April Fool’s Inflation Medicine Threatens Progress - The world economy is on the brink of outright recession, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The Ukraine war and sanctions have scuttled recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. Over 80 central banks have already raised interest rates so far this year. Except for the Bank of Japan governor, major central bankers have reacted to recent inflation by raising interest rates. Hence, stagflation is increasingly likely as rising interest rates slow the economy, but do not quell supply-side cost-push inflation. The IMF chief economist recently advised, “Inflation at current levels represents a clear risk for current and future macroeconomic stability and bringing it back to central bank targets should be the top priority for policymakers”. While acknowledging the short-term costs of raising interest rates, he has never bothered to explain why inflation targets should be considered sacrosanct regardless of circumstances. The Fund recognized the major sources of current inflation are supply disruptions – first due to pandemic lockdowns disrupting supply chains, and then, delivery blockages of food, fuel and fertilizer due to war and sanctions. Without explaining why, US Federal Reserve Bank Chair Jerome Powell insists on emulating his hero, Paul Volcker, Fed chair during 1979-87. Volcker famously almost doubled the federal funds target rate to nearly 20%.Thus, Volcker caused the longest US recession since the 1930s’ Great Depression, raising unemployment to nearly 11%, while “the effects of unemployment, on health and earnings of sacked workers, persisted for years”.Asked at a US Senate hearing if the Fed was prepared to do whatever it takes to control inflation – even if it harms growth – Powell replied, “the answer to your question is yes”.But major central banks have ‘over-reacted’ time and again, with disastrous consequences. Milton Friedman famously argued the US Fed exacerbated the 1930s’ Great Depression. Instead of providing liquidity to businesses struggling with short-term cash-flow problems, it squeezed credit, crushing economic activity.Similarly, later Fed chair Ben Bernanke and his co-authors showed overzealous monetary tightening was mainly responsible for the 1970s’ stagflation. With prices still rising despite higher interest rates, stagflation now looms large.Most central bankers have long been obsessed with fighting inflation, insisting on bringing it down to 2%, despite harming economic progress. This formulaic response is prescribed, even when inflation is not mainly due to surging demand.Powell recently observed, “supply is a big part of the story”, acknowledging the Ukraine war and China’s pandemic restrictions have pushed prices up.While admitting higher interest rates may increase unemployment, Powell insists meeting the 2% target is “unconditional”. He asserted, “we have the tools and the resolve to get it down to 2%”, insisting “we’re going to do that”. While recognizing “very big supply shocks” as the primary cause of inflation, Bank of England (BOE) Governor Andrew Bailey also vows to meet the 2% inflation target, allowing “no ifs or buts”.While European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde does not expect to return “to that environment of low inflation”, admitting “inflation in the euro area today is being driven by a complex mix of factors”, she insists on raising “interest rates for as long as it takes to bring inflation back to our [2%] target”.Much of the problem is due to the 2% inflation targeting dogma. As the then Governor of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand – the first central bank to adopt a 2% inflation target – later admitted, “The figure was plucked out of the air”. Thus, a “chance remark” by the NZ Finance Minister – during “a television interview on April 1, 1988 that he was thinking of genuine price stability, ‘around 0, or 0 to 1 percent’” – has become monetary policy worldwide!
BankThink: The true cost of misleading headline inflation statistics | American Banker - Several key government-reported headline statistics present a distorted view of reality for most Americans, with the impact extending far beyond Wall Street. And it can have dire consequences — particularly when those numbers drive economic policy. Look no further than the Federal Reserve's recent decision to hike interest rates. The Fed is putting its foot firmly on the brakes. It's raising interest rates at a pace we haven't seen in almost 30 years. In July, it hiked rates another 75 basis points. Some have argued that this radical response is the result of the Fed having been slow to respond to inflation. But here's the rub: The Consumer Price Index is not a good gauge of inflation, most notably as it affects middle- and lower-income Americans. Using the CPI alone as an inflation gauge, it is understandable that the Fed would have been cautious about acting. As a point of fact, the Fed officially uses the Personal Consumption Expenditure Price Index (PCE), although in past months it appears that it has made rate increases based on CPI data alone. In June, before the PCE was even reported, the Fed responded to the imminent CPI increase by abandoning one of its strongest monetary policy tools, forward guidance, and raised rates 75 basis points instead of the planned 50 points. In the prior decade, the main issue with inflation from the Fed's perspective was that it was too low. Then-Fed Chair Janet Yellen testified before Congress in January 2017 that "we're watching [underinflation] very closely and stand ready to adjust our policy if it appears the inflation undershoot will be persistent." Accordingly, when the Fed in 2021 first saw signs of inflation using its usual metrics, price increases might not have been a worry, rather these increases may have been seen as welcome, offsetting the deflation seen during the initial COVID-19 outbreak. But the signals coming from the PCE and CPI in fact understated the reality faced by most Americans. A more meaningful way to examine inflation is to understand its actual impact on most Americans. And in this regard, measuring the prices of the goods and services that middle- and low-income Americans need to buy to stay alive is an extremely relevant, if not the most relevant, piece of inflationary information. Measuring the necessity basket of goods and services, chiefly — housing, food, health care, transportation, needed technology — what we have called the "true living cost" or "TLC," one finds that during the past 20 years, costs have risen 40% faster than the CPI. The rising costs of these core necessities have impacted the American economy beyond what policymakers, including those at the Fed, have been led to believe. In 2020, the national average rent per square foot was up more than 44% since 2011. This was during an expansion period following the Great Recession and before the COVID dip. The average medical expenses paid by families was up 56% since 2011. Yet the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported CPI was up only 18% during this nine-year period. The Fed's "official" inflation metric, the PCE, went up only 13.3%. For low-income families, the basket of core necessities in the TLC is what they spend money on, but the CPI doesn't weight them as such in the overall inflation metric.
Without Any Legislative Powers, the Fed Is Rewriting the Law and Creating a Permanent $500 Billion Bailout Facility for Wall Street - By Pam and Russ Martens: The Fed is doing something it’s never been allowed to do in its 109 years of operation. And, it’s doing it without any pushback from Congress.The Fed draws its statutory authority from the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 which created the Fed’s “discount window” for making loans to Fed member banks which are engaged in making loans for “agricultural, industrial or commercial purposes….” The Federal Reserve Act strictly prohibited the Fed from making loans “for the purpose of carrying or trading in stocks, bonds, or other investment securities….” On July 28 of last year, the Fed announced that it was creating a $500 billionpermanent bailout facility for the trading houses (“primary dealers”) on Wall Street to support “smooth market functioning.” The Fed gave the facility the bland sounding name of “Standing Repo Facility” or SRF. What the Fed was effectively doing was creating a new “discount window” where both Fed member banks and Wall Street trading houses could obtain billions of dollars in cumulative loans if a liquidity crisis arose.The resolution issued by the Fed in conjunction with the announcement indicates that the $500 billion ceiling can be “temporarily increased at the discretion of the Chair.” That means that Fed Chair Jerome Powell, who just recently started a new four-year term, has the power, without any advice and consent from Congress, to throw unlimited amounts of money at the trading houses on Wall Street.The resolution also puts this unlimited bailout facility under the auspices of the New York Fed – the same regional Fed bank responsible for the majority of the $29 trillion Wall Street bailout during and after the 2008 financial crisis.The New York Fed is literally owned by some of the biggest banks on Wall Street, including JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. (See our report: These Are the Banks that Own the New York Fed and Its Money Button.)The Fed’s resolution also notes that the loans will be made as “open market operations.” By calling these loans “open market operations” instead of emergency loans under the Federal Reserve Act’s Section 13(3), the Fed has effectively repealed the restrictions imposed on it by Congress under the Dodd-Frank financial reform legislation of 2010. The Dodd-Frank Act required that emergency loans made by the Fed under Section 13(3) receive the “prior approval of the Secretary of the Treasury”; cannot be made to insolvent institutions or to help those institutions avoid a bankruptcy filing; and the names of the borrowers and amounts borrowed had to be given to the Senate Banking and House Financial Services Committees within seven days. Under its new Standing Repo Facility, the Fed has effectively taken Congress out of the loop. Last Friday morning, the New York Fed quietly added the federally-insured banks — Morgan Stanley Bank, N.A. and Morgan Stanley Private Bank, N.A. — to its list of counterparties at its Standing Repo Facility. Morgan Stanley & Co., the trading unit of the megabank, is already a counterparty to the SRF as one of the Fed’s primary dealers. This means that Morgan Stanley will be able to make three separate requests for loans from the Fed’s Standing Repo Facility. Likewise, both Goldman Sachs and Citigroup (Citibank) have both a trading unit and their federally-insured bank listed as counterparties to the SRF.
JPMorgan Chase's Lake named to Fed advisory council --Marianne Lake, co-chief executive officer of consumer and community banking at JPMorgan Chase, has been appointed to the Federal Reserve Board's Federal Advisory Council for a one-year term. Lake is the joint head, along with Jennifer Piepszak, of JPMorgan's largest division. Both she and Piepszak are among those often said to be in the running to succeed CEO Jamie Dimon whenever he retires. She's a 20-year veteran of the company, having previously been chief executive officer of consumer lending and chief financial officer. Lake joins 11 other industry representatives on the advisory council from each of the 12 Fed districts; the council also has a secretary and a deputy secretary. Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan, for example, serves for the fifth district, the home base of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond. Lake, who was appointed by the New York Fed to represent the second district, is the only current member of the council who is not a CEO. The council typically meets four times a year in Washington, D.C. It helps advise the Fed's board of governors, and its members usually serve three one-year terms.
Sen. Warren blasts Fed for withholding trading records - U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren rebuked Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell for withholding information on trading by central bank officials during the pandemic and said an investigation into the matter by the Fed's inspector general was "troubling." The IG report "raises new concerns about the reasons why you continue to withhold key information about Fed officials' financial trading activity from Congress and the public," the Massachusetts Democrat said in a letter to Powell released Thursday. Warren — a member of the Senate Banking Committee that has Fed oversight authority — also sent letters to all 12 reserve banks asking for securities transaction records for all senior officials since Jan. 1, 2020, giving the banks an Aug. 25 deadline. Warren's request to the Board and reserve banks marks growing dissatisfaction with the central bank's responses to its main oversight body in Congress. This week Republican members of the Senate Banking Committee, in response to a separate matter in which the Fed refused to share documents with lawmakers, vowed to create legislation that will compel the Fed to disclose certain information to Congress. Though Republicans and Democrats have sought different information from the Fed, both sides have expressed frustration at being stonewalled following repeated requests. 2020 trading Warren's criticism centers on financial disclosures for 2020 that revealed trading by some officials during a time when the Fed was intervening in nearly every significant credit market to try and buffer the economic downturn brought on by the pandemic. The reserve bank officials included Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan and Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren, who have since resigned. "My ongoing concerns about the culture of corruption at the Fed have become more extensive with each new revelation, and with each additional failure by the Fed to provide the information needed by Congress and the public," Warren wrote.
