-Manchin received significant media attention. Democrats are conscious about not allowing internal policy battles to spill out into the press, and some partially blame Biden’s deflated poll numbers on last year’s disputes. And after multiple self-imposed deadlines for movement on the legislation came and went without action in the House last summer, Psaki said Friday that the administration just wants to get a scaled-down version passed as quickly as possible. But the bill would likely need to be passed and signed into law during the first half of the year for Democrats to reap tangible benefits and be able to tout it when campaigning for November’s elections. As such, some see Biden’s March 1 State of the Union address as a natural soft deadline. “However they want to do it I don’t think is of much interest to most people,” said Eric Schultz, who worked as a deputy press secretary in the Obama White House. “But to the extent they can get these pieces done, I think there’s sort of zero interest in terms of how it’s done, but if they’re able to get it done, that’s going to be meaningful.” Biden has already acknowledged an extension of the child tax credit and free community college — two of his priorities and popular programs among progressives — are unlikely to survive as officials and lawmakers seek out what is palatable for Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.). Democrats are hopeful that the bill can include provisions on Affordable Care Act subsidies, lower prescription drug prices, funding for universal prekindergarten and fighting climate change. “[Biden] wants to get as much, as big of a chunk as we can get done, done and through Congress,” Psaki said in a Thursday briefing. “He also recognizes that nothing is going to get done without 50 votes. So, we’re not confronting a choice between what can happen and our ideal, it’s a choice between do we make critical progress for the economic well-being of middle-class families and in tackling the climate crisis, or not.”

Senate Democrats call special caucus meeting ahead of filibuster fight Senate Democrats are convening a special, in-person caucus meeting on Tuesday as they brace for a fight on voting rights and the filibuster to come to a head. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) has called the meeting for 5 p.m. on Tuesday, a source confirmed to The Hill. Unlike most of the caucus meetings in the wake of the rise of the omicron coronavirus variant, the meeting will be in person. The meeting comes as the Senate is expected to formally start debate on Tuesday on voting legislation that combines the Freedom to Vote Act, which would overhaul federal elections and campaign finance laws, and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which strengthens and expands the 1965 Voting Rights Act. It will be the first in-person meeting for Senate Democrats since both Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) reiterated that they support keeping the 60-vote filibuster. Though Sinema reiterated her position before a caucus lunch with Biden, Manchin waited until after the meeting to release a statement. Despite the setback, Schumer is signaling that he’s vowing to push forward with his plan to force a voting rights debate. Democrats view the bills as must-pass as GOP-controlled states enact new voting rules in the wake of the 2020 election that former President Trump falsely claimed was “stolen.” Democrats are using a procedural loophole to sidestep the need to break a filibuster to start debate on the bill. But they’ll still need 60 votes to end debate on the bill, a vote that is expected to take place on Wednesday. Once Republicans block the voting bill, Schumer is signaling that he plans to move forward with forcing a vote on trying to change the Senate’s rules. "I'm going down to Washington, and we are going to debate voting rights. We are going to debate it, and, in the Senate, you know we need 60 votes to break a Republican filibuster ... but since we only have 50 Democrats in our razor-thin majority, the only path forward on this important issue is to change the rules to bypass the filibuster," Schumer said at an event earlier Monday. He added, in reference to Sinema and Manchin, that "there are two Democrats who don't want to make that happen. But the fight is not over, far from it." But the attempt to change the filibuster appears doomed given opposition from Manchin and Sinema.The meeting comes as Schumer hasn’t yet said how Democrats will propose to change the rules.

Sanders calls out Manchin, Sinema ahead of filibuster showdown - Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Monday name-checked Democratic Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) and Joe Manchin (W.Va.) as a months-long push to change the legislative filibuster and pass voting rights legislation is poised to come to a head this week. Sanders, in a tweet, asked whether all 50 Democrats will support changing the filibuster, which requires 60 votes for most legislation to advance in the Senate, noting that it is the one vote that really matters. To change the rules without GOP support, Democrats will need total unity from their caucus. "As the voting rights bill finally comes to the floor of the Senate, there is only one vote which will really matter. Will 50 Democrats vote to override the filibuster, protect American democracy and pass the bill, or will Manchin and Sinema vote with the GOP and let the bill die?" Sanders said in the tweet. Sanders's tweet comes as the Senate is expected to formally start debate on voting legislation on Tuesday, with Democrats taking up legislation that combines the Freedom to Vote Act, which would overhaul federal elections and campaign finance laws, with the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would strengthen the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Though Democrats are using a procedural loophole to sidestep the 60 votes typically needed to start debate on a bill, they'll still need GOP help to end debate. That vote, which would require 10 GOP senators to vote with Democrats to advance the legislation, is expected on Wednesday, according to a scheduling update from Senate Democrats. Republicans, however, are expected to use the filibuster to block the voting rights bill from advancing. Once that happens, Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) has vowed that he will force a vote on changing the Senate's rules. "Members of this chamber were elected to debate and to vote, particularly on an issue as vital to the beating heart of our democracy as this one, and we will proceed. And if the Senate Republicans choose obstruction over protecting the sacred right to vote, as we expect them to, the Senate will consider and vote on changing the Senate rules," Schumer said during a scheduling update late last week. But Democrats don't have the votes they need to change the rules. Both Manchin and Sinema reiterated last week that they do not support changes to the 60-vote hurdle. The statements, while reiterating long-held positions, came around President Biden's meeting with Senate Democrats in which he urged them to change the rules to pass voting rights legislation without GOP support. Democrats view voting legislation as urgent as GOP-controlled state legislatures enact new legislation following the 2020 election, which former President Trump falsely claims was "stolen." Manchin, however, said in a statement that he would "not vote to eliminate or weaken the filibuster." Sinema, in a floor speech, reiterated that while she supports the voting bills, she also has “long-standing support” for the legislative filibuster. “It is the view I continue to hold. It is the belief I have shared many times in public settings and in private settings,” Sinema said.

Manchin, Sinema join GOP to sink filibuster change for voting bill -Senate Democrats failed to change the legislative filibuster for a voting bill on Wednesday night, after Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) voted with Republicans to oppose the rules reform, handing President Biden and the party a stinging defeat. Senators voted 52-48 to defeat the rules change, which would have nixed the 60-vote hurdle for the election bill. To have been successful, Democrats would need total unity from all 50 of their members, plus Vice President Harris to break a tie. The outcome of the vote was telegraphed, but it marks a defeat of Democrats’ months-long push to pass voting rights legislation, even if it meant changing the rules so they could do it alone. Even as the effort appeared poised to fall short, Biden and Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) poured time and political capital into the fight. Biden went to Georgia earlier this month to urge Senate Democrats to pass voting rights legislation, and change the Senate’s rules if necessary, and made a similar pitch to the caucus during a closed-door meeting last week. In a statement after the vote, Biden said that he was "profoundly disappointed" in the Senate. Schumer has talked up the issue both on the Senate floor, during a blitz of TV appearances and back in New York this week for Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebrations. Democrats were under pressure to hold the vote, regardless of the outcome, to show that they were all-in on voting rights. Schumer made a final plea to his own party after Republicans blocked a voting bill on Wednesday night that would have combined the Freedom to Vote Act, which overhauls elections and campaign finance laws, and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, which would expand and strengthen the 1965 Voting Rights Act. “The only choice to move forward on these vital issues is to change the rules in the modest way we have proposed. My colleagues, history is watching us. Let us choose in favor of our democracy,” Schumer said. Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) fumed over the attempted rules change accusing Democrats of trying to "break the Senate." "The Senate will be saved tonight. America can breathe a sigh of relief. This radicalism will have been stopped and it's a good day for America," McConnell said. Under the rules change proposal, Democrats would have gotten rid of the 60-vote hurdle currently required for most legislation, but only for the voting rights bill. Instead, opponents could delay the election legislation by holding the floor but after that it could pass by a simple majority. Schumer picked up support for the proposal, which he announced on Tuesday night, throughout Wednesday. Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), who had previously said he would study the issue, announced on Wednesday morning that he would support the rules change proposal. “If campaign finance and voting rights reforms are blocked again this week, I will support the proposed changes to pass them with a majority vote. Protecting the vote-by-mail system used by a majority of Arizonans and getting dark money out of our elections is too important to let fall victim to Washington dysfunction,” Kelly said in a statement.

Manchin touts Nick Saban's opposition to changing filibuster -Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) touted Alabama football coach Nick Saban’s opposition to changing the filibuster on Twitter Thursday after receiving backlash for voting against changes to the procedure. “​​Coach Saban is exactly right: you cannot throw the filibuster out and expect the legislative process to work better. I wholeheartedly agree with the coaches that ‘Our democracy is at its best when all Americans are encouraged to participate,’” Manchin said.

Schumer vows to keep fighting on voting rights after filibuster defeat -Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) vowed that Democrats would keep trying to find a path forward for voting rights legislation after they failed to pass a rules change to exempt election legislation from the legislative filibuster. Schumer — speaking from the floor after Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) voted with all Republicans to defeat the rules change — called the setback "disappointing," but said Democrats would "keep working until voting rights are protected for every American." "It will not deter Senate Democrats from continuing our fight against voter suppression, dark money, and partisan gerrymandering. With no support from Senate Republicans, many of whom deny the very existence of voter suppression, we faced an uphill battle, but because of this fight and the fact that each senator had to show where they stand, we are closer to achieving our goal," Schumer said. "Now that every senator has gone on record, the American people have seen who's on the side of protecting voting rights, and it will only strengthen our resolve as we work to ensure our democracy does not backslide," Schumer added. Even though the outcome of the vote was baked in, Schumer tried on Wednesday night to change the Senate's rules to let the voting rights bill bypass the legislative filibuster, which requires 60 votes for most legislation to advance. The move came after Republicans blocked legislation that combined the Freedom to Vote Act, which overhauls federal elections and campaign finance laws, and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which strengthens the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Even as Schumer vowed to fight on, it wasn't immediately clear what the next steps are. Democrats are increasingly turning to trying to revive the Build Back Better legislation, while a bipartisan group of senators are eyeing narrower changes to the Electoral Count Act, which lays out how the electoral college results are counted. The attempt to change the rules ramped up tensions in the Senate, both between Democrats, who went increasingly public with their frustration with Sinema and Manchin, and Democrats and Republicans. Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) floated that Wednesday "is in all likelihood the most important day in the history of the Senate as an institution" and accused Democrats of trying to "not only break their word," after previously supporting the filibuster, "but also break the Senate." "There's really only one question that we're dealing with here, just one, not complicated — will it take 60 votes to pass massive changes or a simple majority to ram them through? That's what is at stake here. Nothing else," he said. "For the first time in history, almost an entire political party will write in permanent ink they would shatter the soul of the Senate for short-term power. Shatter the soul of the Senate for short-term power," he added.

Manchin, Collins leading talks on overhauling election law, protecting election officials -- Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) said on Thursday that they are pushing forward with their effort to reform an 1887 election law after a more sweeping Democratic effort fell short this week. Manchin and Collins — meeting together with a crowd of reporters in the Senate basement — said that a bipartisan group of senators is discussing overhauling the Electoral Count Act, as well additional protections for election workers including beefing up penalties for threatening poll workers. "I'm very encouraged by the fact that so many of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle have indicated an interest in making sure that votes are properly counted and certified and that means overhauling the 1887 Electoral Count Act, it means looking at additional protections against violence and threats for poll workers and election officials," Collins told reporters. Manchin added that the senators "just think it's such a needed thing to secure our elections" and wanted to ensure that election and poll worker intimidation would be "dealt with in the harshest penalties, we're not going to fool with our count." The decision by Manchin and Collins to drive their efforts back into the spotlight comes after Collins convened a bipartisan group of senators earlier this month to talk about potential election reforms. But those talks have largely flown under the radar as Democrats made a failed bid to bypass the 60-vote legislative filibuster in order to pass a sweeping election and voting rights bill. That effort unraveled late Wednesday night when Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) voted with Republicans to prevent a one-time rules change that would have nixed the 60-vote hurdle for the elections bill. Instead, under the rules change, opponents could have slowed down the bill by holding the floor, but after that it could have passed by a simple majority. There's growing bipartisan support for altering the Electoral Count Act after then-President Trump tried to get some of his closest allies, including Vice President Mike Pence, to try to challenge the Electoral College results on Jan. 6, 2021. A pro-Trump mob breached the Capitol that day as lawmakers and Pence were formally counting the results. Among the changes under discussion are clarifying the vice president's role and changing the number of lawmakers who need to object before the House and Senate must vote on a challenge to a state's Electoral College slate. In addition to the bipartisan group, Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Angus King (I-Maine) are working on separate legislation that would make changes to the Electoral Count Act.

Will the Biden Administration Deliver on Overtime Pay? --The typical American is working more hours per week — especially during the COVID pandemic — and yet only a fraction of employees qualify for overtime pay. More than half of full-time American employees work at least 41 hours a week, according to aGallup survey. About 18 million of them toil more than 50 hours each week, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Economic Development. Many young workers can be forgiven for not knowing, but a workload of more than 40 hours in a week has long been considered “overtime,” worth 150% of the normal wage starting at hour 41. These days, though, just 15% — or three out of every 20 workers — qualify for overtime pay. That’s a marked change from the era leading into the mid-1970s, when overtime pay was the norm. More than 60% of salaried employees qualified for the extra income in 1975, making their access to extra pay four times more likely than it is today.In the 47 years since, mortgages and rents in much of the country have soared, college tuition has followed suit, and retirement savings have shriveled for many Americans. So it is worth asking a simple question on behalf of the nation’s workers: What happened to our overtime pay?The easy answer is that the income threshold for people to qualify for overtime pay hasn’t come close to keeping up with inflation or the cost of living since Richard Nixon was in the White House.Amid aggressive lobbying by corporate interests and pushback from fiscally conservative lawmakers, the threshold hardly increased since Watergate, and remained stuck at just $23,000 per year from 2004 until 2014, when the Obama administration tried to lift it to $47,000 as part of an updated rule that it calculated would have made about 4.2 million additional workers eligible for overtime. But 21 states and business groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commercesued the administration, asserting government overreach, and a federal judge rejected the new rule that included the broadening of overtime pay.  Rather than appeal the judge’s decision, which was criticized by many unions and worker advocates, the Trump administration proposed a new rule in 2019 that elevated the overtime wage threshold increase to just over half what the Obama administration had sought. The result is that federal law currently requires overtime pay only for employees who earn an annual salary of less than $35,568, although many such workers are excluded because they work in specific sectors determined by the Department of Labor, or because they engage in managerial duties. Now the Biden administration is overhauling the rule in ways that are expected to sharply increase the number of Americans who qualify, which should help more workers earn a living wage. While the specific threshold proposal remains uncertain, sources close to the Labor Department tell Capital & Main that a decision is likely in the fall after agency staffers make the necessary economic calculations and department attorneys craft a legal analysis that they think will withstand possible court challenges. They must also draw up a political strategy able to overcome the opposition of fiscally conservative lawmakers.

Biden defensive in rare solo news conference ahead of 1-year mark in office - On the eve of the one-year anniversary of his inauguration, President Joe Biden held a formal news conference at the White House Wednesday, answering reporter questions on his handling of the pandemic, the economy and legislative agenda, characterizing the country as unified -- but not as much as it could be -- and raised eyebrows by saying Russia was likely to invade Ukraine."It's been a year of challenges, but it's also many years of enormous progress," Biden said to begin, ticking through his administration's successes before fielding questions from reporters. With Biden facing the limits of what he can accomplish with an evenly-divided Senate, unable to get either his signature social spending package or major voting rights reform through Congress in recent weeks, and with the pandemic still raging well into its second, his approval rating in polls has hit an all-time low. A Jan. 12 Quinnipiac poll found his approval rating to be 33%, a 3-point drop from November.Questioned at one point on the falling numbers indicating Americans are unhappy with his job performance, Biden replied bluntly, "I don't believe the polls."The president touted wins over the last year to kick off the news conference, including administering more than 200 million COVID-19 vaccine doses and hitting record-low unemployment rates in many states"Should we have done more testing earlier? Yes," Biden said in his opening remarks. "But we're doing more now. We've gone from zero at-home tests a year ago to 375 million tests on the market just this month."He said the bottom line on COVID-19 is the country is "in a better place than we've been and have been thus far" and reiterated his position not to go back to lockdowns and school closures."Some people may call what's happening now a new normal. I call it a job not yet finished," Biden said with confidence. "We're moving toward a time that COVID-19 won't disrupt our daily lives or COVID-19 won't be a crisis, but something to protect against and a threat. Look, we're not there yet. We will get there." The first question to Biden was on whether he believes he overpromised to the American public what his administration could achieve in office one year in. "Look, I didn't overpromise," a defensive Biden replied. "I have probably outperformed what anybody thought would happen. The fact of the matter is that we're in a situation where we have made enormous progress."

Biden Walks Back Ukraine Statements: Any Russian Offensive Marks An "Invasion" - During President Biden's 2-hour solo press event, he was asked repeatedly about the administration's posture on Ukraine and the growing fears of a Russian invasion threat. To the disappointment and anger of US hawks as well as Ukrainian government officials themselves, he made a distinction between a "minor incursion" and an all-out "invasion" - suggesting that only in the latter scenario might there be a robust response from the US. CNN soon after the Q&A session focused on Biden's distinguishing between an "incursion" vs. major invasion: But he suggested a "minor incursion" would elicit a lesser response than a full-scale invasion of the country."I'm not so sure he is certain what he is going to do. My guess is he will move in. He has to do something," Biden said, describing a leader searching for relevance in a post-Soviet world. "He is trying to find his place in the world between China and the west."We want to remind the great powers that there are no minor incursions and small nations. Just as there are no minor casualties and little grief from the loss of loved ones. I say this as the President of a great power Ukraine's President Zelensky responded Thursday by emphasizing "there are no minor incursions" - after Biden layed out that America's response would be determined based on the scope of any Russian offensive, with the US president strongly suggesting he would likely stop at imposing sanctions. Hawks took this as tantamount to Biden giving Putin a 'green light' to act as Russia pleases in restive Donbass. Many want Biden to instead threaten a full American military response.All this has prompted Biden to do some walking back of the original statements. On Thursday he sought to clarify at the start of a press event that was supposed to focus on infrastructure. "I've been absolutely clear with President Putin. He has no misunderstanding. If any assembled Russian units move across the Ukrainian border, that is an invasion," Biden said."Let there be no doubt at all that if Putin makes this choice, Russia will pay a heavy price," Biden continued. He noted this could also come in the form of a Russian cyber-attack or other form of irregular warfare. The day prior Biden stated provocatively that Putin "has never seen sanctions like the ones I have promised will be imposed if Russia further advances into Ukraine."

How a European gas pipeline became a U.S. political weapon - Members of both parties oppose the Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline from Russia into Germany, but that hasn’t stopped the project from becoming mired in the U.S. political dysfunction. Senate Democrats yesterday, at the behest of the White House, blocked legislation from Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to impose immediate sanctions against a conduit that is already complete but not yet operational. In total, 44 Democrats, along with Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), voted against the bill. Six Democrats — all of whom represent presidential swing states and four of whom are up for reelection this year — sided with Republicans on the sanctions bill. Those Democrats included Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto and Jacky Rosen of Nevada, Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, Mark Kelly of Arizona, Raphael Warnock of Georgia and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire. Republicans accused President Biden and the Democratic majority in Congress of changing their tune on Nord Stream 2 now that former President Trump is no longer in office. The GOP portrayed Trump as having halted the pipeline. “For two years, this body has had bipartisan consensus and unanimity on standing up to Russia on stopping Nord Stream 2,” Cruz said ahead of the vote. “It is only with a Democrat in the White House that suddenly scores of Democrats have decided partisan loyalty is more important than standing up to Russia.” But Russia hawks like Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) have repeatedly taken issue with Cruz’s characterization. They say Congress had to badger Trump to impose sanctions. Senate Foreign Relations Chair Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) said, “To me, that’s a Trump-Putin pipeline." After weeks of lobbying, most Democrats joined the White House’s view against sanctioning a project affecting Germany, a key ally. And with Russian President Vladimir Putin threatening to invade Ukraine, keeping new sanctions on the table would give the West leverage. "I’ve worked for years to stop NS2 & prevent it from becoming operational. That work goes on," Shaheen wrote on Twitter. "But Sen. Cruz’s bill creates more risk than it solves by alienating key allies & undermining diplomacy. There can be no daylight btw the U.S & our allies on combating Russian aggression." The White House would have rather not had the Senate vote on the Cruz bill. The Texas Republican scored a roll call in a deal with Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), who wanted Cruz to stop blocking dozens of nominees.

White House Helpless As Oil Prices Climb Higher When President Joe Biden announced plans to release up to 50 million barrels of oil from the strategic petroleum reserve to lower retail fuel prices, many analysts warned that any effect this move would have would be short-lived. Indeed, prices dropped for a very short while and are now on the climb again, with the number of three-digit price forecasts growing. The strategic reserve release was already a desperate attempt to put a lid on gasoline prices, pushed up by crude oil prices, themselves the result of a faster rebound in global demand and production constraints among OPEC members. The Omicron variant of the coronavirus, like the SPR release plans, had a transitory negative effect on benchmarks, but before long, they were once again on the rise. Morgan Stanley expects Brent crude to reach $90 per barrel later this year. This is also the price forecast of Goldman. JP Morgan recently said that crude could reach and exceed $100 this year, noting the decline in OPEC spare production capacity. The latest to join the bullish choir is Vitol, whose head for Asian operations told Bloomberg last week that oil had further up to go because of tight supply. What this means for the Biden administration and its efforts to keep gasoline affordable for voters ahead of the midterms is nothing good. Perhaps more SPR releases could be organized, but that would have little more effective than the first announcement: like plenty of analysts has explained, oil prices are influenced by global rather than local factors, even a major oil-producing country such as the United States. If Brent moves towards $100, West Texas Intermediate will not be far behind, even with rising U.S. production. The problem, from a Washington perspective, is that even with rising U.S. production, global supply remains short of demand, ironically because of OPEC, which Biden personally pleaded with to raise oil production so U.S. prices at the pump would ease. "OPEC+ remain steadfast in adding 400,000 bpd back to the market each month, but our data suggests that monthly additions tally closer to 250,000 bpd," Many OPEC members are struggling with their higher production quotas because of technical issues, such as Nigeria, or because of political factors, such as Libya, which, to be fair, has been exempted from any production cuts and can pump at will as long as the political situation in the country allows it. Brent crude was trading at more than $86 a barrel at the time of writing, with WTI at over $84. The reason for this is structural. The supply problem is not a temporary issue that can be fixed quickly or easily. First, there is the limited OPEC spare capacity, which has been on the decline for the past two years amid the pandemic. Second, there is the potentially more serious problem of underinvestment, this one driven not so much by the pandemic as by the ESG trend that has made shareholders a lot more demanding about companies' environmental credentials than their money-making abilities. Apparently, however, end-consumers do not care as much about environmental credentials as shareholders. They care about having fuel for their cars, resulting in demand rising so steadily. Even the International Energy Agency had to backtrack from calls for the immediate suspension of all investments in new oil and gas production and instead call for more investments. According to the IEA, global oil supply is at least 1 million bpd below demand. This is a gap that would be difficult to fill, even if the whole U.S. shale oil industry started drilling wells. First, because shareholders would lash out. Second, because even in the shale patch, it takes some time to drill enough wells to make a difference in international prices, especially when few other producers have the capacity to do the same. There is little left to do for the White House and other decision-makers than sit and wait to see how the oil price game will play out. It is telling enough that OPEC does not want Brent to reach $100, per comments made by the oil minister of Oman. .

The Biden Employer Vaccine Mandate: In Defense of National Federation of Independent Business v. Department of Labor - On January 13, the US Supreme Court, by a vote of 6-3, blocked the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate. The policy took the form of an emergency OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) standard and would have required all firms with more than 100 workers to mandate vaccination or a testing regime as a condition for remaining employed. The conservative majority on the court argued that this measure was too far from the original intent of the law to warrant the deference that is normally given to administrative flexibility. Quite aside from the practical significance of the standard, which I’ll get back to, I think the court was right. The Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, which created the OSHA administrative apparatus, was centered on protecting workers. It was not intended to be a general purpose vehicle for advancing public health across the entire population. Why do I think the emergency Covid standard wasn’t primarily about workers? It did take the form of an employer mandate, after all. The reason is that workers have been exposed to many risk factors from the virus with far greater impact than the vaccine status of their colleagues, and the Biden administration expressly refused to take any protective action. Poor ventilation in the workplace is extremely hazardous. A requirement to be masked in indoor settings and the provision of high quality masks would fit perfectly into the existing regulatory framework regarding personal protective equipment. Redesigning workplaces to reduce crowding would be a big step, as would regular testing of everyone at employer expense. Finally, a paid leave policy, while arguably a big step beyond traditional health and safety regulation, would have an immense impact on worker exposure to the virus. In fact, a wide-ranging emergency standard with many of these provisions was drawn up early last year, but the Biden administration refused to adopt it.  By its own actions, the Biden administration has made it clear it has no intention of protecting workers as workers from avoidable pandemic risks. Its vaccine mandate was intended to apply to workers as available components of the general public, and insofar as this is true, it is beyond the intended scope of the OSH Act. This is supported by the practical effect of striking down the standard. It will presumably lead to less vaccination and testing. But vaccination status has little effect against infectiousness with the dominance of the Omicron variant, and the testing regime proposed in the standard was too weak to prevent a tsunami of false negatives. The only consequential outcome will be that there will be a higher percentage of cases that result in hospitalization, ICU usage and death. That is terrible, but its social cost is at a population level (strain on the medical system, social disruption), not on workers as workers.

Milley tests positive for COVID-19 – Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley tested positive for COVID-19 on Sunday and is isolating. Col. Dave Butler, spokesperson for the Joint Staff, said in a statement that Milley is experiencing “very minor symptoms” and can perform his duties remotely. Butler said Milley is fully vaccinated against the coronavirus and has received a booster vaccine dose. All other Joint Chiefs of Staff, except for one, tested negative for COVID-19. Officials have not said who that one was. . Also on Monday, the Marine Corps announced that its Commandant Gen. David Berger tested positive for COVID-19. “The performance of his duties will remain unaffected,” commandant spokesperson Maj. Eric Flanagan said in a statement to The Hill. Milley and Flanagan are the latest top Defense officials to test positive for COVID-19 this month. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced on Jan. 2 he had tested positive. He also experienced mild symptoms and worked remotely.

Colorado Democrat latest House member to test positive for COVID-19 – Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) on Monday announced she had tested positive for a breakthrough case of COVID-19. “I have tested positive for COVID-19. Thankfully, I am fully vaccinated and boosted and experiencing mild symptoms,” DeGette’s announcement comes as the latest coronavirus surge, driven largely by the omicron variant, sweeps through Congress. At least 14 members of the House and one senator tested positive for coronavirus this month, including Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Jim Cooper (R-Tenn.), Sean Casten (D-Ill.) and Young Kim (R-Calif.). Overall, there have been at least 50 breakthrough cases of COVID-19 among vaccinated members of Congress since last summer. More than half of those breakthrough cases have been since mid-December. Iowa Rep. Ashley Hinson (R) announced Friday that she had tested positive for the virus a second time within two years. “Yesterday afternoon, I began experiencing mild, cold-like symptoms. I took a COVID-19 test and the results were positive. I am fully vaccinated and boosted against COVID-19,” Hinson wrote in a tweet.

Maryland Democrat announces positive COVID-19 test – Rep. David Trone (D-Md.) announced he has tested positive for COVID-19 in the latest breakthrough case among lawmakers in Congress. “Today, I tested positive for COVID-19. I’m fully vaccinated + boosted, and am only experiencing mild symptoms,” Trone wrote in a tweet on Saturday. “I’ll be voting by proxy this week. Trone’s infection follows similar announcements in the past week or so from Reps. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Md.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Jim Cooper (R-Tenn.), Sean Casten (D-Ill.) and Ashley Hinson (R-Iowa.). Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) also announced she has tested positive for COVID-19 in a tweet on Monday, adding she is experiencing mild symptoms. “I have tested positive for COVID-19. Thankfully, I am fully vaccinated and boosted and experiencing mild symptoms,”

Latest Biden Covid Speech Sinks Without a Trace by Lambert Strether -President Biden gave another speech on Covid on January 13: “Remarks by President Biden at Virtual Meeting on Military Deployments Supporting Hospitals for the COVID-⁠19 Response.” I promised I’d pull on my yellow waders and go through it; and here you are! The speech is 12 minutes long; I have helpfully numbered each of the very short paragraphs, and annotated them. There are clearly places in the speech where Biden is stuttering; I have not marked them. But there are also places where Biden has clearly lost his train of thought; I have highlighted the false starts and the flubs in yellow, thus. If I occasionally betray a little irritation, please forgive me. It’s been a long pandemic. I have added some commentary at the end.

Biden Urged to Fire Covid Response Chief Jeff Zients Over ‘Damning’ Failures --President Joe Biden is coming under growing pressure to fire White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Jeff Zients—a former private equity executive with no public health background—as the administration continues to face criticism over its slow-moving and inadequate efforts to combat Covid-19.Watchdog groups have long warned that Zients is not qualified to take on the massive task of leading the federal government’s pandemic response given both his lack of scientific and medical experience as well as his record in the private sector, where his firm invested in a company accused of exploitative surprise billing.Early critics of Biden’s decision to appoint Zients to the key post believe their fears have been realized during the Omicron surge, which has laid bare the administration’s failure to prepare for a highly contagious variant that experts warned was all but inevitable.Writing for The American Prospect, Daniel Boguslaw of the Revolving Door Project (RDP) notedThursday that “amid an entirely predictable viral mutation and a winter surge, Zients has failed to provide the materials necessary to improve the U.S. response, or the guidance necessary to keep the pandemic under control.”“He’s proven himself not up to the task,” he added, “and Biden should relieve him of his duties.”

CDC's definition of 'fully vaccinated' has not kept up with the science - A year ago, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) defined “fully vaccinated” against SARS-CoV-2 as having received one dose of the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) vaccine or two serial doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines. This definition has been used extensively across the country to establish requirements for public engagement,from work to schools to restaurants to Broadway shows, under the interpretation that those who are “fully vaccinated” are those who are safest from acquiring and spreading the virus. Fortunately, we’ve learned a lot of science in the last year about vaccine durability, protection from new variants, as well as natural immunity. We also have much more granular ways to evaluate the likelihood that someone will put others around them at risk of COVID-19. Unfortunately, CDC’s definition has not kept up with the science, and the year-old national standard has not aged well. We learned months ago that vaccines have limited durability, particularly in their ability to protect us from acquiring, replicating, shedding and then spreading the virus. Five months after being “fully vaccinated,” we might still have a decent T-cell repertoire to reduce the chances of getting very sick from COVID-19. However, our antibody levels have likely dropped substantially, and with them, our first line of defense against acquiring and replicating — and thus shedding and spreading — the virus. This is particularly relevant with the new omicron variant, which is so rapid and contagious that we need even higher levels of antibodiesthan we ever have before. Boosters can help rekindle antibody production and immediate early protection, and CDC is wisely recommending boosters. But inexplicably, they are not incorporating boosters in the definition of “fully vaccinated.”Someone vaccinated a year ago has a much higher likelihood of putting others around them at risk of COVID-19 than someone boosted a month ago, yet CDC puts both in the same “fully vaccinated” category. The protection afforded by boosters is on the order of 20-fold higherthan without boosters, about the same magnitude as the protection afforded by vaccines in the first place. So, if it were important to distinguish between vaccinated and unvaccinated when CDC first established this definition, now it is similarly important to distinguish between boosted and unboosted. To put it more bluntly, someone whose last dose of the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine was over five months ago should no longer be considered “fully vaccinated” and is likely no longer protected enough to be around strangers indoors. Sure, they might be fine if they get COVID-19, but their chances of infecting others in that room have likely become unacceptably high. Furthermore, the entire concept of natural immunity has been ignored by definitions that focus on “fully vaccinated” rather than “appropriately immune.” Indeed, even for those with previous COVID-19 infection, it remains essential to get vaccinated and boosted, as hybrid immunityseems to be the most powerful weapon against SARS-CoV-2. However, today it seems hard to reconcile that an unvaccinated person who recovered from moderate COVID-19 last month, and probably has very high antibody levels, is considered less “safe” than someone vaccinated a year ago, who probably has very low antibody levels.

The CDC’s New Challenge? Grappling With Imperfect Science - The Omicron coronavirus variant is moving much faster than researchers can, worsening a longstanding problem: The agency must make tough decisions with scant data. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was long revered for its methodical and meticulous scientific approach. Agencies in other nations modeled themselves after the world’s most highly regarded public health authority, even adopting the name.At the outset of the pandemic, the C.D.C. moved at its accustomed pace. But this time, with a novel virus moving so quickly, the country paid a price: Testing and surveillance lagged as the agency tried to implement dated approaches with creaky infrastructure. Officials were late to recommend masking, in part because federal scientists took too long to recognize that the virus was airborne.Now the contagious Omicron variant is pushing the C.D.C. into uncharted territory. Because decisions must be made at a breakneck pace, the agency has issued recommendations based on what once would have been considered insufficient evidence, amid growing public concern about how these guidelines affect the economy and education. …The agency’s director, Dr. Rochelle P. Walensky, has sometimes skipped much of the traditional scientific review process, most recently in shortening the isolation period for infected Americans. After the Trump administration’s pattern of interference, President Biden came to office promising to restore the C.D.C.’s reputation for independence and rigorous science. The challenge now for Dr. Walensky is figuring out how to convey this message to the public: The science is incomplete, and this is our best advice for now.For a bureaucracy staffed primarily by medical professionals, the change has not been easy.In recent interviews, some officials at the C.D.C. privately described the decisions as demoralizing, and worried about Dr. Walensky’s increasing reliance on a small group of advisers and what they saw as the White House’s heavy political influence on her actions.Yet others outside the agency commended Dr. Walensky for short-circuiting a laborious process and taking a pragmatic approach to managing a national emergency, saying she was right to move ahead even when the data was unclear and agency researchers remained unsure. …

Why Joe Biden Gave Up on Covid - When Joe Biden was elected, he promised to treat the pandemic differently from his predecessor. And for a while, it seemed that his approach was working. But a year into his administration, omicron is surging, and many of Biden’s more ambitious plans have fallen by the wayside. On episode 41 of The Politics of Everything, hosts Laura Marsh and Alex Pareene talk with Melody Schreiber, a regular contributor toThe New Republic, and the social epidemiologist Justin Feldman. What happened to Biden’s promises? And what has his approach cost us?

 FBI activity at Rep. Cuellar's home part of Azerbaijan probe: reports - Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) activity at the home of Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) on Wednesday was related to a federal probe involving several U.S. businessmen and Azerbaijan, ABC News and CBS News reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.ABC News additionally reported that Cuellar’s campaign office was also involved in the FBI activity, and that the FBI had raided both the office and his home, citing a source familiar. The outlet noted that a federal grand jury is investigating the case and that it was not immediately clear if Cuellar is a target of its probe.Rosanne Hughes, a spokesperson for the FBI's San Antonio office, on Wednesday told The Hill in a statement that "the FBI was present in the vicinity of Windridge Drive and Estate Drive in Laredo conducting court-authorized law enforcement activity," which is reportedly the neighborhood in which Cuellar lives.The congressman's office confirmed to The Hill on Wednesday that there was an investigation, but they did not say if any activity was being conducted near where he lived. "Congressman Cuellar will fully cooperate in any investigation," the statement read. "He is committed to ensuring that justice and the law are upheld."

Federal judge bans Martin Shkreli from the pharmaceutical industry for life, orders him to pay $64.6 million fine - Former pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli was handed a lifetime ban from the industry and ordered to pay a $64.6 million fine, according to a federal judge's ruling on Friday.Shkreli was sued in January 2020 for allegedly violating antitrust rules over fixing the price of the anti-parasitic drug Daraprim and delaying "the entry of generic competition for at least eighteen months," according to the ruling. US District Judge Denise Cote said in a 135-page ruling that Shkreli's "egregious, deliberate, repetitive, long-running, and ultimately dangerous illegal conduct" warranted the stiff penalty. The so-called "Pharma Bro" — who was also a former hedge fund manager before launching his career in pharmaceuticals — was previously convicted of securities fraud and is serving seven years in prison.He also faces a new lawsuit filed last year by health insurers accusing him of illegally hiking the price of Daraprim from $17.50 to $750 per tablet once acquiring the rights to the drug in 2015. Daraprim, according to the lawsuit, is "an essential, life-saving drug used in the treatment of toxoplasmosis."

Trump lawyers to Supreme Court: Jan. 6 committee 'will not be harmed by delay' - Former President Trump’s lawyers told the Supreme Court that the House committee probing the Jan. 6 attack would suffer no harm if the justices delayed the transfer of Trump administration records to congressional investigators. The bold assertion came amid an ongoing legal clash between Trump and the House panel over whether a trove of records that investigators say would shed light on the deadly Capitol riot is covered by the former president’s assertion of executive privilege. Trump’s attorneys, in their latest filing, pushed back on the committee’s claim that a protracted legal fight threatens to undermine its work. “Respondents will not be harmed by delay,” Trump attorneys wrote, referring to the House panel. “Despite their insistence that the investigation is urgent, more than a year has passed since January 6, 2021. Years remain before the next transition of power.” “The Committee and the Court have time to make a swift but measured analysis of these important issues and make sure that in the rush to conduct its investigation, the Committee does not do irreparable structural damage in the process,” they added. The Jan. 6 committee has not established a hard deadline for completing its investigation, but its chairman, Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), has said the panel hopes to wrap up by early spring. Trump turned to the Supreme Court last month after lower federal courts in Washington, D.C., rejected his request to halt the National Archives from passing along the records. His attorneys have asked the justices to shield the disputed materials from disclosure while they consider his formal appeal. In the lower federal courts, judges made quick work in rebuffing Trump’s claims. They zeroed in on President Biden’s refusal to invoke executive privilege over Trump-era schedules, call logs, emails and other requested documents. Biden declined to do so after determining that the House panel's needs for the records exceeded any benefit of keeping them under wraps. The House panel, for its part, has emphasized the importance of a prompt resolution in the case. “The Select Committee’s work is of the highest importance and urgency: investigating one of the darkest episodes in our nation’s history, a deadly assault on the United States Capitol and Congress, and an unprecedented disruption of the peaceful transfer of power from one President to the next,” they told the justices last month. The prospect of a drawn-out Trump court fight has prompted comparisons to the drain-the-clock litigation strategy he wielded as president, where delay tactics were deployed to stymie lawsuits, hamper investigators and fend off subpoenas, with numerous cases against Trump and his administration still hanging in the balance as he left the White House.

Supreme Court rejects Trump's bid to shield records from Jan. 6 committee --The Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected former President Trump's bid to block a trove of his administration's records from being handed to the Jan. 6 House committee. The ruling came in an unsigned, one-paragraph order. Justice Clarence Thomas, a staunch conservative, was alone in indicating that he would have granted Trump’s request. The move cleared the way for congressional investigators to receive a batch of Trump-era schedules, call logs, emails and other requested documents that the committee says could illuminate key circumstances surrounding the deadly Capitol riot. The committee said it had begun receiving records Wednesday night just hours after a ruling that chairman Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and Vice Chair Liz Cheney (R-Wy.) hailed as “a victory for the rule of law and American democracy.” “Our work goes forward to uncover all the facts about the violence of January 6th and its causes,” they said in a joint statement, emphasizing that their effort aims “to ensure nothing like that day ever happens again.” The order leaves intact a lower federal appeals court ruling that found Trump’s assertion of executive privilege and other legal theories unpersuasive in light of President Biden’s refusal to invoke privilege, as well as the House panel’s pressing task. The justices wrote that although the unprecedented dispute between a former president and lawmakers raised “serious and substantial concerns,” the Washington, D.C.,-based federal appeals court had suitably analyzed the issues at hand. “Because the Court of Appeals concluded that President Trump’s claims would have failed even if he were the incumbent, his status as a former President necessarily made no difference to the court’s decision,” the court wrote. Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who concurred with the majority’s ruling, wrote separately to note his disagreement with part of the lower appeals court’s reasoning and its prospective legal weight. Thomas, the lone dissenter, did not explain the source of his disagreement. Trump turned to the Supreme Court last month after lower federal courts rejected his request to halt the National Archives from passing along his administration’s records. His attorneys had asked the justices to shield the disputed materials from disclosure while they considered his formal appeal, a request Wednesday’s ruling rebuffed.

Boebert asked Jewish visitors to Capitol if they were doing 'reconnaissance': report - Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) reportedly asked a group of Jewish individuals who were visiting the Capitol if they were there to do “reconnaissance,” the visitors told BuzzFeed News. Boebert is said to have seen the group of visitors on Thursday, looked at them “head to toe” and asked if they were visiting the Capitol to do “reconnaissance,” one person who saw the interaction told the outlet.“You know, I’m not sure to be offended or not,” one of the rabbis in the group told Buzzfeed News. “I was very confused.” “When I heard that, I actually turned to the person standing next to me and asked, ‘Did you just hear that?’” the rabbi said.The group was there to meet with Rep. Thomas Suozzi (D-N.Y.), who said reckless language like Boebert's should not be used by lawmakers. "The bottom line is that everyone, especially members of Congress, have to be very, very thoughtful in the language they use,” Suozzi said. “Because when you're a member of Congress, you have an important role to play in society. You can't be cavalier in the comments you make especially if they could be perceived as being antisemitic, or discriminatory." Boebert told the outlet the question was in jest and that she made it as a dig against Democrats who accused her of conducting large tours for people days before the Capitol riot happened.

Prosecutors offer to drop Ghislaine Maxwell's perjury charges if she is sentenced - Prosecutors in the Ghislaine Maxwell case are offering to drop two perjury charges against the British socialite if she is sentenced for the sex-related crimes she was convicted of last month. The offer comes as defense attorneys for Maxwell are calling for a new trial after one of the jurors on the case revealed in media interviews that he had been a victim of sexual assault as a child. Maxwell faces up to 65 years in prison after being found guilty of five counts last month on charges including enticing minors to travel to engage in sex acts and transporting minors with the intent of having them engage in criminal activity. She was accused of helping her close confidant, convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, recruit and sexually abuse underage girls, allegations that she has denied. In a letter to Judge Alison Nathan filed on Monday, the government said it is willing to dismiss two perjury counts against Maxwell if her post-trial motions are denied. If any of them are granted, prosecutors said parties should propose a schedule for further proceedings. Maxwell is facing two counts of perjury in connection to a 2016 civil deposition, which was part of a defamation lawsuit filed by Jeffrey Epstein accuser Virginia Giuffre. A date for that trial has not yet been set. The government said it is prepared to drop the two charges “in light of the victims’ significant interests in bringing closure to this matter and avoiding the trauma of testifying again.” Maxwell, however, does not appear to be interested in striking a deal. Her defense team asked the court to delay establishing schedule for sentencing “because there is a compelling basis for the Court to overturn Ms. Maxwell’s conviction and grant her a new trial based on the disclosure of Juror #50 during deliberations,” referring to the juror who said he was a sexual assault victim. The defense also said that requiring Maxwell to take part in the preparation of the Presentence Investigation Report — which helps the court come to a sentencing decision — while waiting for a response to her motion for a new trial would “adversely impact her Fifth Amendment rights.” The attorneys said any scheduling for the perjury counts “should be deferred until the post-trial motions are resolved.”/p>

 Ghislaine Maxwell Ends Fight to Protect Men Involved With Epstein; Names Could Be Revealed -- After being found guilty of aiding Jeffery Epstein's sex trafficking of young girls,Ghislaine Maxwell has given up a legal fight against revealing the names of others possibly involved in the illicit operation.The revelations would come from separate litigation involving Virginia Giuffre, a victim of Epstein's sex-trafficking ring who filed a defamation lawsuit against Maxwell in 2016.In a court filing on Wednesday, Giuffre asked a federal judge to unseal the names of eight "John Does." These anonymous individuals weren't parties to the lawsuit and whose lawyers have kept their names secret out of concern of embarrassment or media attention. Giuffre's filing argued it's time for that secrecy to end."The Court's unsealing process has been quite consistent: with the exception of a narrow set of circumstances which are generally not present here, documents have been unsealed notwithstanding generalized concerns about annoyance or embarrassment," reads Giuffre's filing. "As this Court has recognized, generalized aversion to embarrassment and negativity that may come from being associated with Epstein and Maxwell is not enough to warrant continued sealing of information. This is especially true with respect to this case of great public interest, involving serious allegations of the sex trafficking of minors." Maxwell, a British socialite and one-time girlfriend of Epstein, had previously supported keeping the "Does" anonymous. But Maxwell reversed course in a court filing on Wednesday. "Each of the listed Does has counsel who have ably asserted their own respective privacy rights," reads the filing. "Ms. Maxwell therefore leaves it to this Court to conduct the appropriate review consistent with the Order and Protocol for Unsealing Decided Motions." None of the "Does" so far have filed responses addressing Giuffre's filing. It will be up to Judge Loretta Preska whether the documents are unsealed. Giuffre has previously called on Maxwell to name names, saying in a 2020 Twitter post, "I know you only care about yourself & you hold all the secrets!"

 Prince Andrew's ex-girlfriend says in a new documentary that Jeffrey Epstein and Bill Clinton 'were like brothers' - Prince Andrew's ex-girlfriend Lady Victoria Hervey claimed in a documentary that Jeffrey Epstein and former President Bill Clinton "loved" being around the Duke of York, and that Epstein and Clinton were "like brothers."The new ITV documentary, "Ghislaine, Prince Andrew and the Paedophile," explores the relationship between Prince Andrew, British socialite and convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell, and convicted sex offender Epstein. The 45-minute documentary hosted by reporter Ranvir Singh aired on Tuesday in the UK to mixed reviews.The Duke of York's press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Clinton could not immediately be reached for comment on this specific characterization. Hervey did not immediately respond to questions following up on her claims.Hervey and Prince Andrew briefly dated in 1999, and she was a longtime friend of Maxwell."[Bill] Clinton was definitely very close to Jeffrey," Hervey said in the documentary, according to the Daily Mail. "They were like brothers, you know, and he was close to Ghislaine as well."

Unredacted Antitrust Complaint Shows Google’s Ad Business Even Scummier than Many Imagined --Yves Smith --The State of Texas and fifteen other states plus Puerto Rico have filed a suit against Google for antitrust abuses in the online ad market. Late last week, the Southern District of New York unsealed the complaint, which at this point is the third amended complaint. We’ve embedded the document at the end of the post.As we’ll discuss, the complaint paints a damning picture of how Google has monopolized all of the critical informational choke points in the online ad business between publishers and advertisers; as one employee put it, it’s as if Google owned a bank and the New York Stock Exchange, only more so.Google shamelessly engages in fraud; in fact, the abuses are so bad that one wonders why the attorneys general are not separately pursuing those charges. Let us crib from the Wall Street Journal’s summary of one of Google’s scams: The newly unredacted details provide more information about a series of programs that Google ran named Project Bernanke, Reserve Price Optimization and Dynamic Revenue Share. Google misled publishers and advertisers to believe they were participating in a “second-price auction,” where the winner pays the price of the second-highest bid, when using its advertising exchange, AdX, according to allegations from the complaint. However, under Google’s Bernanke program, AdX would at times knock out the second-highest bid, allowing the third-highest bid to win, thus depriving the publisher of revenue, according to the complaint. At the same time, Google would charge advertisers the price of the second-highest bid and pocket the difference, Google pooled the advertisers’ overpayments and used the money to manipulate auctions on its systems, at times boosting bids from advertisers bidding through its ad-buying tools to ensure it would win an auction it otherwise wouldn’t have, the complaint said. Mind you, I am not able to judge the merits of this suit, since antitrust enforcement has become so weak and precedents have also shifted to favor the big boys. The original complaint filed in December 2020, echoes the findings of numerous competition authorities, including the UK Competition and Markets Authority, the French Autorité de la concurrence, and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (more on this later), all of which have found that Google has used its market power across the ad tech supply chain to engage in a variety of leveraging tactics that have distorted competition. In the meantime, the US Department of Justice is reportedly preparing to file its own lawsuit against Google, while the European Commission is also probing the latter over its ad tech practices. By way of reminder, ever since its acquisition of DoubleClick, Google has become the largest ad tech vendor across each step of the value chain, with market shares as high as 90-100%, while also a major publisher itself (selling inventory on its owned and operated properties like YouTube). While most of this was more or less known, the Texas complaint made headlines for claiming that when faced with the prospect of Facebook supporting a disruptive technology known as Header Bidding, which Google viewed as an “existential threat,” Google struck a deal with Facebook. According to the so-called Jedi Blue agreement, Facebook would curtail its Header Bidding initiatives in return for special privileges when bidding in Google’s auctions. While originally a significant portion in the complaint was redacted, we now have access to the full lawsuit thanks to the order of the US District Court. Most of the previously redacted passages are (rather juicy) quotes from internal Google and Facebook documents, as well as information on Google’s fees

With Billions in Fines, U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Ranks Are ‘Packed With Rogues’ -- The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, an ultra-powerful business lobby, does not disclose its members, but it represents the interests of America’s largest corporations — some of which have a long record of breaking state and federal laws.A new report from consumer watchdog group Public Citizen details how 111 known members of the Chamber — including major polluters and banks that back fossil fuels — have violated state and federal laws at least 15,896 times since 2000, totaling more than $156 billion in fines and penalties.These findings come after the Chamber attacked the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) late last year for the agency’s efforts to step up enforcement of unlawful corporate behavior, calling increased oversight a “war on American businesses.”“In fact, it is the Chamber’s ranks that are packed with rogues,” Rick Claypool, a Public Citizen research director and author of the report, said in a statement. “The time is long overdue for big corporations that engage in abusive, monopolistic, and predatory behaviors to face serious consequences. Corporate crime shouldn’t pay, and honest businesses should welcome the FTC’s recent pledge to crack down on corporate crime.”Of the 111 known members, JPMorgan Chase has paid the most penalties, racking up more than $35 billion over the past two decades, according to Public Citizen. Other banks also topped the list, including Citigroup and Wells Fargo.The oil, gas, and coal industries, including Occidental Petroleum, Duke Energy, Marathon Petroleum, and Chevron, are also prominent members of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and have been frequent violators of state and federal laws.Occidental Petroleum was fined the most out of any energy company, hit with penalties an estimated 235 times. The bulk of the fines came from a massive $5.15 billion settlement between a subsidiary and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency over the company’s attempts to evade its environmental cleanup liabilities by shifting troubled assets to a shell company.Another notable example is Duke Energy, which has paid more than $2.8 billion in penalties since 2000, much of which are related to the massive 2014 coal ash spill in North Carolina. The nature of the violations varies. For instance, Chevron has paid more than $975 million in penalties since 2000 (Violation Tracker data pegs it at $1.07 billion), with violations ranging fromwrongful termination of employees to a $30 million settlement over a kickback scheme related to Iraq’s oil-for-food program in 2001 and 2002. The oil giant has also accumulated a long list of environmental violations that often result in small civil penalties accompanied by commitments to spend much more on upgrading equipment. Range Resources, a Texas-based fracking company with a heavy drilling presence in Pennsylvania, has accumulated more than $16 million in penalties since 2000. That included pleading no contest in 2020 to a criminal investigation brought by the Pennsylvania Attorney General related to an incident in which the company covered up leaks from fracking waste storage ponds. In total, the Chamber of Commerce’s oil and gas members have logged more than 1,600 violations totaling $8.9 billion in penalties, the report said. “It’s a lot of lawbreaking. On the other hand, it can also be seen as the tip of the iceberg,” Claypool told DeSmog, referring to the all the violations committed by the Chamber of Commerce’s members.

Fed defers to elected officials on issuing digital currency — The Federal Reserve released a long-awaited report examining the potential ramifications of issuing a digital version of the U.S. dollar, saying it would not create one without a clear directive from elected officials. The 40-page report, released Thursday, coincides with a request for feedback from the Fed on the impact of a hypothetical U.S. digital dollar — a central bank liability intended to be the online equivalent of physical cash. The public will have until May 20 to respond to nearly two dozen questions around CBDCs. The Fed’s report is “not intended to advance any specific policy outcome,” the agency wrote. But the paper marks a historic first step towards a potential CBDC, which experts believe could have considerable consequences for banks and the broader U.S. financial system. The Fed itself noted that the introduction of a digital dollar would represent a “highly significant innovation in American money.”

This rarely used tax loophole is helping some bitcoin holders save tons of cash Bitcoin is down around 36% from its all-time high in November, but the dip has a good side, thanks to a quirk in the tax code that helps crypto holders shield their winnings from the IRS. The IRS treats cryptocurrencies like property, meaning that anytime you spend, exchange, or sell your tokens, you're logging a taxable event. There's always a difference between how much you paid for your crypto, which is the cost basis, and the market value at the time you spend it. That difference can trigger capital gains taxes. But a little-known accounting method known as HIFO — short for highest in, first out — can significantly slash an investor's tax obligation. When you sell your crypto, you can pick and choose the specific unit you are selling. That means a crypto holder can pick out the most expensive bitcoin they bought and use that number to determine their tax obligation. A higher cost basis translates to less tax on your sale. But the onus is on the user to keep track, so thorough bookkeeping is essential. Without detailed records of a taxpayer's transaction and cost basis, calculations to the IRS can't be substantiated. "People rarely use it because it requires keeping good records or using crypto software," explained Shehan Chandrasekera, a CPA and head of tax strategy at crypto tax software company CoinTracker.io. "But the thing is, lots of folks now use that kind of software, which makes this kind of accounting super easy. They just don't know it exists." The trick to HIFO accounting is keeping granular details about every crypto transaction you made for each coin you own, including when you purchased it and for how much, as well as when you sold it and the market value at that time. But if you don't have all transaction records logged, or you're not using the right kind of software, the accounting method defaults to something called FIFO, or first in, first out. "It's not ideal," Chandrasekera explains. Under FIFO accounting rules, when you sell your tokens, you're selling the earliest purchased coin. If you bought your crypto before its big price run-up in 2021, your low cost basis can mean a bigger capital gains tax bill. Pairing HIFO accounting with the wash sale rule has the potential to save taxpayers even more money, experts tell CNBC. Because the IRS classifies digital currencies like bitcoin as property, losses on crypto holdings are treated differently than losses on stocks and mutual funds, according to Onramp Invest CEO Tyrone Ross. In particular, wash sale rules don't apply, meaning that you can sell your bitcoin and buy it right back, whereas with a stock, you would have to wait 30 days to buy it back. This nuance in the tax code paves the way for aggressive tax-loss harvesting, where investors sell at a loss and buy back bitcoin at a lower price. Those losses can lower your tax bill or be used to offset future gains. For instance, say a taxpayer purchases one bitcoin for $10,000 and sells it for $50,000. This individual would face $40,000 of taxable capital gains. But if this same taxpayer had previously harvested $40,000 worth of losses on earlier crypto transactions, they'd be able to offset the tax they owe. "You want to look as poor as possible," explained Chandrasekera. Chandrasekera says he sees people doing this on a weekly to quarterly basis, depending on their sophistication. Quickly buying back the cryptos is another key part of the equation. If timed correctly, buying the dip enables investors to catch the ride back up, if the price of the digital coin rebounds.

 Wells Fargo freed from six-year-old consent order - Wells Fargo is dealing with one less regulatory headache now that a 2015 enforcement action related to the sale of identity protection products has been lifted. The six-year-old consent order was terminated in early December, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said Thursday. The consent order was issued for what the OCC described as unfair billing practices in connection with various identity protection products the bank offered between 2004 and 2014. Wells Fargo charged some customers the full fee even though they were not receiving all of the credit monitoring services that were supposed to come with the products, according to the consent order.

 Consumer Reports will give financial apps same scrutiny it gives appliances - Consumer Reports is preparing to test consumer finance apps with the same rigor it applies to its evaluations of washing machines and mattresses. In September, the nonprofit announced that it had received a $1.5 million grant from Flourish Ventures, a venture capital firm that focuses on financial health innovations. The purpose of the grant is to strengthen the consumer organization’s assessments of digital finance services, from conducting surveys to testing products to advocating for protections based on its findings. Consumer Reports will look at fintech apps and other digital tools that let users spend, save, borrow or invest their money. Although the benefits for consumers are clear — this project aims to help consumers navigate the digital finance marketplace, uncover potential harms in the industry and press policymakers and companies for solutions — the findings could have ripple effects on banks and fintechs as well.

Retailers ask U.S. regulators to examine Visa, Mastercard fees - regulators to examine the fees charged by credit card companies after Amazon.com threatened to ban Visa cards in the U.K. The group said it was concerned about the “excessively high” fees Visa and rival Mastercard charge retailers. Amazon this week announced it would continue accepting Visa credit cards held by U.K. customers after saying it planned to ban such cards on its site starting Wednesday, due to rising transaction costs. “We believe U.S. authorities should look closely at what Amazon has done in the U.K. and need to be aware that many retailers here feel the same,” the Merchants Payments Coalition said in a letter to regulators, including those at the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice. “Despite the reversal, Amazon’s move shows how frustrated even the largest retailers are over skyrocketing swipe fees, and the situation is even worse for small retailers.”

CFPB suggests credit card giants may not be playing fair - The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is looking at whether the largest credit card issuers are engaged in unfair or anti-competitive practices given that eight companies control 70% of the market. The CFPB said in a blog post Wednesday that it is looking at ways to make it simpler for consumers to compare, switch or refinance credit cards. Consumers paid roughly $120 billion a year in interest and fees on credit cards from 2018 to 2020, or roughly $1,000 a year per household, the CFPB said. After the blog post was published, CFPB Director Rohit Chopra tweeted: "The market is dominated by a handful of banks and credit card giants."

Black Knight: National Mortgage Delinquency Rate Decreased in December; Foreclosures at Record Low -Note: At the beginning of the pandemic, the delinquency rate increased sharply (see table below). Loans in forbearance are counted as delinquent in this survey, but those loans are not reported as delinquent to the credit bureaus. From Black Knight: Black Knight: 2021 Ends With Foreclosures at All-Time Low and Near Record-Low Delinquency Rate; Serious Delinquencies Still More than 2X Pre-Pandemic Levels

• At 3.38% entering January, the national delinquency rate sits just 0.1% above February 2020’s near record-low of 3.28%, just prior to the onset of the pandemic
• However, over half a million excess serious delinquencies remain – borrowers 90 or more days past due on their mortgages, including those in active forbearance – more than twice pre-pandemic levels
• Just 0.24% of loans are in active foreclosure in December – an all-time low – with the month’s 4,100 foreclosure starts some 90% below December 2019 levels
• While roughly twice as many foreclosure sales (completions) occurred in the month as compared to December 2020, there were only one-third as many as in pre-pandemic December 2019
• Given the volume of borrowers who’ve exited forbearance protections in recent months, the industry must keep a very close eye on foreclosure metrics moving forward in 2022
• Prepayment activity fell by more than 7% in December and is poised to fall even further as rising rates continue to erode refinance incentive

According to Black Knight's First Look report, the percent of loans delinquent decreased 5.9% in December compared to November and decreased 44% year-over-year.
The percent of loans in the foreclosure process decreased 3.8% in December and were down 28% over the last year. Black Knight reported the U.S. mortgage delinquency rate (loans 30 or more days past due, but not in foreclosure) was 3.38% in December, down from 3.59% in November. The percent of loans in the foreclosure process decreased in December to 0.24%, from 0.25% in November. The number of delinquent properties, but not in foreclosure, is down 1,452,000 properties year-over-year, and the number of properties in the foreclosure process is down 50,000 properties year-over-year.

 MBA Survey: "Share of Mortgage Loans in Forbearance Decreases to 1.41% in December 2021" - Note: This is as of December 31st. From the MBA: Share of Mortgage Loans in Forbearance Decreases to 1.41% in December 2021 The Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) new monthly Loan Monitoring Survey revealed that the total number of loans now in forbearance decreased by 26 basis points from 1.67% of servicers’ portfolio volume in the prior month to 1.41% as of December 31, 2021. According to MBA’s estimate, 705,000 homeowners are in forbearance plans.The share of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans in forbearance decreased 8 basis points to 0.68%. Ginnie Mae loans in forbearance decreased 47 basis points to 1.63%, and the forbearance share for portfolio loans and private-label securities (PLS) declined 51 basis points to 3.43%. “The share of loans in forbearance continued to decline in December 2021. This was especially the case for government and private-label and portfolio loans, as those loans have higher levels of forbearance than loans backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac,” said Marina Walsh, CMB, MBA’s Vice President of Industry Analysis. “With the number of borrowers in forbearance continuing to decrease below 750,000, the pace of monthly forbearance exits reached its lowest level since MBA started tracking exits in June 2020.” Added Walsh, “It is likely that the remaining borrowers in forbearance have experienced either a permanent hardship that may require more complex loan workout solutions, or they have encountered a recent hardship for which they are now seeking relief.” emphasis added This graph shows the percent of portfolio in forbearance by investor type over time. The number of forbearance plans is decreasing rapidly recently since many homeowners have reached the end of the 18-month term.

MBA: Mortgage Applications Increase in Latest Weekly Survey From the MBA: Mortgage Applications Increase in Latest MBA Weekly Survey - Mortgage applications increased 2.3 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending January 14, 2022. ... The Refinance Index decreased 3 percent from the previous week and was 49 percent lower than the same week one year ago. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 8 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 14 percent compared with the previous week and was 13 percent lower than the same week one year ago. “Mortgage rates hit their highest levels since March 2020, leading to the slowest pace of refinance activity in over two years. The 30-year fixed rate reached 3.64 percent and has increased more than 30 basis points over the past two weeks. FHA and VA refinance declines drove most of the refinance slowdown,” said Joel Kan, MBA’s Associate Vice President of Economic and Industry Forecasting. “Despite the increase in rates, purchase applications jumped almost 8 percent, with conventional purchase applications accounting for much of the stronger activity. The average loan size for a purchase application set a record at $418,500. The continued rise in purchase loan application sizes is driven by high home price appreciation and the lack of housing inventory on the market – especially for entry-level homes. The slower growth in government purchase activity is also contributing to the larger loan balances and suggests that prospective first-time buyers are struggling to find homes to buy in their price range.”...The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with conforming loan balances ($647,200 or less) increased to 3.64 percent from 3.52 percent, with points remaining unchanged at 0.45 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent loan-to-value ratio (LTV) loans. The first graph shows the refinance index since 1990.The refinance index will probably decline sharply again next week.The second graph shows the MBA mortgage purchase index According to the MBA, purchase activity is down 13% year-over-year unadjusted.Note: Red is a four-week average (blue is weekly).