Four 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 August 7th. This data shows the 7-day average of daily total traveler throughput from the TSA for 2019 (Light Blue), 2020 (Black), 2021 (Blue) and 2022 (Red). The 7-day average is down 11.0% from the same day in 2019 (89.0% of 2019). (Dashed line) Air travel - as a percent of 2019 - has been moving sideways over the last several months, off about 10% from 2019 - with some ups and downs, usually related to the timing of holidays. This data shows domestic box office for each week and the median for the years 2016 through 2019 (dashed light blue). The data is from BoxOfficeMojo through August 4th. Movie ticket sales were at $151 million last week, down about 40% from the median for the week. This graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four-week average. This data is through July 30th. The occupancy rate was down 3.8% compared to the same week in 2019. The 4-week average of the occupancy rate is below the median rate for the previous 20 years (Blue). This graph, based on weekly data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), shows gasoline supplied compared to the same week of 2019. As of July 29th, gasoline supplied was down 10.6% compared to the same week in 2019.Recently gasoline supplied has been running somewhat below 2019 levels.
Republicans unload on Manchin, Sinema on reconciliation - Senate Republicans today slammed moderate Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, in comments that threatened to block permitting reforms planned for next month. The comments from Senate Energy and Natural Resources ranking member John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) and other Republicans follow news last night that Democrats have secured support from all 50 caucus members for budget reconciliation legislation with $369 billion in climate and energy spending. Dubbing it a “political payback scheme,” Republicans threatened to tank the permitting reform deal Manchin secured with Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and President Joe Biden. Schumer has indicated that permitting reform could ride in a spending continuing resolution. Republicans, who have long supported many of the permitting deal’s provisions, are lining up in opposition. “Sen. Manchin, if you think you are going to get 60 votes to get the sweeteners that cannot be done in reconciliation, you need to think long and hard about what you are doing,” top Budget Committee Republican Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told reporters this morning. Schumer, during his own press conference, appeared unconcerned about GOP threats on permitting. “It’s a long time, it’s a long time away,” Schumer said. The Senate is gearing up to hold an initial procedural vote on the reconciliation package tomorrow afternoon. The $369 billion in clean energy spending would be one of the biggest climate-focused investments in the nation’s history.
Senate Dems pass long-awaited climate, tax and health care bill --Senate Democrats passed their signature climate, tax and health care package Sunday afternoon, handing a long-sought victory to President Joe Biden and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer even as the bill hit some last-minute snags. In a 51-50 vote, Senate Democrats approved their party-line package after an amendment process that spanned more than 15 hours. Democrats fought off most GOP efforts to change their fragile deal but did make a change just before the bill’s final passage that adjusted the corporate minimum tax provisions. “After more than a year of hard work, the Senate is making history,” Schumer said shortly before final passage. “This bill will kickstart the era of affordable clean energy in America, it’s a game changer, it’s a turning point and it’s been a long time coming.” The Senate’s passage of the bill caps off more than a year of up-and-down intra-party negotiations. And while the package is far smaller than the $3.5 trillion legislation that Democrats originally envisioned, it’s larger than many in the party expected just two weeks ago. The bill now heads to the House, which will take it up Friday. The core of the legislation includes lowering some prescription drug prices, providing more than $300 billion into climate change and clean energy and imposing a 15 percent minimum tax on large corporations, plus a new 1 percent excise tax on stock buybacks. The bill also increases IRS enforcement and extends Obamacare subsidies through the 2024 election. Of course, final passage didn’t occur without some last-minute drama. Senate Democrats’ push to pass their climate, tax, and health care package hit a speed bump midday Sunday, as Senate Republicans sought to pursue an amendment with Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) to change the legislation’s corporate minimum tax. Senate Minority Whip John Thune proposed an amendment that would exempt businesses owned by private equity from Democrats’ new corporate minimum tax, which would be paid for with a one-year extension of a cap on State and Local Tax deductions. Specifically, Thune wanted to roll back a provision that could sweep some private equity companies and the businesses they own into the 15 percent corporate minimum tax included in the bill. Sinema, along with six other Democrats, supported that amendment, leading to its passage. Four of those Democrats — Sens. Raphael Warnock of Georgia, Mark Kelly of Arizona, Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire — are all up for reelection in 2022. But several Democrats opposed using the State and Local Tax deductions as a revenue stream. That prompted Democrats to adopt a subsequent amendment from Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) that would pay for the change by extending existing limits on how certain businesses can write off their losses for another two years. In addition to the Thune amendment, Democrats’ failure to keep a cap on insulin prices on the commercial market in the bill was the most notable blow during a fusillade of GOP amendments.
Senate passes Democrats’ fraudulent climate, anti-inflation and “tax fairness” bill -On Sunday, following a 27-hour exercise in political posturing by both sides, the US Senate passed the Biden administration’s misnamed “Inflation Reduction Act of 2022” by a party-line vote of 51 to 50. Vice President Kamala Harris cast the tie-breaking vote in her capacity as president of the Senate. “The Senate is making history,” declared Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, otherwise known as the senator from Wall Street, as Democratic senators and their staff members rose for a standing ovation. The staged celebration reflected not the actual content of the bill—a miserable climb-down from earlier iterations of the Biden administration’s domestic agenda, purged of any significant social measures, restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions or corporate tax hikes—but rather the desperation of the Democratic Party to create the illusion of progressive reform and register a legislative “win” in advance of the November midterm elections. It is unlikely to fool the masses of working people, who face brutal inflation and a deliberate policy of increasing unemployment to halt a growing wages movement. The final version of the bill that emerged from the so-called budget reconciliation process, which blocked a Republican filibuster and allowed the measure to pass by a simple majority in the evenly divided chamber, allocates some $430 billion for climate measures and a three-year extension of increased subsidies for health insurance purchased on private exchanges under the Affordable Care Act. The $369 billion over 10 years nominally devoted to fighting climate change consists entirely of tax credits to private energy corporations, both non-carbon and fossil-fuel. It is, as some commentators have noted, “all carrot and no stick,” i.e., all corporate welfare and no penalties for belching greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. There is good reason to believe, despite the hype from Democrats and media outlets friendly to the Democratic Party, that the bill will worsen the climate crisis. One expression of the complete subordination of both parties to the corporate-financial oligarchy, including Big Oil, is the insertion into the bill of provisions massively expanding exploration and drilling for oil and gas on federal lands and offshore regions, including both the Gulf of Mexico and the waters off of Alaska. These provisions were added at the insistence of West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin, a coal business multi-millionaire and the Senate’s biggest recipient of campaign cash from the fossil fuel industry. Manchin chairs the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Manchin also secured from Schumer, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Biden White House a commitment to vote on a separate measure in the fall—which could not be passed under the budget reconciliation procedure—that would dramatically weaken the role of environmental agencies in approving permits for energy pipelines and other fossil fuel installations. That measure is likely to win a large number of Republican votes, boosting its chances for passage by Congress. Manchin has a direct interest in this gift to greenhouse gas emitters. He has been fighting protests by environmental groups and small landowners in his home state opposing the completion of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, a 300-mile pipeline for the transport of Appalachian shale gas from West Virginia to Virginia. Included in the bill is a little-noted provision that will shift judicial review of suits lodged against the pipeline project from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which has upheld some of the protests, to the US Court of Appeals for the D.C Circuit, deemed more friendly to the fossil fuel industry.
Is the climate bill 'historic'? Maybe not, historians say. - There’s a word Democrats keep throwing around to describe the “Inflation Reduction Act.” “This was very, very important — and historic, many have said,” Vice President Kamala Harris said just after casting the tie-breaking vote to advance it through the Senate. “I think Americans will see historic results,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said on CNN hours after it cleared the upper chamber. “This is a historic victory for the United States and the planet,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) said in a statement Sunday. Activists, scientists, trade associations, unions — all of them are using the H-word to describe the $369 billion in spending for climate change and energy programs in the “Inflation Reduction Act.” In a literal sense, it’s true: This is a record amount of money for cutting U.S. climate pollution. Historians themselves, though, are more circumspect about where this bill fits into the grand arc of history. “One lesson from the history of American energy is that there’s never been the passage of a bill and then everything was done,” said Paul Sabin, a professor of history at Yale University. What the legislation actually accomplishes, he said, will be the subject of constant renegotiation between federal agencies, courts, state and local officials, and international market forces. “We’re 40 or 50 years into the climate era — but we’re really still at the beginning,” Sabin said. Time, nevertheless, is running short. Scientists say that avoiding the worst effects of climate change will require slashing global greenhouse gas emissions 50 percent by 2030. The “Inflation Reduction Act” is forecast to help the United States reach a 40 percent reduction by 2030. There’s no true parallel for that pace of action in U.S. environmental or energy history, said John McNeill, a professor of history at Georgetown University. In the 1970s, many of the bedrock environmental and consumer protection laws in the United States passed in a flurry of bills — numbering more than five dozen altogether. That was an intensification of a yearslong trend, McNeill said, and the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act transformed the U.S. regulatory regime “almost overnight.” No energy system can change that quickly, he said. But the “Inflation Reduction Act” is the most significant attempt to decarbonize the power sector in U.S. history. “If that happens — that’s a big if — this is of far greater historical importance than the intensified environmental regulatory regime that was put in place in 1970 to 73,” McNeill said. “Because energy regimes are so fundamental to human existence — to the course of history, to economies, to health, to the distribution of power in the international system — all these things are at stake,” he added.
Climate groups react to Senate passing the Inflation Reduction Act - The Senate passed the most ambitious climate spending package in U.S. history on Sunday, prompting optimism among environmental advocates after months of gridlock around President Joe Biden's emissions-reducing agenda.Called the Inflation Reduction Act, the legislation earmarks $369 billion for U.S. energy security and fighting climate change.Vice President Kamala Harris provided the tie-breaking vote on the bill after senators voted along party lines. The bill will now head to the House. Here's what [industrial] climate groups said of the legislation:
- American Clean Power Association: "This is the vote heard around the world. It puts America on a path to creating 550,000 new clean energy jobs while reducing economy-wide emissions 40% by 2030. This is a generational opportunity for clean energy after years of uncertainty and delay. This unprecedented investment in clean energy will supercharge America's clean energy economy and keep the United States within striking distance of our climate goals."
- Solar Energy Industries Association:"Today is a monumental day for America's clean energy progress and global climate leadership. With the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act in the Senate, solar and storage companies are one step closer to having the business certainty they need to make the long-term investments that decarbonize the electric grid and create millions of new career opportunities in cities and towns across the country. This legislation is the most transformational investment America has ever made in our climate future, and we are thankful to our members, the clean energy community and every one of our solar champions in Congress for their work to get us to this historic moment."
However, some groups argued the bill carves out too much for fossil fuel projects. "This bill reflects an unjust process, where the voices of communities at the frontlines of fossil fuel production and harm were largely ignored," Jean Su, Energy Justice program director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said ahead of the bill's passage. "While it contains important renewable-energy funding, the bill's commitment to massive federal oil and gas expansion is dangerously at odds with scientific reality," she added.
Here’s How Democrats’ Big Domestic Agenda Bill Has Shrunk - The New York Times— — The sweeping climate change, health care and tax package that is on track to clear Congress this week is a major victory for President Biden and Democrats in Congress, who toiled for months to salvage as much as they could of a domestic agenda that met with solid Republican opposition and resistance from within their own ranks.But the plan, which passed the Senate on Sunday, falls far short of the transformational cradle-to-grave social safety net plan that Mr. Biden had pitched, which would have invested trillions in public education, affordable child care and a federal paid leave program, paid for by an overhaul of the tax code to target the highest earners and big corporations.Many of those elements were dropped as Democrats contended with the realities of their slim majorities in Congress and the demands of two Democratic holdouts, Senators Joe Manchin III of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, with conflicting priorities. President Biden made a variety of climate proposals central to his administration’s agenda, aiming to fulfill a pledge that the nation would reduce its emissions at least 50 percent below 2005 levels by the end of the decade. The proposals included the establishment of a Civilian Climate Corps, limits on offshore drilling, and ambitions to drive people and companies toward wind and solar power.Mr. Manchin, a centrist Democrat protective of his state’s oil and gas industries, forced his party to set aside many of its climate proposals, including a plan that would have replaced coal- and gas-fired power plants with wind and solar power. In November, the House approved $555 billion for programs intended to curb fossil fuel emissions. The programs were scrapped at Mr. Manchin’s insistence. Mr. Biden, backed by leading liberals like Senator Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent, pushed to expand not only the scope of the Affordable Care Act, but Medicare benefits to cover hearing, dental and vision. As lawmakers whittled down a $3.5 trillion budget blueprint, the House agreed to spend $165 billion to cover hearing for Medicare, provide insurance for an additional four million people through Medicaid and continue reducing health care premiums for people covered through the Obamacare marketplace. The Medicare expansion was among the items dropped in negotiations with Mr. Manchin. In a deal he struck late last month with Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader, the bill includes a three-year extension of expanded Affordable Care Act subsidies, set to expire at the end of the year, for an additional three years. Mr. Biden and Democrats pushed to redefine infrastructure beyond roads and bridges to include child care, a program to provide federal paid family and medical leave, and billions of dollars for college financial aid, housing support and home care. The House-passed bill also sought to maintain expanded monthly payments to families with children, which helped reduce child poverty. Mr. Manchin expressed reservations about many of the programs, insisting that they should be limited only to the people who needed them — if they were included at all. When Mr. Manchin rejected a $2.2 trillion version of the domestic policy plan passed by the House last fall, the monthly payments aimed at reducing child poverty lapsed at the end of 2021. The programs were scrapped at Mr. Manchin’s insistence. Top Democrats spent time on the Senate floor Saturday vowing to pursue them in future legislation, though it was unlikely they could draw the requisite level of Republican support to do so. A Medicare expansion fell, but a drug price reduction plan was added.
Will the climate package in Congress help those who need it? - In some ways, it’s a peculiar time for Congress to be heaping tax credits onto the electric vehicle industry.Sales of electric vehicles are skyrocketing and recently hit record highs, according to Cox Automotive. General Motors, which lost access to the old U.S. tax credit for electric vehicles three years ago, has sold 70,000 plug-ins since then despite a public relations disaster involving burning batteries. Pricier Tesla has reached an annual pace of nearly 1 million car sales worldwide. And multiyear back orders have piled up for electric versions of GM’s Hummer, Volkswagen’s updated minivan and Ford’s Mustang among others.Despite that robust business, the Inflation Reduction Act, which the Senate approved Sunday and is likely to be passed into law by the end of the week, will pump $36 billion to incentivize more electric car purchases over the next decade. It’s part of $369 billion in the bill for tax subsidies and other measures designed to speed up the clean energy transition.The Senate passed the sprawling legislation, a key part of President Biden’s economic agenda, on Aug. 7 after almost 20 hours of debate on the Senate floor. (Video: The Washington Post)A wide range of economists and energy and climate experts agree the money will be a powerful tool to reduce carbon emissions and transition America’s economy to one that contributes much less to global warming. Yet even if the federal money becomes available, a lot else will have to come to pass to make the investment pay off.An entire supply chain of rare minerals, semiconductors, batteries and financing has to fall into place before Americans give up their combustion engines. American consumers can only claim the full $7,500 credit for an all-electric engine if their manufacturers displace Chinese batteries by 2024 and minerals from China or other countries lacking free-trade agreements by 2025 — a threshold that automakers are warning could be impossible to meet. And China, furious right now over House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent visit to Taiwan, will be watching as the United States openly strives to liberate itself from manufacturing in the People’s Republic.Nonfinancial barriers — such as local opposition to building wind and solar farms or a lack of transmission lines — must be overcome. And with roughly 40 tax credits in the legislation, some of those aimed at transforming the energy economy from automobiles to wind turbines to heat pumps will inevitably miss the mark. Some portion of those funds will be pocketed when they aren’t entirely needed — many companies have promised to transition to clean energy irrespective of federal policy.Abandoned coal mines are being transformed into solar installations large enough to contribute renewable energy to the electric grid. (Video: Zoeann Murphy/The Washington Post)And some money will go to projects that never materialize or fail altogether. The 2009 stimulus bill, the largest investment in clean energy before the new bill, created a clean energy loan program that infamously funded the failed solar start-up Solyndra, which became an embarrassment for the Obama administration. And it poured billions of dollars into a high-speed-rail system in California that has still not come to fruition. “It’s very hard to try to target incentives to activities that wouldn’t otherwise happen,” said N. Gregory Mankiw, a Harvard University economics professor and chairman of President George W. Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers. “Some dollars are wasted, but that’s the nature of government subsidies.” The electric vehicle benefits are a good illustration of these dynamics. Existing tax law provides $7,500 tax credits for each of the 200,000 electric vehicles made by an individual manufacturer. After that, the credits are phased out for that manufacturer over the course of a year. If GM’s customers since April 2019 got the full tax credit, they would have received $200 million to $300 million for doing something they did anyway.
Inflation Reduction Act Commits Just $47 Billion to Environmental Justice, Activists Say - Senate Democrats could be “overcounting” the funding for environmental justice provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act and misrepresenting the bill’s benefits for low-income families, communities of color and other historically disadvantaged Americans, according to a coalition of climate and environmental justice advocacy groups that is analyzing the 725-page spending package. Despite the general disapproval from environmentalists over the bill’s provisions that benefit the fossil fuel industry that were included in the final measure passed by the Senate over the weekend, however, the House is expected to approve the bill with little or no alteration sometime this week. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and other party leaders have billed their spending package as a necessary compromise that would ensure the United States can keep its promises to tackle climate change and elevate environmental justice. The draft legislation dedicates nearly $370 billion to address rising greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to the effects of global warming, including more than $60 billion for projects that in some way advance environmental justice and reduce the nation’s long standing environmental and health disparities. But a preliminary analysis by the Just Solutions Collective, a nonpartisan think tank that promotes equitable climate policies and acts as a coalition hub for environmental justice groups nationwide, has found just $47.5 billion in the bill that it considers beneficial for low-income families and communities of color. In some cases, the group says, Senate Democrats appear to be counting the total spending for certain programs where only part of that funding is dedicated to helping disadvantaged communities. For example, all $27 billion for a national green bank appears to be counted, while only $15 billion of that funding pool is dedicated to benefiting disadvantaged communities, according to the analysis. Similarly, all $3 billion for neighborhood access and equity grants appears to be counted, while only $1.1 is earmarked for disadvantaged communities. Same with the $87 million for the low-emissions electricity program, where just $17 million of that goes to those communities. As well as all $281 million for air pollution monitoring, where only $3 million goes to those groups. If her calculations prove accurate, Sylvia Chi, a senior strategist on federal policies and financing for Just Solutions Collective, said that’s a $12.5 billion shortfall in what proponents of the Inflation Reduction Act say would benefit the nation’s most vulnerable populations. That’s a significant discrepancy, Chi told me in an interview, “especially when you consider what they cut out of Build Back Better, including $9 billion for lead remediation.” Schumer’s office did not respond to questions about Chi’s analysis.
'Inflation Reduction Act' Would Make IRS Among The Largest Govt Agencies -- by Jazz Shaw via HotAir. Tucked away in the hilariously-named “Inflation Reduction Act” that Joe Manchin has been working on with Chuck Schumer is one significant bit of spending that has been mostly flying under the radar. The measure would fund a massive expansion of the Internal Revenue Service to the tune of eighty billion dollars. And we’re not using the word “massive” in a hyperbolic fashion here. This money would go toward hiring an additional 87,000 employees for the detested agency, more than doubling the size of its workforce. As the Free Beacon points out this week, that would make the IRS larger (in terms of manpower) than the Pentagon, the State Department, the FBI and the Border Patrol combined. And what do they plan to do with that many people? Do you really need us to tell you?If Democrats have their way, one of the most detested federal agencies—the Internal Revenue Service—will employ more bureaucrats than the Pentagon, State Department, FBI, and Border Patrol combined.Under the Inflation Reduction Act negotiated by Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.), the agency would receive $80 billion in funding to hire as many as 87,000 additional employees. The increase would more than double the size of the IRS workforce, which currently has 78,661 full-time staffers, according to federal data.The additional IRS funding is integral to the Democrats’ reconciliation package. A Congressional Budget Office analysis found the hiring of new IRS agents would result in more than $200 billion in additional revenue for the federal government over the next decade. More than half of that funding is specifically earmarked for “enforcement,” meaning tax audits and other responsibilities such as “digital asset monitoring.” So this expansion would turn the IRS into an even larger beast than it already is. And we know that it’s also one of the most heavily armed agencies in the federal government. So what do they need all of those people for, not to mention all of the guns and ammo? Democrats always talk about the need to go after “the top one percent” and make them “pay their fair share.” It’s true that we have quite a few wealthy people in this country, but we don’t have so many that you need more than 150,000 agents to keep an eye on them. No, according to one recent study cited in the linked report, this move is being sought to generate more revenue for the federal government. And the vast majority of that new revenue will come from families earning less than $200K per year. In other words, the middle to upper-middle class. Trust us, the IRS already goes over Elon Musk’s taxes with one hundred fine-toothed combs.
What the Senate's sweeping climate, tax package means for banks | American Banker — The U.S. Senate passed a sweeping legislative package on Sunday that could supercharge the federal government's efforts to finance the societal transition to cleaner energy and deliver long-sought tax reforms targeting large businesses. The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 was passed in a party-line vote of 51-50 on Sunday using the budget reconciliation process, which is exempt from the Senate's 60-vote-threshold filibuster. Democratic senators were joined by Vice President Kamala Harris's tiebreaking vote to advance the package which now moves to the House, where Democrats hold a thin majority. If passed by the House, the Inflation Reduction Act would represent the U.S. government's largest single investment in improving the nation's climate preparedness — a total of $369 billion in tax incentives and subsidies to push consumers and energy companies alike toward cleaner forms of energy. The bill also contains significant tax reforms that would target some of the country's largest businesses, including some banks. A new minimum tax of 15% would target corporate profits for firms reporting more than $1 billion in annual income, for instance. The bill would also deliver a roughly $80 billion increase to the budget of the Internal Revenue Service, an investment sought by the Biden administration since early 2021. The bolstered budget secured by the Senate this month passed without a related provision that was fiercely opposed by the banking industry last year — a proposal to have banks reportaccount inflows and outflows for customers in an attempt to crack down on tax avoidance. The Inflation Reduction Act would introduce another progressive priority in tax policy: a 1% stock buyback tax. Jaret Seiberg, a managing director at the Cowen Washington Research Group, said in a research note Monday that the buyback tax could represent a long-term risk for banks, particularly if the tax is increased above 1% in coming years. "This is an issue for publicly traded banks as regulators prefer buybacks to dividend increases," Seiberg wrote, "as they believe the market is more accepting of banks slashing buybacks than they are of banks cutting dividends. As such, we see this provision as contributing to systemic risk." Senate Banking Chair Sherrod Brown of Ohio applauded the passage of a stock buyback tax provision in a press release Sunday afternoon, noting that he had introduced the Stock Buyback Accountability Act with Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., last fall. (Brown and Wyden's original bill would have set the buyback tax at 2%.) In the press release, Brown said that the Inflation Reduction Act marked "an historic step to fight inflation, lower costs, and create jobs that corporations can't ship overseas," adding that Democrats were "taking on Wall Street to rein in stock buybacks that reward CEOs at the expense of workers."