NAR: Existing-Home Sales Decreased to 6.18 million in December --From the NAR: Annual Existing-Home Sales Hit Highest Mark Since 2006 - Existing-home sales declined in December, snapping a streak of three straight months of gains, according to the National Association of Realtors®. Each of the four major U.S. regions witnessed sales fall in December from both a month-over-month and a year-over-year basis. Despite the drop, overall sales for 2021 increased 8.5%. Total existing-home sales, completed transactions that include single-family homes, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops, dropped 4.6% from November to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.18 million in December. From a year-over-year perspective, sales waned 7.1% (6.65 million in December 2020). ... Total housing inventory at the end of December amounted to 910,000 units, down 18.0% from November and down 14.2% from one year ago (1.06 million). Unsold inventory sits at a 1.8-month supply at the present sales pace, down from 2.1 months in November and from 1.9 months in December 2020. This graph shows existing home sales, on a Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate (SAAR) basis since 1993. Sales in December (6.18 million SAAR) were down 4.6% from last month and were 7.1% below the December 2020 sales rate. The second graph shows nationwide inventory for existing homes. According to the NAR, inventory decreased to 0.91 million in December from 1.11 million in November. Headline inventory is not seasonally adjusted, and inventory usually decreases to the seasonal lows in December and January, and peaks in mid-to-late summer. The last graph shows the year-over-year (YoY) change in reported existing home inventory and months-of-supply. Since inventory is not seasonally adjusted, it really helps to look at the YoY change. Note: Months-of-supply is based on the seasonally adjusted sales and not seasonally adjusted inventory. Inventory was down 14.2% year-over-year in December compared to December 2020. Months of supply declined to 1.8 months in December from 2.1 months in November. This was below the consensus forecast.

Big Drop in Home Sales, Surging Mortgage Rates, Tight Supply: The New Dynamics Shaping Up - Sales of previously owned houses, condos, and co-ops in December fell by 4.6% month-to-month and by 8.3% year-over-year, to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.1 million homes, the National Association of Realtorsreported today. It was the fifth month in a row of year-over-year declines, amid very tight supply and rising mortgage rates (historic data via YCharts): Seen over the long term, the seasonally adjusted annual rate of sales in December of 6.1 million homes wasn’t only below the peaks of 2020 but also well below the peaks during the 2003-2006 era. Sales of single-family houses dropped 5.9% for the month and by 8.1% year-over-year, to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.44 million houses.Sales of condos plunged by 7.0% for the month and by 9.6% year-over-year to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 660,000 condos.By Region, the seasonally adjusted annual rate of total home sales dropped year-over-year in all four regions:The scramble to lock in still low but spiking mortgage rates.The average 30-year fixed rate of conforming mortgages in December was around 3.30%, which was up from November’s range of around 3.20%. But in January so far, mortgage rates have spiked. In the reporting week through January 19, the average 30-year fixed rate hit 3.64%, according the Mortgage Bankers Association (data via Investing.com):

More Analysis on December Existing Home Sales Today, in the CalculatedRisk Real Estate Newsletter: Existing-Home Sales Decreased to 6.18 million in December: Excerpt:This graph shows existing home sales by month for 2020 and 2021.This was the fifth consecutive month with sales down year-over-year. Sales will likely be down YoY in January 2022 too since were exceptionally strong last Winter....[and on inventory] According to the NAR, inventory decreased to 0.92 million in December from 1.11 million in November. Inventory usually declines significantly in November and December as potential sellers remove their homes from the market for the holidays. Inventory is now at a record low.There is much more in the post.

Housing Starts Increased to 1.702 million Annual Rate in December - From the Census Bureau: Permits, Starts and Completions Housing Starts: Privately‐owned housing starts in December were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,702,000. This is 1.4 percent above the revised November estimate of 1,678,000 and is 2.5 percent (±13.8 percent)* above the December 2020 rate of 1,661,000. Single‐family housing starts in December were at a rate of 1,172,000; this is 2.3 percent below the revised November figure of 1,199,000. The December rate for units in buildings with five units or more was 524,000. An estimated 1,595,100 housing units were started in 2021. This is 15.6 percent (±4.0 percent) above the 2020 figure of 1,379,600. Building Permits: Privately‐owned housing units authorized by building permits in December were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,873,000. This is 9.1 percent above the revised November rate of 1,717,000 and is 6.5 percent above the December 2020 rate of 1,758,000. Single‐family authorizations in December were at a rate of 1,128,000; this is 2.0 percent above the revised November figure of 1,106,000. Authorizations of units in buildings with five units or more were at a rate of 675,000 in December. [Special Note: In December, there was a large increase in building permits issued in Philadelphia, PA. Philadelphia enacted several real estate tax changes for residential projects permitted after December 31, 2021.] An estimated 1,724,700 housing units were authorized by building permits in 2021. This is 17.2 percent (±0.6 percent) above the 2020 figure of 1,471,100. The first graph shows single and multi-family housing starts for the last several years. Multi-family starts (blue, 2+ units) increased in December compared to November. Multi-family starts were up 53% year-over-year in December. Single-family starts (red) increased in December and were down 10.9% year-over-year. The second graph shows single and multi-family housing starts since 1968. This shows the huge collapse following the housing bubble, and then the eventual recovery (but still not historically high). Total housing starts in December were above expectations and starts in October and November were revised up slightly, combined.

December Housing Starts: Most Housing Units Under Construction Since 1973 – McBride - Today, in the CalculatedRisk Real Estate Newsletter: December Housing Starts: Most Housing Units Under Construction Since 1973 Excerpt: The 1.595 million total starts in 2021 were up 15.6% from 1.380 million in 2020. Starts in 2021 were the most since 2006 when 1.801 million units were started. The fourth graph shows housing starts under construction, Seasonally Adjusted (SA). Red is single family units. Currently there are 769 thousand single family units under construction (SA). This is the highest level since February 2007.For single family, most of these homes are already sold (Census counts sales when contract is signed). The reason there are so many homes is probably due to construction delays. Since most of these are already sold, it is unlikely this is “overbuilding”, or that this will impact prices (although the buyers will be moving out of their current home or apartment once these homes are completed).Blue is for 2+ units. Currently there are 750 thousand multi-family units under construction. This is the highest level since July 1974! For multi-family, construction delays are probably also a factor. The completion of these units should help with rent pressure. Census will release data in March (part of February survey) on the length of time from start to completion, and that will probably show long delays in 2021. In 2020, it took an average of 6.8 months from start to completion for single family homes, and 15.4 months for buildings with 2 or more units. Combined, there are 1.519 million units under construction. This is the most since November 1973. There is much more in the post.

New Residential Building Permits: Up 9.1% in December - The U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development have now published their findings for December new residential building permits. The latest reading of 1.873M was up 9.09% from the November reading and is above the Investing.com forecast of 1.702M. Here is the opening of this morning's monthly report, including a note regarding revisions:Privately‐owned housing units authorized by building permits in December were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,873,000. This is 9.1 percent (±1.1 percent) above the revised November rate of 1,717,000 and is 6.5 percent (±1.7 percent) above the December 2020 rate of 1,758,000. Single‐family authorizations in December were at a rate of 1,128,000; this is 2.0 percent (±1.3 percent) above the revised November figure of 1,106,000. Authorizations of units in buildings with five units or more were at a rate of 675,000 in December. An estimated 1,724,700 housing units were authorized by building permits in 2021. This is 17.2 percent (±0.6 percent) above the 2020 figure of 1,471,100. [link to report] Here is the complete historical series, which dates from 1960. Because of the extreme volatility of the monthly data points, a 6-month moving average has been included.

1.44 million Total Housing Completions in 2021 including Manufactured Homes - In February, the Census Bureau will release the placements of manufactured homesfor December and for all of 2021. There were 97.8 thousand placements through November, and my estimate is there will be 105.8 thousand total placements in 2021 - the most since 2006.The housing start report on Wednesday indicated 966.9 thousand single family completions in 2021, and 370.9 thousand 2+ units completed.This graph shows total housing completions and placements since 1968. The net additional to the housing stock is less because of demolitions and destruction of older housing units. Even though there were significant construction delays in 2021 - and there are currently the most housing units under construction since 1973 - there were 1.444 million total completions in 2021, the most since 2007.Although we don't know the exact number of net new households formed in 2021, it seems clear - based on home buying and rental demand - that there were more households formed than housing units completed last year. Some of the demand was from second home buying too, not household formation.What isn’t clear is if this increase in household formation, with little population growth, will continue. See “The Household Mystery”

 NAHB: Builder Confidence Decreased to 83 in January - The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) reported the housing market index (HMI) was at 83, down from 84 in December. Any number above 50 indicates that more builders view sales conditions as good than poor. From the NAHB: Builder Confidence Edges Lower on Inflation Concerns: Growing inflation concerns and ongoing supply chain disruptions snapped a four-month rise in builder sentiment even as consumer demand remains robust. Builder confidence in the market for newly built single-family homes moved one point lower to 83 in January, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI). The HMI has hovered at the 83 or 84 level, the same rate as the spring of 2021, for the past three months. Higher material costs and lack of availability are adding weeks to typical single-family construction times. NAHB analysis indicates the aggregate cost of residential construction materials has increased almost 19% since December 2021. Policymakers need to take action to fix supply chains. Obtaining a new softwood lumber agreement with Canada and reducing tariffs is an excellent place to start.The most pressing issue for the housing sector remains a lack of inventory. Building has increased but the industry faces constraints, namely cost/availability of materials, labor and lots. And while 2021 single-family starts are expected to end the year about 25% higher than the pre-Covid 2019 level, we expect higher interest rates in 2022 will put a damper on housing affordability.It is worth noting that the HMI responses for the January survey were collected January 3 through January 13, with many responses collected before interest rates jumped last week. The impact of these higher rates will be more fully reflected in the February HMI....The HMI index gauging current sales conditions held steady at 90, the gauge measuring sales expectations in the next six months fell two points to 83, and the component charting traffic of prospective buyers also posted a two-point decline to 69.Looking at the three-month moving averages for regional HMI scores, the Northeast fell one point to 73, the Midwest increased one point to 75 and the South and West each posted a one-point rise to 88, respectively..This graph show the NAHB index since Jan 1985.This was close to the consensus forecast, and a strong reading.

Lumber Prices Are off the Rails Again. Blame Climate Change. - Last year, lumber turned into the surprise superstar of the U.S. economy when it briefly outperformed bitcoin, gold, and the S&P 500 to become “the hottest commodity on the planet.” Now it’s happening again. Yesterday, the market closed at more than $1,200 per thousand board feet, a surge in price with only one precedent in the decades-long history of lumber trading. Last year, I wrote about the role that climate change was playing in the lumber volatility. Its effects now seem even more pronounced. “The lumber price story is really a climate-change story,” Stinson Dean, a lumber trader in Colorado, recently tweeted. He has argued that climate change has all but dictated the ongoing price rally, going so far as to call the lumber price a “climate price.” To learn more, I talked with Dean, who sells to lumberyards from New Jersey to Texas. Friday was the “the busiest day of the year selling lumber,” he said. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

AIA: "Architecture firms end 2021 on a strong note" in December --Note: This index is a leading indicator primarily for new Commercial Real Estate (CRE) investment.  From the AIA: Architecture firms end 2021 on a strong note: As architecture firms ended 2021 on a high note with strong business conditions, staff recruitment is becoming a growing concern among firms. December’s Architectural Billings Index (ABI) score of 52.0 was an increase from 51.0 in November (any score over 50 indicates billings growth). Despite a variety of concerns related to the omicron variant, labor shortages, and rising prices as well as limited availability of construction materials, firms continued to report a robust supply of work in the pipeline. Inquiries into new work and the value of new design contracts both remained strong, and backlogs, at an average of 6.5 months, remained near their highest levels since the AIA began tracking this metric in 2010.“Since demand for design projects has been healthy over the last year, recruiting architectural staff to keep up with project workloads has been a growing concern for firms,” said AIA Chief Economist, Kermit Baker, Hon. AIA, PhD. “Architecture is one of the few industries where payrolls have already surpassed their pre-pandemic high, so meeting future staffing needs is a challenge that most firms will need to confront."...
• Regional averages: South (56.4); Midwest (51.0); West (47.5); Northeast (45.3)
• Sector index breakdown: mixed practice (60.6); multi-family residential (49.2); commercial/industrial (49.2); institutional (47.6)
This graph shows the Architecture Billings Index since 1996. The index was at 52.0 in December, up from 51.0 in November. Anything above 50 indicates expansion in demand for architects' services.Note: This includes commercial and industrial facilities like hotels and office buildings, multi-family residential, as well as schools, hospitals and other institutions. This index was below 50 for eleven consecutive months but has been positive for the last eleven months. The eleven months of decline represented a significant decrease in design services and suggested a decline in CRE investment through most of 2021 (This index usually leads CRE investment by 9 to 12 months), however this index suggests a pickup in CRE investment in 2022.

Hotels: Occupancy Rate Down 16% Compared to Same Week in 2019 From CoStar: STR: US Hotel Occupancy Dips Below 50% for Second Week of January- U.S. weekly hotel occupancy worsened in comparison with pre-pandemic levels, according to STR‘s latest data through Jan. 15. January 9-15, 2022 (percentage change from comparable week in 2019*):
• Occupancy: 48.8% (-16.3%)
• Average daily rate (ADR): $122.12 (-1.6%)
• Revenue per available room (RevPAR): $54.47 (-19.0%)
On an absolute basis, occupancy was higher than the previous week, but the gap to 2019 levels widened, pointing to a larger impact from the omicron variant. ADR and RevPAR were up week over week and when indexed to 2019. ...
*Due to the steep, pandemic-driven performance declines of 2020, STR is measuring recovery against comparable time periods from 2019.
The following graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four week average.

Airlines suspend US flights in response to 5G deployment | TheHill -- Numerous international airlines based outside of the U.S. have announced they will be suspending flights to certain U.S. locations due to the upcoming 5G deployment near airports. Air India on Tuesday announced on Twitter that numerous flights departing from India and arriving at U.S. airports including the John F. Kennedy International Airport, Newark Liberty International Airport, O'Hare International Airport and San Francisco International Airport would be canceled. "Due to deployment of the 5G communications in USA, we will not be able to operate the following flights of 19th Jan'22," the airline said, listing four India to U.S. flights scheduled for Wednesday. Ina statement provided to Reuters, the Dubai-based Emirates airline said it was also canceling U.S. flights due to "operational concerns associated with the planned deployment of 5G mobile network services in the U.S." The airline said the affected destinations were Boston, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Miami, Newark, Orlando, San Francisco and Seattle. "We are working closely with aircraft manufacturers and the relevant authorities to alleviate operational concerns, and we hope to resume our US services as soon as possible," said Emirates. Two major Japanese airlines — All Nippon Airways and Japan Airlines — also announced that they would be suspending flights to the U.S. due to the 5G deployment. As the Nikkei reported, All Nippon Airways canceled 10 flights that were scheduled from Tuesday to Thursday this week, affecting around 650 passengers. Japan Airlines canceled three passenger flights and five cargo flights scheduled for Wednesday. According to the Nikkei, All Nippon Airways said that while Boeing 787 planes can still operate amid 5G with equipment adjustments, Boeing 777 aircrafts can be affected. Flights that "cannot be switched to the 787" were canceled and the airline said it would consider switching these routes out with 787s going forward. Airlines have repeatedly called for the deployment of 5G to be delayed, citing concerns that it could cause flight delays and interruptions. On Tuesday, Verizon and AT&T announced that they would be temporarilydelaying their 5G deployment. The wireless carriers had already delayed the deployment by two weeks earlier this month at the request of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Federal Aviation Administration Administrator Steve Dickson. “At our sole discretion we have voluntarily agreed to temporarily defer turning on a limited number of towers around certain airport runways as we continue to work with the aviation industry and the [Federal Aviation Administration] FAA to provide further information about our 5G deployment, since they have not utilized the two years they’ve had to responsibly plan for this deployment,” an AT&T spokesperson said.

Airlines Threaten to Ground Many Passenger and Cargo Flights Over Cell Operators’ Refusal to Change 5G Plans -- Yves Smith - Nothing like a good Godzilla v. Mothra fight, provided you are not caught between them. This one, showcasing airlines and wireless operators over 5G, is set to blow big on Wednesday. Major airlines are threatening to wreak havoc by cancelling passenger and cargo flights that they deem to be at risk of 5G interference. Remember the reason people do something as crazy-seeming as getting into aluminum canisters that fly at >30,000 feet is the airlines’ safety record, which is the product of relentless checks and controls. It took only two Boeing 737 Max crashes to have the FAA lose its status as global regulator of US-made aircraft, a position it may never recover.Wireless carriers thumbed their noses at the airlines’ request not to deploy 5G transmitters within 2 miles of airports. The airlines did win two delays and some concessions around 50 major airports, but not what the airlines deemed to be a sufficient course change from Verizon and AT&T, who are set to launch their 5G services on January 19. The network operators apparently figured that the two of them having spent $68 billion on spectrum and having a captured regulator gave them the upper hand.What AT&T and Verizon have missed is air travel and transport are a hell of a lot more important to American commerce than whiz bang cell phone speeds. As Paul Maud’Dib said in Dune, “He who can destroy a thing has real control of it.” Reuters published an exclusive on the revolt of the air carriers. From its piece: The chief executives of major U.S. passenger and cargo carriers on Monday warned of an impending “catastrophic” aviation crisis in less than 36 hours, when AT&T (T.N) and Verizon (VZ.N) are set to deploy new 5G service. The airlines warned the new C-Band 5G service set to begin on Wednesday could render a significant number of widebody aircraft unusable, “could potentially strand tens of thousands of Americans overseas” and cause “chaos” for U.S. flights… The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has warned that potential interference could affect sensitive airplane instruments such as altimeters and significantly hamper low-visibility operations. “This means that on a day like yesterday, more than 1,100 flights and 100,000 passengers would be subjected to cancellations, diversions or delays,” the letter cautioned. Airlines late on Monday were considering whether to begin canceling some international flights that are scheduled to arrive in the United States on Wednesday….Action is urgent, the airlines added in the letter also signed by UPS Airlines, Alaska Air, Atlas Air , JetBlue Airways and FedEx Express. “To be blunt, the nation’s commerce will grind to a halt….United Airlines late Monday separately warned the issue could affect more than 15,000 of its flights, 1.25 million passengers and snarl tons of cargo annually.”The wireless networks contend that the US carriers are being unreasonable because 5G has been deployed overseas with no airline mishaps. But they know this is a bogus argument; the US spectrum abuts the air carriers’ frequencies, which is not the case elsewhere. As vlade pointed out on an earlier post about this row: Well, looking at this USA has its own 5G bands, unlike the rest of the world (except for the super-high frequencies, where it’s joined by Japan and South Korea).Maybe there is a good technical reason why the US has to have the spectrum not just close the to altimeter one (4.2-4.4 GHz), but in fact overlapping? Reader prof confirmed: But the A4A said the issue remained unresolved as of December 30, with only days remaining before 3.7 GHz license 5G operations are set to start. According to the A4A, the FCC failed – since the beginning of the C-band proceeding – to explain why it rejected evidence of the “detrimental impact of interference” from 3.7 GHz licenses on radio altimeters “

Thanks to China, Supply Chains Will Never Recover | Opinion – If you are in the habit of celebrating Halloween in the middle of January, you're in luck this year. American ports, plagued by logistical problems, are now unloading Halloween gear from container ships. Supply chains, which once delivered goods to American stores cheaply, quickly and at the right moment, are now, as Jonathan Bass tells Newsweek, "not cheap, not quick and not just-in-time." Bass, CEO of Whom Home and a nearshoring advocate, also points out that retailers, anticipating long delays, are ordering goods nine to 12 months ahead of time. Shelves at stores both big and small are sometimes empty, and delivery times are no longer predictable. There's no mystery why an extraordinarily efficient global mechanism broke down. Draconian COVID-19 lockdowns in China closed factories, and disease stopped trucks and planes in both producing and consuming countries. At the same time, there was a surge in demand for goods from locked down consumers who could not spend their money on services. A logistical supply chain with little resiliency thus collapsed.There are now about 120 ships waiting off the twin ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Off China's ports, the numbers are far higher. In the beginning of November, for instance, there was a total of 493 ships loitering, waiting to load. The backups are significant: Ships carry about 90 percent of the world's cargo.So when does the world get back to normal?Perhaps never. It is true that these delays are the result of misguided transportation policies in the U.S., especially California, as well as fundamentally flawed policies in China. But countries adjust and, as COVID dissipates, many problems will eventually go away.These disruptions, however, will have a profound long-term effect on manufacturing. Companies will be forced to adjust. As Scott Price, president of UPS International, told the Financial Times, there will be a "migration to new supply chain models"—in other words, producers will move factories closer to consumers.Yet there are more than just logistical reasons for companies to shorten the long route between factory floor and store shelf. First, as Washington, D.C. trade expert Alan Tonelson points out, China is shortening supply chains by driving factories out."Xi Jinping's neo-Maoist counterrevolution," Tonelson tells Newsweek, "has made the People's Republic of China an increasingly unreliable and unpredictable place to do business."As a result, some production has migrated to even lower-cost jurisdictions in Asia, such as Cambodia and Vietnam. But factories have also moved to cheap-labor countries in the Western Hemisphere. In the middle of last year, for instance, American footwear and apparel company Steve Madden announced that, due in part to supply chain problems, it was relocating about half of its women's production from China to Mexico and Brazil.

Amid COVID-19 outbreaks in China, corporate fears of a worsening supply chain crisis - A rash of articles in the US and international press has given voice to fears in the financial and business elites that China’s measures to suppress COVID-19 outbreaks will compound a serious and growing global supply chain crisis. As the world’s largest manufacturer and the supplier of a vast array of goods, production and transport delays in China necessarily impact on economies internationally. China’s scientifically-based policy of eliminating the COVID-19 virus through mass testing and contact tracing, travel restrictions, quarantining and lockdowns, as well as mass vaccination, has been under sustained attack by the Western media. Misleading stories highlighting grossly inflated examples of bureaucratic excesses and opposition on social media cannot obscure the fact that, in contrast to the disasters created by governments elsewhere, the policy has been to date successful and has a high degree of public support. This politically foul campaign is part and parcel of the US-led demonisation of China as Washington steps up its aggressive and reckless confrontation with Beijing, which it regards as the chief threat to American global hegemony. The concerted push for the Chinese government to drop its COVID-zero policy now takes on another dimension as global corporations grapple with supply chain breakdowns. The Financial Times on Sunday declared: “China’s battle to contain the Omicron coronavirus variant risks choking already stretched global supply chains, manufacturing managers and analysts have warned, threatening production of goods ranging from smartphones to furniture.” After the lockdown of Xi’an, a city of 13 million, for three weeks to control an outbreak, the identification last week of cases of community transmission of the highly-contagious Omicron strain in the port city of Tianjin, close to Beijing, raised alarm bells. Beijing itself recorded a case of Omicron last weekend and COVID cases were discovered in other cities, including Shanghai, Shenzhen and Dalian—all major ports. In contrast to the “let it rip” policies elsewhere in the world that have led to millions of infections, hospitalisations and deaths, the restrictions implemented in China have contained the limited outbreaks. The daily cases numbers in China are miniscule by comparison. As of midnight on Saturday, there were 119 cases reported across China, of which 65 were locally transmitted according to the National Health Commission. Of those, 33 were in Tianjin, 29 in cities in Henan province and one in Xi’an. Beijing reported one case, its first of the Omicron variant.

Facing a shortage of truck drivers, pilot program turns to teenagers -- People as young as 18 will soon be allowed to drive commercial trucks carrying tons of cargo across state lines under a federal apprenticeship pilot program that is intended to train thousands of new drivers.The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, a branch of the Transportation Department, outlined details for the program last week, setting up training procedures and vehicle safety technology requirements.During the pilot program, which can last up to three years, as many as 3,000 young truckers at a time will be required to complete 400 hours of cumulative probationary time with an experienced driver in the passenger seat. After that, until they turn 21, they will be able to drive solo but under continuous monitoring by trucking companies. …… The program is part of a $1 trillion bill, signed into law by President Biden on Nov. 15, to modernize the nation’s aging infrastructure. Hundreds of millions were allocated for investments like expanding high-speed internet access, developing transportation programs, and improving roads and bridges.The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration was assigned to start the pilot truck-driving program within 60 days after the infrastructure bill was signed into law, a deadline that has now passed. A start date for the pilot program has not been announced.Trade groups, including the American Trucking Associations, said that the pilot program would provide a much-needed boost for the industry. A declining driver workforce, a perennial issue for the trucking industry, grew worse during the pandemic, said Nick Geale, a vice president at the American Trucking Associations, who also referred to continuing concerns over supply chain shortages. …

Imports Take "Dramatically Longer" To Reach US As Bottlenecks Bite - Planning to import goods from Asia by ocean and sell them in America this summer? Better act fast. The trans-Pacific cargo move can now take over three months. According to multiple sources, average transit times have risen to double pre-COVID levels — and they’re still increasing.Methodologies and data sources differ, so time estimates vary. But each dataset shows the same trend: With every passing month, more vessels, container equipment and goods inventories are getting waylaid in the Pacific.Flexport launched its weekly Ocean Timeliness Indicator (OTI) in early December. The OTI uses data from Flexport’s freight forwarding customers back to March 2019, measuring the time from the cargo-ready date at the exporters’ gate to the date when products leave the destination port (i.e., the landside transport time from the factory to the port in Asia, the Asian port wait, the ocean journey, and the North American port wait). The OTI is an average for loads from all Asian countries to all North American ports on any of the three coasts.Flexport’s Asia-U.S. OTI reached an all-time high of 114 days last week. That’s 41 days or 57% higher than at the same time last year, and 63 days or 125% higher than at the same time in 2020, pre-COVID. A shipment time is not included in the average until the import cargo leaves the U.S. port, meaning the indicator is retrospective. Goods included in the average in the first week of January might have left an Asian factory in early October, at a time when the queue of waiting ships off Los Angeles/Long Beach was around 40% smaller than it is now.Phil Levy, chief economist of Flexport, explained the value of the OTI in an interview with American Shipper. “It does speak in terms of days, and in that sense it’s supposed to give a general idea of the magnitude shippers have to deal with. But it’s not a precise, forward-looking estimate of how long it will take you to get from your factory in Vietnam to Vancouver, for example.“This is intended as a straightforward and transparent measure of how severe the crisis is,” he said. “You see a lot of things that jump around and other fleeting measures. You might say, ‘Hey, I got a great spot rate out of Yantian so I guess the crisis is over’ or ‘There was stuff on the shelves when I went shopping yesterday so I think we must be OK.’ But the OTI is something that is fairly consistent, you can see it over time, and you can see the degree of variability over time. You can see that these are dramatically longer times than we’ve had before — and they haven’t backed off yet.“Let’s suppose the supply chain fairy waved a wand and solved all of these problems and we went right back to the old shipping times of the pre-COVID era again. What would the ‘all clear’ look like? You wouldn’t see an immediate drop because it would take awhile for things to sort out [due to the OTI’s retrospective nature]. But you should start to see this trending down as each stage [Asia factory to ships/ocean/U.S. port] moves faster. And we haven’t seen that yet. If this resolves, you should see something very different here.”Another measure of trans-Pacific shipping duration is produced by Freightos. It uses data since October 2019 from bookings on its Freightos.com marketplace, including both full container load (FCL) and less than container load (LCL) business.The average monthly transit time is measured from China to U.S. ports, with the majority going to the West Coast ports. The delivery times are measured on an end-to-end basis, generally warehouse to warehouse. Freightos calculated that it took an average of 80 days in December for trans-Pacific cargo, with FCL at 72 days and LCL at 82 days. The average transit time is 51% or 27 days higher than in December 2020 and 86% or 37 days longer than in December 2019, pre-COVID.

Empty Shelf at a Grocery Store Near You? Tight Inventories, Labor Shortages, Supply Chain Snags, Strong Sales, Soaring Costs - Wolf Richter - Grocery-store shoppers are sporadically encountering portions of a shelf that is suddenly empty when a week earlier there was plenty of product. There are again social-media “reports” of purchase limits of some items, such as toilet paper (why is it always toilet paper?) at some Costco, or pasta at some Walmart, or beef at some Safeway, or whatever. You can buy all kinds of stuff, but you might not be able to get one or two items that are part of your normal list.At fault is a combination of problems. Staffing shortages due to the difficulty of hiring people are now being aggravated by omicron, where employees that tested positive have to self-isolate and can’t come to work for a few days. This impacts supermarkets and their suppliers in a big way. Transportation companies, faced with soaring demand, already struggled with driver shortages that was further aggravated by omicron, and further aggravated by the recent snow storms first in the West and then in the East, entailing traffic chaos and closed highways.For businesses that have been operating on their finely tuned lean-inventory strategies, it has been challenging for the past 22 months to keep the shelves stocked.And the costs of everything have soared – which generates a phenomenon where inventories, measured in dollars, have risen to new records because the costs of the goods in inventory have soared. But sales are high too as the shift to working from home changed consumption patterns, with grocery stores getting a bigger piece of the pie. And supply, as measured in how many days of sales are in inventory, has plunged. So here we go.Total inventories, measured in dollars, at food and beverage stores rose to a record $54.9 billion in November, according to the Census Bureau on Friday. This was up 4.1% from a year ago, and by 6.6% from November 2019, driven by soaring costs of those goods.During the empty-shelves-period in March through May 2020, inventories dropped to $48.6 billion, same as in April 2018. This wasn’t such a big drop, but inventories had been kept so tight on purpose that, when demand suddenly increased, shelves became empty, customers walked out shocked and frustrated, and stores couldn’t maximize their revenues because they were out of product. It didn’t take much of a drop in inventory to accomplish that:Supply as measured by the inventory-sales ratio was down to just 0.71 months (about 21 days’ supply) at the November rate of sales. The inventory-sales ratio (inventories divided by sales) is a standard metric of supply that cancels out the impact of price increases.During the empty-shelves March 2020, supply plunged to 0.59 months (18 days’ supply) and then bounced partially back to the 0.70 months range for a few months. Then it ticked up in early 2021 to hover around 0.73 months. But then supply started tightening again and dropped to 0.71 months in August, where it has remained as retailers struggled with epic labor shortages, transportation snags, and supply-chain entanglements as their supplies struggled with the same issues:Sales at food and beverage stores rose to $78 billion in November, the second highest ever, beaten only by hoarding-March 2020. The driver were price increases and the still ongoing situation of working-from-home that shifted some consumption from the office environment to the supermarket (this chart also includes the preliminary sales for December, which ticked down a tad):This shows how the brittle the system has become: The supply chains, transportation, and lean-inventory strategies all the way up the supply chain, that worked so well through the Good Times 2019, have created all kinds of havoc when unforeseen factors, one after the other, became economic routine.

Intel to build two fabs in Ohio for $20B, launch $100M college partnership - Intel will build two chip factories in New Albany, Ohio, at cost of more than $20 billion on a mega-site that could eventually have eight fabs total valued at $100 billion, creating tens of thousands of long-term jobs for the area.The chip giant also said it will spend $100 million over a decade to build a partnership with universities and community colleges in the region to include labs and curriculum leading to undergrad and associate degrees.The new fabs in Ohio represent the first time Intel has expanded into the Midwest. The development is being dubbed the Silicon Heartland, with the $20 billion touted as the largest single private sector investment in the state’s history. Construction is expected to begin in late 2022 with chip production coming online in late 2025. New Albany is in Licking County outside Columbus, the state capitol of Ohio.Intel broke down the jobs this way: 3,000 Intel jobs, 7,000 construction jobs over the course of the multi-year build and tens of thousands of added local long-term jobs, including those from supporting businesses. The $100 million academic investment includes partnerships with local universities and community colleges for research projects and lab investments, including designing a chip-focused curriculum for associate and undergraduate degree programs.The site will be designed and constructed with green building ideals, with a goal for the new factories to be powered by 100% renewable electricity and to a achieve net positive water use and zero total waste to landfills.

New & Used Vehicle Inventories Rise, But for the Wrong Reasons - The number of new vehicles in inventory on dealer lots rose to 1.098 million vehicles in December, the fourth month in a row of increases, and the highest inventory level since July, according to data from Cox Automotive. But inventory is still desperately short, after having collapsed by 76% from an average of 3.66 million vehicles in 2019 to just 886,000 vehicles in September, which was the low point of the year. But inventories inched up for the wrong reason: New vehicle retail sales plunged 24% year-over-year in December, to just 1.40 million vehicles, and thereby out-plunged production that to this day is struggling with the semiconductor shortage.There’s a circularity here. Sales were so weak because there was so little on the lot, and what customers could buy came with ridiculous prices, which depressed sales, which then allowed inventories to build a little.The semiconductor issues are still going on. For example, Toyota announced yesterday that production at up to 12 of its plants in Japan will be halted and could cut production in January by as many as 47,000 vehicles. Other automakers are also still struggling with the shortages. And production will take far longer to return to normal than anyone expected a year ago.For the whole year 2021, new vehicle sales plunged by 12% from 2019 and were back to 1978 levels (my charts on annual auto sales in the US total, and by major automaker going back years). Supply of new vehicles ticked up to 35 days in December 2021, the highest since April 2021, according to Cox Automotive, which among numerous other brands owns Manheim, the largest auto auction house in the US, and vAuto, a provider of dealership inventory management software.New vehicle supply had collapsed to just 25 days in September 2021 at the low point. About 60 days is considered healthy. In 2019, supply had averaged 90 days. The spike in supply in March and April 2020 was caused by the collapse of sales volume during the lockdowns. Used vehicle inventory also rose for the wrong reason.The number of used vehicles on lots of franchised and independent dealers in December rose to 2.38 million vehicles, the highest since February 2021, according to data from Cox Automotive. This was down by 17% from the average inventory in 2019 (2.88 million vehicles).From mid-2020 through 2021, used vehicle inventories declined but never collapsed to the extent that new vehicle inventories collapsed, which makes those ridiculous price spikes for used vehicles – that people were actually paying new-vehicle prices for two-year-old vehicles with 25,000 miles on them – that much more astounding.

The Coming Version of CPI for New Vehicles Will Blow Your Doors Off: Spikes Even More. WHOOSH! - The Bureau of Labor Statistics is finally going to change the component of the Consumer Price Index for New Vehicles that has vexed me since Adam and Eve. It’s going to change it in two big ways: The way it collects the data, and the way it figures the CPI for new vehicles. The BLS announced the final changes in March last year. The new version will be included in the CPI for April 2022, to be released in May. The data for the new version, going back to December 2007, is going to blow your doors off in a moment. The BLS is going to switch to transaction-based prices for new vehicles. It purchases the data from J.D. Power. I have been producing charts with J.D. Power’s Average Transaction Prices for a while. The BLS will abandon the old survey-based method of asking dealers about the prices of hypothetical vehicle configuration. It will also make changes in the way it calculates the CPI for new vehicles.The coming version of the CPI new vehicles spiked by 15.9% in December from a year earlier (red line), compared to the current version’s 11.8%, which had already been the biggest spike since 1975 (purple line). If this new method – officially called “Research CPI-U-NV” – had been used last year, the overall CPI for December wouldn’t have been 7.04% (rounded to 7.0%), but something like 7.16% (rounded to 7.2%).Whatever higher or lower CPI this new version might produce in the future, it picked up on the current price spikes much more than the classic survey-based method.But from the index in its cumulative form, with both the classic CPI-NV and the R CPI-U-NV indexes set at 100 for December 2007, we can see that the new version doesn’t always produce higher CPI readings, and in fact produced lower readings some of the time. But it sure picked up on the current price spikes:The “R CPI-U-NV” is the first CPI component based on real transaction data, rather than surveys. As such, how calculations are done changes too. And that gets too deeply into the weeds for us real people here (but if you’re into recreational juggling of CPI-math, you can check out the changes at the BLS).

Used Vehicle Wholesale Prices -- Since the pandemic has disrupted new car production and sales, used car prices have increased sharply. This has pushed up inflation ("Used Cars" were up 51% annualized in December). Here is some data on used vehicle wholesale prices. From Manheim Consulting: Wholesale Prices Increased at Slowing Pace on Seasonally Adjusted Basis in December: Wholesale used vehicle prices (on a mix-, mileage-, and seasonally adjusted basis) increased 1.6% month-over-month in December. This brought the Manheim Used Vehicle Value Index to 236.2, a 46.6% increase from a year ago. The non-adjusted price change in December was a decline of 1.1% compared to November, leaving the unadjusted average price up 43.4% year-over-year....According to Cox Automotive estimates, total used vehicle sales were down 4% year-over-year in December. We estimate the December used SAAR to be 39.1 million, down from 40.6 million last December and flat compared to November’s revised 39.1 million SAAR. The December used retail SAAR estimate is 20.4 million, down from 21.6 million last year and flat month-over-month. This index from Manheim Consulting is based on all completed sales transactions at Manheim’s U.S. auctions. According to the BLS, "Used cars and trucks in U.S. city average, all urban consumers, seasonally adjusted" is up 55% since the low in June 2020. The Manheim index suggests this might slow.

Empire State Mfg Survey: Activity Leveled Off - This morning we got the latest Empire State Manufacturing Survey. The diffusion index for General Business Conditions at -0.7 was a decrease of 32.6 from the previous month's 31.9. The Investing.com forecast was for a reading of 25.7.The Empire State Manufacturing Index rates the relative level of general business conditions in New York state. A level above 0.0 indicates improving conditions, below indicates worsening conditions. The reading is compiled from a survey of about 200 manufacturers in New York state.Here is the opening paragraph from the report.Business activity abruptly leveled off in New York State, according to firms responding to the January 2022 Empire State Manufacturing Survey. The headline general business conditions index fell thirty-three points to -0.7. New orders declined slightly, while shipments held steady. Delivery times continued to lengthen, and unfilled orders increased. Labor market indicators pointed to a moderate increase in employment and a longer average workweek. Both price indexes moved lower, but remained elevated. Plans for capital and technology spending were strong. Looking ahead, firms remained optimistic that conditions would improve over the next six months. [Full report]Here is a chart of the current conditions and its 3-month moving average, which helps clarify the trend for this extremely volatile indicator:

Pennsylvania has the highest gas prices east of the Rockies, AAA says According to AAA, Pennsylvania’s average price for a gallon of regular gas on Monday — $3.517 — was the highest of any state east of the Rocky Mountains.The New Jersey price per gallon, $3.376, was about 14 cents cheaper, but still higher than the national average, $3.31. Apparently the best deals were in Camden County, where the average was $3.268, the lowest in the Philadelphia area.Overall, prices in both states have dropped by about half a percentage point from last week, the AAA said, but are still 80 cents higher at this time than last year.The automobile group said it is in keeping with the national trend, in which prices have gone up despite a fall in demand, probably a result of the winter season and the strength of the Omicron variant.

 Weekly Initial Unemployment Claims Increase to 286,000 --Note: This report is for the BLS January reference week.The DOL reported: In the week ending January 15, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 286,000, an increase of 55,000 from the previous week's revised level. The previous week's level was revised up by 1,000 from 230,000 to 231,000. The 4-week moving average was 231,000, an increase of 20,000 from the previous week's revised average. The previous week's average was revised up by 250 from 210,750 to 211,000.The following graph shows the 4-week moving average of weekly claims since 1971. The dashed line on the graph is the current 4-week average. The four week average of weekly unemployment claims increased to 231,000.The previous week was revised up. Weekly claims were well above the consensus forecast, likely due to the current COVID wave.

Autoworkers describe horrible working conditions: “There are so many out because of COVID; we are operating with a serious skeleton crew” - As the wave of COVID-19 infections sends tens of thousands into overcrowded hospitals and ICUs, US autoworkers are speaking out against the refusal of the auto companies and the United Auto Workers to implement any mitigation measures. Although hospitalizations and deaths in Michigan, the center of the auto industry, are already at record levels for the pandemic, the state’s top medical officer, Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian said in a recent interview with a local television channel that “based on Michigan’s data, what they’re really predicting is that we will peak by the end of January, maybe early February. So, we have not seen the worst, I fear.” The continuing danger posed by the virus was shown last week by the death of 32-year-old Chicago Ford worker Caleb Mateo Dye after a long fight against COVID-19. In a display of indifference, neither Ford management nor the UAW informed co-workers of Caleb’s death. In fact, it has been the policy of both union and management in auto plants to conceal worker deaths and infections. A worker at the Mack Trucks plant in Macungie, Pennsylvania, described the situation at his plant to the World Socialist Web Site Autoworker Newsletter. “Six hundred seventy-two of the 2,098 of us working have caught COVID that Mack admits to. Several workers have died in the past few months with no cause given. I know for a fact one of (the deaths) was COVID, the company and UAW know it too, but they hide it to keep us working peacefully. “I talk with a number of workers throughout my shift, and more and more are starting to understand that we are our only defense. The UAW canceled union meetings due to COVID after these guys died. If that doesn’t tell you you’re on your own, I don’t know what will. Many are still hesitant to act, but seeing workers die around us is wearing that hesitancy thin. There are only so many coworkers you can see die before you start to question things, before you’re willing to fight back.” Another Mack Trucks worker added, “The company only allows us 11 minutes for a break, even during COVID. It isn’t being extended to give us time to wash our hands before eating our food; there is no hand sanitizer in the work area.”

North Dakota Farm Sues John Deere, Claiming Antitrust Violations on Equipment Repairs - A North Dakota farm filed a class-action lawsuit on Wednesday, alleging John Deere is violating the Sherman Act in not making diagnostic software available to farmers who want to repair their own equipment. The lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Northern Illinois alleges John Deere has monopolized the repair service market for John Deere brand agricultural equipment with onboard central computers known as engine control units, or ECUs. Forest River Farms in Forest River, North Dakota, asked for a trial by jury and wants the court to order John Deere to make the necessary software available to individual farmers and repair shops. In addition, the lawsuit seeks damages for farmers who have paid for repairs from John Deere dealers beginning on Jan. 12, 2018, to the present. The right to repair increasingly has become an issue in agriculture and other industries with state legislatures introducing bills in at least 32 states, including bills in 21 states in 2021. Part of the problem is the equipment manufacturers currently will not allow farmers the hardware or software needed to diagnose a problem, much less repair it. So, dealers must send their teams out to the field to diagnose a problem and likely order parts, then come back out to make the repairs. There may be other complications with repairs. Forest River Farms said in the complaint that it owns five John Deere tractors and two John Deere combines that use ECUs. "During the class period, plaintiff Forest River Farms purchased Deere repair services in North Dakota from a John Deere dealership to diagnose and repair tractor and combine malfunctions and suffered antitrust injury as a result of defendant's conduct alleged herein," the lawsuit said. "Farmers have traditionally had the ability to repair and maintain their own tractors as needed, or else have had the option to bring their tractors to an independent mechanic. However, in newer generations of its agricultural equipment, Deere has deliberately monopolized the market for repair and maintenance services of its agricultural equipment with ECUs by making crucial software and repair tools inaccessible to farmers and independent repair shops."

Gateway tunnel project gets 'medium-high' rating from the FTA -The project aimed at improving the decrepit, century-old tunnels that shuttle commuters back and forth under the Hudson River has been upgraded to a “medium-high” priority by the Federal Transit Administration.This new ranking makes the $12.3 billion project eligible for federal funding in the Capital Investment Grants program and is the first of many steps needed to get this long-awaited and mammoth project off the ground. It was previously ranked "medium-low" by former President Donald Trump's administration.“Well-planned, large public transportation projects can transform lives and entire regions by reducing commute times, increasing safety, opening economic opportunities, reducing emissions, and making travel more affordable,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a statement announcing the change. “The Hudson Tunnel Project will enable a safe, comfortable commute for hundreds of thousands of Americans currently traveling through a tunnel that was built more than 110 years ago.”The project partners, including the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, NJ Transit, Amtrak, New York and New Jersey, according to the FTA announcement, "must complete several CIG program requirements before the project is eligible to advance into the next phase of the CIG process, which is entry into Engineering."Five other projects received new or updated ratings along with the Hudson tunnel proposal.During former President Barack Obama's administration, the Gateway project was developed to replace the ARC plan vetoed by former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in 2010.Gateway is a collection of more than $30 billion in projects to expand and improve rail capacity under the Hudson River and through New York Penn Station and to upgrade the most trafficked andtroublesome portion of the Northeast Corridor. The first phase would rehabilitate the 112-year-old tunnels rapidly deteriorating from Superstorm Sandy and build two new tunnels to increase the number of trains that can enter and exit Penn Station. Amtrak and NJ Transit trains use the tunnels.In 2018, the Trump administration assigned the tunnel project a “medium-low” ranking, the second-lowest on a scale of five. The FTA said the low grade was due to concerns about how much money New York and New Jersey were committing for the project and where the local share would come from.The Portal North Bridge project, a $1.6 billion plan to r eplace the 112-year-old swing-span bridge that has a history of getting stuck and clogging trains on the Northeast Corridor for hours, was downgraded in 2018. But it received a new rating in 2020. The first span of that bridge is expected to open in 2025, with full completion estimated for 2027.

 COVID-positive health care workers in Washington state told to work while symptomatic -- Health care workers at MultiCare Health Systems in Washington state have been ordered by the hospital, clinic and urgent care network to resume working even if they are symptomatic. The Jason Rantz Show on radio station KTTH broke the story, publishing an internal memo from MultiCare dated January 6. Claiming “crisis levels of staffing,” the memo asserts that the hospital system has changed its “employee testing and return-to-work process to allow people to return to work more quickly than before.” The memo continues, “some staff may return to work even if they are experiencing mild symptoms,” adding the caveat that employees are to return only if symptoms “are improving.”Health care workers took to social media to express their outrage after the new policy was exposed. One nurse commented: “I’m an ICU RN. I’ve known about this for about two weeks now as my employer has already showered us with emails about these new ‘crisis-guidelines.’ This is the essence of ‘Insult to Injury.’ As if we haven’t gone through enough trauma in these past two years, now they will ‘allow’ us to also face the moral dilemma of coming to work at the cost of potentially (very likely seems to be a better choice of word) infecting our vulnerable patients and our colleagues. This is too much!!! It’s inhumane! Not even soldiers at war are ever asked to harm their brothers and sisters at arms!” Another added, “THIS IS CRAZY! Our health care system has become so overrun that now the nurses can’t even stay home until they have a negative test, (and stop shedding the virus..........passing it around to patients!)” The immediate cause for the demand by MultiCare to its workers to return to work even while infectious stems from the skyrocketing hospitalizations in Washington state. The most recent figures reveal a daily average of about 2,200 hospitalizations statewide, well above the state’s previous record of 1,700. Washington State Hospital Association Executive Vice President Taya Briley told reporters last week, “This is the worst situation hospitals in Washington state have been in compared to any prior point during the pandemic.”

Missouri hospitals and schools reel from staffing shortages - As the Omicron variant surges in the US, COVID-19 hospitalizations in Missouri are reaching new records. The illnesses and deaths are throwing hospitals, schools, government offices, grocery stores and other workplaces into disarray. The St. Louis area has very high COVID-19 positivity rates, reaching nearly 40 percent in St. Louis City, St. Louis County and St. Charles County. By comparison, the winter 2021 positivity rate was only 20 percent. In the St. Louis metropolitan area, an average of 208 people a day were admitted to a hospital for COVID last week. As of January 11, there were over 3,100 COVID patients in the state’s hospitals. Since the pandemic began, there have been nearly 1.2 million cases and 16,822 deaths in the state. Sixty-three percent of the population has gotten at least one vaccine dose. While there is currently a mask order in place in St. Louis County, it is unenforceable due to a lawsuit filed by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt. Dr. Alex Garza, co-director of the St. Louis Pandemic Task Force, which involves four of the area’s largest health care centers, warns, “Although it’s hard to comprehend, we believe it’s probably going to get worse over the next couple of weeks.” The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that some patients visiting area emergency rooms must be boarded for days at a time, due to medical staff being busy treating COVID-19 patients. Dr. Aamina Akhtar, chief medical officer for Mercy Hospital South, told the Post-Dispatch, “Some of these boarders may sit for hours, sometimes days and sometimes long enough they get discharged from that status—so never reaching the level of health care we would like to provide.” Teacher and staff shortages at St. Louis-area schools have forced some districts to return to virtual learning temporarily. Normandy High School, St. Louis Language Immersion School and Lafayette Prep will have virtual learning until January 18. A dozen other private schools have moved to virtual learning so far this year. The Illinois schools in St. Louis’s Metro East will begin in-person learning January 18 after having begun the 2022 school session virtually. The Missouri state government is actively obstructing efforts to keep students and school staff safe. On January 11, the State Board of Education ruled to keep a 36-hour-per-year limit on online instruction for schools. If schools are forced to temporarily close due to staffing issues, the school year could be extended. Normandy School Board member Mike Jones called those who are blocking online learning “Neanderthals who belong to a different age” over their refusal to allow districts to switch part of the school year to online.

Top Florida health official on leave over support for vaccination BBC. The Florida Department of Health has placed a top official on administrative leave after he criticised staff over their vaccination rate.In an email on 4 January, Dr Raul Pino called unvaccinated staff members "irresponsible" and wrote "we are not even at 50% - pathetic".Legislation passed in Florida late last year prohibits employers, public and private, from mandating jabs.DOH confirmed on Wednesday the doctor's actions were being investigated."As the decision to get vaccinated is a personal medical choice that should be made free from coercion and mandates from employers, the employee in question has been placed on administrative leave, and the Florida Department of Health is conducting an inquiry to determine if any laws were broken in this case," a spokesperson said in a statement to the BBC."The Department is committed to upholding all laws, including the ban on vaccine mandates for government employees and will take appropriate action once additional information is known."

29 charged in 6-state shoplifting ring that hit pharmacies (AP) — State and federal authorities announced Thursday that they arrested and charged more than two dozen people for taking part in a multistate shoplifting ring that made off with more than $10 million in stolen goods over the past few years, most of which was over-the-counter medications. U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson in Tulsa and Oklahoma Attorney General John O’Connor announced state and federal charges against 29 defendants. Johnson said 25 of those charged had been arrested and four others were still at large. Prosecutors said the defendants took part in a conspiracy to steal mostly over-the-counter medications from retailers such as Walmart, Costco, Walgreens, CVS and GNC in Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas. The ringleaders would then arrange for the sale of the items on websites such as Amazon and eBay. “Consumers and businesses incur a high price for thieves who commit larcenies and profit by selling their stolen goods to well-organized theft rings,” said Tulsa Police Chief Wendell Franklin, whose department launched its investigation in 2019 after an organized crime investigator from a pharmacy retailer shared information about bulk thefts from its Tulsa-area locations. “Thieves should take notice. Tulsa is not going to capitulate and allow criminals to disrupt commerce in our city.” Prosecutors allege that a 48-year-old Tulsa woman, Linda Been, led the ring, which netted an estimated $4.5 million from the sale of stolen goods such as Flonase, Mucinex, Nexium and Allegra to fencing organizations outside of Oklahoma that then sold the merchandise on e-commerce sites. They allege that Been, whose name is listed in jail records as Linda Gann, would provide shoplifters with a detailed list of items to steal and pay for their expenses when they traveled out of state. She also would pay for the shoplifters' bond if they were arrested, prosecutors allege.

Thieves target another source for stolen goods: Delivery trucks and trains full of packages - Instead of shoplifting from stores, some thieves are zeroing in on another target: Trains and delivery trucks full of packages on the way to customers' doorsteps. UPS Chief Executive Carol Tome said Friday that one of the company's 18-wheeler trucks was robbed in Atlanta in the early hours of the morning. She said thieves hijacked the truck after the driver left one of the delivery company's largest hubs. "He was stopped at gunpoint. He was zip-tied, thrown into the back of his feeder car and they took the packages," she said on CNBC's "Squawk Box." The robbery took place in late December, according to an NBC news report. In downtown Los Angeles, a video from the local CBS station shows looted packages littering the train tracks. Thieves raided cargo containers and left behind cardboard boxes that had been carrying purchases from Amazon and REI, including some with UPS labels and tracking numbers, according to the report. Those abandoned boxes carried merchandise ranging from unused Covid tests and fishing lures to EpiPens, according to tweets from one of the TV station's reporters. According to a report from NBCLA, the thefts have been an ongoing issue in recent months. Organized theft has gained more attention from major retailers and trade groups, after brazen smash-and-grabs at stores like Nordstrom and concerns that thieves can steal and sell goods anonymously online. CEOs of companies, including Target, Neiman Marcus, Levi Strauss & Co. and Walgreens a sent a letter to Congress last month, urging legislation that makes it harder for criminals to "hide behind fake screennames and false business information" on third-party marketplaces. Best Buy CEO Corie Barry said the crimes — which are sometimes violent — have compounded staffing challenges for retailers who are trying to find and retain employees during the pandemic. UPS' Tome said the delivery company's robberies have not noticeably changed in number. She said the company is helping customers who have affected packages and its security team "is leaning in in a big way to try to protect our customers' packages and our cargo." "I wouldn't say it's materially higher, but it's something that we all need to be concerned about," she said.

New York mayor says subway safe after woman shoved in front of train New York Mayor Eric Adams (D) on Sunday assured New Yorkers that the city's subway system is safe to use after a woman died when she was pushed in front of an incoming train. “New Yorkers are safe on the subway system. I think it’s about 1.7 percent of the crimes in New York City that occur on the subway system," Adams said during a press briefing, according to The Telegraph. “Think about that for a moment,” he said. “What we must do is remove the perception of fear." “When you see homeless individuals with mental health issues not being attended to and given the proper services, that adds to the perception of fear,” said Adams. The Telegraph noted that the mayor's remarks drew criticisms from New Yorkers who said he is dismissing genuine concerns stemming from physical attacks on the subway. On Saturday, Michelle Alyssa Go was killed after being pushed onto the tracks by Simon Martial, a 61-year-old homeless man. Martial turned himself into authorities and has been charged with Go's slaying. Shouting at reporters outside a police station, Martial admitted to shoving Go and appeared to have no remorse for his actions. As local New York CBS-affiliate WCBS reported, police Commissioner Keechant Sewell called Go's death an "absolutely senseless act of violence.”

Three Pennsylvania police officers charged in killing of 8-year-old girl - Prosecutors in Pennsylvania have filed manslaughter charges against three police officers who shot and killed 8-year-old Fanta Bility last summer as she and her family exited a high school football game in Sharon Hill, a suburb of Philadelphia, last August. Her older sister and two others were also shot and wounded, but not killed. The three officers, Devon Smith, Sean Dolan and Brian Devaney, were each charged with one count of voluntary manslaughter, one count of involuntary manslaughter and 10 counts of reckless endangerment. Bail was set as an unsecured $500,000 bond. The officers were immediately released without having to pay any bail. Investigators recovered 25 9mm cartridge casings at the scene and ballistic tests showed that they all came from the officers’ guns as did the bullet which killed Fanta. According to witnesses, two teenagers, Angelo “AJ” Ford and Hasein Strand, were among hundreds of students and families attending the football game on August 27, 2021. According to most accounts, Ford and Strands had been exchanging words during the game and afterwards, more than a block from the stadium, got into a fight in which they fired their guns. The three officers, without knowing where the shots were coming from, opened fire on a car being driven by two girls who were also leaving the football game. Neither the two girls driving the car, 8-year-old Fanta Bility, her older sister or the others who were also shot were involved in the fight between Ford and Strand. The charges were filed after a grand jury investigation returned its findings. Testimony before the grand jury is not made public. The Delaware County District Attorney’s office chose the lesser charge of manslaughter rather than murder in the third degree, claiming that there was no evidence of malice. At the same time, the District Attorney suspended murder in the first degree charges against the two teenagers, Ford and Strand. Those charges were filed this past November. Anger erupted in Sharon Hill and throughout the Philadelphia region after prosecutors charged the two youths and not the police, even though the teenagers did not fire the bullet that killed Fanta Bility. Justifying the first-degree murder charges against the youth, Delaware County District Attorney Jack Stollsteimer said at the time that the teenagers were ultimately responsible for the police murder of Bility.

 Nearly 1 million US children were infected with COVID-19 last week -Nearly one million US children were infected with COVID-19 last week, according to statistics released by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) on Tuesday. The 981,488 new pediatric cases shatters previous records. It is four times higher than the number recorded at last year’s winter peak, triple the number of new cases from two weeks prior, and a 69 percent increase over the week ending January 6, when cases leaped by a then-staggering 580,000. The exponential leap in pediatric cases was accompanied by nearly 2,000 new child hospitalizations last week, double the growth in the number of children now fighting for their lives in hospital beds from the week prior. As students were forced back into school buildings following the Christmas holidays, cases predictably skyrocketed, but the unprecedented scale has crushed healthcare systems nationally. During two short weeks, the US has experienced 11 percent of all child COVID-19 infections to date. The death of a child is the most unspeakable horror, one that is now striking several American families every day. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the pediatric death total is now 1,127, while the AAP has a significantly lower count of 762. Data sets from the CDC and AAP suffer due to the deliberate lack of reporting by state and local health departments and the refusal of the Biden administration to make these numbers mandatory. In response to the horrific reality they confront in overcrowded, poorly-ventilated schools that are now hotbeds of infection, students have organized in an effort to save their lives and those of their families, teachers and communities by walking out across the US, from New York City to Chicago to Boston to Oakland and Redondo Beach, California over the last week. Following the remote work action by courageous Chicago teachers, educators are likewise increasingly demanding the closure of unsafe schools and building Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committees throughout the country. Growing numbers are seeking to break the straitjacket of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) and National Educators Association (NEA), which have demanded passive compliance with the Biden administration’s school reopening policies. Among the children whose lives were prematurely cut short last week was 17-year-old Taigan Bradford. A senior at Kalamazoo Central High School, she died on Tuesday, January 11, after a nearly two-month fight against COVID-19. Taigan had plans to attend Kalamazoo Valley Community College for nursing after graduating.

Ohio schools: Record 27,000 new COVID-19 cases reported this week – Ohio schools reported more than 27,000 new coronavirus cases this week, setting a new record one week after cases shattered a previous record. K-12 schools reported 27,774 new cases to the Ohio Department of Health in the week ending Sunday, Jan. 16, according to data released Thursday.Last week saw 23,268 new cases, which was still more than double the most cases NBC4 had previously seen since starting to track cases in mid-September. More than 50,000 cases have been reported in just the past two weeks, more than were reported in the previous seven weeks combined.The school year total stands at 187,094 cases among students and staff. Infections were caught in and out of school.1,589 (57%) of the 2,769 schools, districts, private schools, vocational schools, preschools and other non-college institutions that ODH tracks have reported a case this school year. That's 18 more schools than last week.The median number of cases among schools with at least one infection is 35 cases, while the median number for school districts is 163 cases.154,047 (82%) of Ohio’s school cases are students and 33,047 (18%) are staff members, which include teachers, administrators, coaches and support staff. Last school year, students were roughly 2 in 3 cases, and staff were 1 in 3.Cincinnati Public Schools, a district of more than 34,000 students, leads the state with 4,644 cases, ahead the Cleveland Municipal School District with 2,931. Dublin City Schools leapfrogged Columbus City Schools for the third spot this week, as the two districts have reported 2,583 and 2,557 cases, respectively. They’re among five Franklin County districts in the top nine.

Redondo Beach, California high school students walk out amid mass COVID-19 infections - Last Wednesday, January 12, hundreds of students from Redondo Union High School (RUHS), in Redondo Beach, California, walked out in protest against the school’s limited mitigation measures as hundreds of students have tested positive for COVID-19. Despite facing threats from the school administration and right-wing elements, anywhere from 150–350 students participated in the walkout. A Redondo high school student speaks during the walkout (Credit: ruhscovid via Instagram) The militant actions of the students are part of a global wave of resistance led by educators, students and workers against the homicidal “herd immunity” policies enacted by capitalist governments the world over. Since the start of 2022, teachers in Seattle, Oakland, San Francisco, as well as thousands of students in Chicago, New York City, Boston and other cities, have participated in walkouts to save lives in the face of mass infection. As is the case throughout the US, the emergence of the Omicron variant coupled with the government’s refusal to enact any public health measures that cut into corporate profits has resulted in record-breaking case counts and overflowing hospitals in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. According to New York Times COVID-19 tracker, there are now an average of nearly 42,000 daily new cases in Los Angeles County, where Redondo Beach is located, while the number of daily deaths is beginning to climb, averaging 34 deaths per day over the last week. Limited mitigation measures are being rolled back as the entire political establishment demands that children be herded back into schools for in-person learning, no matter the level of infection. In response, students have taken it upon themselves to fight for their lives.

More than 1,200 Oakland students pledge to stay home unless schools improve Covid safety - More than 1,200 students in Oakland, California, have signed a petition saying they would stay home this week unless school administrators provide additional Covid protections, including more N95 masks, weekly testing and better social distancing – or a shift to virtual learning. On Tuesday, three district campuses were closed because students and teachers, in solidarity, stayed home. At a news conference today, the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) spokesperson John Sasaki said that attendance numbers would not be available until tomorrow, but the district was expecting more than a thousand students to stay home. The district said it was providing free tests and masks and had implemented other safety protocols including air purifiers, but students and teachers have alleged inequities in the distribution of resources between schools in more and less wealthy neighborhoods. The protest comes as schools across the country have struggled with the latest, Omicron-fueled wave of the coronavirus pandemic. In recent weeks, students in New York City, New Jersey, Chicago, Washington DC and elsewhere have launched protests and petitions as well, demanding improved safety measures. Districts, meanwhile, have faced immense pressures from parents and politicians to keep school campuses open as the US enters its third year of the pandemic. Students and teachers around the US have complained of inconsistency in schools’ coronavirus policies and a chaotic return from winter break. Last week, students from several New York City schools walked out, demanding virtual learning options, and a video of hundreds of masked, Brooklyn Technical High students filing out of class went viral.

Nearly 1,200 students in California threaten to stay home unless additional COVID-19 precautions implemented - Students in California have threatened to stay home and continue remote learning unless the school district commits to more COVID-19 protocols, joining hundreds of other students making similar demands in cities across the U.S.More than 1,200 students in Oakland, Calif. created a petition demanding Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) ensure a safe learning environment through school-provided KN95/N95 masks and weekly PCR testing. If demands are unmet, students have threatened to strike and not attend school in-person. So far, the petition has garnered a little over 1,200 signatures from students across OUSD.In late December, before OUSD was planning to welcome students back into classrooms following the winter break, it outlined its COVID-19 safety measures. That included upgraded ventilation systems, bi-weekly safety walkthroughs, additional masks and hand sanitizers, 41,000 at-home-tests sent to students and staff before the break and an expanded quarantine testing team. Last week the district announced it had distributed KN95 and N95 masks to school sites so each employee would have at least five, while an additional 50,000 KN95 masks would be sent to all school sites and 200,000 were ordered for students. According to local media, students and teachers have planned a sickout in Oakland as a way to protest COVID-19 safety measures in schools, and it’s expected to last through the week. OUSD acknowledged the student-led petition, telling local media in part, “we are already meeting, or are in the process of meeting, most of the demands noted in this petition. And we will continue to work towards fulfilling the rest in the coming weeks.” Students in Oakland are not alone, as the Chicago Public Schools Radical Youth Alliance also led a walkout last week which turned into a rally that involved at least 500 students outside of the Chicago Public Schools headquarters, according to the Chicago Tribune.Chicago students demanded laptops for virtual learning, a seat at the table during discussions over COVID-19 safety measures, more cleaning supplies and better social distancing in schools. A similar scene played out in New York City, where hundreds of students participated in a walkout over lack of COVID-19 safety protocols. Students also said access to at-home tests has been limited and they’re concerned that teachers and students are still coming into school while sick.The student walkouts come amid severe staffing shortages caused by the current rise in COVID-19 infections across the country. Burbio, a tech company tracking school closures across the U.S., found that more than 6,000 schools were disrupted the week of Jan. 10, all of which were not offering in-person learning. The White House is attempting to help schools by providing 10 million tests every month to help them stay open and offering full reimbursement for schools that provide COVID-19 testing to their communities.

Maryland students and teachers oppose school reopenings as state officials seek to force in-person classes at all costs - Amid a surge of infection driven by the Omicron variant of COVID-19, Maryland’s Republican Governor Larry Hogan and the Democratic Party-controlled state government are resorting to ever more manipulative measures to keep businesses and schools operating in-person. Maryland has seen more than 10,000 new cases each day since the new year started. An astounding 17,253 people tested positive on January 9. This number surpassed the previous record of 3,792 set last winter by over four times. Deaths are also beginning to climb with the seven day rolling average hitting 66 per day on January 17, an all time high, up from a low of 9 in early November. ICU and acute hospital bed usage has increased seven-fold since before the holidays, and a number of hospitals have begun instituting emergency measures. The current level of testing is grossly inadequate with the positivity rate reaching 30 percent. The surge had caused Baltimore City Public Schools to close 60 of its 155 schools at the beginning of the year, but by the end of the week the district had quickly reopened them. Outbreaks in Baltimore City schools have been covered up by the school board, leading to deaths. “We are being forced into school environments that are unsafe—due to overcrowding, limited access to testing, lack of school nurses, lack of proper masking—and are being gaslighted by leadership with promises of safety,” a Baltimore City schoolteacher told the World Socialist Web Site. “Educators are at a breaking point and cannot keep this ‘normal school year’ pace in an environment that is anything but normal. We are more than capable of delivering high-quality instruction virtually,” she insisted. This situation has been met by an increasing opposition within broad sections of the working class. In the heavily-populated Washington DC suburbs, Montgomery County bus drivers are continuing to remain home from their jobs. The county’s Democratic Party-controlled executive requested the National Guard to keep the buses running. 'We don't have a break glass in case of emergency bus driver pool that's sitting somewhere being unused right now,' stated Montgomery County assistant administrative officer Dr. Earl Stoddard to Fox News. The official stated that “between 75 and I think 90 routes that have been affected that's a significant number of routes.” A petition started by high school students on Change.org calling for remote learning has garnered 18,200 signatures in a little over a week. “A month ago, [Montgomery County Public Schools] announced that if a school reached a student infection rate of 5 percent, the school would be reviewed by MCPS and the Department of Health and Human Services to go virtual for two weeks,” it reads.

Hundreds of students walk out across Manitoba to protest unsafe schools -- Hundreds of students at up to 90 schools across the Canadian province of Manitoba walked out of class Monday to protest the dangerous conditions created by the government’s insistence on a return to in-person learning at the peak of the Omicron wave of COVID-19. The protest was organized by MB Students for Covid Safety, a grassroots group set up by high school students concerned about the lack of safety measures to protect them and their teachers from the potentially deadly virus. The demands being advanced by the students are an option to enroll in remote learning along with the provision of N95 masks and rapid antigen tests. They are also calling for students to be given immediate access to booster shots and the right to be notified when there is a case reported in their school. “We just want to be able to go to school without getting sick or spreading the virus,” Ava, a 15-year-old student from Kelvin High School in Winnipeg, one of the initiators of the walkout, was inspired by similar walkouts that took place a week ago in New York. Students at Grant Park High School and College Louis Riel have also been instrumental in organizing the walkout. Protesters explained that they decided to take action in the face of the refusal of the Progressive Conservative provincial government to do anything to safeguard students and education staff from infection. “Everyday of winter break we were waiting for restrictions and they never came,” Piper, a student from Grant Park High School, told the WSWS. “Hallways are terrible, especially during class change,” Eniola added. “The lack of resources provided plus taking away contact tracing is looking like it’ll create some school outbreaks sooner or later (probably sooner). You can sort of feel people’s frustrations.” Eniola stated on the removal of contact tracing, “There wasn’t any justification for why they got rid of it. It was one way that we were keeping ourselves protected.”

Michigan K-12 schools see 74 new COVID-19 outbreaks as opposition to in-person learning builds - Like many states across the US, Michigan is experiencing record infections from the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, dwarfing previous highs in the COVID-19 pandemic, with schools remaining the primary source of outbreaks and transmission across the state. Last week, Michigan officials identified at least 185 new COVID-19 outbreaks across the state. Counting the 380 prior outbreaks recorded, the state now has 565 total ongoing outbreaks. Michigan currently averages over 18,000 cases a day, up 36 percent from two weeks ago, while hospitalizations are up 19 percent. K-12 schools lead the settings responsible for the latest outbreaks, representing 74 of those reported last week, followed by childcare/youth programs, which account for 23. The most horrific outbreaks last week took place in Midland, Michigan, with the city’s H.H. Dow High and Midland High School reporting 121 and 108 cases, respectively. Western High School in Bay County saw the third largest outbreak of 100 cases last week. This map depicts the ongoing outbreaks across Michigan. A recent report from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services on the state of the pandemic before Omicron became the dominant variant underscores the terrible toll that has been enacted on Michiganders over the past two years. The report found that COVID-19 infections hospitalized nearly one in every 100 Michiganders and has killed one in every 1,000. Shockingly, one in six Michiganders is confirmed to have contracted COVID-19. Infections among Michigan children between ages 0-9 increased 343 percent over the last nine months compared to the first year of the pandemic, while the number of children ages 10-19 infected with the virus increased 139 percent. In the first weeks of 2022, the Omicron variant’s spread is exacerbating the preexisting crisis of the surge from the Delta variant. Already, by January 14, 140 pediatric patients had been hospitalized in Michigan with cases of confirmed or suspected COVID-19. While school district leaders and capitalist politicians continue to flagrantly claim that COVID-19 only “mildly” affects the youth and does not spread through schools, the reality of the situation is asserting itself. On January 11, after a two-month hospitalization, healthy 17-year-old Kalamazoo Central High senior Taigan Bradford succumbed to the virus. While not confirmed, Taigan’s mother suspects her daughter became exposed and infected with the virus at her school. Since resuming in-person classes from winter break on January 3, Kalamazoo Public Schools (KPS) has recorded at least 170 new COVID-19 cases among students, not including faculty. At Taigan’s funeral, her mother stated that she is urging KPS leaders to end in-person learning and return to virtual learning.

Five Baltimore Schools Go Virtual Tuesday – (WJZ) — Five Baltimore City schools temporarily transitioned to virtual learning Tuesday, the school system announced. Three schools transitioned because of understaffing or the ability to conduct COVID-19 testing. Those schools are Baltimore International Academy West, Empowerment Academy and Southwest Baltimore Charter School. Two schools, Booker T. Washington Middle School and Western High School, are going virtual for what City Schools called “facility challenges.” The school system did not say when each school might return to in-person learning.

New Jersey psychologist describes horrific conditions in K-12 schools during Omicron surge - New Jersey has been one of the hardest-hit states in the US during the initial weeks of the Omicron surge, with 747,687 people officially infected with COVID-19 since December 1. At one point, laboratories in the state were reporting a 100 percent test positivity rate. In response to the catastrophic surge of COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations, including among children, Democratic politicians at the state and local level have followed the line of the Biden administration and adamantly refused to switch schools to remote learning or implement any public health measures to stop the spread of the virus. In Edison Township Public Schools, the fifth-largest district in New Jersey with roughly 16,000 students, the start of the spring semester has been horrific, with mass infections at schools fueling a broader spread of COVID-19 in the surrounding community. In response, students, educators and parents have protested at recent school board meetings, demanding the implementation of strict safety measures in schools and a switch to remote learning. A student-initated petition calling for an indefinite switch to remote learning has now been signed by over 3,600 people in the city. The World Socialist Web Site conducted the following interview with a clinical psychologist in Edison, who requested anonymity in order to avoid retaliation from the district. Evan Blake: What has this semester been like in New Jersey, as schools have reopened during the surge of the Omicron variant? Clinical Psychologist: We came back from break on January 3. During that week, two of my students contracted COVID-19 at school, as determined by contact tracing. They brought it to their separate homes and inadvertently infected their mom and grandma (who was the primary caregiver), both of whom died last week. Before break, both kids told me that their mom and grandma had been staying home, not even going out for groceries, because mom was immunocompromised, and grandma was elderly. The kids were extremely careful and nervous about being in school. The conditions at the school are horrible. We had a teacher pass out during class. Administration first said she had COVID, then said it was due to stress. The children watched the EMTs give her oxygen on the floor in their class. That was during the first week of January.

Ontario educator’s post about allowing infectious students to return to class gives voice to widespread outrage -A report from an educator in Canada on how government isolation guidelines are allowing infectious people to return to school and pass the virus onto others prompted widespread outrage and has been widely shared online. Ken, a teacher in Ontario, posted to Twitter about how a student who tested positive for COVID-19 would be permitted to return to the classroom January 18, just five days after their positive test.“If this is any indication of how things are going to go, we are in big trouble,” wrote the teacher on Twitter last Friday. “I got informed this morning that a student in my class just got COVID. I was given a heads up that they will be back in class Tuesday. When I raised the concern that the kid is contagious for 10 days, I was told that the guidelines state he can come back after five days. So, I will be in class teaching with a student who I know has COVID and is contagious in a room with 27 other kids.“To make things worse, I can’t tell any of the kids around him that he has COVID. I will be forced to watch in fear every time his mask slips off his face and he breathes that he is not infecting everyone in the classroom. I will have to just accept that he will infect others.”Ken’s thread has been retweeted over 130 times and liked by hundreds more educators. Workers responded by sharing their own horror stories. “Work just quotes the guidelines as well, and lets people go maskless at desks etc. even though, well science says COVID moves through air. Really is just part of the bigger plan to get everyone exposed and ill,” wrote one worker. “I’ve had a hard time sleeping the past couple of nights. I’ve been thinking about taking sick days because this individual will be sick in my class. On the other hand, I can’t let my students down. A supply teacher would come in who wouldn’t know that the student is infected.” Ken’s story is just one among many illustrating the criminal disregard for the health and very lives of educators, support staff, and students shown by governments at all levels across Canada. Schools reopened in four provinces, including Ontario and Quebec, Monday, with virtually no protections to prevent transmission of the potentially deadly virus.

Bill to prevent West Virginia public schools from implementing mask, COVID testing mandates clears first committee hurdle — A bill aiming to prevent public schools from implementing mask mandates for students or employees has made its way out of one committee, and is currently under consideration in another.House Bill 4071 was passed Thursday out of the House Education committee after being amended. It was remanded to the House Judiciary Committee, which did not consider the bill Friday.Under the bill, called the Public School Health Rights Act, no public school — defined in the bill as including any public school or facility under the control of a county board of education; a charter school; or the West Virginia School for the Deaf and the Blind — would not be able to do any of the following:

• • Impose a COVID-19 mask or face covering requirement on any student or employee
• • Impose a mandatory COVID-19 testing requirement on any asymptomatic or pre symptomatic student or employee
• • Require a student or employee to quarantine or isolate unless the student or employee has tested positive for COVID-19.

The bill additionally outlines: that parents or guardians would maintain the right to decide if their child should wear a mask at school; that any quarantine period would end upon the student or employee testing negative for COVID-19 or after a period of five days; and that "rights identified under this act shall not be overridden by any elected or appointed official."The bill also allows the filing of "a declaratory judgment action, seeking an injunction against any act or practice that violates this act."HB 4071's lead sponsor is Del. Jordan Maynor, R-Raleigh. Another 10 Republicans have cosponsored the bill. Maynor said the primary goal of the legislation is to give the decision of masking to parents and individuals. "The purpose of this bill was to give options to parents options to individuals and give them the freedom to decide," he said. Maynor said he has heard from educators of the difficulties masking has brought to classrooms. "Educators originally brought this to me... that was the starting point," he said. "I had heard from them how hard it is to teach with the masks on and how distracted the children are having to wear them while trying to learn. "On top of that, another comment that was made, it was mentioned about a double-standard: How you can tackle each other on a football field, box each other out on the basketball court, have fans cheering in the stands who don't have to be masked and, quite frankly, don't have to be tested when they arrive at games (while mandating masks in classrooms)?"

Amid teacher shortages, Oklahoma schools bring in cops as substitutes - Facing chronic teacher and staff shortages due to the spread of COVID-19 infections, Moore Public Schools in Oklahoma has called in police to supervise classes at three elementary schools. The Moore Police Department announced its involvement in a social media post. “Moore PD is a proud community partner of Moore Public Schools. This week, several on-duty officers are serving in the classroom as schools continue to face teacher and staff shortages. Today, officers Stromski and Lewis covered 6th grade classes at Apple Creek Elementary. Additional officers are serving Houchin and Broadmoore. We are thankful to be able to assist our community during these difficult times.” In the post’s attached photos, unmasked officers in uniform can be seen presiding over students doing virtual schoolwork at their desks. In one of the pictures, an unmasked officer is sitting at a desk with a mug with a large “Q,” a symbol associated with the far-right QAnon conspiracy theory, although some posters said this was the initial of the missing teacher. In any case, parents and teachers overwhelmingly commented on the inappropriate and irresponsible decision to bring police into the schools. “Protect and serve? Outrageous and infuriating. How dare you! Unmasked and armed to teach little children. Not physically or emotionally safe. Not appropriate. And a horrible role model for children during a pandemic. Not only that, but these cops are literally putting human lives at risk, including their own. Absolutely disgusting,” said one parent. “What are you going to do when all the police officers get COVID? Because unless the teachers have been attending some very intimate parties in their off hours that no one knows about, I think the whole ‘teaching in close proximity to students’ might be the reason why they’re all sick in the first place,” another parent commented.

New York University announces in-person reopening for spring semester 24 hours after former librarian dies from COVID-19New York University (NYU), one the largest private universities in the United States, announced on Wednesday that the spring 2022 academic semester will be held in-person. This announcement came amid record numbers of new coronavirus infections and hospitalizations and 24 hours after it was reported that Dr. Jennifer Steenshorne, a former NYU librarian and American history scholar, died last week from COVID-19. Dr. Steenshorne, in her early-to-mid 50s, was fully vaccinated and had previously recovered from an infection early in the pandemic. Her tragic death underscores the immense danger of in-person classes and work amidst the continued surge of the coronavirus pandemic. Dr. Steenshorne worked in the enormous NYU Libraries system in several capacities, starting as a clerical staff member at NYU’s Stern Graduate School of Business Library in 1990 and then working as a reference associate at NYU’s Elmer Holmes Bobst Library until 1993. After receiving her PhD from the University of California, Irvine’s History Department, she returned to NYU to work as Manager of the Stephen Chan Library at the Institute of Fine Arts from 1997 to 2000. In addition to her work at NYU, Dr. Steenshorne taught courses in early American history at John Jay College, LaGuardia Community College, St. Francis College and Queens College. Dr. Steenshorne also worked as a librarian and researcher for various prestigious institutions, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. She served as an editor of the collected private and public papers of John Jay at Columbia University and was director and editor-in-chief of the George Washington Papers collection at the University of Virginia. Dr. Steenshorne lived in New York City with her husband. Dr. Steenshorne is one of the millions of human beings internationally whose lives have been tragically cut short by capitalist governments’ criminal policies to allow the highly infectious and deadly coronavirus to rampage unchecked through the population.  Dr. Steenshorne’s death further exposes the utter fallacy of the claims of NYU administrators, parroting the lies of capitalist politicians and the bourgeois media, that the new mutations of the virus are “mild” and that the population can “learn to live with the virus.” She had contracted and recovered from COVID-19 early in the pandemic and was fully vaccinated, having received two vaccine shots last year. Announcing her second infection on Twitter, Dr. Steenshorne wrote on December 28, “Just took a home Covid test. Positive. I’ve had two shots, so not so bad aside from the exhaustion and cough. Booster in January. I haven’t left the house in 2 months, so exposure was via my husband. I also had an early case of Covid.” The next day, December 29, she tweeted, “My Covid Cough makes me feel like I have been slammed in the ribs by baseball bats.” This was her last social media post before her death last week.

 Education Department opens probe into LGBTQ dating ban at BYU - The U.S. Department of Education has opened a probe into the treatment of LGBTQ students at Brigham Young University, a private school affiliated with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, The Salt Lake Tribune reported on Thursday.The investigation comes after BYU changed its Honor Code in 2020; the school removed a rule banning “homosexual behavior,” but shortly after clarified that same-sex relationships would still be prohibited, and those who break the rule by holding hands or kissing would be disciplined. The probe, carried out by the Office of Civil Rights, deals with the Education Department’s Title IX protections against discrimination on the basis of sex and will look into whether the rules are justifiable because of BYU’s status as a private religious school or whether they violate LGBTQ rights. “BYU is exempt from application of Title IX rules that conflict with the religious tenets of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” said BYU spokesperson Carri Jenkins. “BYU does not anticipate any further action by OCR on this complaint.” LGBTQ issues have been especially controversial at BYU in recent years. Multiple students and former students have sued the school based on allegations of discrimination.

Low folate linked to risk of cognitive decline in later life - A new study from researchers at The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA) at Trinity College Dublin has found strong links between low levels of folate (the natural form of the dietary supplement, folic acid) and accelerated cognitive decline.The study, published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, uses data from over 3,000 community dwelling participants aged 50 years and older in Ireland, and is the largest sample to date to investigate longitudinal associations of folate and cognitive function, using repeated assessments of cognitive tests.The study examines older adults who provided blood samples of folate at Wave 1 of TILDA, with repeated measurements of cognitive function assessed over eight years. Researchers found that older persons with low folate faced a greater risk of poorer cognitive function overall over eight years, particularly evidenced in memory tests. TILDA’s study is the largest representative study of its kind, with the findings revealing important information for at-risk older adults, clinicians, public health stakeholders and policymakers alike. Dementia is a disease that affects 7% of the world’s population, and is a major cause of disability and death, while the risk of developing dementia greatly increases with age. Cognitive impairment is a known precursor to dementia, resulting in a deterioration in attention, executive function, learning and memory. Low folate is associated with an accelerated decline in cognitive function, and is an important marker for cognitive decline among older people.

Mild Covid infection degrades memory for up to nine months – research - Mild Covid infection can cause attention and memory problems for months after recovery, new research suggests. The findings, reported by researchers from Oxford University showed that people who had mild Covid infection but did not report long-Covid symptoms still had worse attention and memory for up to six to nine Previous studies have shown that long-Covid sufferers experience difficulties maintaining attention, which is known as “brain fog”. However, it was not known if similar effects were felt by those who had experienced no other issues after recovery from Covid-19.Participants in the study were asked to complete a number of cognitive tests, with a focus on sustaining attention, memory, planning, and semantic reasoning. While they performed well in short-term working memory and planning compared with the control group, the participants scored significantly worse in their memory of past events and in their ability to sustain attention over time. All the participants had previously suffered from Covid-19 and were similar to the control group in factors such as fatigue, forgetfulness, sleep patterns or anxiety at the time of testing. Dr Sijia Zhao of Oxford’s Department of Experimental Psychology said: “What is surprising is that although our Covid-19 survivors did not feel any more symptomatic at the time of testing, they showed degraded attention and memory.

COVID-19 patients show more signs of brain damage than people with Alzheimer's disease – A new study reveals older patients contracting COVID have more signs of brain damage than people who develop the neurodegenerative disease.Specifically, a team from NYU Grossman School of Medicine found significantly higher levels of certain blood proteins which typically arise when someone suffers neurological damage among COVID patients. Researchers say, over the short-term course of their infections, seven markers of brain damage were noticeably higher among COVID patients than non-COVID patients with Alzheimer’s. One of these markers was more than twice as high among coronavirus patients. “Our findings suggest that patients hospitalized for COVID-19, and especially in those experiencing neurological symptoms during their acute infection, may have levels of brain injury markers that are as high as, or higher than, those seen in people who have Alzheimer’s disease,” says lead author Jennifer Frontera, MD, a professor in the Department of Neurology, in a university release.Study authors say the main sign of brain damage among the COVID patients was the condition of toxic metabolic encephalopathy (TME). Symptoms range from confusion to coma, due to toxins created by the immune system reacting (sepsis), the kidneys failing, and not enough oxygen in the tissue.The team examined 251 people hospitalized for COVID-19 during the first few months of the pandemic in 2020. The average age of the participants was 71 years old, but all were in generally good health with no history of dementia or cognitive decline before their COVID infection. Researchers separated these patients into two groups, those with and without neurological symptoms due to COVID-19.From there, the team compared these individuals to a group of control patients from the Clinical Core cohort of NYU Langone’s Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center. This group is part of NYU’s long-term study of dementia and included 54 healthy people, 54 with mild cognitive decline, and 53 with Alzheimer’s disease. None of the control patients contracted COVID-19 during the study.Results show the seven brain damage markers were over 60 percent higher among COVID patients with TME than those without the neurological symptoms.Concerningly, study authors found the markers for brain damage were even worse among patients that did not survive their coronavirus infection. Markers among patients who died from COVID were 124 percent higher than those who eventually left the hospital. In comparison to patients with Alzheimer’s, results show markers for neurofilament light chain were 179 percent higher among coronavirus patients over the short term. Levels of GFAP were also 65 percent higher among COVID patients in comparison to those with dementia.

Hallucinations and headaches: Seven ways COVID can affect your brain - Covid is largely thought of as an illness that mostly affects your lungs, with the effect it can have on the brain less known. But as well as causing obvious physical symptoms, the virus can also spark neurological ones too — and these are the ones that tend to last longer. In what is traditionally a respiratory illness, medics were surprised when people began complaining of headaches, delirium, brain fog and loss of smell or taste at the start of the pandemic. And in the more seriously ill, things like strokes and blocked blood vessels in the brain were soon being reported. One in five Covid patients could suffer with cerebral vascular events, according to Professor James Goodwin. He explained in the Telegraph this is because infections send our immune system into overdrive, and in some people who have a huge viral load, it can cause an uncontrolled response. This is the release of a large amount of inflammatory molecules — known as a cytokine storm — to the infected area. It mainly affects the lungs, and can spark acute respiratory distress syndrome, failure and sometimes death. But it’s not only the lungs that are hit by an immune system in overdrive — other organs such as the heart, liver and kidneys can be damaged due to low oxygen, inflammation and blood clotting. The brain can also be hit by this too, and become injured in the body’s attempt to fight back against the virus. Professor Goodwin said medics now know that Covid gets into the brain through tightly sealed blood vessels which surround the organ. Spikes in the virus grab onto receptors, replicate inside them and then move on into the brain. With the body in panic-mode an inflammation response tries to defeat the virus by breaking down the blood vessels, causing damage which also impacts the immune system. 7 neurological events caused by Covid:

• Headaches
• Brain fog
• Delirium
• Strokes
• Blood clots
• Loss of smell
• Hallucinations

After recovering some people can then experience serious neurological, behavioral or psychiatric disorders, due to the (often temporary) scars left in the brain. These can include hallucinations and hearing sounds that aren’t there, as the brain reconfigures itself after the virus.And you don’t have to have been struck down terribly badly to experience mild neurological issues or brain fog while recovering from Covid.In fact, the brain fog is probably quite a common feeling for people emerging back into the world after the illness, even with milder Omicron. It is simply from the virus having invaded — or tried to invade — your brain and the damage done to the cells in the subsequent battle.

My wife had long Covid and killed herself. We must help others who are suffering - - My wife, Heidi Ferrer, was a screenwriter with a history of social advocacy and an empathetic heart. She was talented, beautiful and the most dedicated mother you ever met; we often referred to her as “sunshine in a dress”. She took her own life after a 13-month battle with long Covid that started as a mostly asymptomatic coronavirus infection. Long Covid took her from one of the healthiest, most vibrant people I’ve ever known to a person so debilitated that she could not bear another day on this planet. I came home one day last May to find that she’d decided to end her pain. As our 13-year-old son waited outside for the paramedics, I tried desperately to revive her. I did a good enough job that by the time we got her to the hospital they could restart her heart, but she was brain dead on arrival. The emergency room doctor assumed that she died from depression. When I told him, “She wasn’t depressed, it was long Covid,” he looked at me with bewilderment and asked, “What’s long Covid?” Late last night I got a desperate Twitter message from a man whose wife could be the next Heidi. She has long Covid and was threatening to end her life. She had already told their eight-year-old daughter her plan. I called him immediately. Heidi and his wife both suffered from unexplained neurological tremors and internal chest cavity vibrations so bad they lost the ability to sleep. Like prisoners of war kept awake for days as a method of torture, their minds lost the ability to make sound cognitive decisions. I knew this man’s terror. Sadly, his call was not an anomaly. I have answered requests like his every single day since my wife’s obituary went viral and I began to share our story with the media. Three weeks before she died, we were already terrified that she would die – not by her own hand, but from a stroke or a heart attack. She said her heart would often race out of control for no reason, and she was ahead of scientists in understanding that this virus also infects the brain. Heidi also suffered from ongoing gastrointestinal issues, exhaustion from just walking up a single flight of stairs, extreme body aches, brain fog and a host of other ailments. All of this – with no hope on the horizon of any cure let alone acknowledgment from the medical world – brought her to the place where she asked me that, if something happened to her, I would tell the world what long Covid is. I made this promise never thinking I would actually have to act on it – never imagining that only three weeks later I would come home to find that she had decided death was preferable to another minute in her own personal hell. Watching long Covid systematically take her apart, organ system by organ system, was the most terrifying deterioration of a human being I have ever witnessed. My wife was an avid 90-minute-a-day walker, ate only organic (and mostly vegan) food, and hadn’t had an alcoholic drink in three and half years. Within six weeks of noticing “Covid toes” and some gastrointestinal issues she could barely walk from excruciating nerve pain in her feet so extreme as to mimic advanced diabetic neuropathy. Long Covid doesn’t come for you all at once; instead, with methodical precision, it slowly robs you. Heidi lost her mobility and her ability to eat. She was a lifelong avid reader but the brain fog (better thought of as cognitive dysfunction) robbed her of the ability to retain information. Even urinating and eventually, and cruelly, sex became painful. Long Covid seemed to steal every part of her life that made it worth living.

Gene That Increases Risk of Dying From Covid Now Identified - Polish scientists have discovered a gene that they say more than doubles the risk of falling severely ill with, or even dying from Covid-19.The Health Ministry in Warsaw expects the discovery to help identify people who are most at risk from the disease, which has already killed more than 100,000 people in Poland alone. It also plans to include genetic tests when it screens patients for potential Covid-19 infections as soon as the end of June. The research from the Medical University of Bialystok estimates that the gene could be present in about 14% of the Polish population, compared with around 9% in Europe and 27% in India. It's the fourth most important factor determining the severity of the illness after age, weight and gender, it said.A genetic test "may help to better identify people who, in the event of an infection, may be at risk of an acute disease, even before the infection develops," said Marcin Moniuszko, a professor in charge of the study, which was carried out with the participation of almost 1,500 Poles. The ministry didn't say if the research had been peer-reviewed The discovery may explain one of the reasons -- other than vaccination hesitancy -- behind the country's high Covid-19 death count. The average excess mortality during the pandemic is above 20%, one of the worst results in the European Union, Eurostat data show

Preliminary Israeli study shows fourth vaccine not enough to stop omicron– A preliminary study in Israel, believed to be the world’s first, found that a fourth COVID-19 vaccine is not enough to prevent omicron infections. Gili Regev-Yochay, director of Sheba Medical Center’s Infectious Diseases Unit, said the trial studied the effect of the Pfizer booster after two weeks and the Moderna booster after one week, according to Reuters. Regev-Yochay said the increase in antibodies from a fourth shot was “probably not enough for the Omicron.””We know by now that the level of antibodies needed to protect and not to got infected from Omicron is probably too high for the vaccine, even if it’s a good vaccine,” she added.Sheba Medical Center ran the trial on second booster shots among 150 of its staff members, and its findings were preliminary and unpublished,The Times of Israel reported. About 500,000 Israelis have been inoculated with a fourth dose as of Sunday.Israel has led the push for vaccinations throughout the pandemic and was the first country to begin to offer booster shots to its population.Prime Minister Naftali Bennett previously announced that the country would begin offering a fourth vaccine as a second booster shot for high-risk populations and vulnerable groups. Despite the push for vaccinations, Israel reported nearly 12,000 new COVID-19 cases earlier this month, a record-setting figure for daily case rates since the start of the pandemic.“There is no control of the omicron wave,” Sharon Alroy-Preis, the Israeli health ministry’s top public health official, said to a local news outlet at the time.

South African Scientists Confirm Boosters Offer Little Protection From Omicron - On Monday, a team of Israeli scientists publicized research showing that even a second booster dose of the Moderna or Pfizer mRNA vaccines doesn't bestow complete immunity from the omicron variant. Now, just days later, their conclusion appears to have been corroborated by a team of South African researchers from the University of Cape Town and Stellenbosch University who observed seven individuals who had been infected with the omicron variant despite having been "boosted". The patients represented the first known cases of breakthrough infection by omicron, the researchers told the Lancet, the British medical journal where their findings were published. Keep in mind, the South African team used a very different approach. First of all, the patients they examined had only received a single booster dose (unlike with the Israeli study, which focused on patients who had received two doses).As for the study's subjects, all of them were white, and four were participating in medical training at Cape Town hospitals. The other three were on vacation. They were all between the ages of 25 and 39, and none of them could be classified as "obese", or had any other relevant medical history. All of them had tested negative before arriving in Cape Town, and none of them had reported a prior bout of COVID infection.Five of them had received three doses of the COVID vaccine made by Pfizer and BioNTech. One had received a dose of the Moderna jab followed by Pfizer for the next jabs. Another received the AstraZeneca jab then switched over to Pfizer.All of the subjects reported respiratory symptoms starting between Nov. 30 and Dec. 2; they ultimately experienced mild or moderate disease. The presence of the group of Germans presented a "unique opportunity" that researchers quickly jumped on, since the seven individuals represented the first known cases of omicron breakthrough infection involving patients who had already been boosted."The presence of this group from Germany presented a unique opportunity to study omicron breakthrough infections in individuals with mRNA vaccine boosters," the researchers said."Robust CD4 and CD8 T-cell responses" were detected in the subjects, the researchers said in reference to an additional line of the human immune system’s defenses aside from the production of antibodies. "The mild to moderate course of illness suggests that full vaccination followed by a booster dose still provides good protection against severe disease caused by omicron," they said.

Omicron Variant Encourages Some to Drop Covid-19 Precautions, Despite Risks – WSJ - Omicron’s ubiquity and reduced severity are encouraging some people to drop pandemic precautions, decisions that public-health experts say present new risks for people at risk of severe Covid-19 outcomes. People, including those who got vaccinated and boosted and curtailed their activities for months, are letting their guard down in the face of a variant that appears to be infecting everyone but causing largely mild illness. This is a dangerous way of thinking, doctors and scientists say: Omicron still poses risks to more vulnerable people, including the elderly, immunocompromised and those with underlying health conditions. Some doctors say they are also worried about Omicron resulting in more long-Covid cases, which can result in lingering and worsening symptoms months after infection, as well as questions of new variants arising with such widespread infection. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention encourages people to avoid nonessential travel and eating inside restaurants. But some people say that they are tired of waiting to reconvene with other people and the world, and that they believe the risks of the pandemic have declined. Joseph Anderson, a 39-year-old librarian in New York City, said he spent the past two years doing everything he could to protect himself and others. He followed CDC guidelines and got Covid-19 vaccinations as soon as they were available. In December, Mr. Anderson, his wife and 11-month-old son all contracted Covid-19 and spent Christmas in isolation with mild, flulike symptoms. He and his wife considered canceling their son’s first birthday party this past Saturday, but after recovering from Covid-19, they chose not to hold back. “When you’re scared about something for so long and then it finally happens, you kind of feel almost a sense of relief,” he says. Mr. Anderson plans to socialize and travel sooner rather than later, while his immunity from his vaccinations and recent infection is likely to be the strongest. He is planning a family trip to see his brother in New Orleans. “I kind of feel like after getting vaccinated and boosted and contracting it that I’m as protected as I can possibly be as a person right now,” he says. Karen Edwards, an epidemiologist at the University of California, Irvine says the threat of Covid-19 means you should avoid eating and drinking in public if you can. More interactions between potentially infected people will give the virus more pathways to spread and potentially mutate, she says. “If we had a variant that caused severe disease like Delta and was as transmissible as Omicron, we wouldn’t want to see that,” Dr. Edwards says.

Blacks and Hispanics are unlikely to have fair access to Paxlovid - This doesn’t justify the NYDH guidance. In a recent post, I criticized the New York Department of Health for using race/ethnicity as risk factors when determining eligibility for Paxlovid without providing evidence that Black/Hispanic people are more likely to die if they get Covid-19 than similar White people. My criticism is not based on a Panglossian view of racial/ethnic equality. I think it is quite unlikely that Blacks/Hispanics will have equal access to Paxlovid during the current omicron wave. Unfortunately, the NYDH policy seem unlikely to do much to fix this problem, it will lead to a backlash that will benefit Republicans, and there are other policies that might be more effective and would certainly be less controversial and vulnerable to legal attack. If you get Covid-19, whether you get Paxlovid depends on

• 1) whether you go to a doctor within 5 days of symptom onset and before your symptoms become serious,
• 2) whether you qualify for Paxlovid based on your risk factors and your doctor prescribes it,
• 3) whether the pharmacy in your neighborhood has Paxlovid in stock, and, if not,
• 4) whether you have the knowledge and resources to search out other pharmacies not in your neighborhood that have Paxlovid in stock.

In the real world, I suspect that these factors will all work against Black and Hispanic people, especially if they are low income.Whites (especially upper-class Whites) are more likely to have primary care doctors and to be aware of the need to get tested immediately to get Paxlovid. They are therefore more likely than Blacks and Hispanics to be eligible for Paxlovid when they get diagnosed (within 5 days of symptom onset, symptoms not serious). Consistent with this, the CDC reports that Blacks appear to be sicker at the time they are hospitalized for Covid-19, which suggests less/later access to medical care, and less eligibility for Paxlovid. I suspect that testing capacity is higher in White neighborhoods (especially upper income neighborhoods), which will be critical to getting diagnosed in time to qualify for Paxlovid.The NYDH guidance does not address this problem.

Fact check: The theory that SARS-CoV-2 is becoming milder - There's a growing narrative in the mainstream media, on social media — maybe even at your dinner table. That is: The coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 is weakening and evolving into a less deadly virus. In the future, each new variant that crops up will cause milder illness than the previous variant."There's this story that we're going to have variants that are progressively less severe," says Dr. Roby Bhattacharyya, who's an infectious disease specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School.But that's completely untrue, Bhattacharyya says. "It's comforting to think there might be some tendency for SARS-CoV-2 to evolve toward a milder form. That's not what we're seeing here." This narrative has arisen over the past month as scientists and doctors increasingly find evidence that the omicron variant of the coronavirus is less likely to cause severe disease than previous variants.Data from hospitals in South Africa, the U.K., and the U.S. all suggest that the risk of a patient with omicron being admitted to a hospital is about half that observed with the delta variant. If you are admitted to the hospital, the risk of being put on a ventilator has dropped by about 75%. On top of that, laboratory experiments and animal studies have shown that omicron acts differently in the lungs than previous variants. For example, biologists at the University of Cambridge found that omicron doesn't infect lung cells as aggressively as delta does. Specifically, Ravi Gupta and his team looked to see how well omicron and delta can infect lung and respiratory organoids — miniature 3D clusters of cells that resemble specific types of tissues in the lungs and respiratory tract. Omicron grew slower than delta — about a tenth as fast — inside the lung cells. But the team saw no difference in replication inside upper respiratory cells."Omicron's growth was severely disabled in cells that delta infected very aggressively," Gupta says. "And that was a real shock, because we were seeing omicron spreading very, very rapidly globally and yet omicron's [ability to grow] in certain cell types was really attenuated." The team also found that omicron uses a different path to enter cells than delta. And this alternative entryway likely causes less damage inside the lungs. "I think these differences are having quite marked consequences in terms of what we're seeing clinically," Gupta says, "with patients having less inflammation in the lungs and a reduced requirement for supplemental oxygen." Gupta and his team published their findings online last month. And right away, the media "seized upon them as a sign of the endgame of COVID," Gupta says. "I was very worried about that narrative because ... omicron is still a very dangerous infection."And the emergence of a less severe variant like omicron is not a sign that SARS-CoV-2 is evolving into a milder virus that is less able to infect the lungs. "It's important to emphasize that the next variant — and there will definitely be one — may not evolve from omicron and it will not necessarily have these characteristics,"

Let's stop saying 'breakthrough cases' — it isn't helping - When historians analyze the national response to the COVID-19 health crisis, they’ll conclude the country’s public health authorities were responsible for saving millions of American lives by recommending the adoption of essential pandemic mitigation measures. Vaccines, mask wearing, social distancing and hand washing have proven their value in battling the spread of the virus. Yet these same health professionals will be criticized for their failure to communicate in a thoughtful and effective manner. The public has decided the pandemic is over, and it’s because public health communications are falling on deaf ears. Throughout the pandemic, public health experts have communicated critical COVID-19 guidance to the American people in ways that are confounding — and sometimes contradictory. Examples of mixed messages by public health officials since the start of the pandemic are plentiful. From mask practices to back-to-school recommendations to booster shots, confusion and ambiguity have circulated, creating uncertainty at times as to what people can do to stay safe. The most recent example is the use of a term that has now become a household phrase: “breakthrough cases.” By now we know what it means, coined to distinguish infections in “fully vaccinated” people from those diagnosed in the unvaccinated. But words matter, and at a time when we need to encourage as many people as possible to get their shots, “breakthrough” is the wrong one to propagate. By trumpeting the term “breakthrough cases,” public health authorities are spreading the impression that these infections are novel, unique and unanticipated by the scientific community. In fact, the vaccine was designed precisely with this likelihood in mind, and it is working exactly as intended. With cases of hospitalization and death largely isolated among the unvaccinated population, it clearly shows the vaccines are doing their job and achieving the desired outcome. To those who have dutifully received their shots, the term “breakthrough case” leaves many wondering whether the vaccine was worth it. To the unvaccinated, it validates every bias and conspiracy theory that has fueled their hesitancy to date. What better way to dissuade these individuals from receiving their shots than by assigning a label that corroborates their own misgivings?

Nearly 1 million pediatric Covid cases reported last week -- Nearly 1 million cases of Covid-19 were reported among children in the United States last week, the American Academy of Pediatrics said Tuesday. The pediatric case count ending the week of Jan. 13 — 981,488 — reflects a 69 percent increase from the previous week's 580,247 cases. The new case count is likely an underestimate of the true number of pediatric Covid cases, the AAP said, because many kids are either tested at home with rapid tests that are never reported to health officials, or not tested at all because of the shortage of tests. Despite the dramatic spike, the rise is due to the increased overall spread of the omicron variant, and does not suggest that the virus has changed somehow to make kids more susceptible, said Dr. Mark Kline, the physician-in-chief at Children's Hospital New Orleans. Omicron is simply contagious in a way that earlier variants were not. As of Tuesday, the variant accounted for 99.5 percent of all Covid cases in the U.S., according the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "That figure of a million is really eye-popping," Kline said. "But I don't think that omicron has a unique propensity for children. Kids are being affected like everybody else." Pediatric Covid cases have accounted for 20 to 25 percent of all U.S. cases since November. Last week, children represented 21.4 percent of weekly reported cases, according to the AAP. Less than a third of kids ages 5 to 11 have received at least one dose of a Covid vaccine, and no vaccines are available to kids under age 5. "They're the only age group left that is 100 percent unvaccinated," Kline said. "We know that a lot of these cases are occurring in very young children."

Older kids, those with underlying chronic conditions most at risk for severe COVID-19, study finds -- From early on in the pandemic, available data has suggested that younger people are not as susceptible to severe COVID-19 illness as older adults. However, the recent surge of children and adolescents being hospitalized with the omicron variant has experts questioning if some may be more vulnerable than others.Now, new data published in JAMA Network Open has shed some much needed light on the issue. The study found that youths in older age – between the ages of 10 and 18 – and those with chronic medical conditions are more at risk for having severe illness. In order to determine who may be more susceptible, researchers tracked over 3,200 youths who were seen at an emergency department and tested positive for COVID-19. There were 41 hospitals located in 10 different countries included in the study — with 62% of them being in the U.S.Nearly 23% of those who tested positive needed to be hospitalized, with a little more than 3% experiencing severe outcomes, including complications such as respiratory distress, heart issues and brain swelling. Four of the participants died.Those with chronic conditions had almost double the risk of developing serious complications. These included heart disease, diabetes, gastrointestinal disorders and neurological conditions, but surprisingly asthma was not a risk factor.Dr. Todd Florin, an associate professor at Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago and an author on the study, told U.S News & World Report that this could be because the children in the study had well-managed asthma, or they had only experienced a mild illness.Florin and his colleagues also found that children between the ages of 10 and 17 were at the highest risk for severe disease. Almost 6% of participants in that age range developed a severe complication, while only 1.7% of those under the age of one did. Florin said that one particularly encouraging finding was that very few of the children who were sent home from the ER were later hospitalized or developed severe complications. He noted that since their findings only include those who were sick enough to end up in the ER, the study numbers should be taken into context.

COVID-Hospitalization Numbers Are as Bad as They Look - More Americans are now hospitalized with COVID-19 than at any previous point in the pandemic. For hospitals, the math of this surge is simple: Fewer staff and more patients mean worse care. Around the United States, people with all kinds of medical emergencies are now waiting hours, if not days, for help. Some reporters and pundits have claimed that this picture is overly pessimistic because the hospitalization numbers include people who are simply hospitalized with COVID, rather than for COVID—“incidental” patients who just happen to test positive while being treated for something else. In some places, the proportion of such cases seems high. UC San Francisco recently said a third of its COVID patients “are admitted for other reasons,” while the Jackson Health System in Florida put that proportion at half. In New York State, COVID “was not included as one of the reasons for admission” for 43 percent of the hospitalized people who have tested positive. But the “with COVID” hospitalization numbers are more complicated than they first seem. Many people on that side of the ledger are still in the hospital because of the coronavirus, which has both caused and exacerbated chronic conditions. And more important, these nuances don’t alter the real, urgent, and enormous crisis unfolding in American hospitals. Whether patients are admitted with or for COVID, they’re still being admitted in record volumes that hospitals are struggling to care for. “The truth is, we’re still in the emergency phase of the pandemic, and everyone who is downplaying that should probably take a tour of a hospital before they do,” Jeremy Faust, an emergency physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, in Massachusetts, told me. Some COVID-positive patients are unquestionably hospitalized for COVID: They are mostly unvaccinated, have classic respiratory problems, and require supplemental oxygen. Omicron might be less severe than Delta, but that doesn’t make it mild. “If a virus that causes less severe lung disease affects an extraordinarily large proportion of the population, you’ll still get a lot of them in the hospital with severe lung disease,” Sara Murray, a hospitalist at UC San Francisco, told me. The proportion of such patients varies around the country: In areas where Omicron has taken off, it’s lower than in previous surges, but it remains high in communities that still have a lot of Delta infections or low vaccination rates, as The Washington Post has reported. At the University of Nebraska Medical Center, “the vast majority of our COVID-positive cases are at the hospital for reasons related to their COVID infection,” James Lawler, an infectious-disease physician, told me.

US Covid-19 hospitalizations expected to substantially increase from an already record-high over the coming weeks, expert says (CNN) -- As hospitals across the US handle record-high Covid-19 hospitalizations nearly two years into the pandemic, staffing shortages are expanding as health care employees face prolonged risks for exposure. With available intensive care beds dwindling across several states, experts are encouraging Americans to remain vigilant and try to avoid Covid-19 as tough weeks lie ahead. Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, warns that because increases in hospitalizations tend to lag spikes in overall cases, "the next three, four weeks are going to be hard" for the nation, which already has more than 156,000 people currently hospitalized with Covid-19, according to data Sunday from the US Department of Health and Human Services."I expect those numbers to get substantially higher. The problem is we are running out of health care workforce, we don't have the staffing. So that is going to be a challenge for many weeks ahead," Jha told Fox Sunday.While early data from New York, one of the earliest hotspots in this latest surge, shows promising developments -- its test positivity rate is 13%, down from a peak of 23% a couple weeks ago, according to Gov. Kathy Hochul -- the wave of ongoing Omicron infections is expected to peak at different times across the country.Cases are plateauing and even declining in some regions, US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy said Sunday, but he cautions that's not the case everywhere."The challenge is that the entire country is not moving at the same pace. The Omicron wave started later in other parts of the country, so we shouldn't expect a national peak in the next coming days," Murthy told Jake Tapper on CNN's "State of the Union."The average daily number of new recorded Covid-19 cases surpassed 750,000 for the seventh consecutive day Sunday, according to Johns Hopkins University data, meaning Americans at work, school and elsewhere face a heightened risk of exposure that is unparalleled during the pandemic. Additionally, the US averaged 1,796 Covid-19 deaths a day over the past week, according to JHU data. Former FDA commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb said Sunday the benefits for those at higher risk for severe illness of avoiding this surge means they will have a better ability to fight the virus as the year moves forward."I would much rather have my reckoning with Covid after I've been vaccinated a number of times, after there's orally available drugs widely accessible to treat this infection, after there's monoclonal antibodies widely accessible to treat it, after diagnostic testing is stockpiled," Gottlieb told CBS' "Face the Nation." "And those realities will be truth come this fall, certainly come this summer. So I think people will be in a much better position to grapple with this next fall. I think we should remain vigilant for the next several weeks, try to avoid this infection if you can," he said.

New projections estimate that up to 304,000 in the US could die from COVID-19 by mid-March - This week the COVID-19 Scenario Modeling Hub, co-led by Professor Katriona Shea of Pennsylvania State University, projected that by March 12, 2022, the United States could see between 409,000 to 2,380,000 cumulative hospitalizations and 54,000 to 304,000 additional COVID-related deaths before the Omicron surge subsides. The Penn State modeling center utilizes multiple datasets to forecast their projections, which are then shared with the White House. Such a grim prognosis demands the immediate mobilization of all public health measures to stem the tide of infections and prevent such a massive additional loss of life. Instead, the Biden administration is offering the country hundreds of millions of adult non-surgical N95 respirators sourced from the government’s Strategic National Stockpile. According to White House officials, these will be made available at local pharmacies and health centers by early February. These will barely suffice for a day or two and come at a moment when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) forecasts suggest that the peak in infections will have passed. Additionally, each US household is to be provided four free test kits, shipped in seven to 12 days once ordered through an online portal, covidtests.com, or they can be remimbursed for purchased tests by their insurance company after a three-page form is completed, printed, and mailed or faxed. Worse, some of these rapid antigen tests are temperature-sensitive and, if they are exposed to the cold for too long, the test results are affected. Simply put, the latest steps taken by the White House—which has ruled out any action to stop of the spread of virus, including lockdowns and school closures—are largely performative and an insult to the population, demonstrating the Biden administration’s criminal indifference to mass suffering and death.

‘You’ve got nothing left’: A Maine nurse’s view from the pandemic frontlines -- As the pandemic grinds on into its third year, with no clear end in sight, the stress on nurses and frontline health care workers is unprecedented.Last week, more Mainers were hospitalized with COVID-19 than at any point during the pandemic, further straining a health care system so short-staffed that Gov. Janet Mills has deployed hundreds of members of the Maine National Guard. Meanwhile, health care workers have been quitting hospital jobs. Those who remain are doing their best to provide care in circumstances they could not have imagined just a few years ago.Cheryl Quint, an emergency nurse who has worked at Houlton Regional Hospital for the last 25 years, and president of the Maine chapter of the Emergency Nurses Association, agreed to provide her perspective on the toll the pandemic has taken on her and her colleagues. The following interview, which took place in early January, has been lightly edited for clarity and length. We’re going into the third year of this pandemic. How are you and your colleagues doing? - I can honestly say that we’re physically and mentally exhausted. I’ve been nursing for over 30 years, and I never thought that I would ever come to a point where I should feel this way. But it has completely drained us for so many reasons. I mean, let’s face it, the whole world has been impacted by the pandemic, in so many different ways. And, as health care providers, it’s been like a domino effect.Coming from a small facility, we have to be able to stabilize our patients, and then, because we are limited with our resources, we work with other facilities to transfer our patients to get the higher level of care that they need. And we’re not able to do that. And it’s not just here in Houlton, Maine, it’s statewide, it’s national.And it weighs on us as well, because we know our patients need that higher level of care and yet we can’t provide it. We pull everything out of our resources that we have where we’re at. But we just don’t have them. The patients are suffering and because of that the nurses and providers are feeling very burdened because we’re not able to give the care that we typically would be able to give our patients, so it’s really affected us.Now we’re having to maintain these patients for sometimes hours, sometimes days before we can get them to other facilities for the care that is needed. So it’s been very hard. Nurses are burnt out. There’s nurses and providers everywhere just rethinking their careers because, you know, how do you go to work every day just knowing what you’re going to be coming up against those same challenges every day that you can’t fix.Nurses are healers, they’re fixers, and we can’t do that right now. And that’s part of the struggle, you know, that we’re facing. So as a whole, yes, I think we’re really feeling the impact physically and mentally. What type of things are you not able to provide that you’d like to? If we have a trauma patient come in, if we have fractures that come in, if we have patients that are having a heart attack and they need to get straight to thecatheterization lab, we can’t deliver that care at our facility. Typically, they go to Bangor for that.We’ve had a couple of patients that we needed to transfer out, and it’s been a couple of days. Typically they would have gone by Life Flight or by ground crew, you want to get them there to have that procedure done as soon as possible. We don’t have the capability of managing those types of patients. I’m sure bigger hospitals are even feeling that because they don’t have the resources they need. There’s just no place to put these patients.Some if it is due to COVID patients. Some of it is due to staffing. There’s been a nursing shortage for years, but not to this level. There’s just no staff to take care of patients. Our patient-to-nurse ratio has increased, and that’s another challenge as well. We’re trying to take care of these patients with the limited staff that we have and trying to provide a level of care that we’re used to providing and not being able to. It’s not untypical for nurses to go home in tears at night, because they’re frustrated, they don’t feel like they’ve given the care that their patients deserve. And it’s just heartbreaking to not be able to do that on many different levels.

Why Covid-19 Didn’t Create the Nursing Crisis – NYTimes - We’re entering our third year of Covid, and America’s nurses — who we celebrated as heroes during the early days of lockdown — are now leaving the bedside. The pandemic arrived with many people having great hope for reform on many fronts, including the nursing industry, but much of that optimism seems to have faded.In the Opinion Video above, nurses set the record straight about the root cause of the nursing crisis: chronic understaffing by profit-driven hospitals that predates the pandemic. “I could no longer work in critical care under the conditions I was being forced to work under with poor staffing,” explains one nurse, “and that’s when I left.” They also tear down the common misconception that there’s a shortage of nurses. In fact, there are more qualified nurses today in America than ever before. To keep patients safe and protect our health care workers, lawmakers could regulate nurse-patient ratios, which California put in place in 2004, with positive results. Similar legislation was proposed and defeated in Massachusetts several years ago (with help from a $25 million “no” campaign funded by the hospital lobby), but it is currently on the table in Illinois and Pennsylvania. These laws could save patient lives and create a more just work environment for a vulnerable generation of nurses, the ones we pledged to honor and protect at the start of the pandemic.

COVID-19 updates: LA has highest daily death total since April - ABC News - Los Angeles County reported 66 deaths associated with COVID-19 on Saturday, which is the most coronavirus-related fatalities reported in one day since April 2, 2021, according to the county's health department. The majority of deaths reported this week occurred in people who became infected after Dec. 20, when the omicron variant was circulating widely, according to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health. The county also reported 41,765 new cases of COVID-19, and said "the extraordinarily high number of new cases reflects worrisome rates of community transmission." In the county there are more than 4,300 people hospitalized with COVID-19.

COVID-19 deaths notably rise, as hospitalizations dip: Weekly COVID roundup - – Though still remarkably high, Ohio hospitals saw a decline in their daily COVID-19 patient count this week. However, the state also reported its highest number of COVID-19 deaths in recent memory. Daily COVID-19 hospitalizations climbed to the highest-ever figure on Monday, Jan. 10 (6,749), but then steadily fell throughout the week. Week-over-week, the daily patient count was lower on Saturday (6,289) than it was the previous Saturday (6,529). That’s a decrease of 240 individuals.

US coronavirus: Omicron hasn't peaked nationwide, and 'the next few weeks will be tough,' US surgeon general says - Areas that were among the first to get hit hard by the Omicron variant are starting to see their Covid-19 numbers level off or even improve. But that's not the case for much of the country, US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy said. "There are parts of the country -- New York, in particular, and other parts of the Northeast -- where we are starting to see a plateau, and in some cases, an early decline in cases," Murthy told CNN on Sunday. "The challenge is that the entire country is not moving at the same pace," he said. "The Omicron wave started later in other parts of the country, so we shouldn't expect a national peak in the next coming days. The next few weeks will be tough." An average of more than 750,000 new Covid-19 infections were reported every day over the past week, according to Johns Hopkins University data.That means Americans at work, school and elsewhere face a heightened risk of exposure that is unparalleled during the pandemic.The number of Americans dying every day from Covid-19 has increased in recent days, with 1,796 Covid-19 deaths reported Sunday, according to JHU data. And 156,000 people were hospitalized with Covid-19 as of Sunday, according to data from the US Department of Health and Human Services. The crush of Covid-19 patients means some hospitals are running out of space to treat other patients in intensive care units.

Many hospitals are halting nonurgent procedures and relying on the National Guard as Covid-19 hospitalizations rise -- As Covid-19 hospitalizations reach new highs, more states and health care systems are cutting back services that aren't urgent and relying on National Guard personnel to fill staffing gaps as infected health care employees miss work to recover and patient demand grows. While officials have started to call out very early signs that the Omicron coronavirus wave is peaking -- or at least plateauing -- in parts of the Northeast, experts say it will be weeks before any change can be declared a trend. Until then, the surge has put frontline workers in the medical industry and others at higher risk. More than 155,900 people in the US are hospitalized with Covid-19, according to data Thursday from the US Department of Health and Human Services, surpassing records set in last winter's surge. And hospitals need more people to help provide care. Meantime, deaths nationally have lagged from the worst of last winter's surge, as the country has averaged 1,817 Covid-19 deaths a day over the past week, Johns Hopkins University data shows. The peak daily average was 3,402 one year ago on January 13. In Washington state, hospitals will temporarily halt nonurgent procedures "so as much capacity and staff can be dedicated to emergent needs -- the people who need this right now," Gov. Jay Inslee said Thursday. In Wisconsin, National Guard members will be trained as certified nursing assistants to support hospitals and nursing homes, Gov. Tony Evers said.

COVID-19 case numbers surge as Oklahoma doctors issue warning — Doctors warn that the worst is yet to come after the latest surge in COVID-19 cases in Oklahoma and as the Sooner State continues to shatter record after record. Last week alone, Oklahoma had five records broken in terms of COVID-19 numbers. Because of the large number of cases the state is seeing, the Oklahoma State Department of Health released a rare Saturday update to the statewide COVID-19 case count. The more than 14,000 new COVID-19 cases reported Saturday marked the worst single-day caseload since the pandemic started in March 2020. Health officials also reported that more than 88,000 Oklahomans are infected with the virus. Dr. Dale Bratzler, OU Health's chief COVID-19 officer, said he's worried the hospitalization numbers will soon catch up with the number of cases Oklahoma is seeing. He said the omicron variant is less likely to put people in the intensive care unit, but there is still a risk. "Throughout most of the pandemic, about one-third of the people who had COVID-19 that were in the hospital ended up in the intensive care unit at any point in time," Bratzler said. "Right now, we're running about 22-23% of the people in the hospital with COVID-19 are ending up in the ICU." There is some hopeful news, with Bratzler saying he doesn't expect this peak to last much longer. He also said while Oklahoma has this very infectious variant, it's important to stay home if you can and to upgrade your mask to a medical-grade one because cloth ones are no longer recommended.

As omicron took hold across US, the delta variant held on in Maine - Maine continued to see a high number of COVID-19 cases from the virus’ delta variant well after the highly contagious omicron variant became the dominant strain in the U.S. An analysis of virus test samples taken by Walgreens pharmacies across the nation showed that Maine had the highest percentage of delta variant cases as recently as Dec. 30. Walgreens is a major testing provider across the nation and has more than 70 stores across Maine’s 16 counties. While the omicron variant now accounts for the vast majority of Maine’s new COVID-19 cases, the fact that the state was among the last to have a significant number of cases from the previously dominant delta strain is another data point showing that Maine generally lags the rest of the country in the spread of respiratory illnesses. Around 44 percent of positive COVID-19 tests sampled were from the delta variant as of Dec. 30, by far the highest share in the United States, according to Walgreens’ COVID-19 index. The next highest shares were found in other largely rural states: Kansas (37 percent), West Virginia (29 percent) and Iowa (29 percent). North Dakota was the only state not included in the data. Walgreens’ estimates of current cases show a far higher rate of omicron in Maine. Some 94 percent of cases were presumed to be omicron as of Jan. 15, but that’s still the third-lowest rate in the U.S. Vermont and Iowa had slightly lower rates.

Sacramento County sets COVID hospital record amid omicron - Sacramento County broke an all-time record for coronavirus hospitalizations over the weekend, reporting nearly 550 COVID-positive patients in hospital beds. The county had 533 confirmed COVID-19 cases in hospitals Saturday and 547 on Sunday, according to data updated Monday by the California Department of Public Health. Each exceeded the previous record of 518 patients, reached at the peak of the winter 2020 surge. Hospitalizations with COVID-19 in Sacramento County have more than doubled in the past two weeks, up from 267 on Jan. 2, as the highly contagious omicron variant continues to boost transmission rates. The county’s daily rate for new infections has exploded to just over 200 per 100,000 residents, according to a Friday update from the local health office. That’s also an all-time high, more than triple the pre-omicron record of 64 per 100,000 set in December 2020. Health officials say that while the omicron variant tends to produce milder illness than the previously dominant delta variant, sending a smaller proportion of infected people to hospitals, the sheer number of people contracting omicron at once will likely outweigh its relative mildness and overload hospitals with virus patients.Hospital leaders in California recently warned that they expect the state’s health care systems to be overwhelmed through February due to omicron.Nearly one-fifth of Sacramento County’s 2,867 licensed hospital beds are now occupied by patients with lab-confirmed COVID-19, state data show.

Arkansas' active covid cases set record for 13th straight day as hospitalizations rise - For the 13th day in a row, Arkansas has set a record for the number of active cases of covid-19. The Arkansas Department of Health reported on Sunday that there are 96,379 active cases of covid-19 in the state. That's an increase of 2,113 from Saturday. On Christmas Day, the total number of active covid-19 cases in the state was 10,033. Holiday gatherings and the highly contagious omicron variant have been cited as reasons for the increase in cases. The Health Department also reported an additional 28 people hospitalized with covid-19, bringing the total currently hospitalized with the virus in Arkansas to 1,385. The Health Department reported 5,386 new cases of covid-19 on Sunday. That number is down considerably from the pandemic peak of 12,990 new cases on Thursday, but it's high for a Sunday, when fewer cases are normally reported. On the previous Sunday, Jan. 9, 4,308 new cases were reported. The Sunday before that (Jan. 2), the total was 2,181. Gov. Asa Hutchinson touted the testing numbers in a tweet on Sunday. They included an additional 13,308 polymerase chain reaction ( PCR) tests and 856 antigen tests that were given Saturday. "Testing remained high Saturday with much lower cases reported," he wrote on Twitter. "This is a hopeful sign we are close to a peak. The best way we can come back down is to get vaccinated and boosted."

New Jersey releases numbers on breakthrough COVID-19 cases in people who have received a booster – New Jersey residents who have received COVID-19 booster shots are more than three times less likely to be infected or hospitalized by the coronavirus, according to data released by the state Department of Health. This marks the first time the state has released data on breakthrough cases since all adults became eligible for boosters on Nov. 19. Of the roughly 2.3 million residents who had received a booster dose, 19,360 tested positive for the virus between Dec. 6 and Jan. 2. That's compared to 113,775 breakthrough cases among the nearly 3.9 million people who received only a primary vaccination course. There were 883 hospitalizations among those with only a primary vaccination course, and 161 hospitalizations among those who received a booster dose. There were two deaths in each of the groups. "The rates of infection and hospitalization for those with boosters is more than three times lower than for those who have only a primary vaccination," Gov. Phil Murphy tweeted.

Mass. Confirms 56,489 New COVID Cases Over Long Weekend – The state's latest COVID-19 data released Tuesday hints at a slow decline of key metrics, though experts say the health care system is still under great stress.There were 56,489 new COVID cases reported Tuesday, data that includes four days due to the holiday weekend. That brings the total reported case count over the pandemic to 1,375,183. There were 47 new deaths, bringing the death toll to 20,497.On Tuesday, Massachusetts' seven-day average of positive tests was at 17.44%, down from the averages over 20% seen last week. Hospitalizations were also lower than what was last reported on Friday.Massachusetts' COVID metrics, tracked on the Department of Public Health's interactive coronavirus dashboard, dashboard, had been spiking to heights not seen since previous surges, thought to be driven at least in part by the omicron variant. But, experts are now cautiously optimistic that we might be on a downturn.They warn, however, that we are still in for a difficult few weeks and that the health care system will continue to be strained.The number of patients in Massachusetts hospitals with confirmed COVID-19 cases was at 3,192, down slightly from the 3,223 reported Friday, which was the highest the state had seen since May 8, 2020. The state has changed how hospitals report COVID-related cases, and top Boston doctors say the new data has the numbers cut in half, but it has yet to be publicly released. The number of hospitalizations reached nearly 4,000 early in the pandemic, but dipped under an average of 85 at one point this July.