Republicans set sights on Manchin over climate bill - -West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin’s leadership role on Democrats’ climate change, tax and health care package is intensifying Republicans’ efforts to kick him out of the Senate. Manchin, a staunchly pro-fossil-fuel lawmaker who leads the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, isn’t up for reelection until 2024. But the GOP, which sees the $739 billion “Inflation Reduction Act” as an attack on fossil fuels and argues it would increase costs for a broad range of Americans, is lining up significant efforts to beat him. Former President Donald Trump last week pledged to work against Manchin for “devastating” West Virginia, which gave Trump one of the largest vote shares in the 2020 presidential election. “I’ll go down and campaign against him as hard as anybody can,” Trump said in his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference, eliciting cheers from the audience. And one of Manchin’s former allies and an historically dominant industry in West Virginia, the coal sector, is on bad terms with him following the Senate’s vote on the bill. The West Virginia Coal Association joined a handful of coal groups in other states in a harsh critique of the climate legislation last week before it passed. Manchin worked on the deal with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). “This legislation is so egregious, it leaves those of us that call Sen. Manchin a friend, shocked and disheartened,” they wrote in their open letter. “Sen. Manchin has seemingly fought against numerous climate measures advanced over the past year by the national democratic establishment,” they said. “The current Schumer-Manchin draft agreement on climate and energy frankly leaves us questioning the motivation and sincerity of Manchin’s previous stance and his repeated chant: we must ‘innovate not eliminate.’” Manchin hasn’t formally committed to seeking reelection in 2024, but such a run appears likely.
GOP senators blocked a $35 insulin price cap: What to know - The Senate passed a sweeping budget package Sunday intended to bring financial relief to Americans, but not before Republican senators voted to strip a proposal that would have capped the price of insulin at $35 per month for many patients. A proposal that limits the monthly cost of insulin to $35 for Medicare patients was left untouched. But using a parliamentary rule, GOP lawmakers were able to jettison the part of the proposal that would apply to privately insured patients. Seven Republicans joined Democrats in supporting the broader price cap, but that wasn’t enough for passage. A number of Republican senators who voted for the proposal to be removed come from states with some of the highest mortality rates for diabetes, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including Arkansas, Oklahoma and Tennessee. Lowering the price of drugs such as insulin, which is used by diabetics to manage their blood sugar levels, is broadly popular with voters, polling shows. Senate Democrats denounced Republicans for voting against relief for Americans struggling to pay for the lifesaving drug. More than 30 million Americans have diabetes, and about 7 million require insulin daily to manage their blood sugar levels. The insulin price cap, part of a larger package of proposals to cut prescription drug and other health-care costs, was intended to limit out-of-pocket monthly insulin costs to $35 for most Americans who use insulin. More than 1 in 5 insulin users on private medical insurance pay more than $35 per month for the medicine, according to a recent analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation. The same analysis found that the median monthly savings for those people would range from $19 to $27, depending on their type of insurance market. The average Medicare patient using insulin paid $54 for prescriptions, according to KFF, an increase of nearly 40 percent since 2007. With the Republican vote to strip the provision, only Medicare recipients would be eligible for the cap. The legislation still must pass the House. W.
Opinion | Drug companies are warning that Medicare pricing reform spells doom. Don't fall for it. - The Washington Post - Democrats are on the verge of passing legislation that, among other things, would empower the government to directly negotiate the price Medicare pays for a handful of the costliest prescription drugs. The measure has precipitated hyperbole from industry lobbyists, who say it represents an existential threat to medical innovation. One prominent group recently claimed the bill “could propel us light years back into the dark ages of biomedical research.”Forthcoming research from our think tank, the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity, proves what investors have long known: The R&D labs of the global pharma giants are lumbering and inefficient.We analyzed pricing practices and R&D productivity for 17 of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer, AbbVie, Novartis and Johnson & Johnson. Together, these companies represent more than 60 percent of global pharma revenue and 56 percent of industry R&D spending.Reducing big-pharma spending likely wouldn’t have a large effect on drug development. Consider this: Had the largest companies held net prices constant on a single large drug in each of their portfolios from 2012 to 2021, Americans would have spent $139 billion less on prescription drugs. Because big companies deployed about 18 percent of their revenue on R&D, that $139 billion in savings translates to approximately $25 billion in reduced R&D spending by the majors.But according to our analysis, that $25 billion in R&D spending accounts for only five drugs developed in these giants’ own labs. That’s 1.2 percent of the 430 drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration in that period.In fact, the largest drug companies are only one-fifth as efficient as the overall industry in R&D. The big companies spend $5 billion per newly developed homegrown drug; the industry average is closer to $1 billion.
The IRA Drug Price ‘Victory’ - If you’re anywhere near a news machine at all, you’ve heard about Joe Manchin’s IRA (“Inflation Reduction Act”) bill, and with respect to drug pricing, you’ve probably seen headlines like these…
- Thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, Medicare is on track to negotiate drug prices (MarketWatch)
- Senate OKs sweeping bill lowering drug prices and promoting clean energy, setting up major Biden win (USA Today)
…offset by headlines like these…
- Schumer Lets Aide Kill Key Drug Price Reforms: The decision comes as Schumer is now the Senate’s #2 recipient of pharmaceutical industry campaign cash(David Sirota / Lever News)
- Democratic drug pricing bill removes insulin cost cap (The Hill)
The drug-price provisions of the shiny IRA bill are being touted from many corners, and in truth, one provision does represent a crack in the wall of drug-price obstruction. But that crack is so small that no one in the industry will shed private tears over its appearance — though for-show public tears are bound to flow, the better to fool you with. To put it bluntly, the drug-price victory that many people are celebrating is far less than it seems. Here’s a handy summary from The Hill of the contents of the bill. This is about its health care provisions:
Every Single Senate Democrat Just Voted Against Defining Pregnancy As A Biologically Female Process - During the passage of Joe Biden’s ‘Inflation Increasing Reduction Act’ in the Senate Sunday, all 50 Democrats voted against an amendment that sought to define pregnancy as a uniquely biologically female process. The amendment was introduced by GOP Senator Marco Rubio, who noted “The only people capable of being pregnant are biological females, and therefore, I think federal pregnancy programs should be limited to biological females, and that’s what this would do.”“A few minutes ago, I looked back across 5,500 years of human history, and so far, every single human pregnancy has been biological female,” Rubio continued.The Senator further stated “And therefore, the only thing I’m trying to do is make sure that federal law is clear, since every pregnancy that’s ever existed has been in a biological females, and that our federal laws reflect that pregnancy programs are available to the only people who are capable of getting pregnant: biological females.”Democratic Senator Patty Murray responded to Rubio, stating “it’s actually outrageous that Republicans are trying to talk about pregnancy when in this country right now, they are forcing women to stay pregnant no matter their circumstances, pushing cruel and extreme abortion bans.” Watch:
Climate Bill Passes: It Could Short-Circuit EV Tax Credits, Making Qualifying for Them Nearly Impossible --Congress passed a far-reaching climate, energy and health care bill on Aug. 12, 2022, that invests an unprecedented US$370 billion in energy and climate programs over the next 10 years – including incentives to expand renewable energy and electric vehicles. Rapid and widespread adoption of electric vehicles will be essential for the United States to meet its climate goals. And the new bill, which includes a host of other health and tax-related provisions, aims to encourage people to trade their gasoline-fueled cars for electrics by offering a tax credit of up to $7,500 for new electric vehicles and up to $4,000 for used electric vehicles through 2032.But there’s a catch, and it could end up making it difficult for most EVs to qualify for the new incentive.The bill, which now heads to President Joe Biden’s desk, requires that new electric vehicles meet stringent sourcing requirements for critical materials, the components of the battery, and final assembly to qualify for the tax credits. While some automakers, like Tesla and GM, have well-developed domestic supply chains, no electric vehicle manufacturer currently meets all the bill’s requirements.At first glance, the revised EV tax credits seem like a smart move.Existing U.S. policy allows credits for the first 200,000 electric vehicles a manufacturer sells. Those credits helped jump-start demand for EVs. But industry leaders, including Tesla and GM, have already hit that cap, while most foreign automakers’ vehicles are still eligible. The bill would eliminate the cap for individual automakers and extend the tax credits through 2032 – for any vehicle that meets the sourcing requirements.Right now, China dominates the global supply chain for materials and lithium-ion batteries used in electric vehicles. This is no accident. Since the early 2000s, Chinese policymakers have adopted aggressive policies that have supported advanced battery technologies, including investments in mines, materials processing and manufacturing. I discuss how China got a head start in the race toward a clean energy future in my new book, Charged: A History of Batteries and Lessons for a Clean Energy Future.Sen. Joe Manchin, the West Virginia Democrat who stalled earlier efforts to get these measures through the sharply divided Senate, said he hopes the requirements will help scale up the U.S. domestic critical minerals supply chain.The EV incentives would complement other U.S. policies aimed at jump-starting domestic EV manufacturing capacity. Those include $7 billion in grants to accelerate the development of the battery supply chain allocated in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 and a $3 billion expansion of the Advanced Vehicle Manufacturing Loan Program included in the current bill, formally known as the Inflation Reduction Act.The problem is that the Inflation Reduction Act’s sourcing requirements come online so quickly, starting in 2023, and ratchet upward so rapidly, that the plan could backfire. Instead of expanding electric vehicle adoption, the policy could make almost all electric vehicles ineligible for the tax incentives.
Inflation Reduction Act heads to Biden's desk - The House has passed the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, a sweeping legislative package that looks to lower healthcare costs, fight climate change and increase taxes on some large companies. The package, which passed in a 220-207 vote, now goes to President Joe Biden, who is expected to sign it into law. The House vote follows a 51-50 party-line approval by the Senate on Sunday, with Vice President Kamala Harris casting a tie-breaking vote. The legislation will represent a total of $369 billion in tax incentives and subsidies for cleaner forms of energy — the largest single investment in combating climate change in the history of the United States. Most of the debate in the House focused on these climate efforts, as well as the Republicans' concerns that increased funding to the Internal Revenue Service could blowback on low and middle income Americans. But it's the tax changes in the bill that could have the greatest impact on some of the country's largest financial corporations, including banks. Among other provisions, the package includes a new minimum tax of 15% that would target corporate profits for firms reporting more than $1 billion in annual income, a roughly $80 billion increase to the budget of the IRS. The legislation notably doesn't include a measure earlier supported by the Biden administration that would require banks to report to the IRS how much money flows in and out of individual accounts each year. Financial services lobbyists opposed the measure last year. The legislation does include a new 1% excise tax on corporate stock buybacks, projected to raise $74 billion over the next decade, according to congressional estimates. It's unclear to what degree that new excise tax would affect banks, which represent some of the largest corporations that repurchase the most shares, by dollar value, in the country. Banks have also come under political pressure in recent years from progressives such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who have criticized banks' repurchasing programs as the country recovered from the economic shutdowns of COVID-19. Jaret Seiberg, a managing director at the Cowen Washington Research Group, said in a note that it's hard to see companies changing their behavior in response to a 1% excise tax, but that it could become an easy way for Washington to raise additional money to offset new spending.