 COVID Hospitalizations Cut in Half By New Reporting Guidelines – NBC Boston - The number of patients who are severely ill with COVID-19 is less than half of all those hospitalized with the virus, Boston doctors said Tuesday, but that doesn't mean there's any less strain on the health care system.Hospitals have started to differentiate between patients they admit primarily for severe COVID-19 and those admitted to be treated for something else who end up testing positive. The change in reporting cut the number of what had been reported as COVID-19 hospitalizations in half.The idea is to give the public a better understanding of how many people are in the hospital because of the virus. But while that data began to be collected last week, it won't be released by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health until sometime this week.During NBC10 Boston's weekly "COVID Q&A" series Tuesday, Tufts Medical Center's hospital epidemiologist Dr. Shira Doron said in a week's worth of data, the number of patients being treated for severe COVID-19 was considerably below 50% of all COVID-19 hospitalizations.She specified that under the new guidelines, hospitals are reporting the proportion of patients who received the drug Dexamethasone, a steroid used to reduce inflammation, at some point during their hospitalization vs. those who are COVID positive and in the hospital."One day was as low as 36%," Doron said of the data. "The state actually called and said, 'Are you sure that it's only 36%?' And so we took a look and indeed, none of those patients were receiving any supplemental oxygen."The data indicates that although patients may have been in the hospital with COVID-19, the majority of them didn't need any oxygen, she explained. And Tufts Medical Center isn't the only hospital reporting lower numbers."We looked at what the other hospitals were reporting that day and we found that we weren't an outlier in that," Doron said. "And so I think that, you know, from Massachusetts, where again, we do mandatory testing of everybody on admission, we may find relatively lower than expected, I think, proportions of patients receiving that drug, which is the standard of care."

Washington hospitals issue urgent plea to public amid COVID-19 spike -Hospitals in Washington state issued an urgent plea to the public on Saturday asking residents to do their part and reduce the pressure on health care facilities overwhelmed by the coronavirus. In a statement released on Saturday, King County hospitals underscored the rapid increase in illness in the state, citing data that hospitalizations were up 700 percent from 8 to 70 people admitted each day. “The sheer number of patients means hospital acute care and ICUs across the state are very full. Hospitals are doing everything they can with critical staffing levels to provide care in the most challenging situation we’ve seen to date,” Washington State Hospital Association President and CEO Cassie Sauer said in the statement. Along with capacity issues, hospitals are experiencing a shortage of staff, leading to difficulties getting patients discharged. “The patients most severely impacted by COVID-19 are almost all unvaccinated and unboosted. If you haven’t yet, please get vaccinated," Sauer said. The group told citizens they needed to get vaccinated, get a booster if they are vaccinated, wear a N95 or KN95 mask and avoid crowded indoor areas, among other things. The hospital system said that health care facilities were struggling even before the omicron surge as non-COVID-19 related cases were increasing due to postponed surgeries. The increase in COVID-19 cases is now coupled with the increase in non-coronavirus-related visits, prompting the appeal to the public to do what they can to avoid catching a severe case of COVID-19. The plea comes after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found the coronavirus booster shots provide strong protection against the omicron variant. The U.S. has continued to see a record number of coronavirus infections in large part due to the spread of the highly transmissible variant. States across the country have asked the federal government for backup to relieve pressure on hospitals that are at capacity due to the rapid increase in COVID-19-related hospitalizations.

 Omicron has Peaked, Now What? - (8 graphs)- It’s almost certain that the Omicron wave has peaked in the US. In fact, the only Census region it is still up week over week is in the Midwest: In almost all of the areas hit hard early – Puerto Rico, and the NYC and DC metro areas – cases are down sharply since peaking. Additionally cases are down substantially in California, Florida, and Illinois: Only Hawaii, anomalously, has continued to increase. This follows the pattern set in South Africa, where cases are now down over 80% from their peak, and deaths have plateaued after a 5 week lag: Note that deaths have increased less than cases in each of the last two waves, and only increased about 30% as much as cases during Omicron. The situation is similar in the UK: It appears the US will follow a similar trajectory with deaths, which probably will peak at under 2500 per day in late February: Returning to the US, although I won’t bother with a graph, cases are only up 10% or more in the past week in the States of AK, AL, AZ, HI, ID, KS, MT, KY, LA, NE, NV, NM, ND, OK, SC, TN, UT, WV, and WY. Hospitalizations have peaked simultaneously with cases, which suggests either a capacity or triage issue, and/or people are reluctant to seek treatment there. ICU admissions are still slowly increasing: Because of the capacity/triage/reluctance issue, it is unclear the extent to which hospitalizations rose less steeply than cases, Hospitals will remain under severe strain for several more weeks. If cases in the US decline roughly as a mirror image of how they rose during Omicron, what next? Trevor Bedford, the biostatistician whose work has been invaluable throughout the pandemic, has a guess: ““We estimate that as of Jan 17 the US as whole has had a cumulative ~15M confirmed cases of Omicron, or approximately 4.5% of the population recorded as confirmed cases. The large majority (>90%) of these accumulated since Dec 14 “Assuming between a 1 in 4 to 1 in 5 case reporting rate, suggests between 18% to 23% of the country has Omicron by Jan 17, with the large majority becoming infected in a span of just ~4 weeks. “There may be a longer tail of circulation after the peak (as seen in South Africa), but a rough expectation would have an equivalent number of cases in the next 4 weeks on the other side of the peak. This would suggest 36-46% of the US infected by Omicron by mid-Feb. “My big question now is to what extent will Omicron-like emergence events characterize “endemic” circulation of SARS-CoV-2? Given it occurred once, having it occur again would not be at all surprising, but I don’t know whether to expect this every year or every ten.” Note the big assumption being, 20% to 25% of all Omicron cases are “confirmed” and the rest flying under the radar. My own rule of thumb has been a ratio of 2:1 or 2.2:1. The reason for this is the experience of North and South Dakota one year ago, where there were massive outbreaks – the biggest of any States before Omicron – one year ago, with 60% of all tests being positive. That hasn’t prevented both States from having Omicron outbreaks more than 50% higher than the worst of that wave: If North and South Dakota’s previous wave, with 10% of their populations having *confirmed* cases and 60% test positivity strongly suggesting a huge number of unconfirmed cases, didn’t lead to sustained resistance to reinfection, is a 10% *confirmed* outbreak in the US as a whole, with 45%+ test positivity, going to have a different result? In other words, the situation going forward depends on whether and when the next unusual variant hits. And how much resistance has been obtained by the vast unvaccinated idiot population in the US. As the graph below shows, only 15% more of the US population vaccinating in the past 7 months, despite both the Delta and Omicron waves:

COVID program delivers 1 billion doses to poorer countries (AP) — The World Health Organization said Sunday that an UN-backed program shipping coronavirus vaccines to many poor countries has now delivered 1 billion doses, but that milestone “is only a reminder of the work that remains” after hoarding and stockpiling in rich countries.A shipment of 1.1 million COVID -19 vaccine doses to Rwanda on Saturday included the billionth dose supplied via the COVAX program, the U.N. health agency said.WHO has long criticized unequal distribution of vaccines and called for manufacturers and other countries to prioritize COVAX. It said that, as of Thursday, 36 of its 194 member countries had vaccinated less than 10% of their population and 88 had vaccinated less than 40%. The program has made deliveries to 144 countries so far, “but the work that has gone into this milestone is only a reminder of the work that remains,” WHO said in a statement.“COVAX’s ambition was compromised by hoarding/stockpiling in rich countries, catastrophic outbreaks leading to borders and supply being locked,” it added. “And a lack of sharing of licenses, technology and know-how by pharmaceutical companies meant manufacturing capacity went unused.” At the end of December, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus urged everyone to make a “new year’s resolution” to get behind a campaign to vaccinate 70% of countries’ populations by the beginning of July.In a newspaper interview published Sunday, Germany’s new international development minister said she wants to use her country’s presidency this year of the Group of Seven industrial nations to ensure that COVAX gets the resources it needs in 2022.“Unfortunately, there are still too few countries participating in the financing of the global vaccination campaign,” Svenja Schulze was quoted as telling the Funke newspaper group. “Alongside Sweden, Norway, Canada and the U.S., we are the ones who are giving most. The other industrial countries have significant ground to catch up.” …

 Coronavirus infection rates in Germany reach all-time high - The coronavirus incidence rates in Germany are higher than ever. On Monday, the seven-day incidence (cases per 100,000 people) reached a new all-time high of 553.2. In Germany alone, 116,448 COVID-19 patients have died; no fewer than 1,620 coronavirus deaths have accrued in the last seven days. The incidence recently exceeded 500 for the first time since the pandemic began. In just one week, more than five of every thousand residents have become infected with SARS-CoV-2. A year ago, even the administration Angela Merkel declared a seven-day incidence of 50 people infected per 100,000 population to be a “critical threshold,” because at higher incidences, public health departments could no longer reliably track chains of infection. Such considerations are long out of date. Levels have increased tenfold and continue an exponential rise due to the Omicron variant. But the federal coalition and state governments still see no reason to employ effective public protections. People in the center of Essen, Germany, on Jan. 12 (AP Photo/Martin Meissner) In a dozen days, the seven-day incidence has more than doubled. And in a number of counties and cities it has passed the 1,000 mark. In Berlin Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, it is just under 1,600; in Bremen, 1,477; in Frankfurt am Main, 1,080; and in Hamburg, 1,056. This mass infection is deliberate, open and ruthlessly enacted. Governments at the federal and state levels are responding to the explosion in case numbers not with the necessary protective measures, but by doubling down on the policy of contagion. They expect the working population to bear the consequences. Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (Social Democratic Party, SPD) summed up these consequences in Bild am Sonntag, saying, “We are facing very difficult weeks in Germany.” He warned that the situation in clinics would worsen, and pointed out that although it was now mainly the younger people with many contacts who were falling ill, once more older people become infected the number of admissions would increase, not only in intensive care units but throughout hospitals as well. “There is a threat of entire departments closing,” Lauterbach said. “Mass infection means that hundreds of thousands will become seriously ill and we will again have to mourn many thousands of coronavirus deaths.”

Australian COVID-19 deaths continue to climb as governments claim Omicron is about to “peak” As Australia’s state and federal governments continue to repeat the baseless assertion that COVID-19 infections will soon “peak,” New South Wales (NSW) Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant today warned that deaths are expected to climb in the coming days. Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt claimed yesterday there were “signs that NSW in particular and the ACT may be peaking.” NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet described yesterday’s official figures—34,399 new infections, 2,650 people current hospital admissions and 20 deaths—as “incredibly encouraging and pleasing.” Staff prepare to collect samples at a drive-through COVID-19 testing clinic at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, Saturday, Jan. 8, 2022. (AP Photo/Mark Baker) The reality is, the woeful state of COVID-19 testing in Australia, along with the redefinition of “close contacts” to include only household transmission, render any scientific assessment of infection numbers impossible. The claim that the current wave of COVID-19 has “peaked”, or soon will, is instead part of a barrage of propaganda aimed at forcing people back to work and school. Australia’s trade unions are actively participating in this drive. Having covered up the rampant infection throughout workplaces, these thoroughly corporatised bureaucracies have, in recent days, been forced to react to mounting anger among workers and issue mealy-mouthed demands for N95 masks and rapid antigen tests. These measures would do little to protect the health and lives of workers and are instead aimed at allowing business to continue operating, even as illness decimates the workforce. The primary concern of the unions, together with the governments, is to keep a lid on mounting opposition to the dangerous pandemic policies. More than 73,500 new COVID-19 infections were reported across Australia today, a vast underestimate of the real figure. The number of people hospitalised for COVID-19 passed 5,000 nationally for the first time in the pandemic, while 410 people are in intensive care, 121 of them on ventilators. Thirty-one COVID-19 deaths were reported today, including seven in Queensland, six in Victoria and one in the Australian Capital Territory. Today, NSW reported 17 deaths from COVID-19, of people aged between 60 and 100. Fourteen of the victims were fully vaccinated, while one had received only one dose and two were unvaccinated. In the past week, 140 people have died from COVID in NSW. Ninety-eight were fully vaccinated, two had received only one dose and 40 were unvaccinated. Twenty-five of those who died were aged under 70.

 Amid record deaths Australian prime minister declares “we should not fear” Omicron - While health authorities and government figures continue to insist the Omicron variant is “mild,” Australia yesterday recorded its worst daily death toll during the pandemic. Across the country, 77 COVID-19 deaths were reported yesterday. This included record highs of 36 in New South Wales (NSW), and 16 in Queensland. The toll yesterday provoked widespread anger. “Port Arthur” was a trending topic on Twitter in reference to a 1996 mass shooting in Tasmania in which 35 people were killed, fewer than died of COVID-19 in NSW yesterday. That horrific incident was viewed as a national crisis requiring immediate action to prevent similar tragedies, including sweeping changes to Australia’s gun-control laws. By contrast governments present the mounting COVID-19 death toll as minor news while declaring that they will continue the profit-driven policies responsible for the tragic fatalities, ensuring there will be many more. Prime Minister Scott Morrison declared at a press conference this morning, “as we face Omicron, we must respect it, but we should not fear it.” A further 67 deaths were reported Australia-wide today, with 32 in NSW, 18 in Victoria, 11 in Queensland and 6 in South Australia. Government representatives and their lackeys in the corporate media noted the “good news” that this was slightly fewer than died yesterday. In just the first 19 days of this year, the country has recorded 604 deaths from the virus, more than 21 percent of the total since the start of the pandemic. Clearly indicating that the toll will continue to grow, an unprecedented statewide “code brown” has been declared in the Victorian health system. The emergency order came into effect from midday today and affects all public hospitals in metropolitan areas and six regional areas. Victorian Deputy Premier James Merlino said yesterday: “We’ve reached a point in our healthcare system where it’s juggling extreme workforce shortages alongside a vast number of patients with COVID-19 who require hospitalisation.” As of Tuesday, 4,067 Victorian health workers were furloughed due to COVID-19 infection or exposure. There are currently 1,173 COVID-19 patients in Victorian hospitals, including 125 in intensive care and 42 on ventilators. Under a “code brown,” hospitals can cancel workers’ leave, reassign staff to priority areas and postpone supposedly less urgent care. This includes “category one” procedures, which are meant to be performed within 30 days, such as lumpectomies, cancerous skin lesion removal and certain types of heart surgery. The “code brown” designation is normally applied to a single hospital or region in response to a transport accident, chemical spill, fire, flood, or other sudden emergency, and is only in effect for hours or days. By contrast, the current emergency declaration is expected to be in place for four to six weeks.

Rwandan genocide chemically modified the DNA of victims and victims’ offspring - Scientists with the USF Genomics program and Center for Global Health and Infectious Disease Research have taken a significant step in providing the people of Rwanda the scientific tools they need to help address mental health issues that stemmed from the 1994 genocides of the Tutsi ethnic group. In a first of its kind study, Professors Monica Uddin and Derek Wildman of the College of Public Health looked at the entire genomes of Tutsi women who were pregnant and living in Rwanda at the time of the genocide and their offspring and compared their DNA to other Tutsi women pregnant at the same time and their offspring, who were living in other parts of the world. In the study published in “Epigenomics,” they found that the terror of genocide was associated with chemically modifications to the DNA of genocide-exposed women and their offspring. Many of these modifications occurred in genes previously implicated in risk for mental disorders such as PTSD and depression. These findings suggest that, unlike gene mutations, these chemical “epigenetic” modifications can have a rapid response to trauma across generations. “Epigenetics refers to stable, but reversible, chemical modifications made to DNA that help to control a gene’s function,” Uddin said. “These can happen in a shorter time frame than is needed for changes to the underlying DNA sequence of genes. Our study found that prenatal genocide exposure was associated with an epigenetic pattern suggestive of reduced gene function in offspring.”

Gene discovered in Georgia water a possible global threat - A gene that causes bacteria to be resistant to one of the world’s most important antibiotics, colistin, has been detected in sewer water in Georgia. The presence of the MCR-9 gene is a major concern for public health because it causes antimicrobial resistance, a problem that the World Health Organization has declared “one of the top 10 global public health threats facing humanity.” Researchers from the University of Georgia’s Center for Food Safety (CFS) collected sewage water from an urban setting in Georgia to test for the MCR gene in naturally present bacteria. Led by College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences assistant professor Issmat Kassem, whose research focuses on MCR’s presence around the world, the team was surprised at how quickly they detected MCR — they found evidence of the gene in the first sample they took. Kassem said that demonstrates that the gene is becoming established in the U.S. The bacteria where the gene was found, Morganella morganii, added further concern for Kassem. This marked the first time that MCR was found in M. morganii, which is problematic because it is a bacteria not often tested by researchers. This means that the problem could be considerably more widespread than initially thought. It was previously believed that agriculture was a driving factor in the spread of MCR. Nations such as China and India use the colistin antibiotic in livestock. Colistin is considered a “last resort” antibiotic because it can kill infections that other antibiotics cannot. Its frequent use means that some bacteria are becoming resistant to it. This means that if people or animals contract a strain of colistin-resistant bacteria, there are potentially no medications that can treat their infection. They face extreme, invasive health measures and possible death. Colistin is banned in the U.S. for use in food animals and it was previously thought that this measure would help slow the spread of antimicrobial resistance to colistin in the country. However, MCR can be spread through global travel and the import of foods from other countries. Results of the CFS study prove that the U.S. is no less susceptible to the threat than other nations around the world. Further complicating the issue is the way that the gene is spread. It transmits in plasmids, which are strands of DNA found inside cells that can replicate on their own, independent of the cell. A plasmid with antimicrobial resistance found in one type of bacteria can transmit to other types of bacteria. This means that bacteria like E. coli and Salmonella that commonly cause outbreaks in humans can potentially carry MCR, turning them from treatable illnesses to potentially deadly infections.

'Forever chemical' blood levels near W.Va. National Guard base higher than US average - Blood concentrations of a “forever chemical” for residents living near the Shepherd Field Air National Guard Base in Martinsburg, W.Va., exceed national averages, a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevent (CDC) has found. The report, released on Thursday by the CDC and the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR), found that the level of one such chemical — perfluorohexane sulfonic acid, or PFHxS — was higher in the blood of Martinsburg area residents than in national average samples. PFHxS is one of thousands of types of per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), the umbrella group known as “forever chemicals,” due to their propensity to linger in the human body and in the environment. PFAS, most known for their presence in firefighting foam used on military bases and civilian airports, are also present in a variety of household products, such as waterproof materials and nonstick pans. Long-term exposure to PFAS is linked to a variety of illnesses, such as kidney cancer and thyroid disease. Other PFAS blood levels tested by the CDC and ATSDR in the Martinsburg area were similar to national averages or not detected enough to calculated averages, according to the study. The report noted that the elevated blood level of PFHxS may be connected to past contamination of the city’s drinking water. Tap water samples collected during a 2019 exposure assessment complied with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) 2016 health advisories for two specific types of PFAS, PFOS and PFOA, according to the report. These advisories are recommended guidelines rather than regulatory standards. There are currently no federal health advisories for PFHxS, but the EPA’s Office of Research and Development is working on developing toxicity assessment for this compound and four other types of PFAS, according to the agency’s PFAS Strategic Roadmap. A complete draft of the risk assessment for PFHxS should be available for public comment and peer review later this year, the roadmap said. Several states, however, have taken it upon themselves to either regulate or set advisory levels for PFHxS in their water. West Virginia has not yet set standards for any type of PFAS, according to the Western Virginia Water Authority. While ATSDR said it does not recommend that community members use alternative sources of water, the agency said it would be holding a virtual information session for residents on Feb. 3. After the CDC and ATSDR released their Martinsburg findings, the Environmental Working Group stressed that PFHxS is one of the most common types of PFAS at military installations due to its presence in firefighting foams. On The Money — Labor chief touts efforts to promote job growth Overnight Defense & National Security — US, Russia meet during '... But the group noted that in addition to the Shepherd Field Air National Guard Base, there are also 13 companies and at least one landfill in the area that may be dischargers of PFAS pollution. “West Virginia is just a snapshot of the widespread problem of PFAS contamination plaguing communities across the United States,” Scott Faber, EWG Senior vice president for government affairs, said in a statement. “Every time studies are released on PFAS, the scope of the problem becomes even clearer, and so does the harm to people who are exposed.”

Problems with EPA Pollution Reporting -- The Incidental Economist (Posts) Dr Aaron Carroll video - While we’re all probably aware that we’re sometimes exposed to air pollution in one way or another, we generally assume that some official (you know, like from the EPA) is keeping tabs on it to make sure it isn’t excessive. However, a recent analysis of EPA data suggests that for those of us living in certain areas, the risk is much higher than we think.

Clean Water Act policy could spur widespread disarray - The Biden administration last week quietly and abruptly announced that developers can no longer rely on decisions made under a high-profile Trump-era Clean Water Act rule about which waters are federally protected to obtain new permits.Legal experts say the move could have far-reaching effects throughout the building, mining and agricultural sectors.At issue is a Jan. 5 post on the Army Corps of Engineers website explaining the agency will “not rely on” an approved “jurisdictional determination” issued under the Trump-era Navigable Waters Protection Rule “in making a new permit decision.”The announcement applies to "jurisdictional determinations” that the Army Corps makes, good for five years, which pave the way for mining companies, developers and property owners to obtain permits to fill or dredge streams, tributaries, lakes and wetlands, ditches, swales and stormwater ponds. Wetlands and streams that are not given federal protections can be damaged and destroyed forever, along with their abilities to sequester carbon and protect downstream water quality.Under the Trump administration, developers flocked to the Army Corps to take advantage of the regulatory and permitting regime under the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, which pulled back protections for large numbers of streams and wetlands. The rule was in effect from June 2020 until around August last year, when a federal judge in Arizona vacated it, finding the rule was too flawed to keep in place (Greenwire, Oct. 26, 2021). Notably, some argue the rule is still in effect until EPA completes the regulatory process of replacing the Trump rule with pre-2015 regulations updated to reflect consideration of Supreme Court decisions (E&E News PM, Nov. 18, 2021).When asked about the Army Corps’ announcement, EPA spokesperson Timothy Carroll in an email said the agency continues to work closely with the corps on issues related to geographic jurisdiction, including its ongoing rulemaking. He also pointed to the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona’s decision to vacate the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, as well as a second court in New Mexico vacating the rule and remanding it in September. "Five other courts have simply remanded the rule to the agencies for reconsideration, as the agencies requested," he wrote. "In light of the District Court vacaturs, the agencies halted implementation of the Navigable Waters Protection Rule in September 2021 and are interpreting ‘waters of the United States’ consistent with the pre-2015 regulatory regime."

 EPA: BWL maybe polluting drinking water -Dangerous toxins leaching from coal ash ponds around Lansing’s Erickson Power Station are contaminating groundwater and for decades may have poisoned nearby drinking water supplies that feed private residences’ wells and the municipal system. The Lansing Board of Water and Light, the publicly owned utility that operates the coal plant, detected high levels of lithium, boron, TDS and molybdenum leaching from the three ponds in 2020, documents submitted to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency by the utility show. Though it’s unclear when the leaks started, the plant, which is off Canal Road inEaton County, has operated the ponds since 1974. The documents, part of a BWL request to delay the ash ponds’ closure, also show the utility violated federal rules by failing to monitor groundwater near the ponds for around three years. As a result, the EPA preliminarily denied BWL’s request, and that could force the agency to at least temporarily shutter Erickson later this year. BWL plans to remove ash from the ponds, but Lisa Evans, an attorney with environmental watchdog Earthjustice, said the utility needs to take far more action than it has proposed if it’s to eradicate the problem, including testing drinking water. “The cleanup plan is inadequate,” Evans said. “They also have a moral obligation to test those wells to make sure nobody is drinking contaminated water, which is a logical, reasonable and an easy step that needs to be done immediately.” Groundwater feeds drinking water supplies, and it’s unclear if the contaminated groundwater is reaching the drinking water drawn by wells. Utility documents don’t show a plan to test drinking water, and BWL spokeswoman Amy Adamy didn’t respond to questions about testing public and private drinking water supplies.

Nearly 28,000 miles of Pennsylvania's streams are impaired by pollution, report finds - One-third of all Pennsylvania waterways are now considered polluted enough to harm wildlife, recreation or drinking water, according to a report released this week by the state's Department of Environmental Protection.The DEP listed 27,886 miles of streams it found impaired in one or more ways, which is about 9% worse than its 2020 estimate.That's 2,398 more miles of streams that Pennsylvania has designated as impaired over the last two years.Philadelphia and its suburban counties have among the most polluted waterways, according to the report, which is issued every other year.The Integrated Water Quality Report is mandated under the Federal Clean Water Act, which is celebrating its 50th birthday this year.Pennsylvania assesses streams for their impact on aquatic life, recreation, water supply, and whether fish can be eaten. That's no small task: The state has 85,000 miles of rivers and streams.Water samples are analyzed for ammonia, nitrates, nitrites, nitrogen, phosphates, calcium, magnesium, chloride, sulfates and dissolved solids. The DEP sets maximum loads for the pollutants, examines bacteriological samples to assess waterways for recreational use during summers, and tests fish tissue samples.Deborah Klenotic, a DEP spokesperson, said that at least some of the increase in impaired streams is simply because staff assessed more miles than in 2020.However, Shannon Gority, executive director for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation in Pennsylvania, said the report shows not enough is being done to protect the state's waterways and called it "a sad reminder that Pennsylvania must accelerate its rate of installing practices that reduce pollution to local waters." The Chesapeake Bay Foundation has been prodding Pennsylvania for years to clean up the Susquehanna watershed, a key contributor to pollution of the Chesapeake Bay.

A 'chemical cocktail' of sewage, slurry and plastic is polluting English rivers - Poor water quality in English rivers is the result of chronic underinvestment and multiple failures in monitoring, governance and enforcement, a report from the UK Parliament's Environmental Audit Committee has claimed. The report includes evidence from The University of Manchester's Professor Jamie Woodward, whose research demonstrated a direct link between poor wastewater management and high levels of microplastic pollution in UK rivers. The report states that only 14% of English rivers meet good ecological status, with pollution from agriculture, sewage, roads and single-use plastics contributing to a dangerous "chemical cocktail" coursing through the waterways. Not a single river in England has received a clean bill of health for chemical contamination. Budget cuts to the Environment Agency have hampered the ability to monitor water quality in rivers and detect permit breaches or pollution incidents from the water industry and farming. There has also been a lack of political will to improve water quality, with successive governments, water companies and regulators seemingly turning a blind eye to antiquated practices of dumping sewage and other pollutants in rivers. The report recommends that the Environment Agency work with water companies to ensure that easily accessible information on sewage discharges, in as near to real time as possible, is made available. The MPs are also calling on the government actively to encourage the designation of at least one widely used stretch of river for bathing in each water company area by 2025. The impact of rural agricultural pollution is the most common thing preventing rivers from achieving good ecological status. Intensive livestock and poultry farming is putting enormous pressure on particular catchments, such as that flowing into the River Wye, as it may be raising the river's phosphorus levels. The Committee is calling for each catchment to have a nutrient budget calculated, and for new poultry farms to not be granted planning permission in catchments exceeding their nutrient budgets. "Our inquiry has uncovered multiple failures in the monitoring, governance and enforcement on water quality," said Environmental Audit Committee Chairman, Rt Hon Philip Dunne MP. "For too long, the government, regulators and the water industry have allowed a Victorian sewerage system to buckle under increasing pressure. "We are calling for these relevant bodies to come together and develop a system fit for the future.. So many emerging pollutants are being missed by inadequate and insufficient monitoring, and court actions against polluters have fallen dramatically."

 Ships from 1,581 ports may go to Antarctica, bringing unwanted guests - Right now, the Antarctic and the waters around it are surprisingly free of invasive species. According to new research, however, that situation might change in the not-too-distant future, thanks to a shocking level of connectivity with ports across the world. Ships can accidentally carry a large array of marine life, which can in turn colonize new places (like the world’s polar south), outcompete native life, and generally wreak havoc on an ecosystem. New research has traced the paths of the various research vessels, tourist ships, and fishing boats that chug along through the icy waters of the Antarctic. “We know from other cold areas in the world, including the Arctic, that things growing on the hulls of ships absolutely do get transported from place to place, and it is one of the major sources of marine introductions around the world,” McCarthy told Ars. “We also know that ships going into Antarctica do have things growing on them. What we didn’t know until this point was good detail on where those ships go.” McCarthy's research suggests that there are 1,581 ports around the world with connections to the Antarctic. These are ports from which at least one ship traveled to the region, defined as south of -60 degrees latitude, as set by the Antarctic Treaty. To determine this, she and her team looked at shipping data from Lloyd’s List Intelligence, an old and reliable source of maritime data, port call data, and raw satellite data. It allowed her to track ship activity from between 2014 and 2018. Antarctic waters are mostly free of invasive marine species—there are some invasive grasses and insects—and the ocean is more isolated than many other oceans. That's due largely to the neighboring Southern Ocean, which has currents that circle around Antarctica. They’re particularly strong and form a kind of barrier. “Anything coming on ocean currents from oceans farther north, they can be deflected away from Antarctica rather than actually crossing into the Southern Ocean… “[They] stop most things that come in on water currents,”

Air pollution significantly reduces pollination by confusing butterflies and bees - Common air pollutants from both urban and rural environments may be reducing the pollinating abilities of insects by preventing them from sniffing out the crops and wildflowers that depend on them, new research has shown. Scientists from the University of Reading, the UK Center for Ecology & Hydrology, and the University of Birmingham found that there were up to 70% fewer pollinators, up to 90% fewer flower visits and an overall pollination reduction of up to 31% in test plants when common ground-level air pollutants, including diesel exhaust pollutants and ozone, were present.The study, published in the journal Environmental Pollution, is the first to observe a negative impact of common air pollutants on pollination in the natural environment. The theory is that the pollutants react with and change the scents of flowers, making them harder to find.: "We knew from our previous lab studies that diesel exhaust can have negative effects on insect pollinators, but the impacts we found in the field were much more dramatic than we had expected." "The findings are worrying because these pollutants are commonly found in the air many of us breathe every day. We know that these pollutants are bad for our health, and the significant reductions we saw in pollinator numbers and activity shows that there are also clear implications for the natural ecosystems we depend on."Previous laboratory studies by members of the Reading team have shown that diesel fumes can alter floral odors. This work suggested that pollution could contribute to the ongoing declines in pollinating insects, by making it harder for them to locate their food—pollen and nectar. The impact this phenomenon has in nature, where insects provide pollination of important food crops and native wildflowers is less well understood, so this new study aimed to gather evidence to investigate how air pollution affects different pollinating insect species, some of which rely on scent more than others.

Genetic Strategy Reverses Insecticide Resistance - Insecticides play a central role in efforts to counter global impacts of mosquito-spread malaria and other diseases, which cause an estimated 750,000 deaths each year. These insect-specific chemicals, which cost more than $100 million to develop and bring to market, also are critical to controlling insect-driven crop damage that poses a challenge to food security. But in recent decades many insects have genetically adapted to become less sensitive to the potency of insecticides. In Africa, where long-lasting insecticide-treated bed nets and indoor spraying are major weapons in the fight against malaria, many species of mosquitoes across the continent have developed insecticide resistance that reduces the efficacy of these key interventions. In certain areas climate change is expected to exacerbate these problems. University of California San Diego biologists have now developed a method that reverses insecticide resistance using CRISPR/Cas9 technology. As described in Nature Communications, researchers Bhagyashree Kaduskar, Raja Kushwah and Professor Ethan Bier with the Tata Institute for Genetics and Society (TIGS) and their colleagues used the genetic editing tool to replace an insecticide-resistant gene in fruit flies with the normal insecticide-susceptible form, an achievement that could significantly reduce the amount of insecticides used. “This technology also could be used to increase the proportion of a naturally occurring genetic variant in mosquitoes that renders them refractory to transmission or malarial parasites,” said Bier, a professor of Cell and Developmental Biology in UC San Diego’s Division of Biological Sciences and senior author of the paper.

Study finds that heavy metal-contaminated leafy greens turn purple - Some might say you look a little green when you are sick. Leafy greens actually turn purple—although not obvious to the human eye, it can be seen through advanced hyperspectral imaging (different than purple varieties of some vegetables). Purdue researchers discovered this color change in kale and basil stressed by cadmium, a heavy metal toxic to human and animal health.The new detection method advances work to create a soil amendment that binds to the metal and keeps it from the plants, improving food safety in produce, baby food and prepared meals. "It is very difficult to see heavy metal stress in plants," said Lori Hoagland, professor of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture at Purdue University, who led the research. "We need new tools for it. If we can quickly see it and accurately measure it as the plants grow, we will be better able to develop soil amendments that sequester the harmful metals, as well as identify contamination before it reaches our plates. Our goal is to be able to have drones that fly over fields and detect plant stress from cadmium, lead and arsenic."Hyperspectral detection is much faster than traditional chemical analysis techniques. It also does not require destruction of the plant being analyzed, which enables studies of the plants and soil amendments through different stages of plant development."Cadmium contamination of plants is known as a 'silent killer' because we can't see it and don't typically test for it," said Hoagland, who leads Purdue's Soil Microbial Ecology Lab. "The plants do suffer when exposed to high levels of cadmium, but they don't shrivel and wilt or die. They appear fine, unless the cadmium levels are through the roof. Contaminated plants make it through to maturity and harvesting."Cadmium is used in batteries and is often bound to phosphate mined for fertilizers. Throughout the world, it and other heavy metals from trash and pollution seep into the soil and travel to nearby farms where crops absorb them. Consuming high levels of cadmium can lead to kidney disease, bone problems, cancer and other health issues."It is naturally present in many vegetables in small concentrations, but elevated levels can be harmful," she said. "We particularly need to keep these levels low in baby foods, but it is a growing issue throughout our food chain."

Biochar Sale Halted, But State Regulators Approve Water Treatment at Defunct Ethanol Plant - - Nebraska officials have approved a preliminary plan to treat 150 million gallons of contaminated water at the defunct AltEn ethanol plant in eastern Nebraska, just a week after officials from two states were able to halt plans by AltEn's owner to sell potentially pesticide-contaminated biochar from the facility. A group comprised of major seed companies and a remediation company continue to work with Nebraska state regulators to clean up the ethanol plant, which had accepted pesticide-treated corn seed for multiple years to process into ethanol at the 25-million-gallon plant. The primary goal of the current cleanup efforts at AltEn involves trying to "effectively manage water contained in the site's lagoons." The facility is storing more than 150 million gallons of untreated water in three primary lagoons and one emergency lagoon built on the site. A separate remediation plan will still be needed to remove roughly 84,000 tons of pesticide-contaminated wet cake stacked at the ethanol plant's property just outside of Mead, Nebraska, about 20 miles west of the Omaha city limits. One result of processing treated seed was lagoons filled with pesticide-laden water and wet cake also considered too toxic to be spread on area farm ground. Nebraska officials sued last year to shut down the plant after a spill from one of its lagoons. Despite concerns about materials at the plant, AltEn's president, Tanner Shaw, in December informed Nebraska regulators that he had plans to sell 600 "supersacks" of biochar from treated seed even though tests from the Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy showed the biochar had elevated levels of neonicotinoid pesticides. Shaw planned to sell the biochar to a Kansas farmer, Brady Yingling, who operates a farm and ranch operation near Topeka, Kansas, as well as a lawn-care company. Shaw informed Nebraska regulators in December that Yingling's company, B Cole Agricultural, had agreed to remove all of the biochar from the ethanol plant. The biochar would then be applied as a soil amendment for corn and/or soybean ground at a rate of no more than 1,000 pounds an acre.

Plan treats Nebraska ethanol plant like EPA Superfund Site - More than 16 acres of contaminated corn waste will be sprayed with a mixture of clay, cement and fiber called Posi-shell, to create a cover that will hold the contaminated corn remnants in place for up to 10 years. — KETV NewsWatch 7 has learned plans are underway to treat an environmentally hazardous waste pile in Mead, Nebraska, with a protective shell-type cover that’s been used at four EPA Superfund Sites around the country. A letter from New Fields engineering consulting firm out of Rockland, Maine, outlines the plans which concern a group of scientists and citizens studying the cleanup efforts at the AltEn ethanol plant about 30 miles west of Omaha. Those community members formed a watchdog group called the Perivallon Group. Al Davis, a former Nebraska state senator, is a member of that team and a lobbyist for the Nebraska Chapter of the Sierra Club. "I think they're going to put a cap on the site and say we've done everything we can," said Davis, who has reviewed the plans extensively for months. In recent months, under the watch of the Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy, environmental clean-up crews have been piling up contaminated corn waste on the site of the AltEn plant. Next week, crews will spray more than 16 acres of the pile with a mixture of clay, cement and fiber called Posi-shell, to create a cover that will hold the contaminated corn remnants in place for up to 10 years. A helicopter will be used to apply the cover to parts of the site that can’t be accessed with a truck-mounted spray system. “This is a really huge and dangerous mess,” said Dr. John Schalles, a biology professor and director of the environmental science program at Creighton University and an active member of the Perivallon Group. Schalles has serious concerns about a multitude of chemicals combining in the wet cake pile as it decays and forms new compounds and becomes more volatile. He's concerned the cap will crack over time and allow more hazardous chemicals to leach from the pile. He also worries about the purity of the Todd Valley aquifer close to the site and the fact that there's no liner beneath the pile. The aquifer feeds the areas of Valley and Lincoln with groundwater. Schalles said while the cap will improve the situation, the volatility underneath is in question. "I refer to it as a witches’ brew because it is almost beyond the scope of environmental toxicology to predict what is mixing with what," said Schalles. A drainage system will pull liquid contaminants out of the pile and guide leached chemicals to a lagoon, where the mixture will be treated. AltEn has applied for a plan to release treated wastewater onto farmland in that area. Right now, about 150-million gallons of wastewater are stored on the property.

Ozone pollution costs Asia billions in lost crops: study - Persistently high levels of ozone pollution in Asia are costing China, Japan and South Korea an estimated $63 billion annually in lost rice, wheat and maize crops, a new study says. While ozone forms a protective layer around the Earth in the upper atmosphere, it is a harmful pollutant at ground level. It is created by a chemical reaction when two pollutants, often emitted by cars or industry, combine in the presence of sunlight and it can interfere with plant photosynthesis and growth. The research published Monday harnesses pollution monitoring data from the region and field experiments to show ozone affects Asia's crop yields more than previously thought. The study's authors said the findings should push policymakers to reduce emissions that produce ozone. "Air pollution control in North America and Europe succeeded in lowering ozone levels," said Kazuhiko Kobayashi, a co-first author of the study and professor emeritus affiliated with the University of Tokyo. "We need to repeat that success across East and South Asia," he told AFP. Previous estimates of ozone's effects on staple crops such as rice, wheat and maize have sometimes used varieties that are not prevalent in Asia, or tested plants grown in pots rather than fields. To get a more accurate picture, the researchers looked at varieties common in the region and did experiments with crops in pots but also in fields. They exposed rice, wheat and maize to varying levels of ozone and used the resulting crop yields to model how different exposures affected plant development. To determine real-world effects, the researchers then applied ozone data from more than 3,000 monitoring sites in China, South Korea and Japan to their model. They found a mean of 33 percent of China's wheat crop is lost annually because of ozone pollution, with 28 percent lost in South Korea and 16 percent for Japan. For rice, the mean figure in China was 23 percent, though the researchers found hybrid strains were significantly more vulnerable than inbred ones. In South Korea the figure was nearly 11 percent, while in Japan it was just over five percent. And maize crops in both China and South Korea were also affected at lower levels. The crop is not grown in Japan in significant quantities.

Ohio siblings accused of chopping down a 250-year-old tree for a small profit - Washington Post - For over 250 years, a black walnut tree lived in what is now a nature preserve in northeast Ohio, growing alongside wildflowers and ferns and the snaking east branch of the Rocky River. Its trunk grew unusually wide — 5½ feet — making it a rare specimen in the Cleveland suburbs. Yet in just two days in September, that tree was cut down with chain saws, turned into logs and hauled away, according to witnesses interviewed by police. The lumber ultimately sold for just over $10,000. Now, two suspects — a brother and sister, Todd Jones, 56, and Laurel Hoffman, 54 — have been indicted in the felling of the tree that prosecutors say sat on Cleveland Metroparks property, just feet away from Jones’s land in Strongsville, about 20 miles south of Cleveland. The siblings face charges of grand theft and falsification — both felonies. Neither Jones nor Hoffman responded to requests for comment from The Washington Post late Thursday. In interviews with the Plain Dealer, the duo said the tree was on their property and that they disagreed with the charges. “This is so ridiculous that they’re doing this,” Jones told the Plain Dealer. “This is insane. There was no ill intent.” The case is the latest recent example of people facing criminal charges after being accused of illegally removing trees from public land. In July, a California couple was fined $18,000 for bulldozing Joshua trees to make way for home construction. In November, a man was sentenced to 20 months in prison for harvesting maple trees in Washington’s Olympic National Forest, which led to a massive 2018 fire. Black walnut trees are treasured for their high-quality lumber — a fine-grained hardwood used for furniture and gunstocks, according to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources. Jennifer Grieser, the natural resources director at Cleveland Metroparks who discovered the tree had been chopped down, told police the trunk’s 207-inch circumference placed it among Ohio’s largest black walnuts.

Nearly half of GDP in cities at risk of disruption from nature loss -Loss of biodiversity and nature could put up to $31 trillion of cities’ gross domestic product (GDP) at risk, according to research released Monday by the World Economic Forum.More than 70 percent of the 576 biggest urban centers worldwide, comprising more than 1.4 billion people, are at elevated or extreme risk from environmental hazards like pollution, water contamination or extreme heat, according to the report. About $31 trillion of their GDP, or 44 percent, is at risk from these losses. Although this is below the global average of 50 percent, it would trickle down to other regions due to the numerous sectors that are headquartered in cities, such as utilities, transportation and shipping.More specifically, the report identified flooding as the foremost natural risk for more than 1,600 cities worldwide. Loss of coastal habitat is a major contributor to this risk, according to the report. Like numerous risks from climate change and biodiversity loss, the poorest residents bear the greatest risk, with the World Bank estimating that the 600 million people most at risk are below the poverty line.Air pollution and lack of green space in cities is also a major environmental risk and financial drain, according to the report. In southern and eastern Asia and the Pacific, exposure to air pollution cost the equivalent of 7.5 percent in regional GDP.Urban centers represent more than 75 percent of carbon emissions worldwide, and the capital allocated for urban climate finance is far below the estimated amount necessary, according to the report. The 2021 State o Cities Climate Finance Report found $384 billion in climate finance went to urban areas in 207-2018, compared to an estimate of $5 trillion needed.However, the report estimates that sustainable development in these areas could create enough jobs and capital to offset these risks. Sustainable transportation infrastructure alone could create 21.6 million jobs by 2030, according to the report, with another 11.66 million created by more sustainable handling of waste.“In the conventional paradigm, urban development and environmental health are like oil and water,” Akanksha Khatri, the World Economic Forum's Head of Nature and Biodiversity, said in a statement. “This report shows that this does not have to be the case. Nature can be the backbone of urban development. By recognizing cities as living systems, we can support conditions for the health of people, planet and economy in urban areas.”

Florida’s Red Tides Are Getting Worse and May Be Hard to Control Because of Climate Change - A task force appointed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to address the state’s algal bloom crisis concluded in a recent report that “without hard work and careful planning” adverse human health impacts and widespread wildlife mortality would most likely “worsen” because of climate change and the state’s growing population. The blooms are caused by high concentrations of a plant-like microscopic organism known as Karenia brevis fed by nutrients in runoff from stormwater, agricultural lands and wastewater treatment plants. A key stimulant is phosphorus from fertilizer used on farms and ranches in the Kissimmee River Basin, which forms the headwaters of the Everglades and drains into Lake Okeechobee, which in turn reaches the coasts through rivers and man-made canals. The algal blooms, which at one point in 2018 covered 90 percent of the lake’s surface, can have devastating impacts on ecological resources and communities, causing respiratory and eye irritation in humans and “widespread reports of fish, sea turtle, marine mammal, and other wildlife mortalities,” according to the Florida Harmful Algal Bloom Task Force. Released on Jan. 10, the task force’s report recommends more research to determine the causes of red tides, more investment in mitigation technologies and continued work under the Clean Waterways Act of 2020. What the task force described as a “prolonged 2017-2019 red tide event” began with an algal bloom on Lake Okeechobee and resulted in “estimated total losses of nearly $1 billion in revenue and an additional loss of $178 million in tax revenue in 23 Gulf coast counties.” The impacts of climate change, which the task force said “may be impossible to change,” contribute to the algal blooms “through a complex variety of mechanisms including warmer water temperatures, changes in salinity, changes in rainfall patterns… changes in coastal upwelling, and sea level rise.” But environmental advocates criticized the task force’s latest recommendations, arguing that the panel failed to hold the polluters accountable and ignored the most obvious solutions, which involve better enforcement of existing laws by the state regulators. The Clean Waterways Act of 2020, they have noted, doesn’t require agricultural interests to reduce phosphorus runoff and continues to rely on what is effectively a system of voluntary compliance. “The task force recommends throwing taxpayer money at unproven mitigation technologies,” said Jaclyn Lopez, Florida director at the Center for Biological Diversity, adding: “If the state regulators instead just stopped pollution at the source by holding polluters accountable, Florida would have a much better chance at turning the corner on its water quality crisis.” Lopez said untreated sewage discharge, nutrient runoffs from various sources, and toxic waste from phosphorus mining leaking into Florida’s open waters act as a booster for red tide, which thrives in nutrient rich conditions. “The task force has ignored the elephant in the room because state regulators are not holding the polluting industries accountable through enforcement action,” she added.

Attempt to feed manatees fails so far, but effort to hold off starvation will continue An attempt to feed starving manatees appears to have failed so far, as the big marine mammals refuse to recognize floating lettuce as food. State and federal wildlife officials undertook the unusual step of offering food to manatees last month after an unprecedented number of deaths last year, most from starvation. The cause was the loss of seagrass in the Indian River Lagoon, largely due to polluted runoff from farms and cities. But so far the manatees have been ignoring the lettuce offered them, said Ron Mezich, imperiled species management section leader for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, in a conference call Thursday with reporters. He said it's possible they ate the lettuce while no one was looking but that so far no consumption of lettuce has been observed. "At this point in time, we have not documented animals foraging on the lettuce," he said. "I will say we are not present at all locations at all times to verify that. We do come back at times, and not everything we provided is there, but we have not documented any animals (eating) it." A record 1,101 manatees died last year, most from starvation in the Indian River Lagoon area, according to the state wildlife commission. Last November state and federal officials set up a unified command to address the manatee deaths, increasing patrols beefing up rescue efforts for manatees in distress and setting up a system to offer them food. Patrick Rose, executive director of the Save the Manatee Club, blamed bureaucratic delays by the federal government for the program's failure so far. Although the state wildlife commission wanted to start the feeding program months ago, he said the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service hesitated to approve it for months. Had the federal government moved sooner, he said, the program could have been ready in August and able to pursue more options for feeding them. "I can't tell you how frustrated I am by the late decision by the service," he said. "So many things could have been tried and experimented with before we reached this point."

‘It’s mind-boggling’: the hidden cost of our obsession with fish oil pills - While some fish oil is made from cod, mackerel or sardines, most comes from Peruvian anchovetas, a type of anchovy. These silvery fish are an important source of nutrition for the wildlife in the Humboldt Current, one of the most productive marine ecosystems on Earth. “I think people should know where the fish in their fish oil is coming from. It’s always good to have a face to the product they’re consuming,” says Katrina Nakamura, founder of the Sustainability Incubator, which screens labour conditions inside food supply chains. As the world’s largest fishery, the anchoveta catch in Peru is enormous – exceeding 4m tonnes a year. Some of the haul is frozen and canned for human consumption, but it is mainly used to feed pigs, poultry and farmed fish. Aquaculture is an expanding global industry, valued at more than £146bn in 2020, with China topping the list as the largest fish-producing country, at 58.8m tonnes a year. Aquaculture now provides half of all the seafood that humans eat – a figure expected to grow to 62% by 2030. Now, large industry players in Peru want to scale up fish oil operations for dietary supplements, too. Though there is still debate among scientists about the benefits of the golden-coloured supplements, there is some evidence that omega-3 fatty acids, including EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid), and DHA (docosahexaenoic acid), can aid in heart and brain function, lower the risk of cognitive function disorders, and may help to reduce inflammation.Anchovetas are rich in EPA and DHA. According to the Global Organization for EPA and DHA Omega-3 (GOED), the industry body of omega-3 producers, an estimated 38,000 tonnes of anchovy oil are extracted for dietary supplements each year.“It’s mind-boggling. What we can catch in a week is what many countries catch in more than one year,” says Patricia Majluf, vice-president of Oceana Peru, part of the international conservation organisation that campaigns to protect and restore the world’s oceans. “And the processing capacity of the factories is even bigger.” Despite being highly regulated, the fishery has recently been condemned for misreporting catches, and for putting workers’ health at risk throughout the Covid-19 pandemic by failing to isolate infected crew members, leading to large outbreaks, according to a report by the Changing Markets Foundation, which in 2020 investigated harmful and unsustainable practices in Peru’s fishmeal and fish oil industry. The fishery is also reportedly catching too many juvenile anchovetas – if the fish are caught before they reproduce, the population cannot sustain itself. Oceana has reported that some factories in southern Peru are operating illegallywithout appropriate permits or licences, and producing fishmeal in unsanitary conditions, while also skewing catch quotas.

In the Atlantic Forest, the lowland tapir is at risk of extinction - Lowland tapir populations in the Atlantic Forest in South America are at risk of almost complete disappearance, scientists have estimated. Weighing up to 250 kg, the animal can adapt to most habitats in South America—but its populations continue to decline across its range.Today, its survival is seriously threatened: it can be found in just 1.78% of its original distributional range in the Atlantic Forest biome, which covers parts of Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay. The main long-term threat to its well-being is population isolation, as hunting and highways keep populations away from each other.Urgent measures need to be taken to connect isolated populations and ensure the long-term conservation of tapirs, warn the authors of a new study on the distribution and conservation status of lowland tapirs in the South American Atlantic Forest, published in the open-access journal Neotropical Biology and Conservation. “Of the 48 tapir populations identified during the study, between 31.3% and 68.8% are demographically unviable (low number of individuals), and between 70.8% and 93.8% of the populations are genetically unviable (low gene flow). Only 3-14 populations are still viable in the long run when both criteria are considered. The evidence suggests that with the appropriate conservation actions, the lowland tapir could be broadly distributed throughout the Atlantic Forest,” says Kevin Flesher. “Tapirs have low reproductive potential, including a long reproductive cycle with the birth of just one young after a gestation period of 13-14 months and intervals of up to three years between births. Our populational simulations clearly show how, in the case of small populations, even the loss of a single individual per year can result in rapid extinction of an entire local population,” adds Medici.

Elephants dying from eating plastic waste in Sri Lankan dump Conservationists and veterinarians are warning that plastic waste in an open landfill in eastern Sri Lanka is killing elephants in the region, after two more were found dead over the weekend. Around 20 elephants have died over the last eight years after consuming plastic trash in the dump in Pallakkadu village in Ampara district, about 210 kilometers (130 miles) east of the capital, Colombo. Examinations of the dead animals showed they had swallowed large amounts of nondegradable plastic that is found in the garbage dump, wildlife veterinarian Nihal Pushpakumara said. "Polythene, food wrappers, plastic, other non-digestibles and water were the only things we could see in the post mortems. The normal food that elephants eat and digest was not evident," he said. Elephants are revered in Sri Lanka but are also endangered. Their numbers have dwindled from about 14,000 in the 19th century to 6,000 in 2011, according to the country's first elephant census. They are increasingly vulnerable because of the loss and degradation of their natural habitat. Many venture closer to human settlements in search of food, and some are killed by poachers or farmers angry over damage to their crops. Hungry elephants seek out the waste in the landfill, consuming plastic as well as sharp objects that damage their digestive systems, Pushpakumara said. "The elephants then stop eating and become too weak to keep their heavy frames upright. When that happens, they can't consume food or water, which quickens their death," he said.

 2021 was one of the hottest years on record, and it could also be the coldest we'll ever see again -Well, it's official: 2021 was one of the planet's seven hottest years since records began, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) declared this week. The year was about 1.11℃ above pre-industrial levels—the seventh year in a row that the average global temperature rise edged over 1℃.The WMO report echoes two separateofficial US analysesreleased last week that found 2021 was the sixth hottest year on record, tied with 2018.For many of us in Australia and overseas, however, 2021 may have felt generally colder and rainier than usual. This is because of the effect of back-to-back La Niña events, a natural phenomenon that brings cooler, rainier weather in our region.The fact 2021 was among the world's hottest yearsdespite these cooling forces shows just how strong the long-term warming trend is. Indeed, 2021 may well be the coldest year we'll ever experience again. Let's reflect on the year that was, and what we can expect for this year and beyond. 2021 started and ended with La Niña events. While it's unusual for this climate phenomenon to occur two years in a row, it's not unheard of.In La Niña years, we see the global average temperature decrease by about 0.1–0.2℃. So how does it work?During La Niña we see cool water from deep in the Pacific Ocean rise to the surface. This happens when wind strength increases at the equator, which pushes warmer water to the west and allows more cool water to rise off the coast of South America.Essentially, the net transfer of energy from the surface to the deeper ocean brings the average global surface temperature down. While La Niña is a natural phenomenon (it's not the result of human activities), human-caused climate change remains a constant underlying influence that sets a long-term warming trend. The La Niña conditions of 2021 took the edge off the global average surface temperature. Parts of Australia, southern Africa and northwestern North America saw cooler temperatures during 2021 compared to recent years as the effects of La Niña kicked in. Unless we have another strong La Niña very soon, we're going to keep seeing even hotter years than 2021 for the foreseeable future until net global greenhouse gas emissions cease.

La Niña Conditions Likely to Continue into Spring. --La Niña conditions are likely to continue during the Northern Hemisphere spring. The La Niña weather pattern has a 67% chance of persisting from March to May before transitioning to ENSO-neutral (51% chance), according to the National Weather Service’s Climate Prediction Center (CPC).This translates into a higher chance of below-normal temps from January to April across the northern High Plains, northern Rockies and Pacific Northwest. There is a higher chance of above-normal temps across the Southern Plains during the spring and early summer. A higher chance of below-normal precip is predicted for the south tier of the continental U.S. from January to April. Above-normal precip is forecast from the Great Lakes, Ohio and Tennessee Valleys, Pacific Northwest and northern Rockies/ Earlier this week, Japan’s weather bureau said the La Niña phenomenon is continuing and that there is an 80% chance it will prevail through the end of the Northern Hemisphere winter and an 80% chance the event will end during spring.

Winter storm leaves thousands without power on US East Coast - A major winter storm lashed much of the East Coast Sunday and Monday, causing widespread power outages and disrupting travel over the holiday weekend. Authorities in North Carolina confirmed that two people died in a car crash and that they responded 600 vehicle accidents during the storm on Sunday, per the Washington Post. : The Weather Prediction Center said in a storm summary Monday that winter storm warnings were still in effect for portions of the Central Appalachians, Ohio Valley, interior Mid-Atlantic and Northeast, while other portions of the Central Appalachians and coastal New England are under high wind warnings. The prediction center, based in College Park, Maryland, said the storm is expected to move slowly through the Northeast on Monday, likely bringing more snow and precipitation to the Central Appalachians and Northeast. Extremely high wind gusts over 60 miles per hour were recorded in parts of the East Coast on Monday morning, and more than 129,200 customers from New York to Georgia were still without power, according to estimates from PowerOutage.us : Heavy snow and ice accumulations were "likely to produce hazardous travel," downed trees and more outages from the Mid-South to the Northeast, per the National Weather Service.

• The NWS reported 22 inches of snow fell in Ohio and New York at their highest points, 20 inches in North Carolina, and 10 inches in Georgia.
• The wintry storm spawned two tornadoes in southwest Florida Sunday morning — including an EF-2 tornado with maximum winds of 118 near Fort Myers, Lee County, which injured at least three people, per the NWS. More than 8,000 customers were without power in West Virginia and over 7,000 had no electricity in both Kentucky and North Carolina on Tuesday morning.
• Other states still with widespread power outages included Georgia (nearly 5,000) and Florida (almost 4,000).
• More than 3,000 flights within, into or out of the U.S. were canceled and over 8,000 others were delayed on Sunday, when the weather was particularly bad, FlightAware data shows.

What to expect: A deep low pressure system responsible for the severe U.S. weather in Florida is set to move farther into southeastern Canada on Tuesday, per the NWS. Much of the interior Northeast will see the snow becoming more scattered over Monday night and the snow across the region should gradually taper off on Tuesday, the agency said. "However, due to the size of the departing storm, blustery conditions are expected to continue into Tuesday for much of the Northeast," the NWS added. Meanwhile, weather agency Environment Canada warned 8-16 inches of snow could fall on Monday over parts of southern and eastern Ontario, near the border with the U.S.

Widespread damage after winter storm spawns multiple tornadoes in Florida, U.S. (w/ several videos) A major winter storm affecting the eastern United States spawned multiple tornadoes in southwestern Florida on Sunday, January 16, 2022, destroying at least 28 homes and damaging others. In addition, at least 7 000 homes were left without power in Lee and Collier counties.Lee County officials said at least 62 homes are currently unlivable after the county was hit by an EF-2 tornado at 07:35 LT on Sunday morning. The tornado may have completely destroyed 30 of 108 mobile homes near Fort Myers, according to a preliminary damage survey by the National Weather Service (NWS).¹Four people suffered minor injuries.According to the National Weather Service, the tornado tore through three mobile home communities in Iona: Tropicana, Point Breeze and Century 21.One county assessment said 27 homes were destroyed, 24 suffered major damage and 14 had minor damage.² The tornado was on the ground for about 5 minutes, traveling a distance of 2.9 km (1.8 miles). The damage it left was about 114 m (125 yards) wide.This was the strongest tornado to hit Southwest Florida since January 9, 2016.An EF-1 tornado was reported in Charlotte County, north of Fort Myers, damaging 35 homes. This tornado was on the ground for over 1.6 km (1 mile).As of 20:30 LT, the NWS confirmed 5 tornadoes touched down in Southwest Florida -- 1 EF-2, 1 EF-1, and 3 EF-0.

Toronto under first blizzard warning since 1978, Canada - A low-pressure system tracking south of the Great Lakes brought significant snowfall and blizzard conditions to parts of Ontario and Quebeck, Canada on Monday, January 17, 2022, forcing authorities to issue the first blizzard warning for the City of Toronto since 1978. This system is a part of a large storm affecting the U.S. East Coast and central and eastern Canada. Environment Canada issued the blizzard warning forecasting up to 60 cm (23 inches) of fresh snow in some parts of the region and snowfall rates of 6 to 10 cm (2 - 4 inches) per hour.¹ Toronto saw 37 cm (14.6 inches) by 09:00 LT on January 17 and strong northwesterly winds gusting up to 50 km/h (31 mph), resulting in areas of poor visibility.Across the region, the storm dumped from 30 to more than 50 cm (12 - 20 inches) of snow, leading to dangerous roadways, delays, collisions, and widespread road closures.²Low pressure over the Northern Plains will move eastward across the Great Lakes overnight Tuesday and into Ontario, Canada, by Wednesday morning, January 19 then into the Canadian Maritimes by Thursday, January 20, NWS forecaster Ziegenfelder noted.³By Thursday, January 20, the associated front will move eastward to just off the Northeast Coast and across the Mid-Atlantic to the Central Gulf Coast.The system will produce heavy snow across parts of Upper Mississippi Valley, near Lake Superior and Michigan s Upper Peninsula, on Tuesday into Wednesday morning.Light snow will move into the Lower Great Lakes overnight Tuesday and into Northern New England on Wednesday into Thursday morning. In the wake of the system, lake effect snow will develop downwind from the Great Lakes.

Great Lakes ice cover lowest in decades: What it means for the rest of winter - Several days of frigid temperatures around Michigan didn't put much of a dent into the record-warm Great Lakes. The lakes collectively are only about 3% ice-covered, and scientists are forecasting a peak ice cover of only 12.3% this winter. That would be the lowest since 12% in the winter of 2002, which was the lowest ice year on the Great Lakes since record-keeping began in 1973. "Now we're back into a warmup after a few days of cooling. The lakes right now are wide open," said Jia Wang, ice climatologist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor. The Great Lakes entered winter with record-warm waters. And climactic conditions in the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, including a strong "La Niña" pattern of colder Pacific surface waters that pushes northward the jet stream, the major prevailing upper atmosphere wind pattern. Collectively, the weather phenomena are influencing air currents to keep the Great Lakes mostly ice-free, Wang said. The long-term average annual maximum ice cover on the Great Lakes is 55%. The northernmost Great Lake, Superior, in a typical winter averages almost 64% ice cover. Forecasters this year expect the biggest Great Lake to only achieve about 8.5% coverage. Although ice coverage varies greatly from winter to winter—the collective Great Lakes were nearly 93% ice-covered in 2014—the longer term trend shows less winter lake ice, as human-influenced climate change causes the Great Lakes region to warm faster than the rest of the U.S. Among other impacts, it has the potential to harm fish habitat—species such as whitefish rely on ice cover to protect spawning beds from winter storms—and fuel more and heavier spring rains, a potential detriment to agriculture. More immediately, the open, warmer-than-usual Great Lakes will continue to churn lake-effect snow into next month. Lake-effect snows occur when frigid air passes over warmer water, acting like a snow-making machine. "February will be the coldest month of our winter," Wang said. "The lake-effect snow will come." The conditions should also dictate extreme caution for those who typically recreate on lake ice, such as ice fishermen and snowmobilers, Wang said. He cited the 34 anglers rescued from a large, floating chunk of ice that broke off the shore of Point Comfort on Lake Michigan in Green Bay, Wisconsin, on Jan. 7. "This year is not very safe for ice fishing," he said.

 Cold weather prompts numerous water main breaks in Philly - Chilly temperatures led to about 30 reported water main breaks in the city Tuesday morning, including one that flooded a section of Kensington, according to the Philadelphia Water Department. "Whenever we get cold weather, there's typically a spike in breaks," spokesperson Brian Rademaeckers said. The corner of Kensington Avenue and Clearfield Street in Kensington was flooded with water Tuesday morning, according to live coverage by 6ABC. The water had receded by the afternoon, leaving the streets muddied. An emergency crew isolated the flow to a possible break on a 12-inch water main, Rademaecker said. Water was restored to all customers by 4 p.m. The department is still responding to other reported leaks and breaks, and asking for patience as crews respond. Residents can report water emergencies by calling (215) 685-6300.