US Senate targets Social Security and Medicare -- Last week, Republican Senator Ron Johnson called for ending Social Security and Medicare as entitlement programs, instead transferring them into the discretionary budget where they would be gutted. Johnson’s proposal follows a similar call by Florida Senator Rick Scott, who earlier this year called for putting Social Security and Medicare up for renewal every five years. Social Security and Medicare spending is allocated as mandatory spending, funded by workers’ payroll taxes, to prevent them from being pillaged. Transferring these programs to the discretionary budget would mean their abolition, slashing US life expectancy as millions of retirees die in poverty and from preventable disease. “If you qualify for the entitlement, you just get it no matter what the cost,” Johnson said. “And our problem in this country is that [mandatory spending takes up] more than 70% of our federal budget, of our federal spending.” Yes, retired workers are “entitled” to these benefits, because they have been paying for them their entire lives. Out of every dollar workers have earned, they paid eight cents to finance their Social Security and Medicare benefits, matched by equal payments from their employer. But Johnson and Scott, lackeys for the billionaires that rule over America, are demanding that these funds that workers have been paying into over a lifetime of toil and struggle be stolen from them to make the oligarchy richer and to fund America’s new “forever wars.”
The US Military Was Just Used To Help A Dementia Patient Try To Start WW3 – Caitlin Johnstone - House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has left Taiwan after a brief but diplomatically corrosive visit, the aftereffects from which may be felt for years to come.Toward the end of her speech alongside Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen, Pelosi’s brain underwent one of its increasingly common software glitches, causing her to begin babbling inarticulately. (video) Here is a transcript of what Nancy Pelosi’s brain said: “In our earliest days at our founding of our country, Benjamin Franklin, our presidency, said, freedom and democracy. Freedom and democracy, one thing, security here. If we don’t have- we can’t have either, if we don’t have both.”Of course Benjamin Franklin was neither a president of the United States nor a “presidency”, and the quote Nancy’s floundering brain was reaching for was “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” These are not difficult things to remember or articulate for someone with functioning gray matter.This is right up there with other famous neural malfunctions by the speaker, like her “Bernie loves hearing” gibberish from last year or her bizarre “Good morning, Sunday morning” restart in the middle of an interview a couple of years ago, and it calls to mind a DC pharmacist’s casual remark in 2017that he had filled prescriptions to treat Alzheimer’s disease for some powerful decision makers on Capitol Hill.None of which would be a problem, if we were talking about some little old lady whiling away her twilight years at a retirement home in Florida. But we are not; we are talking about one of the most powerful elected officials in the most powerful government on earth, third in the line of succession to the presidency after the vice president.More importantly, we are talking about someone who just participated in an incendiary visit to Taiwan which has ensured the escalation of dangerous cold war tensions between major world powers, and could potentially have triggered a hot war with China.US war machinery, including aircraft carriers and large planes, were mobilized to provide security for Pelosi’s visit ahead of her arrival. The United States military was literally just used to help a dementia patient try to start World War Three.
In wake of Pelosi visit, US-China military standoff continues - Military tensions remain high across the Taiwan Strait in the wake of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s provocative trip last week to Taiwan. The American nuclear aircraft carrier, the USS Ronald Reagan, with its strike group, has been ordered to remain in nearby waters, as the Chinese military yesterday announced ongoing military drills. China’s Eastern Theatre Command declared that it was continuing “to carry out practical joint exercises and training in the sea and airspace around Taiwan island” and “focusing on organising joint anti-submarine and sea assault operations.” No indication was given of the time and place of the drills. The continuing military activities follow the ending of major Chinese live-fire exercises involving warships, warplanes and missile launches in five different zones adjacent to Taiwan, in some cases crossing the median line in the Taiwan Strait. The Chinese military fired a number of short-range ballistic missiles, including several that landed inside Japan’s 200-nautical mile Economic Exclusion Zone. The live-fire exercises ended at noon on Sunday, but the potential for an incident or clash remained high up until the last minute. An unnamed source told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that shortly before those drills ended, about 10 warships each from China and Taiwan manoeuvred at close quarters around the unofficial median line of the Taiwan Strait. At its narrowest the Taiwan Strait separating the island from the Chinese mainland is just 130 kilometres wide. Taiwan’s foreign ministry yesterday condemned the announcement that China’s Eastern Theatre Command was continuing to drill, declaring that Taiwan would not back down in the face of military intimidation. Taiwan’s comments are part of the chorus of criticism orchestrated from Washington condemning Beijing’s response to Pelosi’s visit. White House officials, US politicians and media commentators have been joined by American military allies, such as Australia and Japan, in lashing China’s actions as “disproportionate,” “destabilising” and “aggressive.” What hypocrisy! The Biden administration was well aware that Pelosi’s trip was playing with fire and initially even warned against it, knowing that it had the potential to provoke a conflict. Both the Trump and Biden administrations have step-by-step been deliberately undermining the One China policy that has been the bedrock of US-China relations since formal diplomatic ties were established in 1979. Under the One China policy, the US de facto recognised Beijing as the legitimate government of all China, including Taiwan, ended diplomatic relations with Taipei and withdrew all military forces from the island. After decades of limited low-level contact, the US has not only ratchetted up high-level US visits to Taiwan, but acknowledged the presence of US troops on the island and dramatically boosted arms sales to Taiwan. In that context, the visit by Pelosi, the second in line to the US president, was calculated to provoke a response. Just as the US goaded Russia into invading Ukraine by ignoring its national security concerns, so the Biden administration is intent on provoking a proxy war with China in Taiwan. Biden has now declared on three occasions that the US would join Taiwan in any conflict with China—a clear breach of the longstanding policy of “strategic ambiguity.” The US previously sought to stabilise the inherently unstable situation across the Taiwan Strait. In order to inhibit Taiwanese provocations against Beijing, it refused, until now, to declare military support for Taiwan in a war with China, in all circumstances.
Pelosi Says Xi Reacting Like "Scared Bully" In A "Fragile Crisis" - After China's PLA military extended its drills encircling and threatening Taiwan, which are now reaching a full week in duration following House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's provocative visit to the island, she blasted Chinese President Xi Jinping in a Tuesday MSNBC "Morning Joe" interview. Pelosi was asked about Xi's reaction to her being the highest American official to visit the self-ruled island in 25 years, to which she answered by saying xi is behaving like a "scared bully" given he's in a "fragile crisis" in the wake of her trip. Via AP"I think that he’s in a fragile crisis … he has problems with his economy. He’s acting like a scared bully," Pelosi said early Tuesday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe" she said when pressed on what she's "learned" about the leader.“We met with every Speaker in all five countries, and their members of parliament, so it’s very productive. And in terms of Taiwan, we were not going to take Taiwan off our list because the president of Taiwan has invited us." She then added that the "President of China does not do our schedule."And yet for all her tough talk lashing at at the "bully" Xi, it remains that 24 million Taiwanese find themselves surrounded, commercial aviation routes blocked and some key trade shipping lanes cut off.There was also a point in the MSNBC interview where she had a 'Biden senior moment' and significant gaffe given she kept talking about China being a free and democratic society...;
Ron Paul: Pelosi's Taiwan Trip Exposes US Policy As Dangerous, Deadly, & Dumb - House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s "surprise" trip to Taiwan last week should be "Exhibit A" as to why interventionism is dangerous, deadly, and dumb. Though she claimed her visit won some sort of victory for democracy over autocracy, the stopover achieved nothing of the sort. It was a pointless gesture that brought us closer to military conflict with zero benefits. As Col. Doug Macgregor said of Pelosi’s trip on a recent episode of Tucker Carlson Tonight, "statesmanship involves advancing American interests at the least cost to the American people. None of that is in play here... Posturing is not statesmanship." PLA pilot patrolling near Taiwan on Sunday: Xinhua via AP Pelosi’s trip was no outlier. Such counterproductive posturing is much celebrated by both parties in Washington. Neoconservative Senators Bob Menendez and Lindsey Graham were thrilled with Pelosi’s stop in Taipei and used it as a springboard to push for new legislation that would essentially declare war on China by declaring Taiwan a "major non-NATO ally." The "one China" policy that, while perhaps not perfect, has kept the peace for more than 40 years is to be scrapped and replaced with one sure to provoke a war. Who benefits? Foolishly taking the US to the brink of war with Russia over Ukraine is evidently not enough for Washington’s bipartisan warmongering class. Risking a nuclear war on two fronts, with both Russia and China, is apparently the only way for Washington to show the rest of the world it’s serious. The Washington Post’s neoconservative columnist Josh Rogin accurately captures the mindset in Washington DC with a recent article titled, "The skeptics are wrong: The US can confront both China and Russia." For Washington’s foreign policy "experts," those of us who don’t believe a war with both Russia and China is a great idea are written off as "skeptics." Count me as one of the skeptics! During the Cold War there were times of heightened tension, but even in the darkest days the idea that nuclear war with China and the Soviet Union could be a solution was held only by only a few madmen. Now, with the ideological struggles of the Cold War a decades-old memory, such an argument makes even less sense. Yet this is what Washington is selling.
When Will Foreign Leaders Start Asking To Speak To America’s REAL Government? – Caitlin Johnstone -- During the furor over Nancy Pelosi’s incendiary Taiwan visit last week, I was watching an appearance by Antiwar’s Dave DeCamp on the show Rising which brought up the under-discussed point that US officials going to Taipei is actually a continuation of a trend that had already been happening under the Trump administration.DeCamp pointed out that China began regularly flying planes into Taiwan’s Air Defense Identification Zone after Trump administration officials made similar visits to Pelosi’s.“That started happening regularly after August 2020 when President Trump sent Alex Azar to Taiwan,” DeCamp said. “He was his health secretary. He was the highest-level cabinet official to visit Taiwan since 1979. The following month, in September 2020, they sent Keith Krach. He was the undersecretary for economics in the State Department, and he was the highest-level State Department official to visit Taiwan since 1979. So these are unprecedented steps, and since then we’ve seen more Chinese military activity in the region.”Later in the interview Rising’s Briahna Joy Gray asked DeCamp if these escalations against China from the Trump administration into the Biden administration were a “kind of blob foreign policy decision that is not partisan.” DeCamp explained how in 2018 the US military began officially transitioning from emphasis on “counter-terrorism” in the Middle East toward “great power competition” with China and Russia, with the ultimate target being China.“If you look at all the really hawkish think tanks in Washington that are funded by the arms industry, it’s all about this so-called great power competition,” DeCamp said. “Russia right now seems to be the more imminent issue I guess, but China seems to be in the long run. And we’ve seen this from just about every government agency — the Pentagon, the FBI, the State Department, the CIA — say that China is the long-term so-called threat. And we’ve seen Biden say this, and this is kind of the name of the game in Washington right now.”
Is the US Underestimating China’s Space and Counterspace Capabilities? – Yves Smith - In a recent Links reader Michaelmas highlighted a fresh report on China’s space warfare capabilities, which we have embedded at the end of this post.Yours truly is not a war nerd, much the less a weapons geek. However, it does not take much in the way of powers of observation to notice that the US very much underestimated Russia’s military, despite presumably having it as an object of study. We were confident the Ukraine army, trained and kitted out to NATO standards, and supersized by mercenaries,1 would make quick work of Russia.One of the striking features of early and still continuing commentary on the war was insisting that if Russia was not prosecuting the war using US doctrine, it must be losing. US doctrine would be the methods we used during counterinsurgency wars: pound infrastructure with air strikes, cut off electricity and communications, and then when you’d flattened an area, move in troops and equipment for what amounted to clearing operations.Russia instead makes much less use of air forces and fancy high tech weapons than we do (why deploy planes and pilots to blow things up? Just use missiles to fly in the bombs) and vastly greater use of artillery. It’s taken the much-discussed-only-in-alternative-media report from the Royal United Services Institute, The Return of Industrial Warfare, to lay out how overwhelming an advantage Russia has in firepower, and how it will take the West at least a decade of capacity-building to catch up.The Western press and pundit response (to the extent they’ve noticed that Russia is grinding down the Ukraine military, and so in control of the battlefield that it can rotate its troops when it sees fit) has been to complain that Russia is using primitive weapons, as if wars were fought in accordance with the Marquess of Queensberry rules. But those whinges overlooked that Russia is second to none in missiles and missile defense. The S-400 system is better than anything has. Russia’s S-500 system is starting to be deployed. This is a long-winded way of saying the US defense-intel complex has come to believe its own PR about the supposed superiority of US equipment and methods. After all, we must be getting a lot for the vast sums we spend on our armed forces.
The "Unthinkable" In US-China Crisis -- One aspect of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan that has been largely overlooked is her meeting with Mark Lui, chairman of the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC). Pelosi’s trip coincided with U.S. efforts to convince TSMC – the world’s largest chip manufacturer, on which the U.S. is heavily dependent – to establish a manufacturing base in the US and to stop making advanced chips for Chinese companies.U.S. support for Taiwan has historically been based on Washington’s opposition to communist rule in Beijing, and Taiwan’s resistance to absorption by China. But in recent years, Taiwan’s autonomy has become a vital geopolitical interest for the U.S, because of the island’s dominance of the semiconductor manufacturing market.Semiconductors – also known as computer chips or just chips – are integral to all the networked devices that have become embedded into our lives. They also have advanced military applications. Transformational, super-fast 5G internet is enabling a world of connected devices of every kind (the “Internet of Things”) and a new generation of networked weapons. With this in mind, U.S .officials began to realise during the Trump administration that U.S. semiconductor design companies, such as Intel, were heavily dependent on Asian-based supply chains to manufacture their products.In particular, Taiwan’s position in the world of semiconductor manufacturing is a bit like Saudi Arabia’s status in OPEC. TSMC has a 53 percent market share of the global foundry market (factories contracted to make chips designed in other countries). Other Taiwan-based manufacturers claim a further 10 percent of the market.As a result, the Biden administration’s 100-Day Supply Chain Review Report says, “The United States is heavily dependent on a single company – TSMC – for producing its leading-edge chips.” The fact that only TSMC and Samsung (South Korea) can make the most advanced semiconductors (five nanometres in size) “puts at risk the ability to supply current and future [US] national security and critical infrastructure needs.”This means that C hina’s long-term goal of reunifying with Taiwan is now more threatening to U.S. interests. In the 1971 Shanghai Communique and the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, the U.S. recognised that people in both mainland China and Taiwan believed that there was “One China” and that they both belonged to it. But for the U.S. it is unthinkable that TSMC could one day be in territory controlled by Beijing.
US To Join Military Drills Near India's Disputed Border With China - The US will participate in war games with the Indian military in an area of India that is less than 62 miles away from the country’s disputed border with China, known as the Line of Actual Control (LAN). The drills will be held from October 18-31 and will be the eighteenth iteration of annual exercises between the two militaries known as Yudh Abhyas, which is Hindi for "war practice." They will be held in the Auli area of the Indian state of Uttarakhand in the Himalayas mountain range.The Yudh Abhyas drills are meant to train for fighting in high altitudes. The last iteration of the exercises was held in the mountains of Alaska in October 2021.Tensions have been high between India and China in the Himalayas since June 2020, when clashes in the Galwan Valley killed 20 Indian troops and four Chinese soldiers. Since then, China and India have been engaged in talks to reduce tensions, but they have also reinforced their militaries along the LAN.The US has been increasing military ties with India in recent years with hopes of using New Delhi as a counter to Beijing. After the Galwan Valley clashes, the US and India signed a new military pact, known as the Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement (BECA). Under BECA, the US can share more intelligence and satellite information with India. US military leaders have said that since signing the pact, the US has been able to help India with surveillance of the Chinese military along the LAN. The intelligence could also potentially be used for Indian missile strikes in the region.
Agreement on nuclear deal within reach but obstacles remain - Indirect talks between Iran and the U.S. on restoring the 2015 nuclear deal are expected to conclude Monday in Vienna, putting the final draft of an agreement in front of negotiators from Washington and Tehran.Western officials told POLITICO on Monday that they had finished negotiating technical questions that had remained open in the final draft text circulated by the European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on July 21. The final draft determines the steps that Iran and the U.S. will have to take to return to full compliance with the original 2015 Iran nuclear deal, officially called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.The deal rolled back U.S. and European sanctions against Iran in exchange for steps by Iran limiting its nuclear program and an agreement to allow intrusive inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations’s nuclear watchdog.On Monday, The EU will officially circulate the final draft document to participants and will ask the U.S. and Iran to agree on it. If there is agreement, foreign ministers are expected to return to Vienna to formally restore the 2015 nuclear accord.“There is a real chance for an agreement but there are still a number of uncertainties as always,” one senior Western official told POLITICO.A senior EU official on Monday confirmed that the bloc has finalized the draft text in its role as coordinator and facilitator and has introduced solutions to the four technical questions that had remained open.“It is now up to capitals to consider this text. It is the best possible effort. We have negotiated ad nauseam every single aspect,” the official said.The senior EU official confirmed that negotiators will leave Vienna in the next few hours and that the draft text is 25 pages long. The draft text will not solve the outstanding questions by the IAEA into the past nuclear program, the EU official explained. “It is a process between Iran and the Agency. There is no link between the two.” An Iranian Foreign Ministry official told the official Iranian news agency IRNA on Monday that “given the continuation of discussions on some remaining important issues, we’re not yet at a stage to finalize the text. Iran has presented its constructive views to other party so as to move forward and the result is up to their political decision. We believe #VienneTalks can be closed soon provided that the other party makes an appropriate decision. But we are not there yet.”
Pentagon announces another $1 billion in Ukraine military aid - The Pentagon on Monday said it is sending Ukraine an additional $1 billion in military assistance, including tens of thousands more munitions and explosives — the largest such package since Russia launched its invasion in February.The announcement comes as Ukrainian forces undertake a counteroffensive aimed at reclaiming the southern city of Kherson. The operation is seen in Kyiv and in Washington as a vital bid to prevent the Kremlin from making good on its vow to absorb occupied territories via planned referendums. Senior U.S. officials have denounced Moscow’s annexation plan as a “sham.”The new security assistance package includes ammunition for the high-mobility artillery rocket systems known as HIMARS and 75,000 howitzer rounds, as well as mortar systems, surface-to-air missiles, Javelin anti-armor missiles, Claymore mines and demolition explosives. It pushes the total U.S. military support for Ukraine past $9 billion since the war began, officials said.“These are all critical capabilities to help the Ukrainians repel the Russian offensive in the east and also to address evolving developments in the south and elsewhere,” said Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Colin Kahl. He characterized the package as comprising the types of weaponry “the Ukrainian people are using so effectively to defend their country.”Kahl said the Russian military has encountered considerable setbacks as a result of U.S. efforts to arm and equip Ukraine, indicating its forces have suffered an estimated 70,000 to 80,000 casualties in the past six months. The figure includes personnel killed and wounded, he said.But the counteroffensive in Kherson will probably be a challenge for Ukrainian forces.The government in Kyiv has signaled for weeks that it intends to move on the city, which before the invasion was home to approximately 300,000. And while the Ukrainians’ efforts have already helped recoversome nearby villages, Russian units have taken notice, said Dmitry Gorenburg, a senior research scientist at the think tank CNA and an expert on the Russian military.It remains to be seen, he added, whether Washington’s latest arms transfer will prove sufficient to enable the Ukrainians to achieve their immediate objectives.“The Russians have redeployed a lot of defenses … in that area,” Gorenburg said. “Kherson is a large city. And the same problems of attacking a large city that the Russians faced in the early stages of their attack, the Ukrainians would face if the Russians chose to defend it.”
U.S. authorizes largest-yet military package to Ukraine The United States has authorized its largest delivery yet of military aid to Ukraine, the Pentagon announced Monday — a $1 billion package of ammunition, weapons and equipment.The package specifically includes ammunition for artillery rocket systems, munitions for surface-to-air missile systems, explosives, armored medical vehicles and medical supplies, according to a press release from Acting Pentagon Press Secretary Todd Breasseale.“To meet Ukraine’s evolving battlefield requirements, the United States will continue to work with its Allies and partners to provide Ukraine with key capabilities,” Breasseale wrote. The U.S. has committed $9.8 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of President Joe Biden’s administration, according to the Pentagon. The United States has also sent hundreds of millions of dollars inhumanitarian aid. The Department of Defense has estimated Russia has had 70,000 to 80,000 killed or wounded in less than six months. Russian President Vladimir Putin drew international condemnation when he invaded Ukraine in late February.
CBS Censors Own Documentary After Ukraine Outraged -- CBS has censored its own documentary investigative reporting after an avalanche of pushback from supporters of Ukraine and its military. The segment highlighted that tons of weaponry shipped from the United States to the country's military has gone missing, and sounded the alarm as billions in dollars more have been pledged by the Biden administration."CBS partially retracted a documentary in which it said that shipments of weapons to Ukraine from the US had been going missing," Insider reports Monday. "CBS tweeted on Monday that it had removed a a video promoting the documentary that included a months-old quote saying most aid was not making it to Ukraine's front lines." Below is the deleted tweet, with the offending line of "30% of it [US-supplied arms and munitions] reaches its final destination." Terrifying how swiftly and obediently the corporate media walks back facts that are undesirable for the regime. https://t.co/SqafRmOnr0 The segment, titled "Arming Ukraine" was published days ago, and follows on the heels of Pentagon and US intelligence officials issuing similar warnings that there are few mechanisms in place to legitimately track the arms flowing into the country. One admin official even described in April that, "we have fidelity for a short time, but when it enters the fog of war, we have almost zero. It drops into a big black hole, and you have almost no sense of it at all after a short period of time."The fresh CBS reporting added to these concerns, quoting the the head of a Lithuania-based organization supplying the Ukrainian military, Jonas Ohman, who said bluntly:"All of this stuff goes across the border, and then something happens, kind of like 30% of it reaches its final destination." Ohman stressed that actually getting the weapons to the designated Ukrainian army units involves having to navigate an array of "power lords, oligarchs [and] political players." This also as there have been persistent reports that some weapons end up on the black market, or might possibly be moved outside Ukraine.