 Rare blizzard traps thousands of vehicles on a major highway in southern Turkey (videos) Some 2 800 people were stranded on a major highway connecting Turkey's southern provinces after rare heavy snowfall and blizzard conditions hit the province of Gaziantep late Tuesday and Wednesday, January 19, 2022. Heavy snow and blizzard conditions also affected other parts of the country, closing schools in 52 of Turkey's 82 provinces and isolating remote towns and villages. Some remote areas in the northeast are reporting up to 2 m (6.5 feet) of snow.According to the Gaziantep Governor Davut Gül, the stranded people were motorists and passengers on Tarsus-Adana-Gaziantep Motorway (TAG), which was closed to traffic on Tuesday night.Around 186 people in need of medical care were evacuated to hospitals, Gül said, adding that rescue teams also distributed food to some 7 000 people on the highway where the vehicles could not move due to low visibility and thick snow.¹While rescue teams helped 1 780 vehicles stuck on the road, at least 2 800 people were still stranded on Wednesday afternoon.Government officials dispatched military helicopters to deliver food aid and perform medical evacuations. The army also sent two tow trucks to remove trapped trucks from the highway.The main cause of the event was several long-haul trucks that were involved in accidents, bringing the traffic to a standstill, the Daily Sabah reported.Another snow-related disruption was reported on a road connecting Gaziantep to the province of Kilis where some 30 vehicles were stranded on the road, while a car and a truck plunged into a shallow cliff after they skidded off the road.No casualties were reported.The city of Gaziantep (population 2 million) recorded 50 cm (19.7 inches) of snow overnight Wednesday and temperatures around -3 °C (- 26.6 °F). Such weather conditions are rare for the region.

Heavy snow buries homes, isolates hundreds of villages in eastern Turkey (videos) Heavy snowfall falling over eastern Turkey over the past 7 days isolated hundreds of villages and in some areas completely buried single-story homes. One of the worst affected areas is the district of Ovacık, one of the regions that receive the most snowfall in Turkey.In the city of Ovacik, Tunceli Province, over 1 m (3.3 feet) of snow accumulated over the past few days while more than 2 m (6.5 feet) fell in the countryside.In some villages, the single-story houses were buried in snow, Özgür Dersim Gazetesi reports.¹"In the villages of the district, where harsh winter conditions prevail, single-story houses were completely buried in the snow and many streets and alleys resembled snow tunnels.""The thickness of snow reached the roofs of some houses in Kandolar Mahallesi and rural villages at the entrance of the district.""Some villages here can have 3 m (9.8 feet) of snow," said Aziz Kapar, the headman of Kızık village, where 1.5 m (5 feet) of snow has fallen so far."In our village, 30 households, snowfall starts at the beginning of December and stays on the ground until May. We have a very difficult winter."Some 2 800 people were stranded on a major highway connecting Turkey's southern provinces after rare heavy snowfall and blizzard conditions hit the province of Gaziantep late Tuesday and Wednesday, January 19.²Heavy snow and blizzard conditions also affected other parts of the country, closing schools in 52 of Turkey's 82 provinces and isolating remote towns and villages.

Heavy snow and rain devastate hundreds of Syrian refugee camps -Heavy snow affecting parts of the Middle East over the past few days devastated hundreds of Syrian refugee camps along the Turkish border overnight Wednesday, January 19, 2022.Many tents were unable to withstand harsh weather and the weight of snowfall in Afrin and Azez districts of northern Syria, and the snow also blocked local roads, Anadolu news agency reports.¹Although the snowfall stopped early Wednesday morning, roads were closed in camps located around Afrin and Azez, where the snow piled as high as 40 cm (15.7 inches) deep.Bülent Yıldırım, head of the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief (IHH), said that winter conditions are becoming more difficult.²"Many tents, including those in this tent city, were destroyed. People who live here have taken shelter with those who live in other camps," he said.Yıldırım invited donors from Turkey and around the world to help those in dire need.

Montevideo hit by more than a month's worth of rain in just 1 hour, Uruguay - At least 10 people have lost their lives after heavy rains affecting Madagascar since January 17, 2022, caused deadly floods and landslides in Analamanga Region, including the capital Antananarivo (population 1.2 million). Twenty municipalities around the capital have been placed on red alert. More heavy rains are expected to hit the island in the coming days, especially on January 20.National Bureau of Disaster Risk Management (BNGRC) said more than 100 mm (3.93 inches) of rain fell during the night from Monday to Tuesday, January 17 to 18, 2022, warning that the worst is yet to come in the next 24 hours.¹The Bureau reported collapsed homes, bridges, and damaged infrastructure and farmlands in the capital Antananarivo and surrounding areas.At least 10 people have lost their lives, 3 in Ambohimangakely, 2 each in Nanisana and Manjakaraya, and one each in Alasora, Ambodempona and Ambohidora.²Most of the victims were trapped in landslides or collapsed houses, especially in the deprived neighborhoods of the suburbs of A ntananarivo.Around 500 people have been displaced. “Floods are common in Madagascar, especially in the rainy season between October and April. But yesterday they were exceptionally heavy," Lovandrainy Ratovoharisoa, a forecaster at the General Directorate of Meteorology told AFP.¹More heavy rains are expected to hit Madagascar in the coming days, especially o n Thursday, January 20, with an even higher peak than on Tuesday.

 A volcanic eruption in 2020 led to hours-long thunderstorm - A study conducted by scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Vaisala Inc., published yesterday in the Geological Society of America's journal Geology, discusses how advances in global lightning detection have provided novel ways to characterize explosive volcanism. Lead author Alexa Van Eaton says, "It's the perfect storm—explosive eruptions can create lightning that is detected around the world."The January 2020 eruption of Taal volcano in the Philippines showed how a powerful volcanic eruption beccame electrified, giving off thousands of cloud-to-ground lightning strikes over several hours. Those flashes allowed scientists to shed light on the eruption's behavior. "As soon as the volcanic ash plume rose high enough to freeze, its electrical activity lit up our sensors," says Van Eaton.Radio waves produced by lightning travel at the speed of light, so, unlike other remote sensing tools with longer lag times, "we can receive the lightning data super-fast," explains Van Eaton. The scientists also used satellite images and hundreds of photos shared on social media. "The eruption took place in a major urban area, so people posted pictures of volcanic lightning as it was happening." Those photos and videos, Van Eaton and colleagues write, "reveal a highly electrified region at the base of the umbrella cloud."In January 2020, the Taal volcano in the Philippines emitted hazardous amounts of volcanic ash and gases. The time-series animation shows the growth and spread of the volcanic plume from 12–13 January 2020, as observed by Japan's Himawari-8 satellite. NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using OMPS data from the Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC). Natural-color animation based on Himawari imagery, courtesy of the Japan Meteorological Agency. Credit: Japan Meteorological Agency"Much more can be done to characterize an eruption when there are camera perspectives from all angles," says Van Eaton. "And understanding the evolution of volcanic lightning helps us recognize the early warning signs of ash hazards to aircraft." However, remote-sensing studies like this one "only provide a broad-brush picture of an eruption," she adds. "It is clear that nothing can replace the work of local geologists who know the area like the backs of their hands."

Tsunami waves up to 10 m (33 feet) high hit Ha'apai Islands, Tonga -- The Tongan Navy has reported major damage in the Ha’apai Islands after the major eruption at Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcano on January 15, 2022.Waves that hit Ha'apai Islands were estimated to be 5 - 10 meters (16 - 33 feet) in height, reaching 500 meters (1 640 feet) inland. Ha'apai is a group of islands, islets, reefs, and shoals in the central part of Tonga. Their combined population is 5 419.Electricity and local mobile phone networks have been restored on the main island of Tongatapu but the power connection is not yet stable, the Council for International Development (CID) reports.¹International and inter-island calls are still not possible due to the damage to the undersea cable. Tonga Cable and other entities are actively working to repair the damage, CID said, adding that there is still no timeframe available for when communications will be restored.Tonga’s main airport Fua’amotu International Airport is undamaged but heavy ashfall is being cleared and inhibits the airport from being fully operational. The Director of Civil aviation in Tonga advises that the airport runway clearance will take days to complete as this is being conducted manually. The earliest possible clearance is Wednesday, January 19.Western Tongatapu suffered significant damage and the government has evacuated people from that part of the island.Authorities confirmed one fatality in Tonga, a 50-year-old British woman² who died after she was washed away while trying to rescue her dogs. Two people died in Peru after tsunami waves reached South America several hours later.The eruptive column³ reached a height of about 30 km (98 500 feet) above sea level, according to data provided by the Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) Limb Profiler aboard the Suomi NPP satellite.⁴Other estimates suggest the cloud could have reached as high as 39 km (127 900 feet) a.s.l.The eruption produced a huge shockwave that circled the planet two times.Sentinel-2 satellite image acquired on January 17 confirms the island created during the eruption in 2014/15 was completely destroyed.

Tonga cut off from the rest of the world after massive volcanic eruption and tsunami - (videos) The Kingdom of Tonga remains cut off from the rest of the world after a massive volcanic eruption at Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'pai volcano some 65 km (40 miles) N of capital Nuku'alofa on January 15, 2022.A 1.2 m (4 feet) tsunami hit Nuku'alofa some 30 minutes after the eruption¹, causing damage to homes and infrastructure. Soon after the eruption, all communication lines with the country have been disrupted and there is currently no timeframe given on restoration.While there are currently no reports of casualties in Tonga, two people drowned in Peru after tsunami waves reached South America. In satellite phone communications with the Tongan deputy head of mission in Australia, officials in Tonga confirmed there are no casualties in the capital so far and the tsunami damage is minimal. However, there are several surrounding islands and coastal areas which have been out of contact and there has been no word from these more isolated parts of the kingdom. Australia and New Zealand have already sent relief supplies using ships, but several days will pass until they reach Tonga. Volcanologist Shane Cronin from the University of Auckland said the eruption was very short-lived but extremely powerful. The power it released is similar to the 1991 eruption of the Pinatubo volcano in the Philippines (VEI 6), Cronin said.Satellite images acquired some 12 hours after the eruption, show that the volcanic island (home of the eruption) is almost completely wiped out. The eruptive column is currently estimated at 30 km (98 500 feet) above sea level, according to data provided by the Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) Limb Profiler aboard the Suomi NPP satellite.² "From what little updates we have, the scale of the devastation could be immense- especially for outer lying Islands. We are trying hard to establish contact with our colleagues at Tonga Red Cross and establish the scale and specific nature of the support they need," said Katie Greenwood, IFRC’s Pacific Head of Delegation.³

Height of Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai eruption reached 30 km (98 500 feet) a.s.l., Tonga - Eruptive column produced by the massive eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcano in Tonga at 04:10 UTC on January 15, 2022, likely reached a height of about 30 km (98 500 feet) above sea level. The data is coming from Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) Limb Profiler aboard the Suomi NPP satellite. Other estimates suggest the cloud could have reached as high as 39 km (127 900 feet) a.s.l. The eruption produced a huge shockwave that circled the planet two times. A 1.2 m (4 feet) high tsunami hit Tonga's capital Nuku'alofa within 30 minutes of the eruption, and reached countries as far away as Japan and United States. The Tongan Navy has reported major damage in the Ha'apai Islands after they were hit by waves estimated to be 5 - 10 meters (16 - 33 feet) in height and reaching 500 meters (1 640 feet) inland. Authorities confirmed one fatality in Tonga, a 50-year-old British woman who died after she was washed away while trying to rescue her dongs. Two people died in Peru after tsunami waves reached South America several hours later. All communication lines in Tonga have been disrupted, likely as a result of heavy ashfall, leaving the island nation cut off from the rest of the world. "From what little updates we have, the scale of the devastation could be immense- especially for outer lying Islands. We are trying hard to establish contact with our colleagues at Tonga Red Cross and establish the scale and specific nature of the support they need," said Katie Greenwood, IFRC’s Pacific Head of Delegation.

Gemini Observatory records volcanic gravity waves over Hawai'i, U.S. (video) Hours after the massive eruption at Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai¹ volcano on January 15, 2022, cameras at the Gemini Observatory on Mauna Kea, Hawai'i, U.S. recorded red waves rippling over Hawai'i."These are gravity waves, a type of atmospheric disturbance excited by intense thunderstorms and volcanic eruptions," Dr. Tony Phillips of the SpacveWeather said.² While many gravity waves scud through the low atmosphere, the ripples caught by Gemini's Cloudcam, were in the mesosphere 85 km (53 miles) high.These waves, seen in the video below, are red because of airglow, an aurora-like phenomenon caused by chemical reactions in the upper atmosphere.Airglow is usually too faint to see, but gravity waves from the volcano boosted the reaction rates. Red is a sign of OH -- a neutral molecule that exists in a thin layer 85 km high and can produce a pure red light, Phillips said. Gravity waves over Hawai'i were spotted by photographer Steve Cullen."I had a hunch that Gemini Cloudcams might detect gravity waves produced by the eruption of Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai. So, I just took a look and there they were!" "The volcanic eruption happened at 04:15 UTC, and the gravity waves passed Hawaii 4.5 hours later," notes Cullen. "This corresponds to a speed of ~1 100 km/h (683 mph)."

Waves from the Tonga tsunami are still being felt in Australia, and even a 50cm surge could knock you off your feet - The eruption of the underwater volcano Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha'apai created a tsunami felt across the Pacific Ocean. This includes Australia, where small but measurable tsunami waves were still being recorded as late as Monday afternoon. These may even persist into Tuesday morning. The sea level gauge at Nuku'alofa, Tonga, recorded a tsunami wave of 1.19 meters before it stopped reporting. The waves that subsequently arrived at the Australian coast were comparable to some of the biggest tsunami waves recorded here, including those generated by the southern Chile earthquake in 1960—one of the largest on record. The Tongan volcanic eruption generated waves of 82cm at the Gold Coast. In southern coastal New South Wales, the tsunami waves reached 65cm at Port Kembla and 77cm at Eden's Twofold Bay. Australians tend to be fairly relaxed about tsunami risk. But this latest event demonstrates Australia is vulnerable to tsunamis, and that warnings from authorities to stay away from foreshore areas should not be ignored. Where everyday ocean waves are caused by wind, tsunamis are caused by the large-scale vertical displacement of the water column.The biggest cause of tsunamis is underwater earthquakes. Underwater volcanoes are a far less common cause, as the graph below shows. A tsunami wave of, say, 50cm might not sound that big. But it's entirely different to the normal waves arriving at our coastline everyday. Those normal waves might take 5–15 seconds to come onshore and flow back out. A single tsunami wave can last minutes or more than an hour. Let's look at data from tide levels in Sydney on Saturday night. The tsunami off Tonga occurred at 3:10pm AEDT, and waves first arrived in Sydney just after 6pm. Between 8:17pm and 9:08pm, two peaks in the tsunami waves were recorded. Each wave lasted almost 30 minutes—15 minutes while the water went onshore, and 15 minutes while it went offshore. And as late as Monday afternoon, hour-long tsunami waves were being recorded at Batemans Bay in NSW. Tsunami waves typically arrive in a series which lasts for 12 to 24 hours, and the first wave is not always the biggest.

Elevated levels of sulfur dioxide across the SW Pacific and Australia - Elevated levels of sulfur dioxide (SO₂) are present across the SW Pacific and Australia after the eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcano on January 15, 2022.Since the eruption, the volcano has been releasing huge amounts of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen, gases that create acid rain when they interact with water and oxygen in the atmosphere.With Tonga’s tropical climate, there is likely to be acid rain around the country for a while to come, which could cause widespread crop damage.¹Acid rain comes from chemical reactions in the atmosphere among oxygen, water and sulfur or nitrogen oxides. When sulfur dioxide dissolves in small droplets of water in clouds, it reacts with the hydrogen and oxygen of the water to form a weak solution of sulfuric acid. Similarly, nitrogen oxides form weak nitric acid in water droplets.²Since everything in an ecosystem is connected, if something harms one part of an ecosystem – one species of plant or animal, the soil or the water – it can have an impact on everything else.³The Department of Environment in Fiji confirmed on January 18 that the Sulphur Dioxide (SO₂) concentration in the atmosphere has increased overnight which could result in acidic rainfall over the Fiji group.The U.N. humanitarian affairs office said Fiji was monitoring its air quality, and has advised people to cover their household water tanks and stay indoors in the event of rain.On January 18, the highest amounts of SO₂ were registered over NE Australia:SO₂ Total Column on January 18, 2022. Credit: Copernicus EU/Sentinel 5P, ADAM Platform New Zealand's NIWA said that while some of the gas is in the atmosphere above Northland, it is expected to be blown away by a southerly change on Thursday, January 19.

First aerial pictures from the disaster zone after massive volcanic eruption in Tonga - The first aerial pictures have emerged from the disaster zone in Tonga after a massive eruption at Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcano on January 15, 2022. Aerial pictures acquired on January 17 by surveillance planes sent by Australia and New Zealand have now emerged showing Tonga covered in a thick layer of ash. "Following the successful surveillance and reconnaissance flight of a New Zealand P-3K2 Orion on Monday, imagery and details have been sent to relevant authorities in Tonga, to aid in decisions about what support is most needed," New Zealand's Foreign Affairs Minister Nanaia Mahuta said today.1 "However images show ashfall on the Nuku’alofa airport runway that must be cleared before a C-130 Hercules flight with humanitarian assistance can land." In the meantime, two Royal New Zealand Navy ships will depart New Zealand today. Note: video contains high-quality Maxar satellite imagery While Tonga's capital Nuku'alofa experienced tsunami waves up to 1.2 m (4 feet), Ha'apai Islands were hit by waves up to 5 - 10 m (16 - 32 feet) in height, reaching up to 500 m (1 640 feet) inland and causing major damage. The number of casualties caused by the tsunami is increasing, with 1 person killed and two missing in Tonga, and 2 people killed in Peru, as of January 18. Electricity and local mobile phone networks have been restored on the main island of Tongatapu but the power connection is not yet stable, the Council for International Development (CID) reports.2 International and inter-island calls are still not possible due to the damage to the undersea cable. Tonga’s main airport Fua’amotu International Airport is undamaged but heavy ashfall is being cleared and inhibits the airport from being fully operational. The Director of Civil aviation in Tonga advises that the airport runway clearance will take days to complete as this is being conducted manually. The earliest possible clearance is Wednesday, January 19. Western Tongatapu suffered significant damage and the government has evacuated people from that part of the island.The eruptive column3 reached a height of about 30 km (98 500 feet) above sea level, according to data provided by the Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) Limb Profiler aboard the Suomi NPP satellite.4 Other estimates suggest the cloud could have reached as high as 39 km (127 900 feet) a.s.l

Three of Tonga's smaller islands badly damaged by tsunami - Three of Tonga's smaller islands suffered serious damage from tsunami waves, officials and the Red Cross said Wednesday, as a wider picture begins to emerge of the destruction caused by the eruption of an undersea volcano near the Pacific archipelago nation.Communications have been down throughout Tonga since the eruption on Saturday, but a ship made it to the outlying islands of Nomuka, Mango and Fonoifua on Wednesday, and reported back that few homes remain standing after settlements were hit with 15-meter (49 feet) -high waves, said Katie Greenwood, the head of delegation in the Pacific for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, which had two people aboard the vessel to help assess the damage."Very unfortunate information has come to light overnight about the three islands that we were really worried about—that they have all suffered devastating consequences as an effect of these incoming waves," she told The Associated Press in an interview from Fiji. "Most of the structures and dwellings on those islands have been completely destroyed."It is not clear yet what assistance Tonga needs or wants from the international community, and complicating matters is the country's concern over the possible spread of COVID-19, which it has effectively kept outside its borders except for one case reported in a traveler from New Zealand in October.Tonga is hoping for "almost contactless disaster relief" as a precaution, Greenwood said, acknowledging that this would complicate efforts but is also understandable amid the pandemic."They really don't want to exchange one disaster for another," she said.Some 60% of Tonga's 106,000 people have already received two doses of a COVID vaccine, and nearly 70% have received at least one dose, according to Our World in Data.In anticipation of the country's needs, New Zealand has already sent two ships. One is carrying 250,000 liters (66,000 gallons) of water and a desalination plant with the capacity to produce 70,000 more liters (18,492 gallons) per day, and another is bringing a survey and diving team to help assess the damage to shipping channels, ports and wharf infrastructure.

Photos show Tonga covered in ash, 'all agriculture ruined' after tsunami impact - Photos from the Kingdom of Tonga show streets and buildings covered in heavy ash after the massive eruption at Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai on January 15, 2022.While streets and roofs can be cleared, tsunami waves, up to 15 m (49 feet) in some places, and heavy ash have totally ruined all agriculture, raising fears the country will be facing food shortage."All agriculture is ruined and I hear the farmers have been reassured by the Prime Minister that they will be taken care of, but it’s very sad to hear, so on top of the water that we need in Tonga, it seems that we’ll be facing a food shortage," Tonga's Speaker of the House Lord Fakafanua said after the latest update from his homeland.¹According to the United Nations, at least three people have died have died in Tonga, and many people are still missing.²At least 90 people have been evacuated in evacuation centres located in the Island of Eua, 17 km (10 miles) south-east of Tongatapu, the most affected island where around 50 houses have been destroyed, and 50 damaged.Many other displaced people fled to the homes of friends and family.Damage has been also reported across the islands of Mango and Fonoi.Furthermore, the affected undersea telecommunications cable connecting Tonga to the rest of the world will take at least a month to be repaired. The first aerial pictures were acquired on January 17 by surveillance planes sent by Australia and New Zealand.³

Volcanic Eruption Was 600 Times More Powerful Than Hiroshima, Many Tongans Went Deaf During Explosion - Last week's eruption of the volcano near the Pacific island nation of Tonga was 600 times more powerful than the nuke dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in World War II. As a result, the eruption was so loud that many Tongans went deaf after the first explosion. "The first explosion…our ears were ringing and we couldn't even hear each other, so all we do is pointing to our families to get up, get ready to run," Marian Kupu, a journalist on Tonga, told Reuters.The eruption was so loud that it could be heard across the world, even thousands of miles away in Alaska. "This might be the loudest eruption since Krakatau in 1883," Michael Poland, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey, told NPR. On Tuesday, the first satellite images shared by Maxar Technologies showed the tiny island nation is smothered in volcanic ash, and building structures were destroyed after a tsunami. Days later, with limited communications due to a severed undersea communications cable between Tonga and Fiji, pictures showed the devastation on city streets. New Zealand's 1 News reveals the first look of the streets of Nuku'alofa, Tonga's capital, coated with ash. Days later, with limited communications due to a severed undersea communications cable between Tonga and Fiji, pictures showed the devastation on city streets. New Zealand's 1 News reveals the first look of the streets of Nuku'alofa, Tonga's capital, coated with ash. Areas on the water were utterly devastated by the tsunami The island's airport was cleared of ash and fixed on Thursday, allowing New Zealand and Australian military transport planes to deliver generators, hygiene supplies, freshwater, and communications equipment.

CH HSS sparks G2 - Moderate geomagnetic storm - Our planet entered a stream of fast-moving solar wind on January 18, 2022, sparking G2 - Moderate geomagnetic storm. A slightly enhanced solar wind environment is anticipated today as CH HSS effects taper, followed by a minor enhancement due to glancing blow effects from the January 16 CME.Solar wind parameters in 24 hours to 00:30 UTC on January 19 reflected persistent Coronal Hole High Speed Stream (CH HSS) influence.¹However, wind speed values were unreliable due to faraday cup issues on the DSCOVR spacecraft.Total field values reached 7 nT, Bz dropped as low as -5 nT while Phi was predominately negative.Geomagnetic K-Index of 6 (G2 - Moderate geomagnetic storm) threshold was reached at 02:59 UTC on January 19. A slightly enhanced solar wind environment is anticipated today as CH HSS effects taper, followed by a minor enhancement due to glancing blow effects from the January 16 Coronal Mass Ejection (CME).Solar activity was moderate during the same period.Region 2929 (N07W58, Dko/beta) produced the largest event of the period, an M1.5 flare at 17:44 UTC with an associated Type IV and Type II (estimated velocity 143 km/s) radio emissions. It was a partial halo CME with no clear Earth-directed component.

Strong M5.5 solar flare erupts from Region 2929 -A strong solar flare measuring M5.5 at its peak erupted from Active Region 2929 at 06:01 UTC on January 20, 2022. The event started at 05:41 and ended at 06:12 UTC. A Type II Radio Emission with an estimated velocity of 329 km/s was detected at 05:57 UTC. Type II emissions occur in association with eruptions on the sun and typically indicate a coronal mass ejection is associated with a flare event. A Type IV Radio Emission was detected at 06:17 UTC. Type IV emissions occur in association with major eruptions on the sun and are typically associated with strong coronal mass ejections and solar radiation storms. Additionally, the event was associated with a 10cm Radio Burst lasting 26 minutes, with a peak flux of 350 sfu. A 10cm radio burst indicates that the electromagnetic burst associated with a solar flare at the 10cm wavelength was double or greater than the initial 10cm radio background. This can be indicative of significant radio noise in association with a solar flare. This noise is generally short-lived but can cause interference for sensitive receivers including radar, GPS, and satellite communications. Region 2929 has Beta magnetic configuration and is capable of producing strong solar flares but its location on the western limb doesn't favor Earth-directed coronal mass ejections. The CME associated with the M1.5 flare at 17:44 UTC on January 18 was analyzed and determined to have a possible glancing blow at Earth.1 CME passage is likely to occur on January 22 based on the speed and trajectory of the ejecta. The geomagnetic field reached G2 - Moderate storm levels in 24 hours to 00:30 UTC on January 20, due to combined effects from a recurrent, negative-polarity CH HSS and possible transient. An isolated period of G1 - Minor geomagnetic storming was also observed. Quiet to unsettled conditions are expected to prevail for the later part of January 20 and into January 21 as combined CH HSS/CME influence continues to lessen. Quiet to unsettled levels should persist on January 22 as weak effects from the January 18 CME arrive.

 Large asteroid 1994 PC1 to fly past Earth at 5.5 LD on January 18 - A large near-Earth asteroid designated 1994 PC1 will fly past Earth at a distance of 5.5 LD / 0.01325 AU (1.98 million km / 1.23 million miles) on January 18, 2022. This is the second-closest approach of this object to Earth since 1933. 1994 PC1 is an Apollo-class asteroid (PHA) with an estimated diameter of 1 km ± 0.303 km (0.62 miles ± 0.18 mi). It was discovered at Siding Spring Observatory in Coonabarabran, Australia on August 9, 1994, by Robert McNaught. The object will fly past us at a speed (relative to the Earth) of 19.56 km/s at 21:51 UTC.The closest flyby of this object took place on January 17, 1933, at a nominal distance of 0.00752 AU (1.1 million km / 700 000 miles). While its next flyby will take place on July 3, 2022, at 0.44349 AU (66 million km), 1994 PC1 will not approach Earth as close as it will tomorrow until 12:28 UTC on January 18, 2105, at a distance of 0.01556 AU (2 328 075 km), and 23:50 UTC on January 20, 2194, at 0.02830 AU (4 233 281 km).

Mount Etna's exceptional carbon dioxide emissions are triggered by deep reservoirs of the gas - The transport of carbon dioxide stored in the Earth's lithospheric mantle beneath the Hyblean Plateau in southern Italy at a depth of approximately 50 to 150 kilometers is responsible for the exceptionally large CO₂emission of Mount Etna. That is the result of research conducted by an international team of geologists, including researchers from the Universities of Florence (Italy) and Cologne (Germany), and from the Istituto di Geologia Ambientale e Geoingegneria of the Italian National Research Council (CNR). To reach this conclusion, the team determined the ratios of a particular set of elements in the magmas emitted by the volcanoes using cutting-edge, high-precision measurement methods. The results have been published in the article "A carbon-rich lithospheric mantle as a source for the large CO₂ emissions of Etna volcano (Italy)' in the journalGeology.Over the geological times, variations in atmospheric CO₂depended mainly on volcanic emissions, which are difficult to estimate because they are not directly related to the volume of the magmas erupted. Indeed, some volcanoes show exceptionally large emission of CO₂ when compared to the amount that can be dissolved in their magmas. Etna is perhaps the most striking example, contributing to 10 per cent (9000 tons/day) of the present global volcanic CO₂ emission. That is three times more CO₂ than a volcano like Kilauea (Hawaii) emits, which erupts four times more magma.The team investigated magmas from four volcanoes in the region (Etna, Vulture, Stromboli, and Pantelleria), using the two rare elements Niobium (Nb) and Tantalum (Ta) as tracers. Ratios of Nb/Ta are very constant in many rocks and are only modified by few geological processes—like the infiltration of carbonate-rich melts in Earth's mantle. The study revealed that magmas from Mount Etna and Mount Vulture are characterized by extremely high Nb/Ta ratios, higher than any other active intraplate volcano. This means that the magmacompositions testify to the presence of lithospheric mantle domains beneath southern Italy that are extremely enriched in carbon. This carbon is 'tapped' during the melting of the magmas.The process is directly related to the region's complex geodynamic setting: The carbon-rich lithospheric mantle domains are located beneath the Hyblean Plateau in southern Sicily. These domains are transported towards the region beneath Etna by means of tectonic activity, specifically the rollback of the Ionian subduction plate. A symmetric mechanism is likely occurring on the other side of the Ionian plate, beneath Mount Vulture.

Satellites show 'mega-iceberg' released 152 billion tons of fresh water into ocean as it scraped past South Georgia --152 billion tons of fresh water—equivalent to 20 times the volume of Loch Ness or 61 million Olympic-sized swimming pools, entered the seas around the sub-Antarctic island of South Georgia when the megaberg A68A melted over three months in 2020/2021, according to a new study. In July 2017, the A68A iceberg snapped off the Larsen-C Ice Shelf on the Antarctic Peninsula and began its epic 3.5-year, 4,000-km journey across the Southern Ocean. At 5719 square kilometers in extent—one-quarter the size of Wales—it was the biggest iceberg on Earth when it formed and the sixth largest on record. Around Christmas 2020, the berg received widespread attention as it drifted worryingly close to South Georgia, raising concerns it could harm the island's fragile ecosystem.Researchers from the Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling (CPOM) and British Antarctic Survey (BAS) used satellite measurements to chart the A68A iceberg's area and thickness change throughout its life cycle. The authors show that the berg had melted enough as it drifted to avoid damaging the sea floor around South Georgia by running aground. However, a side effect of the melting was the release of a colossal 152 billion tons of fresh water in close proximity to the island—a disturbance that could have a profound impact on the island's marine habitat.For the first two years of its life, A68A stayed close to Antarctica in the cold waters of the Weddell Sea and experienced little in the way of melting. However, once it began its northward journey across Drake Passage, it traveled through increasingly warm waters and began to melt. Altogether, the iceberg thinned by 67 meters from its initial 235-meter thickness, with the rate of melting rising sharply as the berg drifted in the Scotia Sea around South Georgia.If an iceberg's keel is too deep, it can get stuck on the sea floor. This can be disruptive in several ways: The scour marks can destroy fauna, and the berg itself can block ocean currents and predator foraging routes. All of these potential outcomes were feared when A68A approached South Georgia. However, this new study reveals that it collided only briefly with the sea floor and broke apart shortly afterward, making it less of a risk in terms of blockage. By the time it reached the shallow waters around South Georgia, the iceberg's keel had reduced to 141 meters below the ocean surface, shallow enough to avoid the seabed which is around 150 meters deep.

Polar ice contaminated with nanoplastics - Decades-old polar ice contains significant amounts of nanoscale plastic particles. Studying ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica, an international team of scientists have identified several types of nanoplastic particles, including particles that originate from tires. As nanoplastics may cause toxic effects, the researchers address that remote and pristine areas may contain more nanoparticle pollution than expected. Polar regions are regarded as some of the last areas on Earth that are pristine and relatively untouched by human influences. Yet, both North and South polar ice appear to contain significant amounts of nanoplastics, or plastic particles smaller than a micrometer in size. Nanoplastics may cause toxic effects in organisms, but since they're difficult to measure, the worldwide extent of nanoplastic pollutionremained unclear until now. Earlier studies have already suggested that nanoplastic can be carried over long distances by wind and water currents. Still, the research team was surprised to find substantial quantities in their samples. "Now we know that nanoplastics are transported to these corners of the Earth in these quantities. This indicates that nanoplastics is really a bigger pollution problem than we thought," said Dušan Materić, lead author of the study. In an earlier study, using the same techniques, his team identified nanoplastic particles in samples the Alps.

Ocean heat is at record levels, with major consequences - The world witnessed record-breaking climate and weather disasters in 2021, from destructive flash floods that swept through mountain towns in Europe and inundatedsubway systems in China and the U.S., to heat waves and wildfires. Typhoon Rai killed over 400 people in the Philippines; Hurricane Ida caused an estimated US$74 billion in damage in the U.S. Globally, it was the sixth hottest year on record for surface temperatures, according to data released by NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in their annual global climate report on Jan. 13, 2022. But under the surface, ocean temperatures set new heat records in 2021. As climate scientist Kevin Trenberth explains, while the temperature at Earth's surface is what people experience day to day, the temperature in the upper part of the ocean is a better indicator of how excess heat is accumulating on the planet. The Conversation spoke with Trenberth, coauthor of a study published on Jan. 11, 2022, by 23 researchers at 14 institutes that tracked warming in the world's oceans. As oceans warm, their heat supercharges weather systems, creating more powerful storms and hurricanes, and more intense rainfall. That threatens human lives and livelihoods as well as marine life. The oceans take up about 93% of the extra energy trapped by the increasing greenhouse gases from human activities, particularly burning fossil fuels. Because water holds more heat than land does and the volumes involved are immense, the upper oceans are a primary memory of global warming. Our study provided the first analysis of 2021's ocean warming, and we were able to attribute the warming to human activities. Global warming is alive and well, unfortunately. The global mean surface temperature was the fifth or sixth warmest on record in 2021 (the record depends on the dataset used), in part, because of the year-long La Niña conditions, in which cool conditions in the tropical Pacific influence weather patterns around the world. There is a lot more natural variability in surface air temperatures than in ocean temperatures because of El Niño/La Niña and weather events. That natural variability on top of a warming ocean creates hot spots, sometimes called "marine heat waves," that vary from year to year. Those hot spots have profound influences on marine life, from tiny plankton to fish, marine mammals and birds. Other hot spots are responsible for more activity in the atmosphere, such as hurricanes. While surface temperatures are both a consequence and a cause, the main source of the phenomena causing extremes relates to ocean heat that energizes weather systems. We found that all oceans are warming, with the largest amounts of warming in the Atlantic Ocean and in the Southern Ocean surrounding Antarctica. That's a concern for Antarctica's ice—heat in the Southern Ocean can creep under Antarctica's ice shelves, thinning them and resulting in calving off of huge icebergs. Warming oceans are also a concern for sea level rise.

UK government: 4°C warming by 2100 "can't be ruled out" - As required by the Climate Change Act 2008, the government has today submitted the Third UK Climate Change Risk Assessment (CCRA3) to Parliament. The CCRA3 is partly based on an independent Technical Report by a large team of experts led by the University of Exeter, in partnership with the Met Office. Professor Richard Betts MBE, who led this team, says that "One of the key conclusions from the University of Exeter's work was that current worldwide policies could result in up to 4°C warming by 2100." "The agreements made at the COP26 climate summit in November have reduced the likelihood of this, but it remains possible." The Technical Report concluded that global warming is already bringing substantial risks to the UK's natural environment, infrastructure, human health, communities and businesses. It also concluded that the UK is subject to international risks relating to issues such as security, migration and supply chains. All these risks are expected to be higher at global warming of 2°C, and would be even greater if warming were to reach 4°C. Professor Betts continued that "COP26 fell short of its aims, and it is becoming less likely that we will be able limit global warming to low levels. The Paris Agreement's 1.5°C goal is slipping out of reach." "We need to be better prepared for the climate changes we have already caused." The Technical Report, the findings of which were presented by Professor Betts at COP26 in Glasgow, involved more than two years of work, drawing on numerous scientific papers and other reports as well as new research. It also involved extensive engagement with a large number of stakeholders in government, the private sector and civil society organizations with responsibility for adapting to climate change or expertise in how this can take place. The CCRA3 report published today also relied on independent advice from the Climate Change Committee (CCC) on the risks posed to the UK from climate change, and the extent to which the UK is unprepared.

How the Refrigerator Became an Agent of Climate Catastrophe - Refrigerators use compressors, condensers, and coils filled with volatile compounds to transfer heat from inside to outside; this same innovation made air-conditioning possible. When I was born, in 1955, air-conditioners in houses (and cars) were rare; today, in almost all of the United States, they’re close to universal. My mother’s father stayed semi-comfortable during Kansas City summers in the thirties and forties by moving a bed into his screened porch and wearing seersucker suits to work. Now it’s possible to pass entire days without encountering air that hasn’t been artificially cooled—and, once you get used to cooled air, its absence can feel unendurable. (In 2011, a retired Army general estimated that the Defense Department was spending a little over twenty billion dollars a year to provide air-conditioning for U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.) The use of cooling technology is growing worldwide. China now accounts for close to half of global air-conditioner purchases and roughly three-quarters of global production; in Dubai, where life during much of the year would be next to impossible without air-conditioning, hotel swimming pools are chilled. According to areport published in 2018 by the International Energy Agency, refrigeration in 2016 accounted for about six per cent of the world’s energy consumption, and space cooling accounted for about eight per cent. In the same report, the I.E.A. predicted that worldwide energy use by air-conditioners would triple by 2050, “requiring new electricity capacity the equivalent to the combined electricity capacity of the United States, the E.U. and Japan today.” Energy use by refrigerators is on a similar upward path. Much of the world’s recent growth in cooling capability has been an adaptive response to global warming. The problem is self-perpetuating, because the electricity that refrigerators and air-conditioners run on is mostly generated by burning fossil fuels. There are other climate impacts. Hydrofluorocarbons—which, for decades, have been the volatile compounds circulating inside most new cooling equipment—were widely adopted as refrigerants because they don’t have the same destructive effect on the Earth’s ozone layer as their immediate predecessors, chlorofluorocarbons. But hydrofluorocarbons are greenhouse gases with hundreds or thousands of times the warming potential of carbon dioxide. Last year, the Environmental Protection Agency adopted a rule phasing down their production and use in the United States by eighty-five per cent over the next fifteen years. But vast quantities are still being manufactured. Leakage is a common problem, and not only when old refrigerators and air-conditioners end up at the dump.

Supreme Court shot-or-test rule freeze hits agency powers - The Supreme Court’s order blocking vaccine-or-test requirements for large employers sent a daunting message to environmental lawyers. Legal observers say the court, which is now dominated by six conservative justices, has signaled its interest in reining in the regulatory authority of federal agencies. And EPA could be next. “The writing’s definitely on the wall,” Yesterday’s decision froze the Biden administration’s mandate that companies with 100 or more employees require staff either to get vaccinated against Covid-19 or wear masks and test weekly to reduce the spread of the virus. The court issued a separate order yesterday allowing a more limited vaccine requirement for certain health care workers.In a 6-3 unsigned opinion that split the court along ideological lines, the justices said that Congress hadn’t clearly authorized the Occupational Health and Safety Administration to issue a regulation on a matter of such “vast economic and political significance” — an application of a legal theory known as the major questions doctrine.The same doctrine is at play in an upcoming Supreme Court battle over EPA’s ability to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants (Greenwire, Nov. 3, 2021).After the Supreme Court took the stunning step of granting the EPA case — which focuses on a regulation that does not technically exist — legal observers speculated that the conservative justices were eager to rein in the agency’s authority.Case Western Reserve University law professor Jonathan Adler said the Supreme Court’s order yesterday on the OSHA rule is just more “bad news” for EPA.The order “suggests the justices will reject the D.C. Circuit’s expansive interpretation of EPA authority to regulate GHGs from power plants,” Adler tweeted last night.The case, West Virginia v. EPA, follows a 2-1 ruling last year from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that struck down a Trump-era regulation that had gutted the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan, which set goals for power plants to slash emissions 32 percent from 2005 levels by 2030.

 Power companies back EPA climate authority at Supreme Court - Public and private power companies yesterday called for the Supreme Court to uphold EPA’s authority to broadly regulate how they produce electricity for the nation. Consolidated Edison Inc., Exelon Corp., National Grid USA and other firms expressed their support for EPA to require the sector to cut emissions using a range of approaches that look beyond technical controls at individual facilities. "Power companies, including the Power Company Respondents, favor emission-reduction approaches that allow for trading because these market-driven approaches enable the greatest emission reduction at the lowest cost," the companies wrote in a brief docketed yesterday in the case West Virginia v. EPA. The companies — which provide power to about 40 million Americans — had opposed Supreme Court review of the challenge launched by coal companies and Republican-led states that asked the justices to limit EPA’s options to regulate emissions under the Clean Air Act. In a stunning move, the court last year agreed to take up the case, which focuses on a federal rule that does not currently exist. The landmark case, set for arguments on Feb. 28, could impede the Biden administration’s efforts to decarbonize the power sector and handcuff federal agencies’ authority to issue broad regulations (Energywire, Nov. 1, 2021). Red states and coal companies have argued that the "best system of emission reduction" for existing sources should be read much more narrowly than the approach the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld last year when it struck down a Trump-era rule that had gutted the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan. Instead of allowing approaches like generation shifting from coal to renewable sources, the Republican states and coal firms argue, EPA should be restricted to emissions reductions at the facility level, or "inside the fenceline." While the challengers’ arguments center on a regulatory approach adopted by the Obama team in the Clean Power Plan, the power companies pointed out in their brief yesterday that the 2015 rule had never gone into effect and that the Biden administration does not plan to revive it. Biden’s EPA has said it plans to issue a proposed carbon rule this summer, which is around the same time the Supreme Court is expected to hand down its ruling in West Virginia v. EPA. "The Power Company Respondents urge the Court to reject Petitioners’ request that the Court issue an advisory opinion about whether speculative abuses of power by an imagined future EPA Administrator would fall within the powers Congress lawfully granted to the agency," the companies wrote. They added that the court should reject arguments from West Virginia and the other challengers that EPA’s regulatory approach raised concerns about whether courts should defer to agency discretion for rules with "vast economic and political significance." The Clean Air Act expressly authorizes EPA to set the best system of emission reduction, which states use to create individual standards of performance for existing sources, the power companies said. "And States retain broad authority and flexibility under [Clean Air Act] Section 7411(d) to regulate existing sources by establishing and enforcing the standards of performance, leaving the agency no room beyond what Congress explicitly authorized," they wrote. In its own response to the petition, EPA challenged the argument that a systemic approach to emissions regulation that would include options like trading or efficiency improvements would prove to be overly burdensome to states. "But contrary to petitioners’ suggestion, those measures need not be utilized by all sources equally," the agency said. "The [best system of emission reduction] may reflect the agency’s determination that overall emissions can best be reduced by taking account of the ways in which different sources are differently situated," the brief continued. In practice, that could mean that one source may comply with the rule by reducing emissions, while another would purchase allowances, EPA wrote.

Dimming Sun's rays should be off-limits, say experts - Planetary-scale engineering schemes designed to cool Earth's surface and lessen the impact of global heating are potentially dangerous and should be blocked by governments, more than 60 policy experts and scientists said on Monday. Even if injecting billions of sulphur particles into the middle atmosphere—the most hotly debated plan for so-called solar radiation modification (SRM)—turned back a critical fraction of the Sun's rays as intended, the consequences could outweigh any benefits, they argued in an open letter. "Solar geoengineering deployment cannot be governed globally in a fair, inclusive and effective manner," said the letter, supported by a commentary in the journal WIREs Climate Change. "We therefore call for immediate political action from governments, the United Nations and other actors to prevent the normalisation of solar geoengineering as a climate policy option." An increase of 1.1 degrees Celsius above mid-19th century levels has already boosted the intensity, frequency and duration of deadly heat waves, droughts and megastorms. The world's nations have committed to capping the rise in Earth's surface temperature to 1.5C above mid-19th century levels, but UN-backed scientists have said that threshold will be breached, possibly within a decade. The failure to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that drive global heating has led some policy makers to embrace solar geoengineering—widely dismissed not long ago as more science fiction than science—in order to buy time for a more durable solution. It has long been known that injecting a large quantity of reflective particles into the upper atmosphere could cool the planet. Nature sometimes does the same: debris from the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines lowered Earth's average surface temperature for more than a year. But the open letter said there are several reasons to reject such a course of action. Artificially dimming the Sun's radiative force is likely to disrupt monsoon rains in South Asia and western Africa, and could ravage the rain-fed crops upon which hundreds of millions depend for nourishment, several studies have shown. Unintended consequences "Stratospheric sulfate injection weakens the African and Asian summer monsoons and causes drying in the Amazon," the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in its most recent scientific assessment. Other regions, however, could benefit: a study last year concluded that SRM could sharply curtail the risk of drought in southern Africa. Scientists also worry about so-called termination shock if seeding the atmosphere with Sun-blocking particles were to suddenly stop. If SRM "were terminated for any reason, there is high confidence that surface temperatures would increase rapidly," the IPCC said. In addition, the technology would do nothing to stop the continuing buildup of atmospheric CO2, which is literally changing the chemistry of the ocean.

Bipartisan lawmakers announce climate adaptation bill - A bipartisan group of lawmakers on Thursday released proposed legislation aiming to help the country better prepare for climate change impacts including sea level rise and worsening extreme weather events. The legislation would require the federal government to develop a “National Climate Adaptation and Resilience Strategy” that would assess the country’s vulnerabilities and make sure the government has a plan to respond to them. It would also create a “Chief Resilience Officer” position in the White House to direct preparation efforts and lead the strategy’s development, as well as interagency groups dedicated to the issue and a council of non-federal partnerships from frontline communities. The effort is spearheaded by Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Chris Coons (D-Del.), as well as Reps. Scott Peters (D-Calif.) and María E. Salazar (R-Fla.). Coons, who co-chairs the Senate’s bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus, said in a statement that the legislation “sets out commonsense first steps so that the federal government can deliver sustainable, resilient, and equitable climate solutions in Delaware, our country’s lowest lying state, as well as for Americans in frontline communities across the nation.” It’s also backed by additional lawmakers from each party, including Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), and Bill Cassidy (R-La.), it’s still not clear whether it would be able to garner enough support on its own to surpass the Senate’s 60-vote threshold. There is also the chance that it won't stand alone and would instead be worked into larger packages.

Ind. carbon storage project seeks protection from lawsuits - An Indiana company is again asking state legislators to grant it the right to inject carbon deep underground without fear of liability claims or the need to compensate property owners. Wabash Valley Resources has for years sought legislation to facilitate its efforts to capture carbon dioxide from power generation or chemical manufacturing and store it underground near Indiana’s Wabash River.A law passed in 2019 allowed the company to undertake a pilot project and declared carbon sequestration in the public interest, allowing the use of eminent domain. But the company has told legislators that the lack of protection from liability claims has hampered its ability to get federal funding.The state House Committee on Natural Resources heard testimony Tuesday before passing a bill, HB 1249, that would prevent liability claims related to Wabash Valley’s project unless plaintiffs can prove “actual interference with the reasonable use of the person’s property; or direct and tangible physical damage to the person’s property,” as a bill summary puts it. A bill with similar provisions, SB 373, was introduced last spring, passing the state House but dying in the Senate. The committee also discussed and passed a separate bill, HB 1209, that would establish various rules for the industry’s growth in the state but does not include liability protection. With federal incentives for carbon capture and sequestration poised to expand, industry leaders say they don’t want Indiana to get left behind. A BP executive who testified to lawmakers this week said the state’s unique geology gives it an advantage when it comes to underground carbon storage.Some testifiers noted support for the concept of carbon capture and sequestration. But a litany of stakeholders, including representatives of the water utility, corn and soybean producers, the Farm Bureau, ethanol producers, and community and civil rights organizations, testified in opposition to HB 1249 because of its curbs on liability.“It does seem to take away the legal rights of those who would be impacted by the carbon stored in the ground,” Denise Abdul-Rahman, environmental climate justice chair of the Indiana State Conference of the NAACP, told the natural resources committee. “Would you want to live where carbon is being stored? We don’t really know what the damages will be in the future.”The potential risks and hazards, while thought to be relatively small, includeearthquakes triggered by the injection process and leaks that could contaminate groundwater or poison people or livestock on the surface.“They want almost total immunity from any consequences related to migration of carbon dioxide they intend to store underground, whether it’s contaminated drinking water [or] carbon migrating to the surface and asphyxiating a herd of cattle,” Kerwin Olson, executive director of the Citizens Action Coalition, told the Energy News Network. “And any property owner who claims damage — the burden of proof would fall on the owner. They’d have to prove direct correlation.”During a hearing last spring on the previous version of the bill, Indiana Department of Natural Resources general counsel David Bausman said “nuisance” provisions could be drafted to limit frivolous legal action, but sweeping immunity could harm the state.“We have very strong concerns that [the bill] would allow for trespass and create immunity for trespass actions,” he said, meaning “trespassing” by carbon dioxide. “The Wabash River is very close — the state owns subsurface mineral rights under the river so any injection of carbon dioxide could very well migrate onto state property, and language in this bill would close a claim” by the state. Representatives of farmers, meanwhile, told legislators that landowners should be able to negotiate payments for any risk that the injection might entail.

Selectmen back biomass plant in Redstone — Selectmen on Tuesday gave general conditional support to a consultant to apply for two grants for a proposed wood chip-powered energy plant to supply the needs of the planned Ridgeline Retirement Community and mixed commercial development project in Redstone. Selectmen took that vote in support of the two grant requests with the condition that the project still needs to come before the planning board later this year. The board took the vote due to pending deadlines for two grant applications this week. Requesting a general letter of support for the grants and project was Charles Niebling. A longtime forester and past director of the New Hampshire Timberland Owners Association, heis now a self-employed wood products energy consultant to Continuum, the company developing the Ridgeline project. One request is for a $375,000 Renewable Energy Generation Project grant, with an application deadline of Jan. 17. The other is for a $1 million USFS Community Wood Energy and Wood Innovation Program grant, with an application deadline of Jan. 19.Niebling said the plant — including the boiler plant, distribution and building heat exchange — would cost about $5 million and said he was applying on behalf of Continuum for the two grants totallng $1.375 million toward that $5 million plus capital costs.He touted energy savings and other benefits.“First, it is a renewable energy resource. Secondly, it will involve some very advanced technology featuring flue gas condensation and absorption chilling, making it a very attractive demonstration project. It will greatly reduce the operating costs of the owners of the (Ridgeline) community once it's built. And it will provide a market for low-grade wood in the region to the tune of 3,000-3,500 tons a year,” said Niebling.Niebling touted the benefits to the local wood industry and said that is one reason why it is so favored by the U.S. Forest Service.Selectmen's chair David Weathers thought the proposal was a good one, noting that “whole tree biomass harvesting is the best thing that ever happened to forestry.”

Gas plant at Old Town landfill could heat 10,500 homes, but would require a new pipeline - An operation that would turn the methane released by trash at the Juniper Ridge Landfill in Old Town into pipeline-quality natural gas could heat up to 10,500 homes, but would require the construction of a new pipeline to distribute the fuel. Archaea Energy has been working to build a facility inside the state-owned Juniper Ridge Landfill that would turn the methane produced by the decomposing waste into renewable natural gas that it would release into local gas distribution lines. It marks the latest effort to reuse the methane produced at the landfill that its operator, Casella Waste Systems, currently burns off using a flare system. Bangor Natural Gas, with about 7,000 customers throughout the Bangor area, has been working to strike a deal with Archaea for the last two years so gas from the landfill could flow into the utility’s distribution system. But the gas company would first have to build a pipeline 1 1/2 to 2 miles long so the gas can travel from the landfill into Bangor Natural Gas’ network, according to Andrew Barrowman, the gas company’s sales and marketing manager. Renewable natural gas can be used to heat homes but is often also used as a fuel source for vehicles like trucks and buses. If constructed, the facility at Juniper Ridge could produce enough gas to heat 10,500 residential homes, according to Shelby Wright, Casella’s eastern region manager of engagement. Bangor Natural Gas currently has about 7,000 customers, which are a mixture of residential customers, businesses and other commercial users, Barrowman said. The methane the landfill releases is about 50 percent pure, Casella’s Ken Robbins said. However, Archaea can refine the gas and convert it into 99 percent pure methane, which meets pipeline standards, he said.

EPA to review permits at hog farms collecting gas - Federal regulators have agreed to investigate whether the N.C. Department of Environment Quality violated the rights of minority residents and poor people living near farms where it approved plans to capture gas from hog waste. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said it had accepted a complaint êled in October by the Southern Environmental Law Center for the Duplin County NAACP and the North Carolina Poor People’s Campaign. The complaint alleges the state’s water quality permit modiêcations at four hog farms approved last March contained “inadequate” protections for nearby communities in Duplin and Sampson counties, violating civil rights laws. Moving forward with the investigation doesn’t reëect any decision on the merits of the allegations, the EPA’s External Civil Rights Compliance Oìce wrote to an SELC lawyer. The farms are among 19 operations set to provide methane to a natural gas facility near the Sampson-Duplin county line operated by a partnership between Smithêeld Foods and Dominion Energy. The farms will capture methane and other gases in a digester and send the product to a processing facility. At three of the farms, a new waste pit would be dug and covered with an anaerobic digester, eéectively a large tarp that is welded together at the seams. As methane and other gases waft from the lagoon, they are captured in the digester and sent to a nearby processing facility. The fourth farm requested a permit to cover an existing pit. Biogas is popular with pork producers, who argue that it cuts down on methane emissions from their waste pits while also turning the captured gas into a source of revenue for farmers. But nearby community members and environmental advocates argue that using waste pits to capture gases perpetuates a system where waste is stored in lagoons before being sprayed onto nearby êelds, damaging air quality and with runoé impacting water quality.

Former BPA chief cautions lawmakers about cryptocurrency's impact on Northwest hydropower – The former head of the Bonneville Power Administration and Chelan County Public Utility District cautioned a House oversight panel Thursday about the effect of cryptocurrency operations that have flocked to the Northwest in recent years in search of cheap hydropower. At a hearing on the energy usage of blockchain technologies like Bitcoin, Steve Wright, who led the Wenatchee-based PUD until last April, told members of a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee what happened when Bitcoin miners started setting up their energy-intensive operations in Central Washington around 2014. “These were small operations in shipping containers, vacant small businesses and residences” at first, Wright said, but soon the operations grew far bigger and caused concerns in the community over safety risks, how few local jobs the industry created relative to its energy use and a lack of tax revenue despite driving up energy costs for local residents. Mining Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies involves rooms full of computers working together solving complicated math problems to unearth a new coin. As more of the digital currency has been mined, the computing power required to acquire another coin has increased, leading to massive electricity usage even as the individual machines used have grown more efficient. According to a calculation by the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom, Bitcoin uses more electricity each year than the nations of Ukraine and Norway. Throughout the hearing, Democrats expressed concerns over the impact of cryptocurrency energy use on efforts to reduce carbon emissions, citing Bitcoin operations that have reinvigorated struggling or shuttered coal-fired power plants in Montana and Upstate New York. While the availability of relatively cheap hydroelectric power has made the Northwest an attractive destination for cryptocurrency operations, Wright said increased demand for low-carbon energy sources can drive up prices for residents. The rapid emergence of blockchain technologies like Bitcoin in less than a decade has posed a tough challenge to regulators in Congress. “I think there was a lot of concern, candidly, about the potential for this decentralized and unregulated currency,” Wright said. “So when folks said to us, ‘We’d like for you to be the cryptocurrency capital of the world,’ I would say there was a skeptical reaction to whether that’s what we wanted to be or not.” Republicans on the panel, meanwhile, warned that regulating the nascent industry could slow innovation and cautioned against Congress “picking winners and losers” by requiring cryptocurrency miners to use low-carbon energy sources.

BP and Oman form renewable energy and hydrogen development strategic partnership - BP and the Ministry of Energy and Minerals in Oman signed a Strategic Framework Agreement and a Renewables Data Collection Agreement which will support the potential development of a multiple gigawatt, world-class renewable energy and green hydrogen development in Oman, by 2030. As part of the agreement, BP will capture and evaluate solar and wind data from 8,000km2 of land – an area more than five times the size of Greater London. The evaluation will then support the Government of Oman in approving the future developments of renewable energy hubs at suitable locations within this area to take advantage of these resources. The renewable energy resources could also supply renewable power for the development of green hydrogen, targeting both domestic and global export markets. This partnership represents a significant evolution of BP’s business in Oman and is aligned with BP’s strategy, which includes rapidly growing our developed renewable generating capacity and to take early positions in hydrogen. BP chief executive Bernard Looney said: “Today’s agreement represents what BP is able to offer as an integrated energy company. These projects will build on our gas business, and bring wind, solar and green hydrogen together in a distinctive and integrated way supporting Oman’s low carbon energy goals. “And we’re not just investing in energy. We are investing in Oman to create and develop infrastructure, support local supply chains and cultivate the skills and talent needed to usher in this next generation of energy leaders. We look forward to working closely with the Omani government to take this forward.”

UAE’s biggest renewable energy firm looks to deals for growth --The United Arab Emirates’ biggest renewable-energy company will make acquisitions and sell bonds as part of a plan to more than double its operations this decade and help the country achieve a net-zero target. “We have very significant growth ambitions,” Masdar’s Chief Financial Officer Niall Hannigan said in an interview in Abu Dhabi, the UAE’s capital. “That growth is going to require capital.” The company is interested in acquisitions of power firms in places including the U.S. and Europe, he said. Asian nations such as Japan, South Korea and Vietnam are potential markets for buying into offshore wind projects, he said. The company is a key part of the UAE’s goal to neutralize planet-warming emissions within its borders by 2050. OPEC’s third-biggest oil producer wants to boost solar, hydrogen and nuclear-generated energy to achieve that aim. Masdar will see its power capacity increase to about 23 gigawatts once a deal announced in December to merge its green projects with those of Abu Dhabi’s state oil firm Adnoc and utility Taqa is completed. As part of the transaction, Adnoc and Taqa will buy stakes in Masdar from sovereign fund Mubadala Investment Co. Masdar wants to generate 50 gigawatts of clean power by 2030, which is the same ambition as BP Plc. The Abu Dhabi firm could get funding from the emirate’s government as well as international capital markets for its growth, Hannigan said. Masdar is rated A2 by Moody’s Investors Service and may sell its first corporate bond next year, he said.

Equinor, BP Seal 2.5 GW Offshore Wind Farm Deal With NY State - Equinor and BP have finalized the Purchase and Sale Agreements (PSAs) with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority for the Empire Wind 2 and Beacon Wind 1 offshore wind projects. The finalization of the PSA agreements was attended by U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm, New York Governor Kathy Hochul, and U.S. Representative Paul Tonko. The PSAs set the terms under which these projects will supply homegrown, renewable power to New York and inject significant economic investments into the state’s economy. The finalization of the PSAs concludes the contracts awarded in January 2021, when Equinor and BP were selected to provide New York State with offshore wind power in one of the largest renewable energy procurements in the U.S. to date. Once completed, Equinor and BP’s portfolio of active offshore wind projects – Empire Wind 1, Empire Wind 2, and Beacon Wind 1 – will produce enough electricity to power about 2 million New York homes and will help generate more than $1 billion in economic output to New York State.

Icebreaker federal grant extended, giving advocates for Cleveland offshore wind project more time to arrange financing - – Advocates of the moribund Icebreaker wind turbine project proposed for Lake Erie off Cleveland Harbor are still clinging to a chance for success. Recent news from the Department of Energy is working in their favor.The Department of Energy has extended a grant critical to the project’s success, said Will Friedman, head of project developer Lake Erie Energy Development Corp., giving LEEDCo at least another year to find the necessary financing.Friedman, who is also the president and CEO of the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority, raised concerns in October when he said the Department of Energy wanted to see progress on the stalled project by the end of 2021, otherwise it might pull its financial commitment.LEEDCo has the necessary permits to erect the turbines - though a challenge is still before the Ohio Supreme Court - but not the funding.The $37 million left on the federal grant for Icebreaker would be primarily used for construction, Friedman said, but significantly more money is needed to make the project a reality.LEEDCo’s push for help from the state legislature impressed federal administrators and contributed to their decision to extend the grant, Friedman said, adding that perhaps they were also less willing to pull the plug on a project because it might look bad given President Biden’s commitment to offshore wind.Cleveland and Cuyahoga County have committed to buy one-third of the project’s 20.7-megawatt output. Friedman and others were hoping the state legislature would approve a slight surcharge on the electric bills of FirstEnergy customers in Northeast Ohio to cover the rest.But in December, the Ohio House of Representatives declined to pass legislation that would have authorized the surcharge. LEEDco was proposing an amendment to a bill that would have allowed for the surcharge, but the idea never made it out of the Republican Caucus and the bill never made it to the floor for a vote.

PSC rejects another wind farm lighting extension request - North Dakota regulators have denied another wind farm operator's request for more time to comply with the state's law requiring technology to mitigate the blinking red lights atop wind turbines at night. The Public Service Commission voted 2-0 this week to reject the request brought by Onward Energy Holdings for its Sunflower wind farm in Morton and Stark counties. The commission has rejected several similar requests in recent weeks. The deadline to install the technology has already passed -- it fell at the end of 2021. Under a new state law, wind farm operators can seek an extension or waiver for economic or technical feasibility reasons. Onward sought an extension, as it had originally hoped to install a system that was waiting on approval from the Federal Aviation Administration. When that did not come through in time, the company opted for different technology already approved but said the equipment would not be running at the wind farm by the deadline. The system the company plans to install is radar-based and keeps the lights off unless an aircraft flies in the vicinity. The light mitigation requirement is in place to improve the night sky for people who live in the vicinity of wind farms..

States unwind FERC plans for grid expansion - A decade after federal regulators opened the door to competition for development of large transmission projects, states — acting at the request of incumbent utilities — are slamming it shut.The latest example is Michigan. In December, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) signed into law a proposal pushed by Novi, Mich.-based ITC Holdings Corp. guaranteeing the company the opportunity to build any new large transmission line in its service area rather than having to compete for the project.With S.B. 103, Michigan joins Iowa, the Dakotas and Minnesota, all of which have adopted similar laws to box out competitive transmission development, which could reshape how new lines are proposed and their cost. Missouri could soon follow. A legislator there has pre-filed a bill to be considered next month to similarly give utilities in the state dibs on regional transmission projects.The right-of-first-refusal laws adopted by an increasing number of Midwestern states represent another area of tension between state and federal energy policy by undoing a key provision of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s Order 1000. The landmark 2011 order eliminated the federal right of first refusal on regional transmission projects, opening them up to competition.“The idea was to create more competition for transmission projects,” said Alexandra Klass, a law professor at the University of Minnesota. “And by creating more competition, you would both spur additional transmission development, which everyone says we need, and also lower the cost of those projects.” While Order 1000 didn’t lead to a regional transmission building boom, it did spur action.“What all the utilities did right after that is immediately start to lobby the state legislatures to create the state rights of first refusal,” said Klass, who worked as a consultant to LS Power, a competitive transmission developer that unsuccessfully challenged Minnesota’s law.Now FERC is diving back into the issue as part of its sweeping review of transmission planning and cost allocation (Energywire, July 16, 2021). Regulators specifically want to know how elimination of the federal right of first refusal (ROFR) has influenced the type of transmission being built.How things at FERC shake out has big consequences for clean energy and whether needed regional transmission projects are developed, who builds them and what they cost.This is especially true today. Modeling by researchers at Princeton University and elsewhere suggest hundreds of billions of dollars in new transmission is needed to help the United States decarbonize the power sector by connecting cities to remote wind and solar farms at the same time gasoline-powered cars are displaced by electric vehicles, putting a new demand on the grid (Energywire, Aug. 3, 2021).

Judge blasts PG&E as 'continuing menace' over wildfires as utility's probation ends - A federal judge on Wednesday declared Pacific Gas & Electric a "continuing menace" to California over its role in igniting deadly wildfires, as the utility is set to end a five-year felony probation. During its probation, PG&E-owned equipment ignited at least 31 wildfires that burned nearly 1.5 million acres and killed 113 people, U.S. District Judge William Alsup wrote in a report.. During PG&E's probation, all of the fires ignited by its distribution lines involved hazard trees. Alsup called the company's backlog of unattended trees and vegetation at the outset of its probation "staggering," and called on the company to stop outsourcing to independent contractors, who he said have performed "sloppy inspection and clearance work." Alsup has overseen the company's probation since its conviction of crimes connected to a 2010 natural gas pipeline explosion in California. PG&E's probation is set to end on Jan. 25. "PG&E has gone on a crime spree and will emerge from probation as a continuing menace to California," Alsup wrote. "In probation, with a goal of rehabilitation in mind, we always prefer that criminal offenders learn to accept responsibility for their actions," Alsup wrote. "Sadly, during all five years of probation, PG&E has refused to accept responsibility for its actions until convenient to its cause or until it is forced to do so." The company's equipment has been blamed for many of the state's wildfires in recent years. A recent state investigation found that PG&E transmission lines ignited the Dixie Fire in Northern California, which burned nearly 1 million acres and destroyed more than 1,300 homes last summer. It was the second-largest fire in California's history.PG&E pleaded guilty in 2019 to 84 counts of involuntary manslaughter in the 2018 Camp Fire, the deadliest wildfire in California's history. It faces five felony and 28 misdemeanor counts in the 2019 Kincade Fire in Sonoma County. It also faces a slew of other civil and criminal actions for its alleged responsibility in causing wildfires.

Cardinal-Hickory Creek: Judge blocks Mississippi River crossing for $492M power line -A federal judge has blocked a power line under construction in Iowa and Wisconsin from crossing the Mississippi River after finding the government’s environmental review was inadequate.Judge William Conley’s ruling throws the fate of the Cardinal-Hickory Creek transmission line into question just months after utilities began construction on the $492 million project. Conley sided with four conservation groups that sued two federal agenciesover approvals of the contentious 102-mile line between Dubuque, Iowa, and Middleton. In an order issued Friday, Conley said the Rural Utilities Service’s environmental review did not give adequate consideration to alternatives and therefore failed to comply with federal law. He ruled the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s decision to grant a right-of-way through the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge was “arbitrary and capricious” and that the line is not compatible with the refuge’s mission.Conley additionally found a proposed land exchange cannot be used “to evade Congress’ mandate” for the 240,000-acre refuge, which stretches from Rock Island, Illinois, to the confluence of the Chippewa River near Eau Claire.Conley noted the utilities waited until after the lawsuit was filed to change their right-of-way permit application, and the Fish and Wildlife Service “suddenly ‘discovered’ errors” in its approval just a week before arguments were due.The utilities then proposed a land swap, which the Fish and Wildlife Service endorsed but Conley said is equally incompatible.Meanwhile, the utilities have continued construction on either side of the river, which Conley said “amounts to little more than an orchestrated train wreck at some later point in this lawsuit.”

War between energy titans could shape New England climate - For five years, two of the world’s largest power companies have been locked in an all-out battle over the future of New England’s electric grid. The outcome could determine the fate of the region’s decarbonization efforts for decades. The fight pits Avangrid Inc., a subsidiary of the Spanish power giant Iberdrola, versus NextEra Energy Inc., the most valuable power company in America. It effectively is a contest between hydro power — generated by dams in Quebec and carried on a 146-mile transmission line built by Avangrid across Maine — versus a large nuclear plant operated in New Hampshire by NextEra. The two companies have poured tens of millions of dollars into a ballot referendum in Maine, waged legal battles in two state supreme courts and are engaged in an ongoing struggle at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Only one low-carbon resource may survive. Today, the transmission line’s future is hanging by a thread after Maine voters overwhelmingly supported a NextEra-backed ballot measure to halt the 146-mile project. Avangrid is appealing the constitutionality of the vote. New England can ill afford the fight. Several deep decarbonization studies show the region needs nuclear power and Canadian hydro imports — in addition to vast amounts of wind and solar — to eliminate emissions from its power plants. “We’re in a world in New England where the states have put a stick in the ground to decarbonize. They need all hands on deck from Canadian hydro, existing nukes, offshore wind and other renewables to do that,” “And that is disruptive to New England power markets.” Avangrid and NextEra each are a green giant in their own right. Florida-based NextEra had 21 gigawatts of wind and solar installed at the end of 2020. Avangrid operates about 8.5 GW of renewables in the United States. Iberdrola, its parent, has a global renewable fleet of 23 GW. The six New England states, by comparison, have installed roughly 3 GW of wind and solar. But the fight between the pair concerns more controversial forms of low-carbon power: hydro and nuclear. The struggle can be traced to increasing efforts to green the region’s electric grid. Power plants in the six-state region compete in a wholesale power market to sell their electricity. But in recent years, as frustration over the pace of decarbonization has mounted, a collection of New England states has opted to award long-term clean energy contracts at a fixed cost, effectively bypassing the market. Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts utilities signed deals to buy large quantities of offshore wind. In 2019, Connecticut handed a 10-year contract to Millstone nuclear power station after the operator of New England’s largest power plant warned it could close. And Massachusetts awarded a 20-year deal to Hydro-Quebec in 2018 to supply electricity delivered via a 146-mile power line to be built by an Avangrid’s subsidiary, Central Maine Power Co. The hydro line has the potential to be transformative for the region. It would annually deliver 9.45 terawatt-hours of electricity, or about 18 percent of Massachusetts power demand, reducing the region’s reliance on natural gas. But the project has generated howls from existing power plant owners, who say it could suppress wholesale power prices and unravel the region’s market.

All around Massachusetts, cities and towns want to go fossil fuel free. Here’s why they can’t. - The Boston Globe - Across Massachusetts, dozens of cities and towns have said they want to outlaw the use of fossil fuels in newly constructed buildings — considered an easy and effective step toward a carbon-free future. The state’s new climate legislation aimed to do just that, and required the state to come up with a new building code that would allow cities and towns to move ahead. The Baker administration promised a draft by fall 2021 but failed to deliver. And now some climate-concerned legislators want the administration to answer for it. “Each additional day of delay means one day less of public discussion,” said Senator Mike Barrett. “The clock is ticking down, and Baker’s people know it.” Representative Jeff Roy said a new building code is “critical to reaching our goals and empowering local municipalities to achieve net-zero by 2050.” In light of the delay, Wednesday’s hearing will consider legislative action that would allow cities and towns to require new residential and commercial buildings to be “all-electric.” “On the off chance the stretch energy code either does not emerge soon or emerges but departs from legislative intent, we’re looking at contingency steps the Legislature may want to take,” Barrett and Roy said in a joint statement. The Baker administration is continuing to work on updating the code and “will issue proposals for these codes for public comment soon,” . The exact details of the building code won’t be known until the Baker administration releases it and it goes through a public comment period and a series of five public hearings. It is required to be finalized by December of next year. But the intent, as laid out by the climate law passed last year, is that cities and towns could require new buildings and gut rehabilitations would have net-zero emissions. This likely means a future of heat pumps to deliver heat, solar panels to generate energy, and onsite batteries to store what is produced to get to net zero. Advocates fear the draft from the Baker administration could ultimately allow for buildings to have fossil fuel hook-ups as long as emissions are offset in another way, like the installation of solar panels. While the offsetting is important for the climate, the continued use of fossil fuels in new buildings would ensure that the required infrastructure remains in place into the future, potentially putting the state’s climate targets at risk.

US utility commissioners: Who they are and how they impact regulation - State utility commissions are quasi-judicial agencies that were created to, among other things, oversee the rates charged by electric, gas and water utilities, which are essentially government-sanctioned monopolies. At the federal level, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission plays a similar role. Numerous factors may influence the degree of investor risk associated with utility commissions and their regulators, including the process through which they are selected, experience and background of the commissioners, and the amount of oversight they have been granted. Maintaining constructive relationships with regulators is key to utilities' financial performances. The tenor of these relationships can be greatly affected by the method and timing of the selection of individuals to serve on these agencies.All else being equal, there is a greater degree of investor risk to jurisdictions in which commissioners are elected rather than appointed. Generally, energy regulatory issues are less politicized when they are not subject to debate in the context of an election. Involvement by the governor, state legislature, courts and the attorney general can further politicize the regulatory process. For example, following the wake of the controversy surrounding the February 2021 winter weather event, Texas enacted a wide range of legislation modifying various aspects of the commission, power generation and utility industry as a whole. Realistically, a candidate for commissioner who is sympathetic to the utilities and/or appears to be amenable to rate increases is not likely to be popular with the voting public. A high degree of turnover can also make for increased regulatory risk.Over the past three years, several states have made modifications to the composition of their respective state utility commissions. Changes include how the state's commissioners are selected, the length of a commissioner's term and the total number of commissioners at the agencies. In 2021, three states expanded the membership of their respective utility commissions.During the 2021 Tennessee legislative session, Senate Bill 252 was enacted, which expanded the commission membership to seven part-time regulators. The governor, the Speaker of the House and the Speaker of the Senate (the lieutenant governor) each appoint two Tennessee Public Utility Commission members. All three offices jointly appoint an additional commissioner..Following the wake of the controversy surrounding the February 2021 winter weather event, Texas enacted a wide range of legislation modifying various aspects of the Public Utility Commission of Texas, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas Inc. and the utility industry as a whole. Specifically, Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, signed Senate Bill 2154 into law on June 18. The legislation increases the number of commissioners on the PUC to five from three and changes some of the prerequisites for commission membership.

Major energy storage deployment can balance load 24/7, cut emissions: NREL study - Significant deployment of energy storage can successfully balance load and meet demand at all hours while also helping electricity grids run more efficiently, according to a new report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).NREL researchers modeled high storage scenarios and found that, by 2050, sufficient storage deployment would allow the grid to operate with no unserved energy and low reserve violations. Additionally, the ability of storage to meet peak demand at times when solar generation is low can improve the efficiency of thermal generation, even allowing grid operators to avoid starting up generators and peaker plants altogether, according to the report. That would also bring down carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and other air pollutants.The report is the sixth in NREL’s Storage Futures Study(SFS), which uses advanced modeling to explore how energy storage will influence the electricity grid. Previous reports in the series have shown a variety of scenarios to boost the role of storage, including the potential for U.S. storage capacity to exceed 125 GW by the end of 2050, more than five times the current capacity. The SFS has also found that energy storage provides its greatest value when meeting peak demand, especially when solar generation increases and peak demand shifts later into the evening. The latest report uses NREL’s Regional Energy Deployment System (ReEDS) model, a national-scale planning tool for the power sector, to examine future scenarios where storage capacity in 2050 ranged from 213 GW to 932 GW. (According to NREL, the U.S. has 23 GW of storage as of 2021, most of which is pumped storage hydropower. The Energy Information Administration found the U.S. had 1,650 MW of battery storage installed at the end of 2019, but was poised to have ten times that by 2024.) That level of installation, the report found, was aligned with significant solar installation and was able to meet peak load, despite concerns about the variability in solar generation. Although energy storage technology has a low annual capacity factor because of its need to recharge, the study found that it would be utilized significantly – more than 75% of capacity – during the top 10 net load hours, when demand is highest. The findings suggest that storage would be used heavily on a daily basis and would need to be charged during the day when solar production is at its highest. "Essentially, the storage technology plays a key role during peak demand when the power system needs energy and capacity the most," said Jennie Jorgenson, NREL researcher and lead author of the study. "We find this consistently across all scenarios and years through 2050."

The Winter Gas Bill From Hell: Oklahomans Face Paying $1.4 Billion Over Snow Storm - Oklahoma Watch - When Neil Crittenden heard that an extreme winter storm was about to hit Oklahoma last winter, he did what officials advised him to do and kept his heat on and water running so that his pipes wouldn’t freeze. The 40-year-old Oklahoma City resident even used hair dryers to keep them thawed.What Crittenden didn’t know at the time was that the energy he used was going to cost him significantly. As winter storm Uri swept across the south central United States last February, utilities that weren’t prepared scrambled. The storm caused blackouts in several states and resulted in the deaths of at least 223 people.Oklahoma’s gas supply was in dire straits, with demand surging and the cold freezing critical equipment. To keep the heat on, the state’s biggest gas company, Oklahoma Natural Gas, made a last-minute decision: it purchased fuel from the wildly expensive spot market at nearly 600 times the usual price. Now, nearly a year later, officials say residents like Crittenden have to foot the entire $1.37 billion bill. The state’s utility regulator, the Oklahoma Corporation Commission, is expected to approve the plan later this month. “Imagine if you went to the gas station and filled up $50 of gas for your car based on the prices the sign says. And then two months later, you get told you actually have to engage in a payment plan to pay off a 1,000 times that price,” Crittenden said. Instead of challenging the prices the utility and its customers were charged, Oklahoma is readying a plan to use securitization — which works similar to a credit card — to cover the debt. It will pay off the $1.4 billion, plus interest, by charging customers as much as $7.80 a month over the next 25 years.Many states have used securitization to cover climate-related costs, like repairing downed power lines after a hurricane. But it has rarely been used for fuel costs. Energy and economics experts say it can be misused to prop up unprepared energy systems that are being tested by worsening extreme weather.“It sets the precedent that there can be basically no upper limits to the cost of gas that would be passed on to a consumer,” said Kylah McNabb, an energy consultant and a former policy adviser to Oklahoma’s secretary of energy and environment under the former Republican governor Mary Fallin. “That’s scary to me as a consumer.” Consumer watchdogs are wondering why Oklahoma Natural Gas wasn’t better prepared — with emergency fuel contracts or weatherized power plants. And they want to know who is profiting off the $1.4 billion — a matter state regulators have agreed to keep secret.

Unacceptable:' Texas market reforms will not be quick, electric grid operator tells dissatisfied regulators - Major reforms to wholesale power markets will take longer to implement than the Public Utilities Commission of Texas (PUCT) anticipated, setting off concerns among regulators. The PUCT issued an implementation "blueprint" for wholesale market changes on Jan. 13 at the direction of state lawmakers and the governor, following last winter's cold snap and widespread blackouts. Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) officials say they do not have sufficient staff to implement new reliability products by next winter, and stakeholders say they are concerned at the lack of detail in the PUCT's blueprint. Observers say a lack of coordination between regulators and ERCOT grid officials have put customers at risk. "We have expectations that these products be put in the market as soon as possible," PUCT Commissioner Lori Cobos said at Thursday's open meeting. "Two years is too long. It's unacceptable." Dive Insight: The PUCT approved a suite of "improvements" for the wholesale electricity market in December. The PUCT's blueprint for wholesale market changes is two-pages long, dated Jan. 13, and requires some changes to be finalized by Jan. 1, 2022. "I'm pretty sure this isn't the way it's supposed to be done," Doug Lewin, an energy analyst and president of Stoic Energy, said in an email. "I am not saying this in any official capacity," he added. "It's more than a little bizarre," he said of the time-stamped order requiring changes be made almost two weeks prior. "This pricing change impacts everybody in ERCOT and there was no notice in the Texas Register, ability to ask for a hearing, etc.," Lewin said. "The apparent disregard for the Administrative Procedures Act is troubling, to say the least." "To describe it as a 'market blueprint' is rather generous," Michael Hogan, senior advisor at the Regulatory Assistance Project, said in an email. "A better description would be a market miasma.” Some changes are already in place for this winter. In December, the PUCT approved adjustments to ERCOT's scarcity pricing mechanism, lowering the high systemwide offer cap to $5,000/MWh from $9,000/MWh. This change is part of modifications to ERCOT's Operating Reserve Demand Curve, which helps to set scarcity prices and which regulators wanted complete by Jan. 1, 2022. Power plants and transmission facilities have also been weatherized. The state is working to avoid a repeat of February blackouts, which knocked out power to millions of customers and left some consumers facing bloated energy bills. Other changes, however, will take significantly longer. The commission had wanted to have a firm fuel and backstop reliability service in place before next winter but have not sufficiently defined those products, according to Allison Silverstein, an independent consultant working with the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy.

Why Democrats make energy expensive (and dirty) - Michael Shellenberger - Progressive Democrats including Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the head of the House progressive caucus, have sent a letter demanding the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) investigate whether “market manipulation” is causing natural gas prices to rise 30 percent on average for consumers over last winter, an astonishing $746 per household. But the main reason natural gas prices are rising is because progressives have been so successful in restricting natural gas production. Sanders, Jayapal, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC), as individuals and as part of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, have successfully fought to restrict natural gas production through fracking and to block natural gas pipelines, including the Atlantic Coast pipeline. In 2020, Sanders celebrated efforts by progressives to cancel the Atlantic Coast pipeline. Today, New England is facing rolling blackouts. “Getting [natural] gas to [progressive Senators Ed] Markey and [Elizabeth] Warren’s Massachusetts is so difficult,” reports The Wall Street Journal, “that sometimes it comes into Boston Harbor on a tanker from Russia.” Democrats aren’t the only reason the United States isn’t producing enough natural gas to keep prices at the same low levels they’ve been at for the past decade. There is higher demand as the economy emerges from covid. There is greater demand for natural gas internationally due to a bad year for wind energy in Europe. And President Joe Biden, for his part, has resisted many progressive demands to restrict oil and gas production. But the main reason there isn’t enough natural gas production is because of successful progressive Democratic efforts to restrict natural gas production in the United States, Europe, and other parts of the world in the name of fighting climate change,

EPA tackles coal-to-crypto industry trend - EPA last week took steps to rein in the environmental footprint of bitcoin miners. On paper, the EPA actions weren’t related to cryptocurrency. EPA denied requests from current and former coal-fired power plants to keep using waste disposal sites filled with the toxic slurry produced from coal power, otherwise known as coal ash. But two of the coal ash ponds — Greenidge in Dresden, N.Y., and the Sioux Energy Center in West Alton, Mo. — are located at power plant sites that are more than mere energy sources. The plants have been used to power computers that produce cryptocurrencies, a growing set of decentralized digital currencies becoming popular in the Internet age.The agency is getting involved as more cryptocurrency mining operations examine using old coal plants as a power source (Energywire, June 24, 2021). Even a coal plant tied to the family of Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) has examined going in that direction, until the proposal was rejected this month by West Virginia’s Public Service Commission (Climatewire, Jan. 5).Proponents excited about this industry trend believe that as grid reliability becomes a greater issue in communities across the United States, mining for bitcoins — the best-known form of cryptocurrency — can help ensure that backup power generation is available to consumers by profitably keeping some plants online.However, environmental advocates are concerned about the high energy needs of the cryptocurrency industry and said the actions taken by EPA demonstrate a novel way the agency can constrain Bitcoin’s environmental impacts in ways that fall outside the purview of financial regulators.“EPA isn’t a cryptocurrency regulator. It’s a pollutants regulator. It seems like they’re using those laws to get at something the financial regulators can’t,” said Todd Phillips, director of financial regulatory and corporate governance at the Center for American Progress.Greenidge Generation Holdings, the company that owns the former coal plant in Dresden, N.Y., acquired the facility in 2014 with backing from a private equity firm. The facility was converted to natural gas and is used primarily for bitcoin mining, while also providing some power to the local electric grid.Ameren Missouri’s Sioux Energy Center is a coal-fired plant that began operating in 1967 and is scheduled for retirement in 2028. In April, the company disclosed that it had launched a bitcoin mining pilot project at the plant. A company representative said Friday that the company completed the pilot project in October (Energywire, Sept. 23, 2021).In both actions taken last week, EPA denied extensions for plants to continue operating the coal ash ponds on their properties past a mandatory deadline. EPA considered Greenidge disqualified from getting an exemption because it no longer uses coal for power. The agency said Ameren’s application for an extension lacked all the information required for deciding on its request.EPA also said that to qualify for an extension, the plants would need their respective grid operators to determine that ceasing operations would affect grid reliability.Following EPA’s action, the agency has proposed giving both companies 135 days to demonstrate they are no longer receiving any kind of waste at their respective coal ash ponds, an EPA official said Friday. Immediately after that deadline, they would have to begin closing those waste sites. Phillips said EPA demonstrated that the cryptocurrency space has more environmental considerations — like waste — to worry about beyond carbon emissions, which have been the primary focus of climate activists critical of the industry. “I never really thought about what they’d do with the pollutants after they started up these new power plants,” Phillips said. “It’s something that we’re all going to have to figure out.”

Biden EPA targets toxic coal ash plaguing Kentucky, Indiana, Tennessee --The Biden administration is making its first significant move toward corralling lingering and widespread problems with toxic ash from coal-fired power plants, one of the nation’s most prominent environmental health legacies from more than a century of coal-fired electricity generation. The agency’s action could have major implications in states such as Kentucky, Indiana and Tennessee, each of which has been wrestling with the consequences of huge volumes of waste products left behind by burning coal. It is also where decisions are being made on whether coal ash can be safely entombed where it was once-storied in watery pits, or whether the waste should be removed and sent to modern, dry landfills with liner systems and other measures to protect groundwater. In 2015, the EPA under the Obama administration put forth the first national rules on coal ash, which required most of the nation’s approximately 500 unlined coal ash surface impoundments to stop receiving waste and begin closing by April 2021. Those ash dumps, laced with contaminants like mercury, cadmium and arsenic, often pollute groundwater and send particulate air pollution into nearby communities. While the Trump administration allowed utilities to request extensions, the Biden EPA announced Tuesday it is taking action on nine of 57 extension applications filed. The agency denied three, including one filed by the Clifty Power plant in Madison, Indiana. It approved one, at East Kentucky Power’s Spurlock power plant in Maysville, Kentucky, and it found four incomplete and one ineligible. The EPA also said it was putting several power plants on notice regarding their obligations to comply with rules, and it was working on plans for future changes to regulations aimed at making sure coal ash dumps meet strong environmental and safety standards. One of those plants to get a letter saying it was out of compliance was the now-retired Gallagher plant in New Albany, owned by Duke Energy, which had stored millions of tons of coal ash near the banks of the Ohio River across from western Louisville. The plant, whose twin stacks sent air pollution to Louisville for six decades, prompting prolonged regulatory battles, has two surface impoundments with ash sitting in 20 feet of groundwater, according to EPA. If Duke wants to avoid removing the ash, it will have to demonstrate how it can keep it in place without causing contaminants in the ash from getting into the groundwater, EPA said.

EPA coal ash announcement turns up the heat on Illinois municipal utility - The municipal utility serving Springfield, Illinois, needs to stop putting new material into its coal ash ponds as soon as summer, under a U.S. EPA decision announced Jan. 11 among its first-ever enforcements of the federal 2015 coal ash law. That law demanded all unlined ash ponds initiate closure by April 2021, and City Water, Light and Power (CWLP) was among many utilities nationwide that sought an extension. The federal Environmental Protection Agency ruled that CWLP’s 1,264-page request, filed in November 2020, was woefully incomplete, and the EPA is moving forward with the process to set a deadline by which the ash ponds must stop receiving new material. Coal ash is no longer placed in the two adjacent ponds in question, which are separated from Lake Springfield — the city’s drinking water source — by a dike. But much coal ash remains in the ponds, and now CWLP uses the ponds for wastewater from its coal plant and lime residue from treating the city’s drinking water. With no alternative place for the lime, closing the ponds will cause a “public health crisis” leaving residents without water, CWLP spokesperson Amber Sabin told the Energy News Network. She said the utility will continue to seek an extension through October 2023. Nick Dodson, a leader with the Sangamon Valley Group of Sierra Club Illinois, said the utility should have been prepared for the finding and worked sooner to find alternatives. “The best technology you were using was simply putting wet coal ash into a pond that was unlined in the center of a flood zone?” he said. “For them to act so surprised — come on, guys. This was coming for quite some time.”

Lummis blocks Biden’s EPA picks in bid to defend coal plants - Wyoming Republican Sen. Cynthia Lummis has stalled confirmation of President Biden’s pick for EPA enforcement chief over concerns about the agency’s handling of coal power plants in her state. Lummis also has placed holds on Biden’s remaining EPA picks, her office confirmed to E&E News. David Uhlmann, Biden’s choice for EPA’s assistant administrator for enforcement and compliance assurance, had been scheduled for a vote Wednesday before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. But Chair Tom Carper (D-Del.) announced at the start of the markup that Uhlmann’s nomination had been pulled from the agenda. Carper said a senator he didn’t name was waiting for information from EPA before considering whether to support Uhlmann. A spokesperson for Lummis told E&E News that Lummis was the senator Carper was referring to at Wednesday’s markup. Lummis was waiting to hear from EPA about whether Wyoming’s regional haze plan for the Jim Bridger power plant would be approved, according to the spokesperson. The federal haze program seeks to reduce pollution to increase visibility, which has proved troublesome for the southeastern Wyoming power plant. After Wednesday’s markup ended, EPA released a decision proposing to reject Wyoming’s plan for the power plant. That prompted a backlash from the state’s officials, including Lummis. "The Biden EPA’s decision here is needlessly hurting Wyoming’s energy workers and threatening America’s energy independence as well. It is blatantly political, and I will continue to block President Biden’s EPA nominees over this issue," Lummis said in a statement. Lummis has a hold on all of Biden’s remaining EPA nominees, including Uhlmann, the senator’s spokesperson confirmed to E&E News.

Environmental group opposes Rustic Ridge Mine permit renewal - A Fayette-based environmental organization is opposing a coal mine company’s request to renew its permit for the Rustic Ridge No. 1 Mine in the Donegal area. The Mountain Watershed Association, which monitors the environmental impact of Rustic Ridge No. 1 Mine, prefers “that the mine is not permitted” for renewal, said Stacey Magda, community organizer for the Melcroft-based organization. If the state renews the mining permit, the association wants to mitigate issues such as mine subsidence, damaged water supplies and dust spread by coal-hauling trucks, Magda said. Mountain Watershed had reached a settlement in 2018 with Rustic Ridge on issues regarding its operations. The Department of Environmental Protection has scheduled an informal public conference in a virtual setting from 6 to 8 p.m. Jan. 26 for LCT Energy LP’s request for a five-year renewal of its coal mining, National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System and air quality permits for another five years. The permits are considered “administratively extended” until the department makes a decision on renewing them, said Lauren Fraley, a DEP spokeswoman in Pittsburgh. State officials will explain the permit review process, make maps available and answer questions from the public, Fraley said. The public hearing, by contrast, is a formal, structured proceeding for the public to provide testimony to DEP on an action under review, but there is not any back-and-forth exchange with the DEP, Fraley said. DEP does not respond in real time during a hearing, but instead formulates a detailed response that is provided to those testifying once the review of the application, Fraley said. The original five-year permit was issued in December 2016, so the company is seeking a renewal for another five years, said Mark Tercek, president of LCT Energy, a subsidiary of Robindale Energy & Associated Cos. of Latrobe. LCT Energy’s permit allows it to mine about 2,880 acres in parts of Donegal Township in Westmoreland County and Saltlick Township in Fayette. The mine, which has about 100 employees, produces metallurgical coal used in the production of steel. Monthly production from the Rustic Ridge mine is approximately 38,000-to-40,000 clean tons of coal, Tercek said. The company removes the coal through a process known as room-and-pillar mining, which Penn State’s College of Earth and Mineral Sciences describes as leaving pillars of coal to support the roof of “rooms” where coal is removed.

West Virginia dumps BlackRock fund over anti-energy stance - West Virginia state Treasurer Riley Moore announced Monday that his state would end the use of a BlackRock Inc. investment fund over the firm's push for climate-focused investment strategies that Moore says threaten his state's economy. "As the state’s chief financial officer and chairman of the Board of Treasury Investments, I have a duty to ensure that taxpayer dollars are managed in a responsible, financially sound fashion which reflects the best interests of our state and country, and I believe doing business with BlackRock runs contrary to that duty," Moore said in a statement. The treasurer's press release explained that the decision came in reaction to reports that BlackRock "has urged companies to embrace ‘net zero’ investment strategies that would harm the coal, oil and natural gas industries, while increasing investments in Chinese companies that subvert national interests and damage West Virginia's manufacturing base and job market." Last month, educational nonprofit Consumers' Research sent a letter to ten governors, including the governor of West Virginia, whose state pension funds are most invested with BlackRock, warning about the money management firm's heavy investments in China. "BlackRock’s funneling of billions in U.S. capital to China carries with it risks not present in other markets, risks that threaten the large wagers the company is putting on steep returns from the Middle Kingdom," Consumers' Research Executive Director Will Hild wrote in the letter. "Chinese firms are not held to the same transparency standards as their western counterparts, so foreign investors are often hard pressed to appreciate the true risk profile of what they’re investing in," Hild added.

How coal holds on in America - — David Saggau, the chief executive of an energy cooperative, tried to explain the losing economics of running a coal-fired power plant to a North Dakota industry group more than a year ago. Coal Creek Station had lost $170 million in 2019 as abundant natural gas and proliferating wind projects had cut revenue far below what it cost to run the plant. After four decades sending electricity over the border to Minnesota, Coal Creek would be closing in 2022, Saggau said, and nobody was clamoring to buy it. “We made folks aware that the plant was for sale for a dollar,” Saggau, of Great River Energy, told the Lignite Energy Council during an October 2020 virtual meeting. “We’re basically giving it away.” A renewable future was at hand. Winds come howling over the Missouri Riverin the heart of North Dakota — at the site where Lewis and Clark spent their first frigid winter — and Great River Energy planned to supply wind power over Coal Creek’s valuable transmission line. NextEra Energy, EDF Renewables and other powerhouse firms were racing to lock landowners into leases to harvest some of the most powerful and sustained winds in the country. But that new clean-energy future never materialized in this part of coal country, with a landscape that has been mined for more than a century and has the scars and sinkholes to prove it. And the sale of Coal Creek Station, which received its last major permit approval earlier this month, illuminates the United States’ halting transition to renewables. Even in places such as North Dakota, where supply and demand align with clean energy, culture and politics pose major obstacles. In these rural North Dakota counties, local officials passed ordinances that blocked wind and solar projects. State officials rallied to save Coal Creek, and a politically connected North Dakota energy firm stepped in to prolong its life, promising someday to capture its carbon emissions and store them underground. During the United Nations climate summit in Glasgow in the fall, conference head Alok Sharma declared that “the end of coal is in sight.” More than 40 countries pledged to phase out coal, the single-biggest source of atmosphere-warming carbon dioxide emissions. The United States did not join them. Despite its rapid decline, coal still generates about 20 percent of the nation’s electricity and has strong political backing in pockets of the country.

Majority of US states pursue nuclear power for emission cuts (AP) — As climate change pushes states in the U.S. to dramatically cut their use of fossil fuels, many are coming to the conclusion that solar, wind and other renewable power sources might not be enough to keep the lights on.Nuclear power is emerging as an answer to fill the gap as states transition away from coal, oil and natural gas to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and stave off the worst effects of a warming planet. The renewed interest in nuclear comes as companies, including one started by Microsoft founder Bill Gates, are developing smaller, cheaper reactors that could supplement the power grid in communities across the U.S.Nuclear power comes with its own set of potential problems, especially radioactive waste that can remain dangerous for thousands of years. But supporters say the risks can be minimized and that the energy source will be essential to stabilize power supplies as the world tries to move away from carbon dioxide-emitting fossil fuels.Tennessee Valley Authority President and CEO Jeff Lyash puts it simply: You can’t significantly reduce carbon emissions without nuclear power.“At this point in time, I don’t see a path that gets us there without preserving the existing fleet and building new nuclear,” Lyash said.

In Georgia, Bloated Costs Take Over a Nuclear Power Plant and a Fight Looms Over Who Pays - Ballooning cost overruns and construction delays at Georgia Power Co.’s Vogtle nuclear project threaten to cost the state’s electricity consumers billions of dollars in the decades to come, a new think tank report concludes.The report, from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, a nonprofit advancing a sustainable energy economy, builds a case that stockholders of the company should take the lead on construction and carry much of the financial load, rather than ratepayers. Once estimated to cost $14 billion, the price tag for two new reactors at Georgia Power’s Plant Vogtle property has climbed past $30 billion, and both units will be more than six years late in coming online, the institute reported after combing through public records including testimony at a Georgia Public Service Commission hearing in December. The plant already has two existing nuclear power units that began producing electricity in the 1980s.Public Service Commission staff and consultants have blamed the project’s high costs and construction delays on Georgia Power, which is the lead partner in its construction and eventual operation, and a subsidiary of Southern Company, the energy policy institute found. Georgia Power was warned in 2008 that using an unproven reactor design would likely cause overruns and delays, said David Schlissel, the report’s author and the institute’s director of resource planning and analysis. “However, the company challenged and the commission disregarded these warnings,” said Schlissel, a lawyer who has been a frequent expert witness in legal proceedings. Commission spokesman Tom Krause said he could not comment directly on the institute’s report or the commission’s ongoing quasi-judicial proceedings that are designed to monitor the construction, which the Atlanta Journal Constitution has described as the largest project in Georgia history. The commission regulates Georgia Power, and as such, has a major say in Georgia energy policy. Krause said future hearings, when the project is farther along, will be held to help the commission, made up of five members who are elected statewide, determine which of the Vogtle costs should be allocated to ratepayers, as opposed to shareholders. “I imagine it will be a knock-down, drag-out fight,” Schlissel said. “I have heard a fair amount of the documentation, and just reading what the PSC staff has been saying, clearly this project has been mismanaged.”

Audit: FirstEnergy didn't track spending of customer charges (AP) — FirstEnergy Corp. collected nearly $460 million from its customers to pay for modernizing its electric grid, but an outside audit ordered by state regulators could not determine how the money was spent, the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio said Friday.The audit found FirstEnergy put the money into a general fund and did not track how it was used, according to the report. It also found no evidence that the charges to customers went toward grid upgrades. FirstEnergy customers were charged between 2017 and 2019 to pay for distribution system upgrades. The Ohio Supreme Court blocked the charges in 2019 because the state's utilities commission did not require the company to ensure the money would go toward the grid.The commission ordered the audit after former Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder and four associates were charged in 2020 with using $60 million from FirstEnergy in a alleged an bribery scheme to secure a nuclear plant bailout. FirstEnergy spokesman Mark Durbin said in a statement that the company followed the rules set by the utilities commission and that the audit did not reflect how the process worked.

Columbiana County seeks to strengthen ties between shale business, education - Youngstown Business Journal - Oil and gas business spurred from the Utica-Point Pleasant shale formation, South Field Energy’s electric generation plant in Wellsville, and Royal Dutch Shell’s cracker plant under construction in nearby Monaca, Pa., stand to have a major impact on Columbiana County’s economy, providing job opportunities for residents here, officials say. Central to achieving this is building a skilled workforce by enhancing the relationship between local business, education, and economic development initiatives, says Tad Herold, economic development director for Columbiana County and chairman of the Columbiana County Business Advisory Council. “Right now we have a core of about a dozen businesses, who have been very active at the business advisory council,” he said, noting he would like to see its ranks expand. “We’d like to see that be a dozen, two dozen or 50 because the more input we get from various sectors in various employers, the more responsive we will be to their needs.” Herold says the business advisory council’s purpose is to see how schools can ensure they are meeting the needs of employers, providing them a trained workforce with in-demand skills. The organization hosted a forum at Kent State University Salem Campus Thursday to encourage closer working relationships between business, education and economic development within the county to bolster the area workforce. Representatives from area schools, businesses, and representatives from the Mahoning Valley Manufacturers Coalition, Lt. Gov. Jon Husted and U.S. Rep. Bill Johnson, R-6, attended. While there are no new multibillion-dollar projects bound for the county anytime soon, Herold says the region is preparing for smaller companies that use materials manufactured from these large projects – plastic pellets produced from Shell’s ethane cracker, for example, or low-cost energy from the Utica shale – to relocate to the region.

 More money for Pa. towns: Marcellus Shale impact fees projected to surge as gas prices rise -Impact fees collected for 2021 from Pennsylvania’s shale gas wells are projected to bounce back from the previous year’s record low to the highest level in three years. A new report from the Independent Fiscal Office credits a surge in natural gas prices for driving impact fees to an estimated $233.8 million for 2021. The total collection is projected to be $87.6 million higher than the previous year, when the pandemic cratered the price of natural gas and the fees paid per well.Rising global demand outpaced natural gas supply as economies began to recover from the pandemic last year. The annual average price at Pennsylvania natural gas trading hubs more than doubled in 2021 from the 2020 average to $3.15 per thousand cubic feet, according to the fiscal office.Those higher prices combined with moderate production growth to nearly quadruple the market value of all of the shale gas produced in Pennsylvania last year to $17.8 billion, the report said. That means, even though total impact fees will rebound this year, the effective tax rate is estimated to be 1.3%, the lowest on record. Most gas-producing states tax natural gas based on price and production volumes, but Pennsylvania’s impact fees are assessed per well and depend on factors including age, inflation and the average annual price of natural gas on the New York Mercantile Exchange.Impact fees are paid in April for the prior calendar year and distributed in July. They were imposed beginning in 2012 to compensate the state and local communities for the industry’s impacts on roads, public services and the environment.The age of Pennsylvania’s oldest Marcellus Shale wells is expected to play a bigger role than normal in the total collection. Nearly 3,200 wells reached their 11th year in operation and so will pay roughly half the fee amount paid by wells in their fourth through 10th years, the fiscal office said. That step down in the fee schedule is expected to depress the collection by about $10.4 million. Counties and municipalities that host wells are expected to split $129 million when payments are disbursed, or $53 million more than last year. Impact fee revenue is also dedicated to state environmental, infrastructure, emergency management and housing programs.

Marcellus/Utica permits issued for two counties in West Virginia (WV News) — Eighteen permits were issued to drill new shale wells last week.Permits were allowed in Marcellus/Utica, a deep natural gas reserve running under parts of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Maryland and Virginia.West Virginia had two permits: One in Lewis and one in Wetzel.

Big fish eat smaller fish in Appalachia: More consolidation expected in 2022 - S&P Global Chesapeake Energy Corp. will get a discount on Chief Oil & Gas LLC if it goes through with a rumored $2.4 billion deal for the privately held Marcellus Shale driller that would continue a trend of consolidation in Appalachian shale gas operations. Citing unnamed sources, Reuters reported Jan. 19 that Chesapeake was finalizing a deal for Chief, Chesapeake's neighbor in the dry gas window of northeast Pennsylvania and one of four Marcellus drillers considered prime buyout targets. "We think this deal is more likely with the valuation reset from more than $3.0 billion in October to $2.4 billion," said veteran shale gas analyst Gabriele Sorbara, a managing director at boutique investment services firm Siebert Williams Shank & Co. In October 2021, Reuters reported that Chief was marketing its assets, consisting of just over 1 Bcf/d of production from 450 active wells in five counties, for $3 billion. "Given the quality of the Chief assets, we do not see this potential deal as a major concern, as it should be accretive to free cash flow and capital returns at the right valuation," "Assuming the deal is confirmed, it seems that Chesapeake lost out to EQT Corp. on the $3 billion [Alta Resources LLC] deal and didn't want to miss out on the last real opportunity for consolidation in northeast Pennsylvania," credit research firm CreditSights senior analyst Charles Johnston said. "Chief's acreage position is a strong fit for Chesapeake and some of the best dry gas acreage in the Marcellus." At the start of the year, CreditSights predicted shale oil and gas M&A would continue in 2022 with operators buying out their neighbors. Shale oil and gas equities have seen healthy gains over the past year, making company stock a viable currency and reducing the amount of cash that must be borrowed to finance a transaction. EQT bought the southwest Pennsylvania operations of Chevron Corp. in 2020. The same year, northern Pennsylvania operator National Fuel Gas Co. bought Royal Dutch Shell PLC's operations along the New York border, and Southwestern Energy Co. purchased Marcellus and Utica shale driller Montage Resources Corp. "Deals are growing in size with a greater focus on consolidating around a core asset base rather than expansion into new growth areas," CreditSights said Jan. 4. "Energy M&A has also been balance sheet friendly, with the vast majority of deals entirely (or largely) equity funded and accretive to credit profiles. In a slower growth world, consolidation reduces costs, improves scale and increases operator efficiency with greater blocks of contiguous acreage for upstream players." Pennsylvania's five largest producers — EQT, Chesapeake, Coterra Energy Inc., Range Resources Corp. and Southwestern — account for about three-quarters of the state's shale gas production.

EQT Achieves Certification for 4 Bcf/d of Appalachian Natural Gas Production - EQT Corp. said 80% of its natural gas now holds the certified designation, giving it a potential leg up for premium pricing. The top natural gas producer in the United States, which produced an estimated 5.6 Bcfe/d during the third quarter, said most of the Marcellus and Utica shale production achieved the certification label last November under standards set by Equitable Origin (EO) and MiQ. An independent audit by Responsible Energy Solutions assessed roughly 200 well pads in Pennsylvania’s Greene and Washington counties that collectively produce about 4 Bcf/day. “These results not only enable us to unlock growing domestic and international markets that are valuing a differentiated commodity, they also serve as an important validation of the environmental attributes of Appalachian natural gas,” said EQT CEO Toby Z. Rice. EQT last April said it was working to ensure most of its Appalachian Basin supply was responsibly sourced. The Pennsylvania-based exploration and production company’s total output “now comprises 4.5% of all natural gas produced in the U.S.” The certifications “provide a transparent, verified method” to track environmental, social and governance (ESG) commitments. The goals include reducing direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions (Scope 1 and 2), and reducing EQT’s methane emissions intensity by 65% by 2025. The EO100 Standard for Responsible Energy Development process focused on the ESG performance, while MiQ verified the methane emissions.

EQT, Seneca Capture Certification Designations for Appalachian Natural Gas - The amount of U.S. natural gas gaining a certification designation is moving up, with Appalachian pure-plays EQT Corp. and Seneca Resources Corp. each gaining the designation for supply. EQT, the largest U.S. gas producer, said 80% of its supply has been certified, giving it a potential leg up for premium pricing. EQT, which produced an estimated 5.6 Bcfe/d during the third quarter, said most of the Marcellus and Utica shale output achieved the certification label last November under standards set by Equitable Origin (EO) and MiQ. An independent audit by Responsible Energy Solutions assessed roughly 200 well pads of EQT’s in Pennsylvania’s Greene and Washington counties that collectively produce about 4 Bcf/d. “These results not only enable us to unlock growing domestic and international markets that are valuing a differentiated commodity, they also serve as an important validation of the environmental attributes of Appalachian natural gas,” said EQT CEO Toby Z. Rice. EQT last April said it was working to ensure most of its Appalachian Basin supply was responsibly sourced. The Pennsylvania-based exploration and production company’s total output “now comprises 4.5% of all natural gas produced in the U.S.” The certifications “provide a transparent, verified method” to track environmental, social and governance (ESG) commitments. The goals include reducing direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions (Scope 1 and 2), and reducing EQT’s methane emissions intensity by 65% by 2025. The EO100 Standard for Responsible Energy Development process focused on the ESG performance, while MiQ verified the methane emissions. EQT achieved “the highest initial certification score ascribed” by EO “to any upstream producer domestically or abroad to date, reflecting EQT’s commitment to being the operator of choice for all of its stakeholders,” EO noted. “EO100 certification is enabling differentiation and recognition of responsibly produced gas,” CEO Soledad Mills said. “The certification standards developed by MiQ and Equitable Origin aim to bring transparency to an opaque market, drive demand for certified natural gas and help operators differentiate themselves through methane-emissions performance and overall responsible energy production.”

 Supreme Court requests 5% budget hike; DEP seeks support to hire gas, oil well inspectors - West Virginia Supreme Court justices are seeking a 5% increase in their budget for ¦scal year 2023, Supreme Court Chief Justice John Hutchison told the Senate Finance Committee Tuesday afternoon. In total, justices and court administrators are asking for $146.318 million for FY 2023. The Legislature allocated $138.963 million to the state’s judicial branch for the current ¦scal year. The costs associated with establishing the new Intermediate Court of Appeals is part of the request for the 5% increase, Hutchison told the committee. The intermediate court opens July 1, the same day the next fiscal year begins.While the actual cost of the intermediate court appears to be coming in $75,000 less than ¦scal notes estimated, the court still is set to cost $5 million during its ¦rst year, Hutchison said. The increase request includes other support for the more than 1,400 Supreme Court employees across the state, Hutchison said. The Supreme Court provides administrative oversight to circuit courts, family courts and magistrate courts. Hutchison said the court experienced budget cuts between 2018 and 2020, in the wake of proceedings that saw four of the five Supreme Court justices impeached. The court received modest increases in the 2021 and 2022 budget years, Hutchison said.

Markey says FERC rethinking Weymouth Compressor - FEDERAL ENERGY regulators will reconsider their approval for the controversial natural gas compressor station in Weymouth less than a year and a half after they gave it the OK to go into service, US Sen. Ed Markey said Friday. Other than saying that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission “announced it will reconsider the authorization of the Weymouth Compressor Station,” Markey’s office did not provide any details. But the docket numbers associated with the Algonquin Gas Transmission and Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline-owned compressor station are listed on the agenda for unspecified action at a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission meeting planned for Thursday. “The Weymouth compressor station is a clear threat to our communities and the environment and does nothing to address energy reliability in Massachusetts. I am pleased that FERC has finally heeded my repeated calls to revisit the unwarranted approval of this dangerous project,” Markey said in a statement. “Local community members and environmental justice advocates have long opposed this project, and its repeated emergency gas releases and shutdowns have only given credence to their concerns … I look forward to continuing to work with the Weymouth community and the dedicated activists to ensure that FERC does the right thing and finally shuts this project down for good.” In February, FERC said that it would reexamine the Weymouth compressor station in light of two emergency shutdowns at the facility in the fall of 2020. FERC authorized the facility to go into service in September 2020 and “received numerous pleadings expressing concerns about public safety and air emissions impacts from the station’s continued operation” over the next few months, the agency said last year. The facility has for years drawn sharp opposition from state lawmakers, environmental and health activists, and groups of local residents. It received all necessary permits from the Baker administration and from federal officials.

As electric rates rise, gas-fired power emerges as both scapegoat and savior - — In a building bigger than a football field, one of two 185-ton natural gas-fired turbines inside the Westbrook Energy Center is ramping up on a cloudy December afternoon. A day earlier, the region’s electric grid operator in Massachusetts told the energy trading desk at Calpine Corp. in Houston to start the plant at 2 p.m. the following day and run until midnight. Calpine is obligated every day to offer up to 550 megawatts of capacity from this plant to a wholesale energy bidding process run by regional grid operator ISO New England. That’s enough electricity to meet the needs of 550,000 homes. These “day-ahead” bids are meant to assure that on each following day, the region will have enough generating capacity every second of every hour, regardless of weather or demand. Westbrook doesn’t get selected every day. But when it does, it’s not hyperbole to say the plant is helping to keep the lights on in New England. Despite its essential role, natural gas is under fire. In mid-November, the Maine Public Utilities Commission directly blamed high wholesale natural gas prices for the more than 80 percent jump in “standard offer” electric supply rates that most Central Maine Power and Versant Power home customers are starting to see in their bills this month. Even more ominous, ISO New England warned in early December that limited gas pipeline capacity and liquified natural gas deliveries could put the region’s electricity supply in a “precarious position” if there’s an extended cold snap between now and spring. So as winter deepens, natural gas is a study in contradictions. It seems to be simultaneously keeping the lights on, raising electric bills and contributing to the risk of rolling blackouts.Policymakers in Maine and the rest of New England are pushing an urgent transition to renewable energy to fight climate change, largely by encouraging solar and wind power. But despite the growth of renewables, natural gas plants such as the one in Westbrook will still make up half of the region’s generating capacity in 2022.

Gas Line Struck In Downtown Baltimore, Fire Officials Say – CBS Baltimore — Crews with Baltimore Gas & Electric have stopped a gas leak about an hour after workers struck a high-pressure natural gas line in the unit block of E. Baltimore Street, according to Baltimore Firefighters IAFF Local 734. Buildings near the leak were being ventilated, the union said. About 3:08 p.m., the union tweeted about the leak, saying E. Baltimore Street had been shut down between N. Charles and Light streets. A nearby apartment tower at 10 Light St. was evacuated by the fire department. (article includes extensive commentary on twitter)

Chickahominy Pipeline representative attending Hanover Supervisors meeting Wednesday | Govt. and Politics - During last month’s virtual town hall meeting hosted by Chickahominy Pipeline LLC, in which company representatives sought to answer questions from the public about the 83-mile pipeline they wish to build through five central Virginia counties, Hanover County’s retired deputy county administrator, Frank Harksen, asked company representatives if they’d attend a Board of Supervisors meeting. For the first time since the pipeline was brought to the county’s attention last summer, they will. The meeting begins at 2 p.m., but Chickahominy is not listed on the agenda until 6 p.m. Hanover County Administrator John Budesky said the timing is interesting, given that the State Corporation Commission last month rejected a request by Chickahominy to build the pipeline without commission approval. The commission’s Dec. 22 order started with a Sept. 3 request by Chickahominy to build a pipeline to transport natural gas through Louisa, Hanover, Henrico, New Kent and Charles City counties to a natural gas power plant in Charles City. The power plant would burn the gas to create electricity that would be sold into a large market of numerous states. Chickahominy argued that it did not need permission to build the pipeline because it’s not a public utility — meaning not selling to retail customers — but rather, it was merely transporting the gas to the power plant. The commission, however, found that Chickahominy is a public utility under the law, agreeing with an SCC hearing examiner who reviewed the case. Minear, in response to the SCC ruling, said last month by email that the company was weighing its options on how to proceed, and “whether it will appeal, file an application for a certificate, or consider other options, all are on the table. “Chickahominy Pipeline still plans to pursue this project.”

Federal pipeline agency shifts focus to cut methane - The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration is readying its first-ever restrictions on methane emissions and planning to press pipeline companies on the issue in the coming months, marking a significant shift for a federal agency traditionally focused on safety and oil spills.PHMSA was given a broad new responsibility by Congress to limit greenhouse gas emissions, and the "thousands" of inquiries it’s planning to make to companies about their methane emissions this year will be some of the earliest tangible signs of that mandate."Congress was very clear that we must not just reduce these emissions, but we must do all we can to minimize these emissions," Tristan Brown, PHMSA’s deputy administrator, said in a speech late last year.In late 2020, Congress ordered pipeline companies to update their inspections and maintenance plans to find ways to reduce methane emissions (Energywire, Jan. 29, 2021). It ordered PHMSA to check those plans with inspections. Meanwhile, the agency is also writing rules on methane, requiring companies to find and fix leaks. It says it’s aiming to have a proposed rule published in the Federal Register by May. Participating in President Biden’s climate agenda represents a new focus for PHMSA, a relatively young, small agency that has traditionally viewed leaks through the lens of physical safety (Energywire, May 19, 2021). The agency’s environmental efforts previously had been geared toward preventing and dealing with spills of hazardous liquids such as crude oil. Gas pipeline leaks in unpopulated areas, if they didn’t explode or catch fire, were not considered a major safety threat. Big interstate gas pipeline companies are supportive of the effort on methane and say they are already working to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. "PHMSA and EPA regulations that embrace innovation to protect public safety, energy affordability and reliability, and our climate will bolster our efforts," the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America said in a statement to E&E News. Many large oil and gas companies have dropped their objections to direct regulation of methane in order to improve the image of natural gas as a lower-carbon fuel. But many environmental groups are fighting gas projects, saying they continue dependence on fossil fuels.

Federal pipeline standards backed by top energy regulator after Colonial Pipeline hack - New federal powers are needed to prevent major energy disruptions like the cyberattack on the Colonial Pipeline that left the East Coast short of gas at the pumps for days, the chairman of the federal commission overseeing energy and some U.S. House Democrats said Wednesday. A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee discussed a proposal by Rep. Bobby Rush, (D-Ill.), that would give the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission the power to impose basic standards for natural gas pipeline reliability and security. Such standards don’t now exist. Members of the House panel aimed to address a joint report from FERC and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation following a devastating Texas winter storm in 2021 that also showed how pipelines can fail. The report recommended a single federal agency be responsible for ensuring pipeline reliability, full committee Chairman Frank Pallone, (D-N.J.), said. He praised Rush “for taking those recommendations seriously.” The Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack, when Russian hackers shut down a key pipeline owned by Colonial Pipeline of Alpharetta, Ga., affected a conduit for gasoline to 17 states in the South and East and the District of Columbia. Shortages and panic buying ensued. “As some recent high-profile events have proven, disruption to our energy supplies has some dire consequences,” Rep. Mike Doyle, (D-Pa.), said. “And the need for reliability is only going to increase as we see more extreme weather events and the proliferation of cyberattacks.” FERC can enforce reliability standards regarding electricity delivery and other matters, but lacks such authorities when it comes to regulating pipelines. “Lack of mandatory reliability standards, especially for natural gas pipelines, poses a risk to the reliability of the bulk power system to the interdependency of our nation’s gas electric infrastructure,” FERC Chairman Richard Glick told the panel. Republican members of the panel opposed the bill expanding FERC’s reach. “The topic of this hearing is completely off base, out of touch with the realities facing Americans today,” said Rep. Fred Upton of Michigan, who is the ranking Republican on the subcommittee. “This bill would dramatically expand FERC, transforming a relatively tiny agency into a behemoth with regulatory powers over America’s energy system.”

Republicans, industry resist FERC oversight of pipeline reliability, security as Glick cites grid threats - House Republicans and the fossil fuel industry are opposed to legislation directing the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to develop reliability and cybersecurity standards for natural gas and other energy pipelines. Trade groups and conservative lawmakers argue the bill is duplicative, costly and creates conflicting authorities. The House Subcommittee on Energy held a Wednesday hearing to consider H.R. 6084, the Energy Product Reliability Act. There are no mandatory reliability standards for gas pipelines and that "poses a risk to the reliability of the bulk power system," FERC Chairman Richard Glick told lawmakers. The Interstate Natural Gas Association of America (INGAA) and seven other groups object to the bill, pushing instead for lawmakers to address "capacity constraints resulting from federal and state permitting obstacles." Republican lawmakers say their priority is to slow rising energy costs. There are now 93 FERC-approved mandatory reliability standards for the bulk power system, but none for gas and other pipelines moving energy. HR 6084 is similar to parts of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which called for the development of reliability standards for the power grid now overseen by the North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC). Gas made up 37% of U.S. electricity generation in 2021, Glick told lawmakers. If a pipeline failure or cyber attack disrupts gas supplies, then "electric generation capacity dependent on that pipeline could be lost, possibly leading to blackouts on the electric grid," he said. "This is more than a hypothetical situation," he added, pointing to Winter Storm Uri, which last year caused blackouts in Texas and the South Central U.S. when gas production facilities froze, among other weather-related impacts. A joint FERC-NERC report in November recommended Congress designate a single federal agency with authority over pipeline reliability. The ransomware attack on Colonial Pipeline in May of 2021 also highlighted the risks, said Glick. In that instance, the largest oil pipeline on the East Coast shut down preemptively to keep malware from infecting its operational systems. "A similar attack against a natural gas pipeline serving electric generators has the potential to also impair the reliability of the electric grid," Glick said. "In my view, it is critical that energy pipelines also be subject to mandatory cybersecurity standards."

 EnCap-Backed Clearfork Gains Entry into Haynesville with Azure Acquisition - Fort Worth, TX-based Clearfork Midstream LLC said Tuesday it plans to acquire Azure Midstream Energy LLC, giving it entry into the core areas of the Haynesville Shale in North Louisiana and East Texas. The price was not disclosed for the takeover, which was funded by Clearfork sponsor EnCap Flatrock Midstream LLC (EFM). The private equity firm backed Clearfork’s start-up in 2020 to provide midstream solutions for oil and gas producers in North American basins, with an emphasis on the Haynesville. A team of industry veterans works with Overstreet, including COO George Grau Jr., Chief Commercial Officer Corey Lothamer and Executive Vice President Kevin Venturini. Prior to forming Clearfork, Overstreet was an executive at Azure, most recently serving as vice president of corporate development and gas supply from 2017 to 2020. Azure’s natural gas gathering and treating platform spans the core areas of the Haynesville formation and includes more than 500 miles of pipeline and 1.2 Bcf/d of treating capacity across systems. The firm has nine downstream interconnects offering access to major market hubs, including Henry Hub, Houston Ship Channel/Katy, Carthage, Columbia Gulf Mainline, Perryville and Agua Dulce.

U.S. natgas futures edge up on colder forecasts (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas futures edged up on Tuesday on forecasts for colder weather and higher heating demand over the next two weeks than previously forecast before the long Martin Luther King Jr Day holiday weekend. In a reminder of last winter's February freeze, traders noted daily gas demand was expected to reach record highs on Friday as frigid weather blankets much of the United States later this week. Front-month gas futures NGc1 for February delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) rose 2.1 cents, or 0.5%, to settle at $4.283 per million British thermal units (mmBtu). Speculators last week boosted their net long futures and options positions on the NYMEX and Intercontinental Exchange by the most in a week since June as they covered their shorts with the front-month up 9% in volatile trade, according to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission's Commitments of Traders report. During the February freeze, gas futures climbed a bit - gaining as much as 7% on Feb. 16 - but did not soar like the spot market. Next-day gas jumped to record highs in several parts of the country - gaining over 1,100% on Feb. 12 at the Waha hub NG-WAH-WTX-SNL in West Texas - as Winter Storm Uri left millions without power and heat for days after freezing gas wells and pipes in Texas and other U.S. central states. In the spot market, frigid weather and high heating demand in the U.S. Northeast kept next-day power and gas prices in New York and New England at or near their highest since January 2018 for much of the past week. Traders noted more cold was on the way later this week and next. Lingering cold since New Year's Day continued to depress output through well freeze-offs and other weather-related equipment issues in several regions, including the Permian in Texas and New Mexico, the Bakken in North Dakota and Appalachia in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio. Data provider Refinitiv said output in the U.S. Lower 48 states averaged 94.6 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) so far in January, down from a record 97.6 bcfd in December. With even colder weather coming, Refinitiv projected average U.S. gas demand, including exports, would jump from 135.6 bcfd this week to 143.2 bcfd next week as homes and businesses crank up their heaters. On a daily basis, Refinitiv projected total U.S. gas demand plus exports would reach 153.4 bcfd on Jan. 21, which would top the 149.8 bcfd high seen so far this year on Jan. 7 and the current record of 150.6 bcfd on Jan. 30, 2019.During last year's February freeze, daily demand hit 147.2 bcfd on Feb. 12, 2021, the day before Winter Storm Uri caused power and gas demand to drop as millions lost their access to electricity and heat for days.

Natural Gas Futures Flop Despite Looming Cold Fronts, Elevated Exports; Cash Cruises Higher -- Natural gas futures dived lower Wednesday even as demand for U.S. exports held strong, forecasts called for the harshest freeze of the winter and analysts expected a hefty storage withdrawal. The February Nymex gas futures contract lost 25.2 cents day/day and settled at $4.031/MMBtu. March fell 20.3 cents to $3.845. Cash markets moved in the opposite direction as near-term demand loomed large. NGI’s Spot Gas National Avg. jumped $1.010 cents to $6.520. The latest forecasts pulled back modestly from expectations earlier in the week for a bitter cold pattern over the northern and eastern United States for late January into early February. But the anticipated bursts of Arctic air were still expected to make January the coldest since 2014 and drive robust heating demand over the next two weeks. The American weather model on Wednesday was “not quite as cold Jan. 28-Feb. 2,” though it “remained quite cold late this week and again Jan. 26-28 for very strong national demand,” NatGasWeather said in a midday note to clients. “Both the domestic and European models still forecast the coldest/best 15-day pattern so far this winter season as lows of minus 20s to 20s impact much of the northern two-thirds of the U.S., including anticipated freeze-offs of several Bcf/day to production,” the firm said. Bloomberg estimated production at around 94 Bcf on Wednesday, already well below late 2021 highs near 97 Bcf following freeze-offs earlier this month. More disruptions to output could further lower daily supply levels just as demand soars, NatGasWeather said. “However,” the firm added, “price is king and the natural gas markets are clearly stating they don’t view the coming pattern as cold enough to justify” prices near $4.30, a level the prompt month approached on Tuesday. Multiple news reports during the trading day also said that China was preparing to send to Europe some of the liquefied natural gas (LNG) that it had imported in 2021. This indicated that China, the world’s largest gas importer, was well-stocked and may not need further U.S. supplies in the near term. That noted, demand from Europe remains strong, Rystad Energy analysts said, owing to the geopolitical standoff between the United States and Russia – with the U.S. threatening new sanctions against Russia that could affect a natural gas pipeline that would deliver much-needed Russian gas to Europe. Russia has recently curtailed gas flows to Europe via other routes as well. Europe, already light on supplies heading into winter, is clamoring for U.S. LNG as a result. U.S. LNG feed gas volumes hovered above 12.5 Bcf on Tuesday, within striking distance of the record 13.2 Bcf level reached earlier in the week, according to NGI estimates.