CBS Wanted To Do Critical Reporting On Ukraine’s Government But Ukraine’s Government Said No – Caitlin Johnstone -Following objections from the Ukrainian government, CBS News has removed a short documentary which had reported concerns from numerous sources that a large amount of the supplies being sent to Ukraine aren’t making it to the front lines.The Ukrainian government has listed its objections to the report on a government website, naming Ukrainian officials who objected to it and explaining why each of the CBS news sources it dislikes should be discounted. After the report was taken down and the Twitter post about it removed, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said this was a good start but still not enough.“Welcome first step, but it is not enough,” Kuleba tweeted. “You have misled a huge audience by sharing unsubstantiated claims and damaging trust in supplies of vital military aid to a nation resisting aggression and genocide. There should be an internal investigation into who enabled this and why.”The CBS News article about the documentary was renamed, from “Why military aid to Ukraine doesn’t always get to the front lines: ‘Like 30% of it reaches its final destination’” to the far milder “Why military aid in Ukraine may not always get to the front lines.” An editor’s note on the new version of the article explicitly admits to taking advisement on its changes from the Ukrainian government, reading as follows:“This article has been updated to reflect changes since the CBS Reports documentary ‘Arming Ukraine’ was filmed, and the documentary is also being updated. Jonas Ohman says the delivery has significantly improved since filming with CBS in late April. The government of Ukraine notes that U.S. defense attaché Brigadier General Garrick M. Harmon arrived in Kyiv in August 2022 for arms control and monitoring.”CBS News does not say why it has taken so long for this report to come out, why it didn’t check to see if anything had changed in the last few months during a rapidly unfolding war before releasing its report, or why it felt its claims were good enough to air before Kyiv raised its objections but not after.Someone uploaded the old version of the documentary on YouTube here, or you can watch it on Bitchute here if that one gets taken down. It was supportive of Ukraine and very oppositional to Russia, and simply featured a number of sources saying they had reason to believe a lot of the military supplies being sent to Ukraine aren’t getting where they’re supposed to go.
"Russian Propaganda" Just Means Disobedience - by Caitlin Johnstone - You can always tell how important narrative control is by watching the way people react when their control of the narrative is jeopardized. Empire apologists are raging at Amnesty International for pausing its aggressive facilitation of western imperialism to issue one brief criticism of the way Ukrainian forces have been endangering civilian lives with their warfare tactics against the Russian military. Amnesty is far from the first to highlight this extensively documented issue; that Ukrainian forces have been deliberately positioning themselves in civilian populations without taking proper measures to protect noncombatants is a concern that has been voiced repeatedly since the war began and reported on by both mainstream western news outlets and the United Nations.Nevertheless, Amnesty’s claim that “Ukrainian forces have put civilians in harm’s way by establishing bases and operating weapons systems in populated residential areas, including in schools and hospitals” has drawn fire from Ukrainian officials, from mass media pundits, from the brainwashed rank-and-file on social media, and from President Zelensky himself. A common criticism circulating among the outrage is that Amnesty is facilitating Russian propaganda, has been influenced by Russian propaganda, or has itself become an instrument of Russian propaganda. “It is a shame that the organization like Amnesty is participating in this disinformation and propaganda campaign,” tweeted Zelensky advisor Mykhailo Podolyak.“Amnesty International can go to hell for this garbage,” tweeted Human Rights Foundation Chairman Garry Kasparov. “Or go to Ukraine, which Putin’s war is trying to turn into hell. As with their actions on Navalny, it reeks of Russian influence turning Kremlin propaganda into Amnesty statements.”The Daily Mail called the Amnesty report “a coup for Vladimir Putin’s propaganda machine.” The underlying premise behind these complaints, of course, is that it is Amnesty International’s job to help Ukraine win a propaganda campaign against Russia. Which is odd, because Amnesty’s reporting on the war has actually been overwhelmingly biased in favor of Ukraine this entire time. “Anger directed at Amnesty is surprising given that it is the first critical piece the group has written on Ukraine since the war began,” reports Unherd. “Over the last six months, Amnesty has published 40 articles on Ukraine, nearly all of which condemn Russia’s invasion, with only one exception — its latest — that could be conceivably described as critical of Ukraine.” Even the Amnesty report currently sparking all the outrage contains repeated condemnations of Russia’s actions in Ukraine, citing “indiscriminate attacks by Russian forces” and “war crimes” Amnesty has found Russia guilty of committing, as well as decrying the use of “inherently indiscriminate weapons, including internationally banned cluster munitions.” But even ninety-nine percent loyalty to the official line is not enough for imperial spinmeisters and the empire’s useful idiots. Anything short of 100 percent compliance counts as Russian propaganda.
Russian Spy Planes Enter Alaska Air Defense Zone In 1st Since Ukraine War: NORAD - The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) has revealed that Russian aircraft breached the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) twice in the past two days, according to a fresh statement. The Alaskan NORAD "detected, tracked and identified Russian surveillance aircraft entering and operating within" the zone off the Alaskan coast, according to an offical statement posted to Twitter. While the ADIZ is not considered technically part of US airspace, it is airspace over which the US requires identification and tracking of aircraft in the interest of national security, which acts as a buffer before planes enter national airspace proper.On this point, NORAD noted that "The Russian aircraft did not enter American or Canadian sovereign airspace."Importantly, this is the first time NORAD has recorded a large Russian surveillance plane breach throughout the six months of the ongoing Russian war in Ukraine, which means it comes as tensions between Washington and Moscow are dangerously heightened. "The last time NORAD announced such a breach was in October 2021, when five Russian aircraft entered the zone," The Hill has underscored.
All Our Systems Are Built To Elevate Viciousness – Caitlin Johnstone --The US empire is able to dominate the world exactly because it has “the will to do what the other guy wouldn’t.” Whenever I lay out my evidence that the US is the most tyrannical regime on earth, I’ll get someone conceding that this is true but arguing that the US only behaves that way because it is the most powerful. Any other government with the power of the United States would behave with the same amount of viciousness or worse, they argue. And I always tell them that they’ve got it exactly backwards. The US isn’t uniquely vicious because it is the world’s most powerful government, the US is the world’s most powerful government because it is uniquely vicious. The United States put an exclamation point at the end of the second world war by dropping two nuclear bombs on Japan, not because it needed to (it didn’t), but because it wanted to intimidate the Soviet Union. It then immediately launched into a succession of new wars and strategic operationsof astonishing viciousness with the goal of eventually becoming the global dominator. It achieved this at the fall of the USSR, after which it immediately instituted a policy of working to ensure that no rival superpowers ever develop and began working toward “full spectrum dominance” of the land, sea, air, and space. All of the major international conflicts of our day are the direct result of these policies.None of the people driving the imperial power structure which rules over us are in their positions because of their wisdom or kindness. Oligarchs get to the top of their corporate and financial ladders by being willing to step on whoever they need to step on to get ahead. Military strategists get to their positions by demonstrating an aptitude for military domination. Intelligence officials get to their positions because they understand how to facilitate the interests of the oligarchic empire. Politicians get to the top by displaying a willingness to serve imperial power.And this principle tracks from the top down through the rest of our entire society. The only valuing system we have for human behavior is money, but what human behavior does money value? Competitiveness makes money. War and militarism make money. Ecocide makes money. Sickness makes money. Finite commodities make money. The entanglement of corporate and state power makes money. Propagandizing people into believing they need more than they have makes money. What doesn’t make money? Kindness. Collaboration. Peace. A thriving biosphere. Health. Psychological well being. Political transparency and integrity. Decisions made to benefit the whole. Sources of energy that can’t be controlled by the powerful. Abundance. People being content with what they have.
FBI agents raid black nationalist group’s homes, offices over bogus allegations of conspiracy with Russia -- Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents conducted a series of raids on July 29 directed against the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP) in St. Louis, Missouri and St. Petersburg, Florida. The raids are linked to a 25-page indictment issued against Aleksandr Viktorovitch Ionov, a Russian national accused of “conspiracy to commit offense” against the United States (18 U.S.C. § 371), a loosely defined federal crime with a penalty of up to five years in prison as well as heavy fines. The APSP as well as several other unidentified political groups, all of which remain unindicted at this point, are accused of having acted as “co-conspirators” with Ionov and Russian intelligence in order to undermine the authority of the United States, sow division within the broader population, and “interfere” in US elections. All supposedly conspiratorial political activity listed in the indictment is protected under the First Amendment of the US Constitution. The indictment against Ionov cites as evidence of an alleged conspiracy involving the targeted US-based organizations correspondence and collaboration with the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia (AGMR), an organization headed by Ionov, which the FBI and the Department of Justice (DOJ) claim has ties to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB). It further accuses senior members of the APSP of having known of AGMR’s ties to the Russian state, and alleges that the APSP and other “co-conspirators” willingly received money from the Russian government—a claim the APSP has publicly denied. The APSP’s only activities noted in the indictment consist of holding rallies in various American cities opposing the “Genocide of African People in the United States” and making public statements denouncing US-NATO involvement in the war in Ukraine, while expressing political sympathy for Russia. The case has all the hallmarks of a political frame-up targeting a political organization for its opposition to the US-NATO war against Russia. It points to an attempt to intimidate and criminalize opposition to the war more broadly. It should be noted that the indictment was drawn up against Ionov in the knowledge that he resides in Moscow and any attempt to extradite him to stand trial would be almost certain to fail. It appears that the main purpose of the indictment against Ionov is to justify the Biden administration’s use of state repression against left-wing opponents within the US of Washington’s imperialist agenda with regard to Russia.
Former Twitter Worker Convicted of Spying for Saudi Arabia (AP) — A former Twitter employee has been convicted of failing to register as an agent for Saudi Arabia and other charges after accessing private data on users critical of the kingdom’s government in a spy case that spanned from Silicon Valley to the Middle East. Ahmad Abouammo, a U.S. citizen and former media partnership manager for Twitter’s Middle East region, was charged in 2019 with acting as an agent of Saudi Arabia without registering with the U.S. government. A jury found him guilty on six counts, including conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering. The jury acquitted him on another five charges involving wire fraud. The case marked the first time the kingdom, long linked to the U.S. through its massive oil reserves and regional security arrangements, has been accused of spying in America. A 2019 FBI complaint alleged that Abouammo and Saudi citizen Ali Alzabarah, who worked as an engineer at Twitter, used their positions to access confidential Twitter data about users, their email addresses, phone numbers and IP addresses, the latter of which be used to identify a user’s location. A third man named in the complaint, Saudi citizen Ahmed Al-Mutairi, was alleged to have worked with the Saudi royal family as an intermediary. The U.S. complaint alleged that user data of over 6,000 Twitter accounts was accessed, including at least 33 usernames for which Saudi law enforcement had submitted emergency disclosure requests to Twitter. Abouammo was arrested in November 2019 and released on bond. He had pleaded not guilty. The FBI still lists Al-Mutairi and Alzabarah as wanted.