Natural gas futures slump for second day despite winter’s biggest pullback - Natural gas futures floundered for a second straight day as weather conditions warmed, eclipsing record export volumes, production threats and the biggest storage drawdown of the season. A day after falling 25.2 cents, the February Nymex gas futures contract lost 22.9 cents day/day on Thursday and settled at $3.802/MMBtu. March fell 19.6 cents to $3.649. Bespoke Weather Services said Thursday’s weather patterns showed substantial warmer day/day trends. As a result, the company lowered its gas-weighted degree-day projections through Feb. 3 from 12.5. “While this is still a cooler than normal picture, we’re just not getting the extreme cold days that have been reported by many models over the past two weeks,” Bespoke said. . “Most importantly, signs of warming in February continue to grow as models gravitate more toward a western US trough and a ridge downstream of the eastern US, which would equate to a warmer than normal pattern nationally.” Even with signs of “material warming” next month, the firm said it was “a bit surprised” by the level of confidence the market was showing ahead of a milder February. “We still have big storage runs ahead of us,” Bespoke warned. Indeed, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) on Thursday reported a pull of 206 billion cubic feet from storage for the week ended Jan. 14. It’s the biggest drop of the season and reflects both strong weather demand during the period — freezing conditions gripped the Plains, Midwest and East — and relatively modest production levels. The EIA recorded a pull of 179 billion cubic feet for the same week a year earlier, while the five-year average is 167 billion cubic feet. Production over the last covered week hovered several billion cubic feet below the late-2021 peak of around 97 billion cubic feet, largely due to freezes. Estimates on Thursday put production at 92 billion cubic feet. “It should bounce back significantly higher once the chill wears off, but exactly how high remains to be seen,” Bespoke said. In the meantime, Bespoke and other forecasters are expecting spells of freezing air at the end of this week and again next week which could lead to strong heating demand in the eastern half of the country and potentially interrupt again. the production. The company also expects storage decreases to exceed 200 billion cubic feet with each of the next two EIA printings. Additionally, if estimates hold, U.S. liquefied natural gas (LNG) export volumes hit a new record high above 13.2 billion cubic feet on Thursday amid continued strong demand from Europe. LNG feed gas volumes eclipsed the 13 billion cubic feet level several times in January. .

U.S. natgas climbs over 5% as cold drives demand to record high — חדשות - U.S. natural gas futures climbed over 5% on Friday on what is expected to be the country's biggest gas demand day on record with forecasts for more cold weather and higher-than-expected heating demand over the next two weeks. In addition to boosting gas demand, the cold this week cut gas output to its lowest in four months as wells and other equipment froze in Texas, Pennsylvania and elsewhere. It was a reminder of the last time gas demand was expected to reach record highs before last February's freeze. Analysts expect the cold will boost heating demand and keep forcing utilities to pull huge amounts of gas from storage over the next few weeks, causing overall inventories to slip below the five-year average for the first time since mid-December. Front-month gas futures rose 19.7 cents, or 5.2%, to settle at $3.999 per million British thermal units. On Thursday, the contract closed at its lowest since Jan. 4. For the week, the front-month fell about 6% after rising about 9% last week. Last winter, next-day gas jumped to record highs in several parts of the country -- gaining over 1,100% on Feb. 12 at the Waha hub in West Texas -- as a winter storm left millions without power and heat for days after freezing gas wells and pipes in Texas and other U.S. central states. In the current spot market, frigid weather and high heating demand for much of the week in the U.S. Northeast kept next-day power and gas prices in New York and New England at or near their highest since January 2018. Traders noted more cold was expected later this week and next. For the first time since 2019, Excelerate Energy started using its Northeast Gateway liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminal in the Boston Harbor to deliver fuel into the New England market. The cold snap put U.S. gas production on track to drop to its lowest since September after lingering cold since New Year's Day had already depressed output through well freeze-offs and other weather-related equipment issues in several regions, including the Permian in Texas and New Mexico, the Bakken in North Dakota and Appalachia in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio. Data provider Refinitiv said output in the U.S. Lower 48 states averaged 94.3 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) so far in January, down from a record 97.6 bcfd in December. Refinitiv projected average U.S. gas demand, including exports, would jump from 134.8 bcfd this week to 141.4 bcfd next week as homes and businesses crank up their heaters before sliding to 134.5 bcfd in two weeks. The forecast for this week and next were higher than Refinitiv projected on Thursday.

Zorn bill would preempt local bans on natural gas use — State Sen. Dale Zorn, R-Ida, introduced legislation to stop local governments from prohibiting the use of natural gas in Michigan homes and businesses. “The terrible idea of banning the use of clean and affordable natural gas at the local level is the latest example of environmental extremism — one that would have a huge impact on Michigan families and small businesses,” Zorn said. “This bill would protect homeowners across our state by preemptively stopping these dangerous policies — which have been adopted in cities from Seattle to New York City — from coming to Michigan.” Senate Bill 820 would prohibit a county, city, village or township in Michigan from adopting or enforcing an ordinance, resolution or policy banning the use of natural gas or the installation of natural gas infrastructure. “The vast majority of Michigan residents use natural gas to heat their homes,” Zorn said. “Not only is a piecemeal energy policy bad for our state, banning the use of natural gas in homes without the electric infrastructure to replace it or assistance to help struggling families get new equipment is morally reprehensible.” In December, New York City banned natural gas connections in new buildings by 2027 and the state of New York is considering a bill to mandate all-electric buildings by 2023. Last year, Seattle also strengthened its restrictions on natural gas in new commercial and multifamily buildings and now bans natural gas use for heating. Since 2020, twenty states have passed similar laws to block local governments from banning the use of natural gas.

US weekly LNG exports go up by one vessel - Weekly exports of LNG from the United States have increased by one vessel from last week, according to data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA). In the latest Short-Term Energy Outlook for the week between 6 and 12 January, EIA reports 25 LNG vessels departed the United States. This is one more than the last reported week. Nine LNG carriers were from Sabine Pass, five from Freeport, four each from Cameron and Corpus Christi, two from Cove Point and one from Elba Island. They held a combined LNG-carrying capacity of 92 billion cubic feet. The Henry Hub spot price also rose from $3.79 per million British thermal units (MMBtu) last Wednesday to $4.59/MMBt this week. Natural gas deliveries to LNG export facilities (LNG pipeline receipts) averaged 12.2 Bcf/d, or 0.3 Bcf/d higher than last week.

 Tribal testimony partially tossed from Line 5 tunnel case review - Portions of testimony from two of Michigan’s tribal leaders won’t be considered as a state agency considers whether to allow Enbridge to relocate a segment of its Line 5 pipeline into an underground tunnel beneath the Straits of Mackinac. Administrative Law Judge Dennis Mack ruled to exclude portions of witness testimony by Whitney Gravelle and Jacques Leblanc, Bay Mills Indian Community’s president and vice-president, respectively. Enbridge sought to strike much of their testimony as irrelevant and outside the scope of the permit review by the Michigan Public Service Commission. Gravelle and Leblanc testified about the risks they believe a pipeline tunnel poses to public safety, tribal sovereignty and accelerated climate change. The tribe intervened in the case to argue the tunnel would be a risk to Indigenous food and water supplies, medicinal plants, economic livelihood, and their preserved treaty rights. “The Straits of Mackinac is a place of deep spiritual and cultural meaning to my people, where there are important cultural and historic resources still being learned of, and where Bay Mills and other Tribal Nations have Treaty rights,” Gravelle offered in her written testimony. “It is dangerous to construct a tunnel and route a pipeline through lands and waters that are central to our existence as indigenous people and as a Tribal Nation,” she wrote. Leblanc is a lifelong tribal fisherman who testified to the state that any oil spill would have both immediate and intergenerational effects. “Beyond the harm that an oil spill or other event would have on the health of lake trout and whitefish, any disruption of the fishery for an extended period would stifle the transfer of fishing knowledge to younger generations,” Leblanc said in his written testimony. Enbridge officials said the company is committed to engaging with Indigenous peoples to better understand their concerns as they build the tunnel. But the state permit process has specific requirements and the Canadian pipeline company argued Gravelle and Leblanc’s testimony didn’t meet those standards. “Testimony outside the scope of the proceedings is inadmissible and not allowed into the record, regardless of the party that offers it,” said Enbridge spokesperson Ryan Duffy in an email. An attorney for Bay Mills and other tribal governments said the judge’s decision to exclude parts of the tribal leaders’ input was a disappointment. “The testimony that was stricken explains the impact, the potential impacts of this project on treaty-protected rights,” said Debbie Chizewer, Earthjustice Midwest office managing attorney.

Line 5 tunnel could be a ‘stranded asset’ in 20 years, report suggests - Critics of a plan to relocate the Line 5 pipeline into a tunnel beneath Great Lakes waters argue Enbridge’s own federal filings prove there’s no need for the infrastructure to be built.Opponents of the Canadian company’s plan to build a $500 million tunnel through the bedrock beneath the Straits of Mackinac said the project would become a “stranded asset” by the end of 2040. That’s when the company set the truncation date for its Lakehead pipeline system, of which Line 5 is a part, according to a depreciation report Enbridge filed last year with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.Officials from the Oil & Water Don’t Mix citizens campaign are pointing to a 2021 Enbridge depreciation study – which was filed with U.S. energy regulators so the company could raise tariffs – as evidence Line 5 will be obsolete by 2041, only 13 years after the tunnel construction is expected to be done. They argue that contradicts agreements Enbridge made with Michigan officials to build the tunnel and use it for a pipeline for 99 years.“That raises questions. The primary one being, did Enbridge enter an agreement with the state while knowing the pipeline wasn’t going to be in the ground for 99 years, that they’d have to replace it, or, based on their own study, they’d be put out of business,” said David Holtz, from Oil & Water Don’t Mix.“Did Enbridge enter into those agreements in good faith?”The citizens campaign, which represents more than a dozen environmental organizations and tribal governments, sent a letter to the Mackinac Straits Corridor Authority to recommend a halt to all state support for and spending on tunnel engineering work. The group also said the state should consider an independent analysis of the implications of building the tunnel given the company’s own economic projections, and additionally request federal safety officials and pipeline regulators consult in the case.

Massive New Orleans oil spill revealed weeks after incident killed thousands of fish -A ruptured fuel pipeline spilled more than 300,000 gallons of diesel fuel into the waters near New Orleans for days before the public knew about it, according to an Associated Press report. A rupture was discovered in late December along a 125-mile fuel line that terminates near St Bernard Parish, New Orleans, according to federal records. Since then, roughly 2,300 fish and more than 100 other animals including 39 snakes, 32 birds and other creatures have died. Still, according to the Louisiana Oil Spill Coordinators office, the spill, most of which went into nearby “borrow” pits, caused “minimal” harm to wildlife, and a mix of a containment wall and rapid cleaning from emergency officials kept the diesel from going into nearby wetlands, the Gulf of Mexico, and other waterways close by. Wildlife officials have been using propane cannons that make a sound akin to a gunshot to scare off migratory birds from the spill. Collins, a subsidiary of the New Jersey-based PBF Energy, was aware its infrastructure near the site was decaying before the spill. A 2020 inspection of the Meraux pipeline showed deep corrosion, with a loss of up to 75 per cent of the present metal at its worst sections. Still, work was delayed on the pipeline after a second inspection concluded the damage wasn’t bad enough to mandate immediate repair under federal rules. An October 2021 email to federal regulators indicates the company repaired another damaged section, and was waiting for federal approval to fix a section near the eventual rupture zone. Working with local officials, the pipeline operator has recovered roughly 315,000 gallons of fuel from the surface of the water. The broken fuel line was repaired at a cost of $500,000, and operations have resumed.

Gators fouled by diesel spill get a scrubbing, teeth cleaned - (AP) — Wildlife rehabilitators are decontaminating dozens of alligators, brushing their pointy teeth and scrubbing their scaly hides in the weeks after a pipeline rupture dumped 300,000 gallons (1.1 million liters) of diesel fuel into a New Orleans area wetland. Diesel poured into the area outside the New Orleans suburb of Chalmette on Dec. 27 after a severely corroded pipeline broke, according to federal records. Seventy-eight alligators have since been rescued, and 33 of them had been cleaned and released by Friday into a national wildlife refuge located in New Orleans and about 10 miles (16 kilometers) from the spill site in St. Bernard Parish, the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries said. Cleaning a six-foot-long (2-meter) alligator on Thursday required eight people: four holders, two scrubbers, one person with a hose for hot-water rinses and one to change the wash water, said Laura Carver, who became the department's oil spill coordinator in February 2010, less than three months before a massive BP oil spill off Louisiana in the Gulf. Carver said the impact of December's diesel spill on wildlife was relatively high compared to most spills in Louisiana. Rehabilitating that many alligators at once “is a new one for us,” Carver said. She said a hard piece of wood “almost like a really old-fashioned mop handle” is used to hold the alligator's jaw open while its teeth are scrubbed. The teeth cleaning comes toward the end of a series of body washes using gradually smaller concentrations of Dawn dish detergent to clean off the gunk. “They literally get their mouths washed out with soap. But it’s the only thing that works,” Carver said. She said nearly all of the spill went into two artificial ponds, and only the smaller pond was completely covered with diesel. The vast majority has been recovered from the ponds and contractors for operator Collins Pipeline Co. of Collins, Mississippi, are working on plans to deal with contaminated soil, Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality spokesman Gregory Langley said Friday. Collins Pipeline, a subsidiary of New Jersey-Based PBF Energy, had known about corrosion on the outside of the pipe at the site of the spill since an Oct. 2020 inspection, according to federal records. However, it delayed repairs after a second inspection showed the corrosion was not bad enough to need immediate attention. At the time of the spill the company was awaiting permits for the work and planned to start it later this month, the records show.

 Mitch Landrieu announces $4.7 billion plan to clean up orphaned oil and gas wells -- Federal agencies have reached an understanding, which will kick off a $4.7 billion campaign to clean-up orphaned oil and gas wells that were abandoned years ago by the energy industry, former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, who now is the president’s infrastructure czar, said during a White House press conference Tuesday. “Millions of us, millions, live within a mile of hundreds of thousands of orphan wells that leak and spew. These wells jeopardize public health and safety by contaminating ground water, seeping toxic chemicals, emitting harmful pollutants including methane,” Landrieu told reporters. “Cleaning it up will take an all-government approach.” He was named Infrastructure Implementation Coordinator by President Joe Biden to handle the roll-out of the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that is spending more than has been spent in a generation to fix and upgrade roads, bridges, airports and other pieces of the nation’s long neglected infrastructure. The law includes $4.7 billion to cleanup orphan well sites, plugging remediation and restoration activities. But the first step was to work out a “memorandum of understanding” between the federal Departments of the Interior, Agriculture, and Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission that would detail how the work that would be done and identify which agency responsible for what tasks.

 Biden Administration Sets Framework to Fund $4.7B US Orphan Well Cleanup - The Biden administration has laid out an interagency framework for working with states and tribes to distribute the $4.7 billion allocated for closing and remediating abandoned oil and gas well sites across the US under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act signed into law in November. Four federal agencies: The US Environmental Protection Agency, and the Depts. of Interior, Agriculture and Energy, and the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, whose members are governors from oil and gas-producing states, signed a memorandum of understanding on Jan. 14 to establish a plan to work together to be able to roll out the funds quickly. The DOI has documented at least 130,000 abandoned oil and gas wells in the US. Sites that have no known owner, or the owner is insolvent and cannot pay for remediation, are considered to be abandoned. If the wells are not closed off, or “plugged," properly, methane and other chemicals can leak and contaminate nearby land and groundwater. The new infrastructure law allows states to apply for $25 million in initial grants, and establishes larger formula grants to fund proper closure and cleanup of orphaned oil and gas wells and well sites. Nearly every state with documented orphan wells submitted a notice of intent (NOI) by the Dec. 31, 2021, deadline declaring interest in applying for a formula grant, DOI says. The MOU establishes an interagency task force, led by the Bureau of Land Management, to identify and inventory orphaned wells and associated pipelines, facilities and infrastructure, and to prioritize for potential federal funding sites that pose the most risk to the environment or public health. The MOU also establishes state and tribal grant programs for states and tribes to establish and manage their own orphan well plugging, remediation and restoration programs. In a statement, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland said that the new infrastructure law “is poised to make critical investments to help clean up … legacy pollution – and it will take an all-of-government approach to implement the program.” DOE Secretary Jennifer Granholm said in a statement that capping unplugged oil and gas wells will provide construction workers in the oil and gas sector “to land skills-matched jobs that will protect the health of their communities.”

Abandoned oil well counts are exploding — now that there’s money on the table -It’s long been an open secret that abandoned oil and gas wells are dramatically undercounted in the United States. Now that the federal government is finally offering substantial funding to plug and clean up these environmental hazards, states are finally starting to admit it.From 2020 to 2021, the number of wells that the state of Oklahoma listed as abandoned — and therefore the government’s responsibility to clean up — jumped from 2,799 to a whopping 17,865. In Colorado, the orphan well tally hovered around 275 from 2018 to 2020 but increased by almost 80 percent last year. In California, the tally almost doubled in the last two years. (It started even lower in 2019, when the state identified just 25 abandoned wells.)What changed? In 2020, Congress began seriously consideringsending states money to plug orphan wells. The proposal had support from both political parties and was ultimately included in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law enacted in November, which set aside $4.7 billion for this purpose. States have long known that their orphan well tallies are outdated and incomplete, but without a source of funding to clean up the wells, many didn’t invest the resources required to identify abandoned wells. That changed as the funding slowly became a reality over the past couple of years. In Oklahoma, the updated well count has been an even longer time coming. Three years ago, the state legislature funded an overhaul of the information technology systems of the Oklahoma Corporation Commission, the state agency responsible for plugging abandoned wells. As it migrated its oil and gas data to a new database, it found a slew of previously miscategorized orphan wells along the way. Additionally, when oil production plummeted during the early months of the pandemic, inspectors had fewer active wells to oversee and were reassigned to locating orphan wells in the field. Matt Skinner, a spokesperson for the Commission, said that this “perfect storm” of factors was accelerated by the fact that, once found, these wells now had a shot at being plugged and cleaned up.

Texas natural gas production falls as freezing weather sets in--Texas natural gas production dropped for the second time this month because of freezing temperatures settling over the state. Output on Thursday was down 6.2%, according to preliminary BloombergNEF data based on pipeline flows. That’s the biggest decline since Jan. 2, when a similar blast of frigid air curbed supplies. “It’s a safe assumption to call freeze-offs,” BloomberNEF analyst Jade Patterson said, adding that figures may still be adjusted throughout the day. Data from analytics firm RBN Energy Thursday show a 4.4% drop in production from the Permian Basin alone. Production shut-ins are not uncommon in Texas during cold weather, typically occurring at least once or twice a year. And while a single-day drop of 6% is bigger than usual, Thursday’s dip was largely offset by a jump in withdrawals from gas storage on the Gulf Coast, so gas and power prices weren’t affected. Yet the increasing frequency of such events -- two freeze-offs in a matter of weeks -- raises questions about Texas’s ability to avoid a repeat of the deadly energy crisis that crippled the gas sector and plunged millions into darkness less than one year ago. “First and foremost on people’s minds is last February,” said Luke Metzger, executive director of Environment Texas. “People like me went without power for several days and the primary reason being that there were disruptions in the natural gas supply chain.” Even modest production drops can affect the power supply. During the last cold blast at the beginning of January, gas output fell by about 7%. At the same time, Texas lost about 1.3 gigawatts of electrical generation due to gas-supply issues. The Texas Oil and Gas Association, which represents producers, downplayed the impact of Thursday’s drop. “TXOGA is confident the natural gas supply is strong,” said association President Todd Staples. “Feedback from our membership confirms production variations have been minimal and something less than 5% seems consistent statewide.”

Texas electricity firm says Energy Transfer threatens to cut gas supply --Vistra Corp. said two units of Energy Transfer LP are threatening to cut off natural gas supplies to power generation facilities it owns in Texas because of a payment dispute over last year’s catastrophic winter storm. Vistra subsidiaries including Luminant Energy asked Texas oil and gas regulators to prevent Energy Transfer from terminating gas service to Luminant’s power plants, which serve about 400,000 Texas homes, according to a complaint filed with the Texas Railroad Commission on Wednesday. The “threat to terminate service in the middle of winter is illegal and grossly irresponsible and should be prohibited by this commission,” Vistra said in the complaint. Energy Transfer said by email that it “will continue to sell them gas pursuant to the same process, terms and conditions that have been in place since Dec. 1, 2021.” The two units, Energy Transfer Fuel and Oasis Pipeline, are threatening to cease gas service by Jan. 24 because Vistra won’t pay $21.6 million in fees stemming from the February winter storm, when freezing temperatures knocked off gas supplies, contributing to widespread blackouts. The dispute comes as Texas is bracing for a new round of cold and sleet that will test the state’s power grid over the next several days. Vistra alleges in the filing that the fee is illegal and stems from the power generator securing and delivering gas into the pipeline operators’ systems during the storm.

Freezing weather returns to the Permian in renewed risk to gas production, prices - Low temperatures across West Texas are forecast to dip well below freezing from Jan. 20 to Jan. 23, potentially bringing wellhead freeze-offs and gas production curtailments to the Permian Basin. An updated forecast for Jan. 20 showed temperatures in Midland, Texas dipping to about 22 degrees Fahrenheit overnight, followed by a subsequent drop to just 19 degrees from Jan. 21 to Jan. 22. Subfreezing temperatures, which hit West Texas earlier this month, have often been associated with gas production declines in the Permian, either from voluntary curtailments or wellhead freeze-offs. Last winter's now infamous polar vortex event, which brought sub-zero temperatures to the Permian, triggered a historic price spike there, briefly sending prices at Waha to over $250/MMBtu. On Jan. 20, spot gas markets across the Lone Star State were actually down on the day, despite the freezing weather forecast. At the Waha Hub in West Texas, cash prices were down over 80 cents to $3.86/MMBtu. In East Texas, prices at Houston Ship Channel and Katy Hub were also down about 20 to 30 cents to around $4.20/MMBtu at both locations, preliminary settlement data from S&P Global Platts showed. In the forward market, meanwhile, traders have long been bracing for a potential spike in gas prices at Waha this winter. In late December, the hub's January 2022 forward contract briefly traded at upwards of 50 cents premium to Henry Hub. Since the start of the new year, the balance-of-month contract has traded as high as 44 cents premium to the benchmark. While the perceived risk of another freeze-off may just be recency bias, concern over the potential for another such event is very real for market participants and regulators. In addition to driving forward-market volatility at hubs in West Texas and the Midcontinent, the February 2021 freeze has motivated the Texas Railroad Commission to take regulatory action. Following an extensive inquiry into the Polar Vortex event last February, the TRCC last year proposed winterization standards for the state's oil and gas producers intended to avert a repeat of last winter's statewide energy emergency. After proposing an initial winterization scheme, the Texas regulator came under scrutiny from industry experts, lawmakers and public interest groups, for what they called an exemption loophole. In the originally proposed plan, most natural gas production, storage or midstream operators would have been allowed to file for an exemption to the winterization standard by submitting the appropriate paperwork to the TRCC and paying a $150 fee. On Nov. 30, though, the Texas regulatory body voted unanimously to close the earlier exemption loophole by designating certain natural gas entities as "critical" during an energy emergency with the new standard imposing basic winterization requirements on certain natural gas suppliers and customers.

Texas pipeline company walks back threat to cut off gas to power plants -After threatening to cut off fuel to roughly a third of the power plants owned by Texas’ biggest power generator, a major pipeline company said Thursday it will continue selling natural gas to the plants through the end of March. But the companies have still not resolved their underlying financial dispute stemming from last February’s deadly winter storm.Energy Transfer LP subsidiaries walked back their threat after Luminant, a Vistra Corp. subsidiary, on Wednesday asked state regulators to prevent the pipeline company from cutting off fuel to five Vistra power plants, which produce enough electricity to power 400,000 Texas homes, businesses and critical infrastructure such as schools and hospitals.The pipeline companies had told Vistra that gas would stop flowing to the power plants on Monday unless Vistra paid Energy Transfer $21.6 million that they claim Vistra owes them, according to Vistra’s complaint to the Railroad Commission of Texas, which regulates the state’s oil and gas industry.The “threat to terminate service in the middle of winter is illegal and grossly irresponsible and should be prohibited by this Commission,” Vistra said in the complaint. It called the move by Energy Transfer, run by billionaire Kelcy Warren, “a form of commercial extortion.”Energy Transfer responded Thursday in a short filing with the Railroad Commission, saying it would continue selling natural gas to Vistra on the spot market — a one-time open market transaction for immediate delivery of gas purchased “on the spot.”That would nullify the Monday deadline imposed by Energy Transfer. Vistra has been paying those spot market prices to Energy Transfer since Dec. 1, when its long-term contract for gas expired, and Energy Transfer said it would not negotiate another contract until Vistra paid the $21.6 million.For Vistra, paying spot prices means buying gas from Energy Transfer at between $15 and $25 per million British Thermal Units (BTUs), compared to the average national price of $3.91 per million BTUs in 2021, according to the Energy Information Administration.During last year’s winter storm — which caused the near-total collapse of the state’s power grid, left millions without power for days and caused hundreds of deaths — natural gas prices soared when a combination of freezing temperatures across the state and skyrocketing demand shut down natural gas facilities and power plants, which rely on each other to keep electricity flowing.Vistra spent approximately $1.5 billion for natural gas during the dayslong crisis, “twice its planned natural gas cost to fuel its entire Texas fleet for a full year,” the filing said.Vistra said in its filing that more than $600 million of that total was paid to Energy Transfer, “which is more than 96% of all amounts invoiced by [Energy Transfer].” While many companies lost money during the storm, Energy Transfer made $2.4 billion.

Texas Earthquakes Prompt New Fracking Rules – WSJ --Frackers in America’s hottest oil field are facing an expensive new setback: earthquakes. Shale companies in West Texas will have to pay more to move millions of barrels of wastewater that surfaces from oil wells and can aggravate tectonic fault lines when deposited underground. A recent spate of earthquakes prompted state regulators to stop companies from pumping as much water underground, forcing some drillers to move water farther afield. Most of the earthquakes have been relatively mild so far and have caused limited property damage. The rising number of earthquakes has led the Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates the oil industry, to shut or sharply reduce the capacity of scores of so-called disposal wells to protect nearby communities. The wells are used by large oil companies including Chevron Corp, ConocoPhillips and Coterra Energy Inc. to inject wastewater into geologic formations. The limitations have left Permian Basin drillers to find other ways to transport wastewater, including high-cost trucking. Trucking the water to disposal wells elsewhere is about five times the cost of using pipelines, according to shale executives and analysts. Some companies said they can avoid trucking by sending water through a network of pipelines to regions unaffected by seismic activity. The added expenses come as frackers are already facing higher costs from labor and supplies. Permian producers’ collective annual cost to jettison that water could increase, conservatively, by more than $200 million if they have to truck it all out, according to market intelligence firm Sourcenergy. If companies are unable to find new means of disposal, they may have to curtail tens of thousands of barrels a day of oil production. The setback could also limit some producers’ ability to increase output in response to the highest oil prices in years. Many that are forced to truck water elsewhere will likely have to shift drilling rigs away from the areas where the Railroad Commission concentrated its cutbacks, executives said. “If you’re forced to truck it, it’s going to have a devastating impact on your lease operating expenses,” said Richard Jennings, president of private West Texas oil producer Atlantic Operating II LLC, which says it operates shallow disposal wells unaffected by the restrictions. In 2020, the latest year for which data is available, oil producers pumped about 342 million barrels of water into the saltwater disposal wells that the Railroad Commission began restricting last fall. The regulator acted after a sharp uptick in earthquakes, including near populated areas like Midland and Odessa. The number of earthquakes with a magnitude of 3.0 or larger in the Texas portion of the Permian rose to 176 last year, up from 51 in 2020 and nine in 2019, according to Sourcenergy, which analyzed state seismic activity data. U.S. seismologists have linked seismic activity to wastewater disposal in oil fields. In Oklahoma a few years ago, regulators moved to limit injections in some areas following a rise in earthquakes that damaged buildings and caused injuries. The large volumes of injected water can increase pore pressure in certain geologic formations, and if faults run through those formations, the pressure pushing against them can cause seismic events, scientists say.

 New Data Shows Massive Climate-Warming Leaks by New Mexico Oil and Gas Operators - In New Mexico, new state rules sparked a dramatic increase in reported incidents of vented and flared natural gas in 2021 — and reveal that the oil and gas industry has been losing vastly more of the climate-change-driving fossil fuel than previously reported. “The state’s updated reporting requirements were long overdue,” says Jon Goldstein, senior director of regulatory and legislative affairs at the Environmental Defense Fund. The new numbers are in line with previous EDF research showing huge amounts of vented and flared natural gas in recent years. A review of year-end data from the state’s Oil Conservation Division (OCD) shows that producers vented or flared enough natural gas to power nearly 39,000 homes for a year — roughly the number of households in Las Cruces, the state’s second-largest city. The actual total for the year is likely much higher as the new reporting only began in May. Not only that, but the new reporting system also reveals that the state’s largest natural gas producer, Hilcorp Energy of Houston, reported surprisingly low numbers of incidents — about a hundred times lower than either similarly sized competitors or the size of its operations would suggest. “Unsurprisingly, I’m unsurprised,” says rancher Don Schreiber. Hilcorp has 122 wells scattered across his ranch in the San Juan Basin, and Schreiber keeps a close eye on them. He says that the small number of official reports from the company reflects “just a failure of the system and a failure of the operator.” The company also owns the state’s greatest number of wells — over 11,500 — all of them in the San Juan Basin in the northwest corner of New Mexico. Yet, as of Dec. 31, it had reported just 26 incidents total for the whole year, roughly the same as before the new reporting requirements.

COPL Makes Significant Wyoming Oil Find - Canadian Overseas Petroleum Limited has announced a “significant” conventional light oil discovery at its Wyoming asset. The company noted that the discovery has been confirmed on COPL’s large leasehold position in the Converse and Natrona Counties in four Frontier Fm. and one Dakota Fm sands. The business currently estimates the total reservoir volume of the discovery to be 1.5 billion to 1.9 billion barrels of oil in place, of which 1.27 billion to 1.64 billion barrels of oil in place underlays company lands, COPL revealed. “We estimate the Frontier element of the discovery to cover an area of approximately 51 square miles with the capacity of up to three horizontal wells per square mile each initially producing 1,000 - 3,000 barrels per day,” Millholland added in the statement. “We plan a phased production program and have already applied for permits covering four horizontal wells. We will use internal resources to cover the initial costs of development whilst full field development plans are evaluated. This discovery highlights the long-term sustainable production outlook from this outstanding asset,” the COPL CEO went on to say. Millholland noted that conventional light oil discoveries of this magnitude have been rare in continental North America for years, if not decades. In its latest operations update, which was released in November 2021, COPL revealed that its net crude oil sales in the third quarter, before royalties, averaged 1,077 barrels per day. This compared to 796 barrels per day in the second quarter of 2021, the company outlined. COPL describes itself as an international oil and gas exploration, development and production company actively pursuing opportunities in the United States with operations in Converse County, Wyoming, and in sub-Saharan Africa through its ShoreCan joint venture company in Nigeria, as well as independently in other countries.

A year after breach, Enbridge says it’s stopped Line 3 groundwater aquifer leak - MPR - A year after workers installing the Line 3 oil pipeline pierced an aquifer in northwestern Minnesota, Enbridge Energy has told state regulators it has stopped the uncontrolled flow of groundwater.Pipeline opponents are marking the anniversary of the breach by calling for more accountability and details about the incident, and others where Line 3 construction might have disturbed groundwater, rivers or wetlands.In January 2021, crews were working on the new pipeline near Enbridge's terminal in Clearbrook, Minn. Instead of digging a trench 8 to 10 feet deep, as Enbridge’s plans called for, the workers apparently dug 18 feet down, and they drove sheet piling down even deeper to stabilize the soil. They punctured the soil layer covering an aquifer that's under pressure, causing groundwater to flow to the surface. Enbridge didn’t immediately report the breach to state regulators. It wasn’t until June that Minnesota Department of Natural Resources officials pieced together what had happened through reports from independent monitors.It’s not yet clear whether the breach caused any long-term environmental damage or affected aquifer levels in the area. There are concerns that sediment could end up in nearby streams or wetlands.There also are some rare wetlands called calcareous fens nearby that support diverse plant life, and rely on a flow of mineral-rich groundwater. Scientists are concerned that the interruption of that flow could negatively affect the fens.In September, the DNR ordered Enbridge to stop the flow of groundwater and restore the site. The agency ordered Enbridge to pay $3.32 million. That included more than $500,000 in penalties, mitigation for the loss of groundwater and monitoring of the rare wetlands nearby, and a requirement that Enbridge place $2.75 million in escrow to restore any damage to the fens.

Judge rejects North Dakota bid to force oil lease sales on federal lands -- — A judge has denied an attempt by North Dakota to force the U.S. government to hold sales for oil leases on federal lands, a lawsuit that the state pursued after President Joe Biden imposed a moratorium on such activity to address climate and environmental concerns. The order, issued Friday, Jan. 14, by U.S. District Judge Daniel Traynor, noted that the U.S. Department of the Interior is already planning to reopen leases for oil development on federal lands in North Dakota, effectively granting the relief that the state is seeking in its legal challenge. The ruling comes two days after Traynor, who was nominated to his post by former President Donald Trump, questioned lawyers from the North Dakota Attorney General's Office on the basis for their request in light of the plans for federal leasing to resume, and since a Louisiana judge had already ruled in favor of a group of oil and gas producing states in a similar lawsuit. North Dakota alleged that the Department of the Interior violated its legal duties and the order of the Louisiana court by not holding sales on eligible lands last year, while federal attorneys argued that leasing was paused for a review of its compliance with a key environmental law — a disagreement that Traynor said he could not resolve without a more complete factual record. While the judge said he was denying North Dakota's request "at this early stage" in the lawsuit, he left the door open for the state to try again if the verdict of the Louisiana case is overturned or its scope limited by an appeal.

Environmental groups: Biden administration has legal authority to end oil and gas leasing on public land - A coalition of more than 300 environmental and tribal organizations on Wednesday issued a petition calling on the Biden administration to fully phase out oil and gas production on federal land by 2035. In the petition, participating organizations argued the administration has the legal authority to phase out such activity. The framework they offer argues that the oil and gas industry has already acknowledged the Interior Department’s authority in the matter through the language in the leases they sign. Similarly, the petition notes, “for all offshore oil and gas operations, every fossil fuel company has already consented in each signed lease to only produce oil and gas only ‘at rates consistent with any rule or order issued’ by the president.” It goes on to argue that the industry has already demonstrated its capacity to alter its rate of production at will, as demonstrated by the practice of turning off valves amid Gulf hurricanes, as well as reduced production during the COVID-19 pandemic. The phaseout outlined in the petition calls for a 10 percent annual decline in production over eight years, beginning in 2022, followed by a 3 percent reduction for each year after. Petitioners include the Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth, the Sierra Club, the Western Environmental Law Center and Honor the Earth. The petitioners fault the administration for allowing leases to resume after a court struck down Biden’s order pausing leasing on federal lands and waters. “This petition offers a lifeline for our planet and a course correction for the Biden administration’s catastrophic failure of climate leadership,” Taylor McKinnon of the Center for Biological Diversity said in a statement. “The natural place to start phasing out climate-destroying oil and gas production is on our public lands and oceans, and Biden has the authority to do so. If the U.S. leads, the world will follow. Biden must keep his promise to end federal oil and gas extraction.” Asked if the petitioners would consider filing a lawsuit to compel the administration to take such action, McKinnon told The Hill, “If the administration fails to timely respond to the petition, that is a possibility. That would be a discussion we’d have co-petitioners down the road.” “That said, this is something Biden can and therefore should do now,” he added.

Post-pandemic oil prices expected to rise, but uncertainty increases too: Kemp –-- Full survey results: https://tmsnrt.rs/3fA6gvz (Reuters) - Oil prices will exceed pre-pandemic levels over the next few years but where they will settle remains extremely uncertain, my seventh annual survey of energy market professionals shows. Brent crude is expected to average $80-85 a barrel through the middle of the decade, up from expectations of $70 before the COVID-19 pandemic took hold in 2020. Expected prices are mostly $10-15 a barrel above where futures were trading at the time the survey was conducted between Jan. 11 and Jan. 14, against a pre-pandemic premium of $10 or less. The most significant post-pandemic change, however, is the large increase in dispersion of views, with many more respondents forecasting prices far above or far below the average. Both short-term forecasts for 2022-2023 and longer-term forecasts for 2025-2026 are characterised by much higher standard deviations than over comparable forecasting horizons before the pandemic. Coronavirus, recession, a record price slump, consolidation in the shale industry and emissions-related concerns about oil and gas investment have combined to make respondents much more uncertain about the price outlook. In the second year of the forecasting horizon, the standard deviation of responses jumps to $17 a barrel, up from $10-11 in the years before the pandemic. In the fifth year, the standard deviation jumps to $26, up from $19-20 in the surveys before March 2020. Most responses are clustered around $70 and $90 a barrel over the next four years, based on the inter-quartile range for responses between 2022 and 2025. And nearly all respondents think prices will average between $60 and $110 (10th to 90th percentiles) or $55 to $125 (5th to 95th percentiles) in 2025. But there has been an increase in number of respondents forecasting high prices averaging above $120 a barrel or very high prices averaging above $150 in the next five years. The increased dispersion points to disagreement about how much of the recent rise in prices is cyclical and likely to be reversed, and how much is structural and could be semi-permanent. The survey is based on a questionnaire emailed to more than 10,000 energy market professionals and others on the “best in energy” mailing list. There were almost 1,000 responses, similar to previous years. Among survey respondents, 21% are directly involved in oil and gas production (exploration, drilling, production, refining, distribution, marketing and oilfield services). Most of the rest work in banking and finance (17%), research (10%), professional services (9%), hedge funds (7%), physical commodity trading (6%), other non-energy corporations (5%) and other energy businesses (4%).

Oil producers aren’t keeping up with demand, causing prices to stay high - NYTimes - Nearly two years ago the world’s oil producers slammed on the brakes and drastically cut production as the pandemic gripped the world’s economies. The sharp pullback came with an implicit promise that as factories reopened and planes returned to the air, the oil industry would revive, too, gradually scaling up production to help economies return to prepandemic health. It isn’t exactly turning out that way. Oil producers are finding it harder than expected to ramp up output. Members of the cartel OPEC Plus, which agreed to cut output by about 10 million barrels a day in early 2020, are routinely falling well short of their rising monthly production targets. “In a lot of places, once output has been reduced, it is not easy to bring it back,” . Production in the United States, the world’s largest oil producer, has also been slow to recover from its one-million-barrel-a-day plummet in 2020, as companies and investors are wary of committing money amid climate change concerns and volatile prices. The Energy Information Administration forecasts that U.S. crude output in 2022, while rising, is likely to average half a million barrels a day below 2019 levels. This global pattern of lagging production has helped push oil prices to seven-year highs, stoking inflation, which has become a political issue in the United States and elsewhere. Brent crude, the international standard, is close to $84 a barrel, while West Texas Intermediate, the American benchmark, is selling for close to $82. A prolonged period when more oil has been consumed than pumped has drained tank farms to low levels. Investment in new drilling for new oil has also fallen to multiyear lows, though it is expected to pick up this year. At the same time, demand is expected to grow strongly, reaching prepandemic levels this year. “The oil market appears to be heading for a period with little margin of safety,”

Biden rattles his saber at oil producers as prices surge to 2014 high --The Biden administration is working with oil-producing countries to ensure supply rises to meet demand, according to the White House, as prices surge to the highest level in seven years. The White House plans to continue to monitor prices in the context of global growth and hold discussions with OPEC+ countries as needed, National Security Council spokeswoman Emily Horne said in a statement on Tuesday. “We continue to work with producer and consumer countries, and these steps have had real effects on prices and ultimately tools continue to remain on the table for us to address prices,” Horne said. Increased gasoline prices have been a major driver of inflation during Biden’s term, and the White House has sought to contain costs for motorists. Rising prices are hurting Biden’s approval rating and make it harder for Democrats to keep control of the House and Senate in November’s elections. In November, Biden announced the release of 50 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in a move coordinated with India, Japan, South Korea and China. The administration sold 18 million barrels of oil from the reserve that it expects will be delivered to the market in February and March, Horne said. Biden has also asked the Federal Trade Commission to investigate “potentially illegal conduct” by oil and gas companies. The White House has said that increases of prices at the pump even when crude oil was lower suggests the possibility of anticompetitive behavior. Biden is committed to working with other countries to bring down the cost of oil, and ultimately gasoline prices, Horne said. Oil is surging as robust demand and strained supplies make physical markets run hot in the world’s largest consuming region. Futures in New York climbed to $85.74 a barrel, the highest since October 2014. Traders are paying higher and higher premiums for cargoes in Asia, as fears fade over the demand impact from omicron, while supplies are tightened by a range of outages from Libya to North America.

API pins high energy costs on Biden policies - The president of the only national trade association representing all aspects of America’s oil and natural gas industry blamed surging energy costs on “restricting” government policies, including several put in place under the Biden administration. American Petroleum Institute President Mike Sommers gave a speech Wednesday on the “state of American energy” in 2022. “In so many ways, the state of American energy is strong,” Sommers remarked. “Even so, we begin 2022 with Americans viewing energy and its costs as major concerns. This is in part because lately we’ve seen policies aimed at restricting production and delivery of US natural gas and oil.” Sommers then listed a number of Biden administration policy decisions, including the Keystone XL pipeline cancelation and tax increases on natural gas, that he says have been restricting America’s domestic energy development. He also pointed to Biden administration policies limiting the development of new infrastructure, which he said has caused problems in production as well. Shortly after taking office, President Joe Biden issued an executive order placing a moratorium on oil and gas leasing on public lands. The move was later overturned by a federal judge, according to Reuters. The Biden administration then appealed but has since resumed leasing while the process plays out. “New leasing for energy development on federal acreage was stopped for many months,” Sommers noted. “Meanwhile, with inflation soaring to historic levels, we’ve seen proposals in Congress for a targeted tax increase on natural gas and even further restrictions on American energy development. These decisions exacerbate Americans’ concerns and put upward pressure on their energy prices.” Sommers urged lawmakers to avoid these policies, which he said, “don’t put America on a path to progress nor help us meet basic energy needs.” Sommers added U.S. policies that restrict domestic production “force our country to seek relief from OPEC,” which undermines America’s energy independence.

Canada's Natural Gas Supply Getting Greener with US Imports - Though at the expense of lost sales from Alberta and British Columbia natural gas supplies, U.S. gas exports to Canada have fueled a significant reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, according to the Canada Energy Regulator (CER). U.S. exports of 2.6 Bcf/d to Ontario and Quebec fueled the green gain by shrinking cross-Canada flows from the western provinces. From a peak of 12.6 million tons (Mt) in 1991, annual GHG emissions produced as exhaust from Canadian pipeline operating hardware have fallen by 34% to 8.3 Mt, CER data showed. Natural gas conduits dominate fossil fuel pipeline emissions by tapping their cargo for compressor fuel, according to the CER. Oil pipelines prefer electric pumps. Canadian pipeline GHG emissions dropped as low-cost Marcellus and Utica shale gas supply grew in the Appalachian region of the United States and increased northbound exports to the nearby eastern provinces. Gas trade scorecards compiled by the U.S. Department of Energy recorded more than six-fold growth of American exports to Canada to their current 2.6 Bcf/d level from 0.4 Bcf/d in 2001. In the 1990s, the volume hovered in a modest 0.08-0.2 Bcf/d range. Counting methane leaks, on top of exhaust from gas-fired compressors, total annual carbon-equivalent GHG emissions by Canadian long-distance pipelines plus local distribution companies are estimated at 10.7 Mt. “Many pipeline companies are actively working to reduce their carbon footprint by electrifying compressor stations, improving leak detection, and implementing waste heat recovery,” CER said. But the roles of pipelines and local distributors in Canadian GHG emissions – and the offset owed to gas imports from the United States – are modest. The delivery network accounted for only 5.6% of 191.4 Mt of emissions, or one-fourth of the national total – attributed to the Canadian fossil fuel industry by the latest official GHG record completed for 2019.

Mexico Is Buying a Texas Oil Refinery in a Quest for Energy Independence - The refinery purchase is part of President Andres Manuel López Obrador’s own bid for an independence of sorts. In an effort to achieve energy self-sufficiency, the president of Mexico is investing heavily in the state-owned oil company, placing a renewed emphasis on petroleum production and retreating from renewable energy even as some oil giants like BP and Royal Dutch Shell are investing more in that sector. Mr. López Obrador aims to eliminate most Mexican oil exports over the next two years so the country can process more of it domestically. He wants to replace the gasoline and diesel supplies the country currently buys from other refineries in the United States with fuel produced domestically or by the refinery in Deer Park, which would be made from crude oil it imports from Mexico. The shift would be an ambitious leap for Petroleos Mexicanos, the company commonly known as Pemex. The company’s oil production, comparable to Chevron’s in recent years, has been falling for more than a decade, and it shoulders more than $100 billion in debt, the largest of any oil company in the world. The decision to pay $596 million for a controlling interest in the Deer Park refinery, which sits on the Houston ship channel and would be the only major Pemex operation outside Mexico, is central to fulfilling Mr. López Obrador’s plans to rehabilitate the long-ailing oil sector and establishing eight productive refineries for Mexican use. Mexico also agreed to pay off $1.2 billion in debts that Pemex and Shell jointly owe as co-owners of the refinery, which is profitable. “It’s something historic,” Mr. López Obrador said last month. In a separate news conference last year, he said, “The most important thing is that in 2023 we will be self-sufficient in gasoline and diesel and there will be no increase in fuel prices.” While Mr. Lopez Obrador’s policies diverge from the rising global concern over climate change, they reflect a lasting temptation for leaders and lawmakers worldwide: replacing imported energy sources with domestically produced fuels. Further, the generally well-paying jobs the oil and other fossil fuel industries provide are politically popular across Latin America, Africa as well as industrialized countries like the United States. In the 1930s, the Mexican government took over Royal Dutch Shell’s operations south of the border as it nationalized the entire oil industry then dominated by foreigners. Now Mr. López Obrador is poised to go one step further, taking complete control of a big Shell oil refinery. The takeover is all the more pointed because it is happening in an industrial suburb that calls itself “the birthplace of Texas,” where rebels marched to the San Jacinto battlefield to defeat the Mexican Army — the event commemorated on the refinery murals. The battlefield is a five-mile drive from the refinery.

Unusual high waves from volcano eruption in Tonga cause oil spill in Peru - Unusually high waves attributed to the eruption of an undersea volcano in Tonga caused an oil spill on the Peruvian coast, but authorities said Monday the spill was controlled within hours and there's an ongoing process to clean the area.The Peruvian Civil Defence Institute said in a press release that a ship was loading oil into La Pampilla refinery on the Pacific coast on Sunday when strong waves moved the boat and caused a spill.The government didn't say how many gallons were spilled only that local and federal authorities were working to clean the coast. La Pampilla refinery, in the province of Callao near Lima's capital, belongs to the Spanish company Repsol. It's considered the main oil processing plant in Peru. Local authorities had closed area beaches to the public since Sunday. The eruption on Saturday caused waves that crossed the Pacific. In Peru, two people drowned off a beach and there were reports of minor damage from New Zealand to Santa Cruz, California.

Peru beaches suffer oil spill blamed on waves from Tonga volcanic eruption -- Peruvian authorities sealed off three beaches Monday after they were hit by an oil spill blamed on freak waves caused by the volcanic eruption in Tonga.The Pampilla Refinery, part of the Spanish company Repsol, said there had been a "limited spill" of oil off the coast of Callao and Ventanilla districts near Lima Saturday due to the violent waves produced by the eruption on the other side of the Pacific Ocean.It said the spill occurred during offloading from a tanker.The National Emergency Operations Center said in a statement that the spill had been brought under control.Environment Minister Ruben Ramirez said the accident had affected a three-kilometer (two-mile) stretch along three beaches."There is great damage to biodiversity, and it could even impact human health," he said."And so it has been ordered that the area is cut off for all kinds of activity," Ramirez told reporters.Pampilla could face a fine of up to $34.5 million, the environment ministry said, as prosecutors opened an investigation into the company for environmental contamination.Pampilla—which did not indicate exactly how much oil was spilled—said it was working with authorities to clean up the affected beaches.Ships worked on collecting oil still floating in the water, while workers in protective gear began cleaning oil that had washed ashore."We want to tell the environment ministry to please follow up, and that those responsible receive a punishment, because this affects the fishermen, the population that they feed with the fish, and marine animals," local Ventanilla resident Brenda Ramos told AFP.Elsewhere in Peru, two women drowned after being caught in waves caused by the volcanic eruption in Tonga.The island nation, in the southwest Pacific, has been nearly entirely cut off from the outside world after the eruption severed an undersea communications cable.The eruption was recorded around the globe and heard as far away as Alaska, triggering a tsunami that flooded Pacific coastlines f rom Japan to the United States.

Peru demands compensation for disastrous oil spill caused by Tonga volcano - Peru has demanded compensation from the Spanish oil giant Repsol after freak waves from a volcanic eruption near Tonga caused an oil spill described as the worst ecological disaster to hit the South American country in recent history. Peru’s prime minister, Mirtha Vásquez, told journalists on Wednesday that the Pampilla refinery, run by Repsol, “apparently” did not have a contingency plan for an oil spill. The country’s foreign ministry called on the company to “immediately compensate” for the damage caused by the spill on Saturday which had inflicted “serious harm to hundreds of fishermen’s families” and had “put in danger the flora and fauna” in two protected natural areas.Authorities cordoned off three beaches on Monday after 6,000 barrels of oil were spilled during the offloading of a tanker at La Pampilla refinery off the coast near Lima, just north of the capital Lima.Images on social media and TV showed blackened beaches and dozens of dead seabirds drenched in oil, among them the rare Humboldt penguin, in an area considered a marine biodiversity hotspot. Officials at the refinery, managed by Repsol, initially described the spill as “limited” and said it was working with authorities to clean up the beaches. However, there has been public indignation at what has been perceived as the company’s tardy response. Tine Van Den Wall Bake, a spokesperson for Repsol, denied it should accept responsibility for the incident.“We did not cause this ecological disaster and we cannot say who is responsible,” she told national radio on Wednesday. Environmental groups have criticized the company’s response, as well as that of the Peruvian authorities. The oil was spreading along Peru’s Pacific coast affecting seabirds, seagulls, terns, sea lions, otters and dolphins, Oceana Peru said in a tweet.“The environmental and social impacts of the Repsol oil spill in the short and long term are devastating, and the company’s response has been weak,” said Christel Scheske, conservation specialist from the Peruvian Society for Environmental Law.“The oil spill has affected a highly biodiverse part of the Peruvian coast, including two protected areas which are important not only for Peru’s astounding marine biodiversity, but also for over 1,000 artisanal fishers in the region that depend on them,” she said.“Heavy metals from the crude oil will remain in the ecosystem for many years, rendering fish, molluscs and other marine species dangerous for human consumption, and affecting the entire marine food web,” Scheske added.

Traditional fishermen in despair over Peru oil spill - Hundreds of traditional fisherman living just outside the Peruvian capital fear their livelihoods are ruined following an oil spill caused by a volcanic eruption thousands of miles away. Authorities called the spill, caused by an eruption on the other side of the Pacific near Tonga, the worst ecological disaster in Lima in recent times. Traditional fisherman in Ventanilla, a district to the north of Lima's port in Callao, on Wednesday protested outside the gates of the Pampilla Refinery owned by Spanish energy giant Repsol, demanding compensation for the spill that occurred as freak waves hit a tanker during offloading on Saturday. "How will we live now? That's our worry," Miguel Angell Nunez, who led the protest, told AFP. "We've lost our source of work and we don't know when this will end. "We want them to recognize the damage. The spill was caused by (Repsol's) negligence." It is an area teeming with sole, lorna drum and Peruvian grunt, commonly used in the local delicacy ceviche, a marinated raw fish dish that Peru is famous for. Traditional fishermen use small scale, low technology, low capital practices, mostly from the beach or rocks. The few that own small boats only travel short distances along the shoreline. The Ventanilla spill sent 6,000 barrels of oil into the sea. The environment ministry said 174 hectares -- equivalent to 270 football fields -- of sea, beaches and natural reserves were affected. The attorney general's office said the spill had "put at risk flora and fauna in two protected areas." Authorities pulled dead fish and birds covered in oil out of the sea, and had to seal off three beaches, meaning hundreds of fishermen had nowhere to go to work. Refinery officials said they had erected "containment barriers that cover all of the affected zones and brigades with specialist sea and land teams have been deployed." But fishermen, some of whom live hand to mouth, fear that they could be prevented from working for years.

Peru: 21 beaches polluted by spill linked to Tonga eruption — Peru declared an environmental emergency on Thursday after announcing that 21 beaches on the Pacific coast were contaminated by an oil spill at a refinery run by Spain-based Repsol, following surging waves caused by the eruption of an underwater volcano near Tonga. President Pedro Castillo said a committee will be formed to propose ways of dealing with the crisis, in keeping with national policies aimed at protecting the environment. Prime Minister Mirtha Vásquez said Repsol has promised to deliver a cleaning schedule, to incorporate local fishermen in the cleanup on beaches and to deliver food baskets to affected families. Vásquez said the United Nations will provide a team of experts to help Peru deal with the oil spill. People are barred for now from going to the 21 polluted beaches because of health concerns. Peruvian authorities say an Italian-flagged ship spilled 6,000 barrels in the Pacific on Saturday in front of the La Pampilla refinery. In recent days, environmental activists have collected oil-stained or dead seabirds. Repsol said Peruvian authorities had not provided a tsunami warning and that the ship was continuing to unload oil to the refinery when the waves hit. Two women in Peru drowned after being swept away by strong waves following the Tonga eruption

'Smells like death': Peru oil spill cleanup expected to take weeks - Spanish energy firm Repsol said the cleanup operation for a major oil spill on the coast near Peru's capital Lima would take until the end of February, in an environmental incident declared a 'catastrophe' by the government. Dead seals, fish and birds have washed up on the shore covered in oil, while fishing activities in the area have been suspended, the government has said. Almost a million litres of crude spilled into the sea on Saturday when a tanker was hit by waves while offloading at La Pampilla refinery in Ventanilla, 30 kilometres north of Lima. Its owner, Spanish oil company Repsol, attributed the accident to the swell caused by the volcanic eruption in Tonga, thousands of miles away. Repsol said it had enlisted fishermen to help clear-up the oil. "I used to collect crustaceans, but now, when I walk to the shore, they are dead," fisherman Walter de la Cruz told Reuters. "Fishermen used to go sell the seafood that we collect. But now everything smells like death." The Pacific Ocean off Peru is a significant source of marine life and seafood for Peruvians, who cherish dishes such as ceviche. The spill has dealt a blow to tourism at Peru's popular resort of Ancon, and to businesses who make most of their money in the summer season. "There were many people until Sunday; the stain arrived on Monday, and since then, no one is swimming anymore," said 48-year-old Richard Gutierrez, who has a food and soda stand on Miramar beach. "We cannot sell anything, there are no vacationers, there is no one" apart from about 100 cleanup workers - soldiers, Repsol hired hands and volunteers - removing the polluted sand with spades to be taken to a toxic waste treatment facility. Repsol said it deployed about 840 people to help with cleaning tasks. Repsol's La Pampilla accounts for 54 per cent of Peru's refining capacity.

Brent North Sea crude trades near 2014 highs as oil demand grows --Brent oil traded near the highest intraday level since 2014 as the market tightened and concerns about the impact of omicron eased. Futures in London held at about $86 a barrel after a fourth weekly advance on Friday, with gains tempered by signs of slowing Chinese economic growth. High prices are justified and futures could rise even further, according to trader Vitol Group. Oil’s market structure has firmed in a bullish backwardation pattern, indicating growing supply tightness. Oil has rallied more than 10% so far this year, in part due to outages in OPEC+ producers including Libya. The International Energy Agency said last week that global consumption has turned out to be stronger than expected, while the physical market is booming as buyers look beyond the spread of omicron. “There is a genuine belief that physical demand will keep exceeding supply,” said Tamas Varga, an analyst at brokers PVM Oil Associates Ltd. “On the demand side, the cold winter in North America is one of the major factors. Mild omicron symptoms and hopes that the rapid rise in cases is about to abate also contributed to the strength.” Brent for March settlement was steady at $85.87 a barrel on the ICE Futures Europe exchange at 10:09 a.m. in London after climbing 1.9% on Friday. Futures rallied to $86.71 earlier, 4 cents shy of the highest level since October 2014. The prompt timespread for Brent was 70 cents in backwardation, compared with 57 cents a week earlier. West Texas Intermediate for February delivery was little changed at $83.75 on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The Covid-Zero policy employed by China will probably ensure that there’s no omicron outbreak big enough to significantly diminish the use of oil products there, Mike Muller, Vitol’s head of Asia, said Sunday during a webinar hosted by Dubai-based consultants Gulf Intelligence. China’s central bank, meanwhile, cut its key interest rate for the first time in almost two years to help bolster an economy that’s lost momentum because of a property slump and repeated virus outbreaks. Official data Monday showed gross domestic product rose 4% last quarter from a year earlier, the weakest since early 2020.

Russia’s February gas-transit plan leaves Europe in the lurch --Russia is keeping Europe’s natural gas market on edge, with no relief in sight from the country’s preliminary supply plans for next month. The nation’s exporter, Gazprom PJSC, again opted not to book any extra pipeline space to ship the fuel westward through Ukraine during a monthly auction on Monday. On top of that, zero capacity was booked for February to deliver gas to Germany via the Mallnow station, where Russia’s Yamal-Europe pipeline terminates. Benchmark Dutch front-month gas briefly pared losses after the auctions but still traded down 4.2% at 83.31 euros a megawatt-hour by 12:05 p.m. in Amsterdam. Prices dropped as much as 7.8% earlier. Europe is grappling with its worst energy crisis in decades. The continent’s gas inventories are at the lowest on record for this time of year, with the heating season far from over. While shipments of liquefied natural gas from the U.S. have helped the region recover somewhat from lows earlier this winter, flows from top fuel supplier Russia remain far below normal. Concerns of a possible military action in Ukraine are also adding to uncertainty about Russian energy exports. “Auction results today will be particularly difficult to interpret,” Tom Marzec-Manser, an analyst for European gas and LNG at ICIS, said before the auctions. Last month, Gazprom booked about 21% of Mallnow’s capacity for January, yet there’s been no flow so far this month. Current supplies via Ukraine are also far below the 109.6 million cubic meters a day that Gazprom can send under its long-term transit contract. Russia has said this is due to lower demand from European buyers.

Russia denies responsibility for Europe’s winter energy crisis- Russia has nothing to do with the energy crisis in Europe, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said, rejecting allegations from the International Energy Agency that it’s holding back supplies and driving up prices of natural gas. “Neither Russia nor our main exporter Gazprom have anything to do with this,” Novak told state television Saturday, according to the Interfax news agency. Russia has “delivered significantly more” to clients such as Germany and Turkey that had exhausted their contracted limits, he said. Novak blamed “the shortsighted policy of the European Union and European Commission, which for many years has deliberately moved away from long-term contracts, shifted its energy sector toward reducing dependence on Russia.” Europe is grappling with an energy crunch that’s resulted in gas and power prices breaking multiple records over the past few months. The continent’s gas inventories are already at their lowest in more than a decade, and the two coldest months of the year have only just begun. Russia is ready to increase deliveries, Novak said, but needs long-term contracts to justify making investments in production. Novak was responding to comments earlier this week from IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol, who accused Russia of holding back supplies to the spot market despite high prices. He said Russia could boost deliveries by at least a third.

Russia-Ukraine crisis could spark a surge in Europe's gas prices and top last year’s highs - Growing tensions between Russia and Ukraine have cast a shadow over energy markets, and the uncertainty could mean a prolonged period of high gas prices for Europe, analysts say. "It's a very tight gas market ... and there's no question that this sense of imminent crisis building with Russia and Ukraine is also hanging over the market, particularly since Russia does provide about 35% of Europe's gas," energy expert Dan Yergin told CNBC on Monday. If the crisis escalates, gas prices in Europe – which soared to highs last year – could surge further, warned research firm Capital Economics in a note over the weekend. William Jackson, chief emerging markets economist at Capital Economics pointed out that in addition to Europe's reliance on Russia for gas, stock supplies are also low right now. "Were sanctions to be placed on Russia's energy exports or were Russia to use gas exports as a tool for leverage, European natural gas prices would probably soar," he said. Tensions between Russia and Ukraine have ratcheted up in recent months amid multiple reports that Russian troops have amassed at the border with Ukraine. The development prompted speculation that Russia is preparing to invade the country and set off fears of a repeat of Moscow's illegal annexation and occupation of Crimea in 2014. Moscow has repeatedly denied those allegations. U.S. representatives and NATO members emerged from several days of high-stakes discussions with top Russian officials with no resolution – but with warnings that the situation along the Ukraine border is in fact getting worse. The imminent crisis has sparked talk the U.S. could impose sanctions on Russia to stop the Kremlin from invading Ukraine. If that happens, according to Capital Economics, European gas prices will probably exceed the peak of 180 pounds per MWh seen late last year. VIDEO09:18 Can harsh U.S. economic sanctions deter Russia from invading Ukraine? "And some states that are very heavily dependent on Russian gas, particularly in Eastern Europe, might be forced to ration power," Jackson added.

U.S. voices misgivings on EastMed gas pipeline – Greek officials - The United States has expressed misgivings on a subsea pipeline designed to supply Europe with natural gas from the eastern Mediterranean, Greek government sources said, in an apparent U-turn over a project supported by the former Trump administration. Washington, under the Biden administration, let its concerns be known recently, in a note sent to Greece, another source said. Competing claims over gas reserves in the eastern Mediterranean are a point of tension between Turkey and ethnically-split Cyprus. Turkey opposes the pipeline project. Greece, Cyprus and Israel have approved an agreement for the EastMed pipeline, which has been in planning for several years. The countries had aimed to reach a final investment decision this year and have the 6 billion euro ($6.82 billion) scheme completed by 2025 to help Europe diversify its energy resources. “The American side expressed to the Greek side reservations as to the rationale of the EastMed pipeline, (and) raised issues of its economic viability and environmental (issues),” one source said. There was no immediate comment from Israel or Turkey. Concerns about the financial viability of the project have been heard before, but Greece, Israel and Cyprus have supported the project.

Europe's Largest Refinery Announces Five Months of Maintenance - Energy company Shell's Pernis refinery in the Netherlands is due to carry out significant maintenance in the first half of this year. The 404,000 b/d facility -- Europe's largest refinery -- is due to carry out maintenance on several units over the next five months, news agency Reuters reported on Thursday, citing comments from Shell. The company has not named the specific units involved. The Pernis refinery is a significant supplier of VLSFO and other bunker fuels to the Northwest European market. The work will start at the end of January and last until the end of June, according to the Reuters report.

 Russia Seen Struggling to Keep Up With OPEC+ Hikes - Russia may be able to deliver only about half of its scheduled increases in crude production over the next six months, joining the ranks of OPEC+ nations that are struggling to ramp up even as fuel demand rebounds from the pandemic. With crude already trading above $85 a barrel in London, the outlook for Russian output leaves the global market looking even tighter than expected. It risks amplifying the energy-price surge that’s contributing to the highest inflation in decades. In the booming Asian physical market, Russian premium ESPO crude -- a favorite grade among Chinese processors -- has already surged to the highest since November amid declining inventories in China, according to traders. The OPEC+ member is supposed to be adding 100,000 barrels a day of crude to the market each month, but growth ground to a halt in December. Due to a decline in drilling last year, most analysts polled by Bloomberg News expect Russia’s actual monthly increases can go no higher than 60,000 barrels a day in the first half of 2022. “We have a hard time seeing Russian suppliers maintaining 100,000 barrels-a-day production increases each month for the next six months,” Bank of America Corp. analysts Karen Kostanyan and Ekaterina Smyk told Bloomberg. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies are in the process of restoring output halted during the pandemic. The coalition is supposed to pump an additional 400,000 barrels a day each month, yet the actual production increases have fallen short due to factors ranging from internal unrest to insufficient long-term investment in a number of countries. Last month, OPEC boosted output by just 90,000 barrels a day. Russia’s production started stagnating in November, and in December it dropped below its OPEC+ quota for crude, according to Bloomberg estimates based on Energy Ministry statistics. The first days of January brought a less than 1% rise in the country’s total petroleum output, which includes crude and a light oil called condensate that is extracted from natural gas, according to Interfax. Russia’s top oil official, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak, has said the country will continue to hit its production targets. Output of crude will rise to 10.1 million barrels a day this month, he told the Tass news agency last week. That would be in line with its OPEC+ quota and an increase of about 100,000 barrels a day from December. If OPEC+ continues to struggle to hit its production targets, there may be wider economic consequences. The recovery in oil demand has remained robust as the Omicron strain of the coronavirus has a milder effect on the global economy than anticipated.

India Oil Demand Recovery Poised to Weather Covid Comeback -- Indian oil refiner Hindustan Petroleum Corp. is cautiously optimistic that the nation’s recovery from the pandemic will remain largely intact, despite a recent spike in coronavirus cases. Infections have surged and fewer vehicles are traversing the streets of India’s capital, but authorities have so far refrained from instituting a nationwide lockdown, opting for targeted restrictions such as closing bars. While people are avoiding unnecessary travel, there hasn’t been a substantial impact to demand, according to Hindustan Petroleum Chairman Mukesh Kumar Surana. “There’s no doubt January will be subdued compared to December,” Surana said, predicting that the current surge in Covid-19 infections should flatten this month. “I’m not seeing a longish trend to this wave.” India was hit hard by a devastating outbreak of the delta variant early last year that overwhelmed the health system, although the nation was spared a collapse in oil demand similar to 2020 after avoiding a nationwide lockdown. The economy recovered over the second half of 2021 as vaccinations rates rose, with diesel consumption climbing to a two-year high in December and gasoline use at the highest in records going back to 1998. Over the first 10 days of 2022, sales of gasoline and diesel -- which together make up more than half of India’s overall petroleum consumption -- dipped by 2% to 3% from a year earlier, according to preliminary estimates by refinery officials with direct knowledge of the matter. Foot traffic through the nation’s airports has also dropped, data from the Civil Aviation Ministry show. The overall outlook still remains bullish. India’s total oil demand is expected to grow 4% to 5% over the 12 month ending March 31 compared with a year earlier, according to Prashant Vasisht, vice president at ICRA Ltd., the local unit of Moody’s Investors Service. The current virus wave won’t have a lasting impact on demand, Vasisht said, forecasting 3% to 5% growth next year. India’s refiners are also keeping crude purchases robust. Bharat Petroleum Corp. is seeking additional volumes from Saudi Arabia for February delivery, while top processor Indian Oil Corp. recently issued a tender seeking to buy crude from West Africa to the Americas for February and March loadings. “February onwards, it will be normal again,” Hindustan Petroleum’s Surana said.

China State Refiners Led Record Oil Processing Volumes - China’s oil processing volumes rose more than 4% to a record last year as state-owned refiners boosted output and new integrated plants came online. Crude refining climbed to 703.55 million tons, or 14.13 million barrels per day, according to data released Monday by National Bureau of Statistics and Bloomberg calculations. That was 4.3% more than in 2020 and 7.4% higher than 2019. Daily volumes in December were down 4.7% on the previous month. China Petrochemical Corp. and PetroChina Co. raised gasoline and diesel output in the second half of 2021 to fill in supply gaps left by independent processors. These refiners, known as teapots, cut production due to a consumption tax on dirtier feedstocks including light-cycle oil that took effect in June. The two state-owned behemoths also ramped up diesel output last quarter to avert an energy supply crisis after the prices of coal to gas soared in the autumn. Refining volumes are likely to continue rising this year as new plants -- such as Shenghong Group’s 320,000 barrel-a-day integrated refinery and PetroChina’s 400,000 barrel-a-day Guangdong complex -- start operations. China’s crude output, meanwhile, rose 2.4% in 2021 from a year earlier to 199 million tons, the statistics bureau data showed. CNOOC Ltd. boosted production at the Bohai field, making it the largest crude producer in China. Bohai produced 30.13 million tons last year, or about 605,000 barrels a day, surpassing PetroChina’s Changqing and Daqing fields to become the largest in the country.

China’s fuel exports drop for a second year as quotas tighten--China’s overseas shipments of fuels fell for a second year as Beijing tightened export quotas, in part to ensure sufficient domestic supply. Gasoline exports in 2021 slid 9.1% from a year earlier to 14.54 million tons, the lowest level in three years, government data show. That’s equivalent to about 333,000 barrels a day, according to Bloomberg calculations. China shipped the least amount of diesel since 2017, down 12.9% year-on-year. Exports slipped last year after state-run refiners were forced to provide more fuel to the domestic market to make up for a shortfall from independent oil processors. Supply from private operators declined after a consumption tax was levied on blending feedstocks. China has also been curbing exports to achieve its green goals of peak carbon emissions by 2030. China exported 940,000 tons of gasoline in December, 35% lower than a year earlier, government data showed. Diesel shipments were 330,000 tons last month, down 78% on December 2020. The fuel export quota for 2021 was 36% lower than 2020, or 21.4 million tons less, according to consultant OilChem. That trend looks like it will continue in 2022 after China slashed its quotas in the first allocation for the year. A quota of 13 million tons was granted in the first batch, including both general trade and tolling issuances, according to refinery officials with knowledge of the matter. That’s 56% less than the 29.5 million tons in the same batch for 2021. Consultant JLC predicts the overall allocation will be 40% lower in 2022.

UAE warns OPEC alone can’t solve global oil supply issues --OPEC and its allies are increasing oil production but can’t solve all the sector’s issues alone, the United Arab Emirates’ energy minister said. The industry needs investment, through the involvement of international oil companies, in order to provide adequate supplies, Suhail Al-Mazrouei said, according to the UAE’s state-run WAM news agency. Failure to provide sufficient capital may lead to future price hikes, he warned. Crude prices rallied to a seven-year high above $89 a barrel in London on Wednesday as global demand recovers from the pandemic and supplies are curtailed by a host of disruptions. It’s an increasing challenge for consumers as they grapple with inflation, from fuels to food prices. A large contributor to the rally has been the failure of many OPEC+ nations to restore output halted during the pandemic, as they contend with depressed spending of their own. The group added only 60% of its mandated output boost last month, according to the International Energy Agency. But diminished spending has also been an issue for the global industry, as a result of the 2020 price collapse and as investors divert cash away from fossil fuels. The UAE remains committed to increasing its output as part of the OPEC+ accord, Mazrouei said.

Vitol Group Says Oil Prices May Rise Even More - The world’s biggest independent oil trader said crude prices, already up more than 10% this year, could rise even further because of tight supplies. “These prices are justified,” Mike Muller, head of Asia for Vitol Group, said Sunday. “Strong backwardation is very much justified,” he said, referring to a bullish pattern whereby near-term futures are more expensive than later ones. Oil posted a fourth-straight gain last week, its longest rising streak since October, amid signs consumption will hold up despite the spread of the omicron variant of the coronavirus. At the same time, spare capacity is dwindling as some of the world’s biggest producers struggle to boost output. Brent crude has jumped 11% this year to over $86 a barrel, extending last year’s gain of 50%. Muller said that while natural gas prices have climbed enough to cause some industrial users -- including in Pakistan and Europe -- to cut back on consumption, the oil market hadn’t reached that point. What’s happening with gas “serves to remind us that people will abstain from buying expensive energy at some point,” he said on a webinar hosted by Dubai-based consultancy Gulf Intelligence. “The question is at what point that affects the oil market.” The White House will probably release more oil from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve than the 50 million barrels it announced in November, Muller said. President Joe Biden took that step to cool gasoline prices, which are around their highest in seven years in the U.S. “The market’s saying: ‘More, please,’” Muller said when asked about supplies. He said China’s zero-tolerance policy toward Covid-19 would probably ensure there’s no omicron outbreak there big enough to significantly diminish the use of oil products. “We’re nowhere near seeing a major demand hit in China,” s

Commodity trader King eyes $200 oil - A hedge fund run by commodities trader Doug King posted a record return last year, thanks to soaring energy, food, power and freight prices. King’s $244 million Merchant Commodity Fund gained 74%, beating its previous best of 59% in 2014, according to an investor letter seen by Bloomberg. London-based King, 55, is among a cadre of hedge fund managers, including Pierre Andurand, who made huge profits from commodities last year amid a global economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic and supply disruptions. The Bloomberg Commodity Spot Index, which tracks energy, metals and crop futures, jumped 27% in 2021, the most in over a decade. Oil surged more than 50% to around $80 a barrel. It’s almost up another 10% so far this year. King said it could soon hit $100 and even $200 over the next five years due to a lack of exploration and investment to maintain existing supplies. “We believe in structural supply-side commodity inflation that most will not have ever seen — the highest since the 1970s,” he said in an interview. “Only OPEC will react to price metrics and they are undershooting every month.”

Oil Prices Hit Seven-Year High on Rising Geopolitical Tensions – WSJ - Crude prices rose to their highest level since the 2014 shale-induced oil crash, a milestone in a rally that is gathering momentum as geopolitical tensions threaten to knock supply.Futures for West Texas Intermediate, the main grade of U.S. crude, added $1.61 per barrel, or 1.9%, to $85.43 on Tuesday. That marks the highest closing level since October 2014, when oil prices were moving in the opposite direction as a gusher of U.S. crude flooded the market.Of the S&P 500’s 11 sectors, only energy rose Tuesday, while the broader index declined 1.8%.It took the oil market several years to recover from the price decline set in motion by America’s re-emergence as an oil-producing superpower. The rebound from the coronavirus crash of 2020—when U.S. crude futures turned negative as the world struggled to find places to store oil—has been much faster.Among the factors driving the rally are concerns that tensions in the Middle East and Europe will spill into energy markets by denting supplies from major crude producers, particularly Russia and the United Arab Emirates. Any outages are likely to goose prices in a market where demand is rising and stockpiles have fallen below recent norms, traders and analysts say. Adding to oil’s gains, the wave of infection caused by Omicron hasn’t reduced demand as much as traders thought it might when the variant was identified in late November. In a report published Tuesday, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries forecast that the world would consume 100.8 million barrels of oil a day this year, up 4.2 million barrels a day from 2021. The rise has been driven by rising demand for light distillates used in the petrochemical industry. Gasoline prices are rising, adding to inflationary pressures and complicating matters for President Biden, who released crude from the strategic reserve in the fall in an attempt to help drivers facing sticker shock. National average gasoline prices stand at $3.314 a gallon, according to AAA, up from $2.386 a year ago.It isn’t just crude futures that are rising. In the physical oil market, prices have jumped for grades of crude such as Forties, produced in the North Sea, and Nigeria’s Bonny Light, a sign that traders and refiners are snapping up barrels in a tightening market.The market “perceives a capacity crunch could happen later in the year and is trying to get ahead of that,” said Paul Horsnell, head of commodities strategy at Standard Chartered. He said traders worry that energy exports from Russia will take a hit from tensions with the U.S. over troops at the border with Ukraine, and are also concerned by attacks on the United Arab Emirates.Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels said they were behind aerial attacks that killed three people in the top-10 crude producer Monday. One of the strikes hit fuel trucks at Musaffah, near a major depot owned by Abu Dhabi National Oil Co., known as Adnoc, about 15 miles from the center of Abu Dhabi where trucks stock up on gasoline and diesel to distribute to forecourts.The attacks showed the Houthis are willing to strike in the heart of a country seen as the region’s main hub for international business. U.S., European and Israeli defense officials say the growing ability of Iran and its allies to deploy drones is changing the security equation in the Middle East.

Oil Rally Continues to Seven Year High | Rigzone - Oil surged to the highest level in seven years as robust demand and strained supplies make physical markets run hot in the world’s largest consuming region. Futures in New York closed up at $85.43 a barrel, the highest since October 2014. Traders are paying higher and higher premiums for cargoes in Asia, as fears fade over the demand impact from omicron, while supplies are tightened by a range of outages from Libya to North America. Meanwhile, a drone attack on oil facilities in the United Arab Emirates on Monday flared geopolitical risks. Adding to bullish indicators, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. raised its Brent forecasts through 2022 and 2023, and predicted $100 oil in the third quarter. Robust fundamentals have reversed last year’s price slump, keeping the market in a surprisingly large deficit, it said. “Oil was already vulnerable to price spikes as the market was tight before the recent wave of headlines,” Oil’s rally poses a challenge for consuming nations and central banks as they try to stave off inflation while supporting global growth. In particular, it’s a headache for U.S. President Joe Biden as his efforts to tame gasoline prices by tapping emergency stockpiles -- and by cajoling OPEC -- fail to yield results. Crude has made a red-hot start to the year with outages at producers including Libya adding to the bullishness brought about by strong demand. There are upbeat signals from across the oil complex, from diesel to jet fuel, which is soaring in Europe as air travel withstands the omicron impact. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries said in its monthly report that it expects global oil markets to remain “well-supported” this year by robust demand. The group also reiterated its forecast from last month that “the impact of the omicron variant is projected to be mild and short-lived” -- a projection that has so far remained true. West Texas Intermediate for February delivery, which expires Thursday, rose $1.61 from Friday’s close to settle at $85.43 in New York. Brent for March settlement rose $1.03 to $87.51 a barrel. The prompt timespread is 73 cents a barrel in backwardation, compared with 64 cents a week earlier. The physical-market strength has been compounded by renewed tension in the Persian Gulf, home to about 40% of the world’s seaborne oil. Yemen’s Houthi fighters claimed to have launched a drone strike on the United Arab Emirates that caused an explosion and fire on the outskirts of the capital Abu Dhabi. The nation is the third-largest producer in OPEC. Low crude stockpiles mean there is no supply cushion for potential outages in producing countries, leaving the market susceptible to price increases, “When you have buffers, small outages like what we have seen over December and January matter a lot less, but we don’t have that luxury,”

Oil prices are at a 7-year high, but Exxon CEO Darren Woods is confident they will trend lower. - Oil prices rose to a seven-year high Tuesday amid ongoing supply concerns and escalating tensions in the Middle East, but Exxon Mobil CEO Darren Woods is confident they will trend lower. In the immediate future, however, the oil executive said the market should expect volatile prices as the industry's recovery from Covid-19 continues. "As you get supply and demand tighter, events that happen around the world ... lead to a lot more volatility because there's less of a buffer, and I think we're going to see that for some time now," he said Tuesday on CNBC's "Squawk Box." "Until industry begins to ramp up productions and increase the level of supply to meet this growing demand, or in turn demand starts to come down a little bit ... you're going to see a lot more volatility until we get better stability." Woods added that it's hard to predict when the market might balance out given the many players involved. West Texas Intermediate crude futures, the U.S. oil benchmark, traded as high as $85.74 per barrel on Tuesday, a price last seen in October 2014. The price marks a blistering recovery after the contract briefly traded in negative territory in April 2020, as the pandemic sapped demand for petroleum products. But Woods said he doesn't get "overly enamored" with today's high prices. When looking at new investments the company focuses on ensuring operations can be competitive across a wide range of price environments, he said. "[W]e anticipated higher prices. We also anticipate a lot of volatility. And frankly we're anticipating lower prices as we go forward," he said. Exxon said Tuesday it's targeting net-zero greenhouse gas emissions for its operated assets by 2050. The announcement follows similar targets from competitors, and comes as Exxon faces board pressure to act on climate change. In 2021, upstart activist firm Engine No. 1 successfully placed three of its candidates on the oil giant's board. Exxon's target does not include so-called Scope 3 emissions — the environmental footprint from the products a company generates — or the company's supply chain. Scope 3 emissions are typically the highest, and the hardest, to quantify. Tuesday's climate-focused pledge builds on prior announcements from Exxon on how it plans to cut its emissions. The company has also pledged billions of dollars to develop emissions-reducing technologies like carbon capture. Woods said the target is "more than just a pledge" and that the company has a "line of sight" for how it plans to slash its emissions. "We have road maps that we're developing in each of our facilities around the world to deliver those reductions," Woods said. "There are plans behind this ambition that takes us clearly through 2030 and then beyond that. I think that should give folks some confidence. This is more than just out there positioning on something; this is actually work that we're doing."

Oil markets may be even tighter than forecasters say --The oil market is getting tighter and there may be even less slack in the system than forecasts suggest. The latest outlooks from the International Energy Agency and the U.S. Energy Information Administration show the world needing more oil this year from the members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries than they did a month ago. The bigger worry is the growing mismatch between the level of oil stockpiles they can measure and the volumes their models predict. Stockpiles are one of the oil market's safety valves, alongside spare production capacity, for dealing with unexpected outages or soaring demand. With spare capacity among OPEC+ producers heading toward multi-year lows, any suggestion that oil stockpiles are lower than previously thought could put an even bigger fire under oil prices that have already climbed to a seven-year high. Some of the oil that can’t be seen may be in storage that is neither visible, nor reported — caverns that form part of China’s strategic stockpile, for example. But that doesn’t account for everything. Demand estimates may be too low, production numbers too high, or some combination of the two. The demand numbers are already looking stronger than they did a month ago with the omicron variant of the Covid-19 virus landing a smaller blow to consumption than many had feared. The IEA has increased its demand forecast for 2022 by almost 200,000 barrels a day and made a similar upward revision to its estimate for 2021 as well. The EIA also sees this year’s oil demand stronger than it did a month ago, but OPEC’s own analysts, who are often slower to revise their forecasts, have left their overall demand outlook for 2022 unchanged from December, though they have shifted some growth from the third to the fourth quarter. They have done the same for 2021. While they see stronger demand, the IEA and EIA are less upbeat on supply. Both have cut their forecasts for 2022 of all non-OPEC oil production since December. And in both cases the biggest downgrades are seen in the current quarter. The IEA pins the revision on global biofuels production, which it has cut by 200,000 barrels a day this quarter from its previous forecast. Elsewhere, it sees lower than previously expected Russian production offset by higher U.S. output. The U.S.-based EIA made downward revisions to its forecasts for domestic production, as well as supplies from Brazil and Ecuador. A downward revision to Russian production was offset by an increase in the forecast for neighboring Kazakhstan. As with demand, the OPEC analysts have left their supply forecasts essentially unchanged from December.

WTI Nears $87 on Tighter Fundamentals, Eyed Crude Draw -- Nearby delivery oil futures extended their recent rally into afternoon trade Wednesday, lifting both crude benchmarks to fresh seven-year highs propelled by expectations for stronger demand growth this year amid a muted impact from the omicron surge of infections and concerns over OPEC+ spare capacity as several members of the producer alliance appear to be reaching their respective production ceilings months ahead of schedule. Arguably, there are only three producers within OPEC+ group that could increase output today more than they could before the pandemic hit in March 2020 -- Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Kuwait. Analysis suggests Russia -- the second largest producer within OPEC+ -- is closing in on its maximum output capacity, pumping over 11.17 million barrels per day (bpd) in the fourth quarter 2021, according to OPEC's Monthly Oil Market Report. Impaired by a lack of investments into greenfield projects in the Arctic and east Siberia, Russia will likely struggle to raise crude production in line with its agreed OPEC+ quota in coming months. A host of smaller producers from Africa, Central Asia and Latin America have begun to underdeliver on their output targets in the second half of 2021 -- a trend that is unlikely to reverse quickly this year. The looming question is whether Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE are willing to open their taps more to cool off the rally or to instead allow global crude prices to remain elevated, which would allow them to capture more revenue, filling their state coffers more quickly to make up for revenue lost during the height of the pandemic. The International Energy Agency said Wednesday morning in its Oil Market Report that OPEC+ will have only 2.6 million bpd of additional output left in the second half of the year should the producer group continue to unwind 2020 supply cuts and Iran remains under sanctions. IEA trimmed its forecast for non-OPEC oil supply by 100,000 bpd to 66.5 million bpd, mostly reflecting constraints on Russian oil production growth. On the demand side, the Paris-based agency revised its 2022 forecast higher by 200,000 bpd to 99.7 million bpd, reflecting a "relatively subdued" impact from the spread of omicron variant on mobility and economic growth across industrialized nations. Global oil demand is now seen to have risen 5.5 million bpd in 2021 and is expected to grow by 3.3 million bpd this year, the IEA said, surpassing pre-pandemic levels by more than 150,000 bpd. "If demand continues to grow strongly or supply disappoints, the low level of stocks and shrinking spare capacity mean that oil markets could be in for another volatile year in 2022," IEA said. On the session, West Texas Intermediate futures for February delivery advanced $1.53 to $86.96 bbl, with the next-month March contract widening its discount to $1.16 bbl. International crude benchmark Brent March futures rallied to $88.44 bbl, adding $0.93 on the session. NYMEX February RBOB futures advanced 2.52 cents to $2.4570 gallon, and the front-month ULSD contract gained 1.83 cents to $2.6923 gallon.

Oil up, settles near 7-year highs after Iraq-Turkey pipeline outage -Oil prices settled higher on Wednesday after a fire on a pipeline from Iraq to Turkey briefly stopped flows, increasing concerns about an already tight short-term supply outlook. Flows have resumed through the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline that carries crude from northern Iraq, the second-largest producer in the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, to the Turkish port of Ceyhan for export. The explosion that set off the fire on the pipeline in the southeastern Turkish province was caused by a falling power pylon, not an attack, a senior security source said. Supply concerns mounted this week after Yemen’s Houthi group attacked the United Arab Emirates, OPEC‘s third-largest producer, while Russia, the world’s second-largest oil producer, has built up a large troop presence near Ukraine’s border, stoking fears of invasion. Brent crude futures settled up 93 cents, or 1.1%, at $88.44 a barrel. The global benchmark earlier touched $89.13, its highest level since Oct. 13, 2014. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures settled up $1.53 at $86.96 a barrel, its highest level since Oct. 9, 2014. OPEC officials and analysts say that an oil rally may continue in the next few months and prices could top $100 a barrel due to recovering demand despite the spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant. “Any way that the numbers are crunched, it appears that global inventory will continue to draw for a few more months with this implied tightening in the balances keeping this bull alive through the rest of this month and most of next,” OPEC+, which groups the cartel with Russia and other producers, is struggling to hit their monthly output increase target of 400,000 barrels per day (bpd). “Unplanned outages in Libya, Ecuador, and Kazakhstan, coupled with downgrades to U.S., Russia, and Brazil forecasts, together result in 1 million bpd lower supply this month than previously forecasted,” The International Energy Agency, however, said the oil market was due to flip into surplus in the first quarter as some producers are set to pump at or above all-time highs. An oil surplus should also lead to a build-up in inventories, as the IEA reported that commercial stocks in OECD countries were well below pre-pandemic levels at around seven-year lows. On Wednesday, President Joe Biden told a news conference he will work to try to increase oil supplies. The administration authorized the release of 50 million barrels of crude oil from the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve last year when prices spiked. WTI Holds Gains Despite Crude Build, Gasoline Demand Remains Dismal - Oil prices extended gains this morning with WTI back above $86 as traders shrugged off a surprise crude build reported by API and ignored President Biden's pledge to maintain efforts to curb prices. “Underlying fundamentals remain strong as confirmed by the IEA in their monthly report,”. “But with technical indicators flashing overbought, a period of consolidation may soon emerge.” Oil has surged since the end of November as stronger-than-expected demand and supply outages tightened the market, leading to buyers in Asia paying much higher premiums for spot cargoes. Goldman Sachs is forecasting a return to $100 crude in the third quarter, while the International Energy Agency said consumption is on track to hit pre-pandemic levels. In the U.S., a blast of cold air across southern Texas is set to pass near one of the country’s major oil-producing regions. The front will raise concerns for power-grid operators and natural-gas drillers. API

• Crude +1.404mm (-1.75mm exp)
• Cushing -1.496mm
• Gasoline +3.463mm (+2.4mm exp)
• Distillates -1.179mm (-1.1mm exp)

DOE:

• Crude +515k (-1.75mm exp)
• Cushing -1.314mm
• Gasoline +5.873mm (+2.4mm exp)
• Distillates -1.431mm (-1.1mm exp)

The official data confirms API's report with an unexpected crude inventory build last week (+515k vs -1.75mm exp). Cushing also saw stocks drop for the second straight week and gasoline inventories surged for the third straight week...

 NYMEX WTI, RBOB Gain Despite Crude, Gasoline Stock Builds -- Oil futures nearest delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange reversed higher in late morning trade Thursday despite weekly inventory data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) showing U.S. commercial crude and gasoline inventories increased above consensus during the week ended Jan. 14 as domestic refiners scaled back crude throughputs amid still sluggish demand for motor gasoline. U.S. commercial crude oil inventories increased for the first time in eight weeks during the period ended Jan. 14, rising 515,000 barrels (bbl) to 413.8 million bbl, the EIA said in its weekly report, although stocks are still about 8% below the five-year average. Markets mostly expected crude stockpiles would fall by 800,000 bbl from the prior week. Oil stored at the Cushing, Oklahoma, hub, the delivery point for West Texas Intermediate futures, fell 1.3 million bbl to 33.5 million bbl. U.S. crude oil production remained unchanged from the previous week at 11.7 million barrels per day (bpd), still some 1.3 million bpd below the pre-pandemic level. The crude build was realized as domestic refiners reduced run rates by 0.3% last week to 88.1%, processing 120,000 bpd less crude compared to the previous week. Gasoline stockpiles once again posted a hefty build, climbing 5.9 million bbl in the reviewed week to 246.6 million bbl compared with expectations for inventories to have increased by 2.1 million bbl. Demand for motor gasoline, meanwhile, reversed off an 11-month low 7.906 million bpd during the second week of January, gaining 4% or 318,000 bpd last week. Distillate stocks fell 1.4 million bbl to 128 million bbl, and are now about 16% below the five-year average, the EIA said. Analysts expected distillate inventories would fall 700,000 bbl from the previous week. Demand for distillate fuel surged 807,000 bpd during the reviewed week to 4.556 million bpd. EIA data was directionally in line with DTN Refined Fuels Demand data that found U.S. gasoline demand up 7.8% year-on-year for the week profiled but down 2.9% from the same week in 2020. Total U.S. diesel demand was up 5.6% year-on-year for the week and up 6% from the same week in 2020. Around noon New York time, February West Texas Intermediate futures gained $0.19 to trade near $87.15 bbl. NYMEX February RBOB futures surged 1.55 cents to $2.4725 gallon, with the front-month ULSD futures declining more than 2 cents to $2.6715 gallon.

Oil prices slip from 2014 highs, supply concerns limit losses - Oil slipped on Thursday as investors took profits after a recent price rally, but strong demand and short-term supply disruptions continue to support prices close to their highest since 2014. Brent crude futures settled 6 cents lower at $88.38 a barrel after dropping more than $1 in earlier trade. The global benchmark rose to $89.17 on Wednesday, its highest since October 2014. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures for February delivery settled 6 cents lower at $86.90 per barrel. The contract, which expires on Thursday, climbed to $87.91 on Wednesday. The more active March WTI contract was down 15 cents, or 0.1%, at $85.65 a barrel. "The voices of those forecasting $100 per barrel oil are getting louder by the day," Supply concerns have mounted this week after a fire temporarily halted flows through an oil pipeline running from Iraq's Kirkuk to the Turkish port of Ceyhan on Tuesday. An attack by Yemen's Houthis on the United Arab Emirates, the third-largest producer in the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), heightened geopolitical risks. The market is also supported by supply shortfalls from the OPEC+ producer group comprising OPEC and allies led by Russia. The International Energy Agency (IEA) on Wednesday said that the group produced about 800,000 barrels per day (bpd) below its production targets in December. The IEA said that while the oil market could be in a significant surplus in the first quarter of this year, inventories are likely to be well below pre-pandemic levels. The agency also upgraded its 2022 demand forecast. A rise in U.S. oil inventories last week weighed on prices. Crude stocks rose by 1.4 million barrels last week while gasoline inventories rose by 3.5 million barrels and distillate stocks fell by 1.2 million barrels, according to market sources citing American Petroleum Institute figures on Wednesday.

Oil Futures Reverse Lower Friday Morning -- Nearby delivery oil futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange and Brent crude traded on the Intercontinental Exchange declined in early trade Friday on profit taking, with both crude benchmarks retreating from seven-year highs that were spurred on concern over a tightening supply-demand disposition on the global oil market and limited OPEC+ spare capacity after several members of the alliance underproduced their quotas. Further weighing on the sentiment, U.S. commercial crude oil inventories unexpectedly increased during the week-ended Jan. 14, according to data from the Energy Information Administration, rising for the first time in nearly two months. The 514,000-barrel (bbl) build occurred as domestic refiners pulled back on crude throughputs, processing 120,000 barrels per day (bpd) less crude compared with the prior week. Gasoline stockpiles, meanwhile, jumped by a hefty 5.9 million bbl last week to 246.6 million bbl, now just 2% below the five-year average. Even though COVID-19 infections are falling across northeastern U.S. states, hospitalizations are still rising nationwide, averaging 156,505 each day -- up 54% from two weeks ago, and the most since the start of the pandemic. Thursday's EIA data suggests, however, that gasoline demand in the United States likely began a tepid recovery, surging 318,000 bpd or 4% last week from an 11-month 7.906 million bpd low reported in the previous week. Although up on the week, demand for the motor gasoline is still down compared to the fourth quarter 2021. This week, oil traders turned their focus to geopolitics after Yemen's Houthi group attacked the United Arab Emirates -- OPEC's third-largest producer. U.S.-Russia tensions were also in the news as Russia, the world's second-largest oil producer, has built up a large military presence along Ukraine's border and stoked fears of armed conflict. The International Energy Agency earlier this week in its Oil Market Report said OPEC+ will have only 2.6 million bpd of additional output left in the second half of the year should the producer group continue to unwind 2020 supply cuts and Iran remains under sanctions. IEA trimmed its forecast for non-OPEC oil supply by 100,000 bpd to 66.5 million bpd, mostly reflecting constraints on Russian oil production growth. Near 7:30 a.m. ET, West Texas Intermediate March contract fell to $84.40 bbl, down $1.14 from Thursday's settlement, and international crude benchmark Brent for March delivery dropped $1.05 to $87.28 bbl. NYMEX February RBOB futures slumped 2.42 cents to $2.4380 gallon, and the front-month ULSD contract dropped 1.74 cents to $2.6544 gallon.

Oil Fell Friday but Up on Week | Rigzone - Oil capped its fifth week of gains on continued signs of robust demand and strained crude supplies that have taken prices to seven-year highs. Futures in New York edged lower on Friday, just above $85 a barrel, but were still up 1.6% for the week. Oil neared $88 earlier this week for its highest level since 2014 as geopolitical tensions threatened greater supply outages alongside strong demand numbers, despite the omicron variant. As prices rise, much of Wall Street has been growing steadily more bullish. Morgan Stanley has joined Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in forecasting $100 oil later this year, and Bank of America reiterated that it expects oil to hit $120 a barrel by the summer. Citigroup Inc. cautioned that sticking to a bullish view could be dangerous after this quarter. Markets also dissected the strong picture of demand that multiple reports provided this week. The International Energy Agency said the oil market was looking tighter than previously thought, with demand proving resilient despite the rapid spread of omicron. Additionally, U.S. demand is still running hot, with the total volume of oil products supplied to the market at the highest for this time of year in at least 30 years, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Earlier on Friday, futures fell over 3% alongside broader equity markets and raw materials including copper. While commodities have been extremely resilient at the start of the year due to supply risks and geopolitical concerns, they won’t “continue to be completely insulated,” said Rebecca Babin, senior energy trader at CIBC Private Wealth Management. Crude’s bumper rally had pushed many of the main futures contracts into overbought territory on a technical basis. Brent, WTI and heating-oil futures all moved out of that zone amid the sharp price pullback early Friday. West Texas Intermediate for March fell 41 cents to settle at $85.14 a barrel in New York. Brent for March settlement slipped 49 cents to settle at $87.89 a barrel. Oil’s rally has also caught the eye of the White House as it poses a political risk for President Joe Biden. The U.S. is considering accelerating the release of strategic reserves, but many of Biden’s options to address the rally would be limited and likely short-lived.

 Yemen Houthi rebels claim responsibility for deadly drone attack in Abu Dhabi - Yemen’s Houthi rebels have claimed responsibility for Monday’s drone attack in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), that killed three people. The Houthi rebels directed the drone strike toward a key oil facility, according to The Associated Press.. The attack caused a fire at the Abu Dhabi International Airport. Two of the deceased individuals were identified by Emirati police as Indian nationals, and the third was Pakistani, according to the AP. A number of other individuals at an industrial area that houses Abu Dhabi’s state-owned energy company were wounded with minor to moderate injuries in the attack. The firm reportedly oversees a pipeline network in addition to a storage facility for an oil tanker. Three transport tankers located at the oil facility caught fire, according to the AP, while another blaze broke out at an extension of the airport. The Houthis claimed responsibility for the attack on Monday but did not disclose specifics, according to the AP. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan on Monday said the U.S. condemns the “terrorist attack” in Abu Dhabi, adding that the U.S. will work with the UAE and international partners to hold the Houthis accountable. “Our commitment to the security of the UAE is unwavering and we stand beside our Emirati partners against all threats to their territory,” Sullivan added in a statement. The drone attack comes as Houthis are under pressure and undergoing losses amid a pushback by Yemeni government forces, the AP noted. Yemeni forces supported by the UAE have clamped back on the Houthis in crucial southern and central regions, which has stymied the rebels’ attempts to take control of the northern portion of Yemen.

Three dead, six injured in UAE fuel tanker explosions claimed by Yemen's Houthis — Three people are reportedly dead and six injured in an attack in Abu Dhabi on Monday claimed by Yemen's Houthi rebels. The attack caused fires and resulted in three petroleum tanker explosions near state oil firm ADNOC's storage facilities. The deceased are one Pakistani and two Indian nationals, according to UAE state news agency WAM. The six wounded are suffering from mild and medium injuries, WAM said, citing the Abu Dhabi police. The fires began Monday afternoon in the industrial area of Musaffah and at a construction site near Abu Dhabi International airport in the UAE capital, Abu Dhabi police said in a statement. Authorities believe the attack was carried out by drones. "Preliminary investigations suggest that the cause of the fires are small flying objects, possibly belonging to drones, that fell in the two areas. Teams from the competent authorities have been dispatched and the fire is currently being put out," the police statement said. The price of oil was unaffected, with international benchmark Brent crude trading at around $85.89 per barrel in the hours following the explosions, down about 0.2% from the previous day. The UAE is the third-largest oil producing member of OPEC, and ADNOC — the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company — controls oil operations in Abu Dhabi, home to the vast majority of the state's crude. The UAE is the world's seventh-biggest oil producer, pumping just over 4 million barrels per day. The initial statement said there were "no significant damages resulting from the two accidents", adding that an investigation has been launched. A spokesman for Yemen's Houthi movement, which since 2015 has been at war with a Saudi-led coalition that includes the UAE, said that its militants have launched a military operation in the Gulf sheikhdom and that it would reveal more details in the hours to come, according to Reuters. The UAE largely withdrew from Yemen in 2019, roughly four years into a bloody war that has plunged the Middle East's poorest country into mass starvation and fueled the proxy fighting between Saudi Arabia and its regional adversary Iran, which backs the Houthis with funding and weapons. Abu Dhabi still carries significant influence among Yemeni forces it has armed and trained to combat the Houthis, who in 2014 forced out Yemen's Saudi-backed government led by President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi. The Houthis have carried out thousands of cross-border missile and drone attacks into Saudi Arabia in the years since Riyadh launched its aerial assault on Yemen, which has killed tens of thousands of Yemenis.

Satellite photos show aftermath of Abu Dhabi oil site attack - (AP) — Satellite photos obtained by The Associated Press on Tuesday appear to show the aftermath of a fatal attack on an oil facility in the capital of the United Arab Emirates claimed by Yemen’s Houthi rebels. The attack brought the long-running Yemen war into Emirati territory on Monday. That conflict raged on overnight with Saudi-led airstrikes pounding Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, killing and wounding civilians. Meanwhile, fears over new disruptions to global energy supplies after the Abu Dhabi attack pushed benchmark Brent crude to its highest price in years. The images by Planet Labs PBC analyzed by the AP show smoke rising over an Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. fuel depot in the Mussafah neighborhood of Abu Dhabi after the attack. Another image taken shortly after appears to show scorch marks and white fire-suppressing foam deployed on the grounds of the depot. The Abu Dhabi National Oil Co., known by the acronym ADNOC, is the state-owned energy firm that provides much of the wealth of the UAE, a federation of seven sheikhdoms on the Arabian Peninsula and also home to Dubai. ADNOC did not respond to questions from the AP asking about the site and damage estimates from the attack. The company had said the attack happened around 10 a.m. Monday. “We are working closely with the relevant authorities to determine the exact cause and a detailed investigation has commenced,” ADNOC said in an earlier statement. The attack killed two Indian nationals and one Pakistani as three tankers at the site exploded, police said. Six people were also wounded at the facility, which is near Al-Dhafra Air Base, a massive Emirati installation that is also home to American and French forces. Another fire also struck Abu Dhabi International Airport, though damage in that attack could not be seen. Journalists have not been able to view the sites attacked and state-run media have not published photographs of the areas. Police described the assault as a suspected drone attack. The Houthis claimed they used cruise and ballistic missiles in the attack, without offering evidence.

UAE vows retaliation for Houthi-claimed attack, but questions emerge over potential Iran role - — The attack on Abu Dhabi claimed by Yemen's Houthi militants Monday threatens to derail fragile efforts at rapprochement between Gulf Arab states and Iran, even as clear attribution for the strikes — which caused fires and fuel tanker explosions that killed three people — is yet to be fully confirmed.It also could complicate the already challenging negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, the latter of which backs the Houthis financially and militarily, on reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.The UAE's government has pledged to hold those responsible for the attack — suspected to have been carried out by drone — to account. Already on Tuesday, the Saudi-led coalition that's been at war in Yemen since 2015began carrying out airstrikes on camps and buildings in the capital of Sanaabelonging to Houthi militants, the coalition reported. The strikes around the Houthi-held city have so far killed around 20 people, a Houthi official told Reuters.But many regional analysts point to what they believe is likely the directing force behind the Houthis' attack: Iran. The UAE has been a part of the coalition fighting the Houthis since 2015, and though it significantly reduced its forces from the country in 2019, it still trains and supports anti-Houthi groups."I think the issue we've got to determine, first of all, was it the Houthis directly," Angus Blair, professor of practice at the University of Cairo in Egypt, told CNBC on Tuesday. "Nothing would have happened without Tehran's consent or direct engagement."Iran's foreign ministry, commenting on what it described only as "recent Yemen-linked developments," said Tuesday that "the solution to any regional crisis is not to resort to war and violence." Its spokesman did not mention the Houthis or the UAE attack, according to Reuters.While blaming Iran still remains speculative, Iran and the Gulf Arab states support opposing sides of numerous regional conflicts including those in Yemen, Syria and Lebanon. Saudi Arabia has accused Iran of attacking its oil infrastructure and of providing Yemen's Houthi rebels with missiles used to attack the kingdom, which Tehran has denied. Blair and others cite historical example to back up their suspicion. Iran has provided missiles and drones to the Houthis for several years, backing them as part of a broader proxy war with Saudi Arabia, which spearheaded an aerial assault on Yemen beginning in early 2015 after the rebel movement overran Yemen's Saudi-backed government.

US condemns ISIS attack in northeast Syria - The State Department condemned the recent ISIS attack in northeast Syria in a statement released Saturday. The attack, an attempt to free detained members of ISIS, occurred Thursday on a Provincial Internal Security Forces detention center located in Hasakah, Syria, per the statement. The Associated Press reported that the attack left dozens dead. Ned Price, spokesperson for the State Department, commended the Syrian Democratic Forces “for their swift response and continued commitment to the fight against ISIS in northeast Syria” in the statement. The statement also extended “sincere condolences” to the families of the Syrian guards who died in the attack. “This attack highlights the importance of, and the need to fully fund, the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS’s initiatives,” the State Department’s press release read. “To improve the secure and humane detention of ISIS fighters, including by strengthening detention facility security.” It continued: “It also underscores the urgent need for countries of origin to repatriate, rehabilitate, reintegrate, and prosecute, where appropriate, their nationals detained in northeast Syria.” The State Department reaffirmed its commitment to "counter the remnants of ISIS" alongside partners in the region. “The losses sustained by our partners in these attacks are a stark reminder of the very real challenges the region continues to face,” Price wrote.

Further slowdown in Chinese growth - China’s economy is continuing to slow, according to the latest GDP data released this week. It adds to fears that lower Chinese growth will impact on the global economy where key sectors of industry are increasingly unable to function because COVID infections have been allowed to “let rip” by governments elsewhere. In the fourth quarter of last year, China recorded an annual growth rate of 4 percent, its lowest rate for 18 months. While the figure exceeded the forecast of economists, it was well below the 6.5 percent annual growth rate for the corresponding period in 2020. A man wearing a protective mask walks in front of an electronic display board in the lobby of the Shanghai Stock Exchange building in Shanghai, China, Friday, Feb. 14, 2020. (AP Photo) Signs of nervousness on the part of government and financial authorities are evident in the decision by the People’s Bank of China to cut a key lending rate for the first time since April 2020 at the start of the pandemic. Releasing the data, the head of the National Bureau of Statistics, Ning Jizhe, said China had sustained the steady growth of the national economy. He noted, however, that “the domestic economy is under the triple pressure of demand contractions, supply shock and weakening expectations.” These issues were reflected in the data. Industrial production rose by only 4.3 percent in December last year compared to 7.3 percent in the same month in 2020. In the fourth quarter of 2021, property investment, one of the key drivers of Chinese economic growth, fell by 7.7 as a result of the financial problems surrounding Evergrande and other major real estate companies. Retail sales rose by only 1.7 percent year-on-year in December, the lowest rate in 14 months.

Australian childcare centres hit by COVID outbreaks -Hundreds of childcare centres across Australia have been forced to close in recent weeks due to COVID-19 outbreaks. In the first week of January, 303 childcare centres were listed as closed in New South Wales, Australia’s most populous state, 30 in Victoria, 29 in South Australia, 22 in Queensland, three in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and one in the Northern Territory. The closures occurred despite a lot of centres having shut down for the summer break. After many reopened last week, closures increased further, with a total of 490 registered as closed yesterday. The tally is almost certain to increase in the next period, as numbers of working parents return from leave and resume placing their children in care. Childcare workers are among those confronting the highest risk of infection in their workplace. Caring for the youngest children, unmasked as well as unvaccinated, cannot occur while maintaining any kind of social distancing, while attending to various hygiene issues further heightens the risk of infection. The exposure to COVID of thousands of young children and babies, all of whom are unvaccinated, represents another indictment of the bipartisan “let it rip” policy being implemented by every state and federal government. The disaster in childcare provides a foretaste of what will happen within the schools, if they are permitted to reopen as scheduled in late January and early February. “Early Learning and Care was experiencing a workforce shortage before the COVID-19 pandemic” Elizabeth Death, the chief executive of the Early Learning and Care Council of Australia, explained. “We are now in a workforce shortage crisis.” In the early 1990s, the then federal Labor government encouraged private operators into the early learning and childcare sector, which had previously been predominantly publicly operated. Childcare provision has since functioned as a cash cow for business thanks to generous government subsidies. Australian families are among the highest users of childcare among OECD countries. Almost 40 percent of households spend more than they can afford, according to international benchmarks that outline no more than 7 percent of disposable household income ought to be allocated. According to a Mitchell Institute report last year, “Counting the cost to families: assessing childcare affordability in Australia,” 83 percent of families using childcare spend more on it than they do on utilities. Altogether, nearly 40 percent of families spent more than 7 percent of their household income on childcare making it unaffordable for almost 400,000 Australians. While childcare workers are paid poverty level wages, CEOs in the sector are handed exorbitant salaries. At the same time, babies, toddlers and young children are put at risk, with government regulations widely disregarded. A recent study found that three-quarters of the 12,000 enforcement actions taken since 2015 were against for-profit providers.

Global Economic Prospects – January 2022 - Menzie Chinn - From the World Bank report: Macroeconomic imbalances have reached unprecedented proportions. Government spending, deficits, and debt in several advanced economies have reached record highs relative to GDP. Central bank balance sheets have absorbed unprecedented amounts of long-term assets financed by bank reserves, resulting in an inequitable allocation of capital. Spending in developing countries surged to support economic activity during the crisis, but many countries are now facing record levels of external and domestic debt. Adding to these debt-related risks is the potential for higher interest rates: it is difficult to predict how rapidly interest rates will rise as advanced economies slow down their expansion in monetary policies. With fiscal and monetary policy in uncharted territory, the implications for exchange rates, inflation, debt sustainability, and economic growth are unlikely to be favorable for developing countries. The world is facing growing income inequality across and within countries. The COVID-19 crisis wiped out years of progress in poverty reduction. As government’s fiscal space has narrowed, many households in developing countries have suffered severe employment and earning losses—with women, the unskilled, and informal workers hit the hardest. School closures and sustained disruptions to healthcare services can do lasting damage to human capital, especially among children and the most vulnerable. At the other end of the income scale, booming asset prices are boosting the wealth of richer segments of the population, adding to inflation. This increasing divergence of fortunes is especially troubling given the possibility of social discontent in developing countries. Compounding this rising inequality, the world is undergoing a phase of exceptional uncertainty. The emergence of the Omicron variant is a stark reminder that the COVID-19 pandemic is not over. New variants of the virus can put even highly vaccinated countries under pressure and threaten to wreak havoc in those with low vaccination rates—which are the poorest and most vulnerable of all. Supply bottlenecks have hit developing countries hard—these countries are often the last in the global supply line, outbid by countries with greater financial resources and larger orders. Ports operating below capacity, pandemic-related delays in orders for new vessels, and containers stranded in the “wrong” ports have increased shipping costs and supply constraints to unprecedented levels. Volatile commodity prices and extreme weather events driven by climate change are aggravating food insecurity risks, further burdening health and nutrition. Progress in vaccination is key to restoring mobility and overcoming supply-chain disruptions…. Video here.

Amid record infections, Argentina’s Peronist President Alberto Fernández scraps measures to contain COVID - Argentina is experiencing its largest outbreak of COVID-19 infections since the pandemic began, driven by the spread of the new Omicron variant. On Friday, January 14, the country set a record of 139,853 infections in a single day. This number is more than three times higher than the previous wave’s record of 41,080 cases, registered in May 2020. Until December, the average number of daily cases in Argentina was less than 2,000. In the period between January 6 and 12, the country recorded a total of 749,022 new infections, more than double the previous week with 359,456 infections. A week ago, the test positivity rate was 66 percent, indicating a high level of underreporting. In the province of Buenos Aires, which has accounted for 40 percent of the country’s total daily cases, hospitals are admitting an unprecedented number of new patients. The health care system is on the verge of collapse, with 20 to 25 percent of hospital staff sent home during the past week with coronavirus infections. In response to the ominous situation, the Peronist government of President Alberto Fernández is relaxing measures to control the pandemic. Health minister Carla Vizzotti and the media are promoting the narrative that the new variant is “mild,” following the campaign of the ruling classes around the world to justify keeping the economy open during the global COVID-19 outbreak. This nefarious campaign is being promoted in unity with the Argentine right wing that Fernández feigns to oppose. Last Thursday, the former health minister in Mauricio Macri’s reactionary administration, Adolfo Rubinstein, was invited by La Nación to advocate for the same idea of a “mild” Omicron. On the same day, 128,402 new cases were registered in Argentina, part of the unprecedented escalation of infections in the country. Rubinstein pointed out that “three out of every four [COVID-19] hospitalizations are of non-vaccinated people, or people with incomplete vaccination schemes.” He concluded, “Eventually, all people will be vaccinated, or they will be infected.” This statement summarizes the policies being adopted by the Peronist government.

Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo postpone Carnival parades due to COVID-19 - Amid a rising number of COVID-19 cases, Brazilian cities Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo announced that their Carnival parades would be postponed until April, Reuters reported."Unfortunately we do not have the sanitary conditions to hold Carnival on the date that was planned," Daniel Soranz, the health secretary for Rio, said to reporters, per the wire service. In a joint statement, the two cities said that the event would be postponed until April instead of being held in late February as scheduled. The two cities were previously considering still holding samba school though they had already canceled Carnival street parties. The news comes as Brazil sees a surge of new COVID-19 cases amid the spread of the omicron variant. Over 204,000 infections were reported on Friday, the highest count of COVID-19 cases for the country at that point since the start of the pandemic, per data from the World Health Organization. In comparison, daily cases in the country were in the thousands in mid- to late-December. According to data from Johns Hopkins University, about 70 percent of Brazilians are fully vaccinated against COVID-19. The omicron variant, which now makes up the overwhelming majority of COVID-19 cases in the U.S., has proven to be highly transmissible. Health officials remain unsure if omicron will be the final wave of the pandemic. "It is an open question whether it will be the live virus vaccination that everyone is hoping for,” President Biden’s chief medical adviser Anthony Fauci said in at the World Economic Forum's Davos Agenda online conference earlier this week, according to CNBC. "I would hope that that’s the case. But that would only be the case if we don’t get another variant that eludes the immune response of the prior variant.”

Canadian restaurant forced to partially close after accepting dog photos as vaccination proof - A Canadian restaurant was ordered to close its indoor operations briefly after it was discovered to be accepting dog photos as proof of COVID-19 vaccination.Alberta, where The Granary Kitchen is located, requires restaurants to get proof of vaccination, a negative COVID-19 test or a medical exemption from the vaccine from all customers.Alberta Health Services sent an executive order to the restaurant on Jan. 14 saying that it needed to shut down indoor services following an investigation of the establishment. According to the order, the health authority received complaints that the restaurant was allowing customers to dine indoors when they presented dog pictures and personal identification. The authority said it sent two "test shoppers" there on two separate occasions and both were permitted to dine in the restaurant after showing staff pictures of dogs and personal identification.“In both instances, facility staff used a tablet to make it appear as if they were scanning a QR code when in fact the staff member was presented with a photograph of a dog. The staff member then proceeded to ask the test shopper for personal identification and offered dine in services,” the order states. The Granary Kitchen announced that it would temporarily close in a post on its Facebook page on Friday.

US envoy in Europe says 'drumbeat of war is sounding loud' -Washington's envoy in Europe on Thursday issued a stark warning of war in Eastern Europe amid Russia’s military buildup on Ukraine’s border but said the U.S. and the majority of its allies support ongoing dialogue to tamp down tensions. “We're facing a crisis in European security. The drumbeat of war is sounding loud, and the rhetoric has gotten rather shrill,” said Michael Carpenter, the U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Carpenter spoke with reporters following a meeting of the OSCE focused on advancing diplomacy between the U.S., Europe and Russia, the conclusion of an extraordinary session of three diplomatic meetings on the continent this week and in response to Russian military provocations. “There's close to 100,000 troops on the Russian side of its border with Ukraine. Their presence and the live fire measures being carried out are raising many questions about Moscow's intention,” Carpenter said. The OSCE meeting, which took place in Vienna on Thursday, was the first inaugural permanent council meeting of 2022 but was overtaken by discussions surrounding Russia’s military buildup on Ukraine’s border. Both nations are members of the security group. It was the first time Russian and Ukrainian officials met in person to discuss what Moscow calls its security concerns and followed bilateral talks between the U.S. and Russia in Geneva on Monday and between Russia and NATO on Wednesday in Brussels. Russia has said that its military is conducting drills and rejected that it has intentions of invading Ukraine, despite its support for an eight-year conflict between separatists and the Ukrainian government in the east of the country as well as its occupation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, which it annexed in 2014. The meetings in Europe this week were organized in response to Russia’s military buildup and its publication in December of security demands of the U.S. and NATO. The U.S. has rejected Russian proposals that NATO cease expansion, in particular over Ukraine’s application to the defensive alliance, but offered ongoing dialogue with Moscow to discuss reciprocal actions that the U.S. and its allies can take to offset security concerns and increase transparency for both sides.

Spain sends warships to Black Sea, considers sending warplanes -Spain has sent warships to join NATO naval forces in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea as tension in the region rises over the Russian military build-up on the Ukrainian border, Defence Minister Margarita Robles said on Thursday.A mine-sweeper is already en route and a frigate will sail within three or four days, Robles told reporters. The Madrid government is also considering sending fighter jets to Bulgaria, she said. “Russia cannot tell any country what to do, so NATO will protect and defend the sovereignty of any country that can or wants to join NATO,” she said.Spain’s preference was for an “exclusively diplomatic response” to resolving the conflict, she added. …

Singer Hana Horká Dies of COVID After Catching It on Purpose To Avoid Vaccine - A woman from the Czech Republic who was opposed to COVID-19 vaccinations has died after deliberately contracting the disease, according to her family.Hana Horká, who was the vocalist for the long-running folk band Asonance, passed away on Sunday at the age of 57, AFP reported, citing her son Jan Rek.Rek told Czech public radio iRozhlas.cz that his mother had voluntarily exposed herself to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, in order to obtain a health pass that would have allowed her to visit the sauna and theater.In the Czech Republic, proof of vaccination or a recent infection is required in order to access cultural and sports facilities, as well as bars and restaurants, and for travel.Rek and his father—the singer's husband—contracted COVID-19 over the Christmas period. The pair had previously been vaccinated. But instead of staying away, Horká deliberately kept in close contact with them, Rek told iRozhlas.cz."She went for it. She was supposed to stay away from us, but she decided to remain at home with us normally, preferring to go through the disease than to get vaccinated," Rek said.On Friday, Horká wrote in a social media post that she had intentionally contracted the disease and claimed that she was recovering."I survived... It was intense," she said in the post. "So now there will be the theater, sauna, a concert... and an urgent trip to the sea. Life is here for me and for you too." Several of her followers appeared to support her actions, with some expressing hope that they too would become infected with SARS-CoV-2. But just two days later, Horká died due to COVID-related complications.

France to loosen COVID-19 restrictions in February - France announced on Thursday that it would be implementing new COVID-19 restrictions in the country while loosening other restrictions beginning in February. French officials said that entry into public places such as museums, bars and restaurants would not be allowed for most people who do not show recent recovery from COVID-19 or proof of vaccination beginning on Monday, The New York Times reported. French health minister Olivier Véran said during a Thursday news conference that the vaccine pass would be applied “as long as necessary, but no longer than necessary,” though officials did not offer definite details regarding that timeline, the newspaper noted. However, other COVID-19 restrictions in the country are expected to be lifted next month. Among some of the first restrictions to be lifted would be capacity limits in public places, requirements for outdoor masking and — for some companies — mandates for remote work, The Times reported. Additionally, stadiums and movie theaters will be able to allow people to eat and drink inside and nightclubs will be permitted to reopen, all by the middle of February. The omicron surge is expected by the government to peak around that time, according to the Times.

When is a life-saving drug too expensive? Critics say patient’s death shows Switzerland’s health system is a «lottery» --It is every patient’s nightmare: A therapy is available that might save your life. But the health insurance company refuses to pay for the treatment, arguing that it is too expensive. While this may be an all-too familiar story in the United States, this case took place in Switzerland, with a fatal outcome. The incident casts a bad light on Obwalden retiree Karl Riebli’s insurance company, but also raises fundamental questions: Are patients at health insurers’ mercy when it comes to approving the costs associated with very expensive drugs? And what role should insurance companies’ medical officers, who review such requests, play in making such decisions? Riebli’s ordeal, which was also covered by the Swiss television program Kassensturz, began in the fall of 2018, when doctors diagnosed him with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, or a tumor in the lymphatic system. Following a successful initial course of chemotherapy, the then-81-year-old Riebli’s cancer returned in 2020. Further chemotherapy had little effect. As a last resort, the oncology team at the University Hospital of Bern, also known as the Inselspital, wanted to give Reibli a treatment called chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy, more commonly known as CAR T-cell therapy. The doctors applied to the SLKK, Riebli’s insurance company, to approve the costs in May. In CAR T-cell therapy, immune cells are removed from the patient and genetically modified in the laboratory to recognize and fight cancer cells. Afterward, they are returned to the patient via an infusion. The procedure is very expensive. The specific therapy that would have been used in this case is called Kymriah. The exact price negotiated by health insurers and the manufacturer, Novartis, varies substantially, but it would typically fall somewhere between $215,000 and $375,000. The SLKK, a small health insurer with fewer than 30,000 customers, used a tactic of delay until it was too late for the patient. Riebli’s son later called this a case of a «deliberate killing.» Although the oncologists pointed out the aggressiveness of the tumor and the urgency of the therapy, the SLKK responded to the request for cost approval only after almost four months had passed – by rejecting the request. Riebli was prepared to shoulder the costs himself if that was the only option. But he was unable to raise so much money in such a short amount of time.

Thousands protest COVID-19 restrictions in European capitals - In several European capital cities, protesters came out in droves to demonstrate against COVID-19 measures and restrictions — the latest in a series of protests that have taken place in Europe over virus protocols. From Paris to Athens to Stockholm to London to Helsinki, thousands of people on Saturday took to the streets to protest various COVID-19 protocols, The Associated Press reported. Roughly 4,000 people participated in protests in Sweden’s capital, Stockholm, and its second largest city, Goteborg, on Saturday to protest a requirement that indoor events including over 50 people must require vaccine certificates, according to the wire service. By late afternoon on Saturday, there were no reported major incidents in Stockholm, though local reports noted the presence of neo-Nazi Nordic Resistance Movement members, the AP reported. Meanwhile, in the Finnish capital of Helsinki, there were also no immediate reports of violence after approximately 4,000 people demonstrated during the day against local and regional COVID-19 restrictions — such as mandating vaccine passes for events and restaurants and transitioning colleges to remote learning — that were instituted at the behest of the government. Paris, in addition to other cities in France, also saw demonstrations on Saturday, with people protesting against a more aggressive COVID-19 pass to be instituted starting Monday. The AP noted that cinemas, bars, in-country flights and bars are among a number of places in France that will not allow people who are unvaccinated from entering under the measure. France previously employed a vaccine pass that required residents to show proof of vaccination, a negative COVID-19 test or recent recovery of COVID-19 in order to enter certain public places.

Johnson ends mask-wearing in UK schools - Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced in Parliament on Wednesday that the wearing of masks in secondary schools in England would be ended with immediate effect within 24 hours. He did so to cheers from Conservative MPs, as he announced that all remaining mitigations against COVID under the current Plan B are to be terminated on January 26. Johnson declared, “From tomorrow, we will no longer require face masks in classrooms and the Department for Education will shortly remove national guidance on their use in communal areas.” The removal of the sole remaining mitigation measure in schools guarantees the further spread of COVID among pupils, educators and the wider community. It is proof positive that the Conservative government is pursuing a herd immunity programme. With the massive spread of Omicron, when schools returned in January the government was forced to advise that masks be worn in classrooms and teaching spaces for pupils and students in Year 7 (aged 11 or above). While limited, this did hinder the spread of COVID in secondary schools. One only has to compare the terrible spread of COVID, illness and hospitalisations among primary school children, who were not mandated to wear masks, during the same period. The announcement came the day after Britain recorded 438 COVID deaths, the highest since February. Tragically, another boy was announced dead from COVID on January 14, taking to 135 the total number of children who have died from COVID in Britain since the beginning of the pandemic. The return to school from January 4 has produced an avalanche of infections among educators and children alike. A poll by Teacher Tapp for the Sutton Trust charity, reported by Schools Week, found that in the week to January 14 one in five state schools had COVID related absences in staff of 10 percent. Three in 10 of the most deprived schools reported the same. Private schools with smaller class sizes had one in eight. Department for Education (DfE) data showed staff absences rose to 60,000, most having tested positive. High absenteeism was compounded by delays in delivering testing kit to schools. A Teacher Tapp survey found that only a third of schools received tests on time, and 17 percent still had not received any by January 14. Government guidance advises twice weekly testing at home, or daily for seven days if living with someone who is positive in order to attend school.

The world’s richest 10 men doubled their fortunes to $1.5 trillion during the pandemic, says Oxfam - The world’s top ten billionaires increased their wealth by $1.3 billion a day, or $15,000 a second, during the global pandemic. That’s according to a new report from global charity Oxfam International released on Monday, that said those billionaires doubled their fortunes from $700 billion to $1.5 trillion. Over the same timeframe, the incomes of 99% of humanity fell and over 160 million more people were forced into poverty. “If these ten men were to lose 99.999 percent of their wealth tomorrow, they would still be richer than 99 percent of all the people on this planet,” said Oxfam International’s Executive Director Gabriela Bucher. “They now have six times more wealth than the poorest 3.1 billion people.” ----- Forbes lists the top five wealthiest billionaires and their net worth as the following: Tesla CEO Elon Musk, $268 billion, Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos, $188 billion, LVMH Chief Executive Officer Bernarld Arnault and family $187 billion, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, $134 billion and Oracle’s co-founder Larry Ellison, $120 billion. The Oxfam report found that Musk has more wealth than the bottom 40%, some 131 million Americas, while U.S. billionaires own a half billion more wealth than the bottom 60%, or 197.6 million Americans. ----- “Billionaires have had a terrific pandemic. Central banks pumped trillions of dollars into financial markets to save the economy, yet much of that has ended up lining the pockets of billionaires riding a stock market boom,” said Bucher. ----- Oxfam added that twenty of the richest billionaires are estimated, on average, to be emitting as much as 8,000 times more carbon than the billion poorest people.