Why the Chair of the Lancet’s COVID-19 Commission Thinks The US Government Is Preventing a Real Investigation Into the Pandemic - Prof. Jeffrey Sachs is the Director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University and the President of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. He has also served as the chair of the COVID-19 commission for leading medical journal the Lancet. Through his investigations as the head of the COVID-19 commission, Prof. Sachs has come to the conclusion that there is extremely dangerous biotechnology research being kept from public view, that the United States was supporting much of this research, and that it is very possible that SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19, originated through dangerous virus research gone awry.Prof. Sachs recently co-authored a paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences calling for an independent inquiry into the virus’s origins. He believes that there is clear proof that the National Institutes of Health and many members of the scientific community have been impeding a serious investigation of the origins of COVID-19 and deflecting attention away from the hypothesis that risky U.S.-supported research may have led to millions of deaths. If that hypothesis is true, the implications would be earth-shaking, because it might mean that esteemed members of the scientific community bore responsibility for a global calamity. In this interview, Prof. Sachs explains how he, as the head of the COVID-19 commission for a leading medical journal, came to the conclusion that powerful actors were preventing a real investigation from taking place. He also explains why it is so important to get to the bottom of the origins of COVID: because, he says, there is extremely dangerous research taking place with little accountability, and the public has a right to know since we are the ones whose lives are being put at risk without our consent. I want to quote something that you said recently: “I chaired the commission for the Lancet for two years on COVID. I’m pretty convinced it came out of U.S. lab biotechnology, not out of nature, just to mention. After two years of intensive work on this. So it’s a blunder in my view of biotech, not an accident of a natural spillover. We don’t know for sure, I should be absolutely clear. But there’s enough evidence that it should be looked into. And it’s not being investigated, not in the United States, not anywhere. And I think for real reasons that they don’t want to look underneath the rug, the statement.”
CDC No Longer Recommends Quarantine, Screening For COVID-19 - The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or CDC has ended recommendations for social distancing and quarantine with a view to minimize covid-19's impact on persons, communities, and health care systems. The agency also ended recommendation for test-to-stay in schools, CNN noted. CDC noted that quarantine of exposed persons is no longer recommended, regardless of vaccination status, in light of high population levels of anti-SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence, and to limit social and economic impacts. Instead of quarantining, if any one was exposed to COVID-19, the agency recommends to wear a high-quality mask for 10 days and get tested on day 5. The agency also emphasized that physical distance is just one component of how to protect yourself and others. CDC, in its new guidelines, said it will now focus on reducing severe disease from Covid-19. Though COVID-19 continues to circulate globally, so many tools like vaccination, boosters, and treatments—to protect ourselves are available for reducing COVID-19 severity. With these, there is significantly less risk of severe illness, hospitalization and death compared to earlier in the pandemic. Greta Massetti, who leads the Field Epidemiology and Prevention Branch at the CDC, said, "We also have a better understanding of how to protect people from being exposed to the virus, like wearing high-quality masks, testing, and improved ventilation. This guidance acknowledges that the pandemic is not over, but also helps us move to a point where COVID-19 no longer severely disrupts our daily lives." For managing SARS-CoV-2 exposures, CDC now recommends case investigation and contact tracing only in health care settings and certain high-risk congregate settings.
Tim Kaine has long Covid. That’s not moving Congress to act. - - Tim Kaine was once hopeful that his colleagues would take the looming threat of long Covid more seriously if they knew someone living with the mysterious post-viral illness — himself. Earlier this year, the Virginia senator and former vice presidential candidate started bringing up the nerve sensitivity that he fears may be permanent at every health care-related hearing, in backroom conversations with colleagues, in speeches and during press conferences. After he was infected in March of 2020 — with strange symptoms he first thought were an allergic reaction — Kaine watched his wife, other loved ones, and fellow senators make full recoveries while his own discomfort remained. Weeks turned into months, then into years. Now, he stresses to fellow lawmakers and top Biden officials that he’s spent two years feeling “as if every nerve ending in my body has had five cups of coffee.” . “It’s just kind of a tingling in my veins all the time.” Sitting behind an expansive wooden desk strewn with papers in his Capitol Hill office earlier this year, the walls behind him covered in framed photos, signed bills and Virginia memorabilia up to the high ceiling, Kaine said he was at first hesitant to speak about his condition because his symptoms are relatively mild compared to those of many people around the country who are debilitated physically, mentally or both by Covid-19. “I probably wouldn’t have even shared my story publicly except that so many people I represent were reporting that they weren’t being believed and that they felt frustrated that nothing was going on,” he said. “Now I can tell them that not only are there people up here who believe you but we are doing stuff.” But after months of efforts, Kaine’s experience sounds a lot like his constituents’: a frustrating and so far fruitless exercise. While he and other Democrats in the House and Senate are pushing for action, they have failed to gain meaningful momentum due to lack of GOP support and a congressional leadership bogged down in battles around spending, inflation, foreign policy and reproductive rights. And as action on Capitol Hill stalls, the problem grows.
Biden Administration Moves to Increase Limited Monkeypox Vaccine Supply With New Injection Method -The Biden administration on Tuesday authorized a new way to inject a monkeypox vaccine in an effort to stretch its low supply of the shot.The Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency use authorization to allow a smaller dose of the shot, called Jynneos, to be injected between the layers of skin instead of a full dose into underlying fat. The agency said the move will increase the total number of doses available for use by up to fivefold.“In recent weeks the monkeypox virus has continued to spread at a rate that has made it clear our current vaccine supply will not meet the current demand,” FDA Commissioner Robert Califf said in a statement. “The FDA quickly explored other scientifically appropriate options to facilitate access to the vaccine for all impacted individuals. By increasing the number of available doses, more individuals who want to be vaccinated against monkeypox will now have the opportunity to do so.”The agency cited a 2015 study in its announcement that showed the new method produced a similar immune response to the other method, though it “resulted in more redness, firmness, itchiness and swelling at the injection site, but less pain, and these side effects were manageable.”The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends vaccination for people who have been exposed to monkeypox and people who may be more likely to get monkeypox. The vast majority of cases have occurred in men who have sex with men. But a shortage of the shots has proved to be a problem for the Biden administration, which has been criticized for not doing enough to address the outbreak. It has delivered over 600,000 doses of the shot, which is far short of the roughly 1.7 million Americans that the CDC considers high-risk for monkeypox.
Limited monkeypox vaccine supply would be stretched under FDA plan - Biden administration officials announced Tuesday a new strategy to split monkeypox vaccine doses in hopes of vaccinating up to five times as many people against the virus.The plan, unveiled days after the federal government declared monkeypox a public health emergency amid criticism over the administration’s response to the rapidly unfolding crisis, would allow public health officials to stretch their limited supply of monkeypox vaccine doses by changing how those shots are administered. Rather than inject doses of Jynneos subcutaneously, a traditional way of delivering vaccines into the fatty tissue under the skin, the doses would instead be injected under the top layer of the skin. This approach, known as an intradermal injection, uses a thinner needle and less vaccine but leads to a small bubble forming on the surface of the skin that can scar.Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra issued a declaration Tuesday that would allow for emergency use of the existing monkeypox vaccine, a move swiftly followed by the Food and Drug Administration granting emergency authorization for officials to inject the shots differently for adults. The move also allows minors to receive the monkeypox vaccine, which is only approved by the FDA for adults, through the traditional approach if they are deemed at high risk of infection.The change in injection method would maximize the immune reaction generated by the vaccine and allow U.S. officials to only administer one-fifth of the original dose, officials said, stressing that the approach would not compromise safety or efficacy.“It’s safe, it’s effective, and it will significantly scale the volume of vaccine doses available for communities across the country,” Robert J. Fenton Jr., coordinator of the nation’s monkeypox response, told reporters Tuesday.FDA Commissioner Robert Califf has compared the new method, which he first described publicly last week, to tests for tuberculosis and other injections routinely performed by health-care workers.But the change in vaccine dosing would be a large-scale, real-time experiment as officials race to stave off a monkeypox outbreak that has infected nearly 9,500 people in the United States. The announcement has drawn support as well as skepticism among public health experts eager to combat the virus, with some questioning its practicality and effectiveness.
Monkeypox Update: FDA Authorizes Emergency Use of JYNNEOS Vaccine to Increase Vaccine Supply | FDA --Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency use authorization (EUA) for the JYNNEOS vaccine to allow healthcare providers to use the vaccine by intradermal injection for individuals 18 years of age and older who are determined to be at high risk for monkeypox infection. This will increase the total number of doses available for use by up to five-fold. The EUA also allows for use of the vaccine in individuals younger than 18 years of age determined to be at high risk of monkeypox infection; in these individuals JYNNEOS is administered by subcutaneous injection. “In recent weeks the monkeypox virus has continued to spread at a rate that has made it clear our current vaccine supply will not meet the current demand,” said FDA Commissioner Robert M. Califf, M.D. “The FDA quickly explored other scientifically appropriate options to facilitate access to the vaccine for all impacted individuals. By increasing the number of available doses, more individuals who want to be vaccinated against monkeypox will now have the opportunity to do so.” JYNNEOS, the Modified Vaccinia Ankara (MVA) vaccine, was approved in 2019 for prevention of smallpox and monkeypox disease in adults 18 years of age and older determined to be at high risk for smallpox or monkeypox infection. JYNNEOS is administered beneath the skin (subcutaneously) as two doses, four weeks (28 days) apart. For individuals 18 years of age and older determined to be at high risk of monkeypox infection, the EUA now allows for a fraction of the JYNNEOS dose to be administered between the layers of the skin (intradermally). Two doses of the vaccine given four weeks (28 days) apart will still be needed. There are no data available to indicate that one dose of JYNNEOS will provide long-lasting protection, which will be needed to control the current monkeypox outbreak. Data from a 2015 clinical study of the MVA vaccine evaluated a two-dose series given intradermally compared to subcutaneously. Individuals who received the vaccine intradermally received a lower volume (one fifth) than individuals who received the vaccine subcutaneously. The results of this study demonstrated that intradermal administration produced a similar immune response to subcutaneous administration, meaning individuals in both groups responded to vaccination in a similar way. Administration by the intradermal route resulted in more redness, firmness, itchiness and swelling at the injection site, but less pain, and these side effects were manageable. The FDA has determined that the known and potential benefits of JYNNEOS outweigh the known and potential risks for the authorized uses. To support the FDA’s authorization of two doses of JYNNEOS administered by the subcutaneous route of administration in individuals younger than 18 years of age, the FDA considered the available JYNNEOS safety and immune response data in adults as well as the historical data with use of live vaccinia virus smallpox vaccine in pediatric populations. JYNNEOS has been tested in individuals with immunocompromising conditions and has been found to be safe and effective in the trials that were performed to support approval. It was initially developed specifically as an alternative for use in immunocompromised individuals in the event of a smallpox outbreak.
Monkeypox vaccine maker raises concerns about plan to split doses -The CEO of the company that makes the only vaccine approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to prevent monkeypox told Biden administration health officials he was concerned about a new strategy to split doses and change the way the vaccine is injected.In a letter shared with The Hill, Bavarian Nordic CEO Paul Chaplin said the company has “some reservations” about the new approach, “due to the very limited safety data available,” as well as the fact that more people experienced adverse reactions after vaccination.“This may have a negative impact on vaccine uptake and coverage,” Chaplin wrote.The letter to FDA Commissioner Robert Califf and Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra was first reported by The Washington Post. Chaplin said the company fully supports approaches to conserve limited supply, but “it would have been prudent” to roll out the new strategy with much more comprehensive guidance that would allow additional safety data to be collected.The letter was dated Aug. 9, the day the administration announced a major change to its monkeypox vaccination strategy. The new method splits up the doses and uses one-fifth as much vaccine per shot. The partial dose of the vaccine is injected into the upper layer of skin, rather than the full dose into the underlying fat, which is how shots are typically administered.The new approach, called an intradermal injection, uses a smaller needle and likely will require additional training for people giving the shot. The request to change the vaccination method was made by the National Institutes of Health, not the manufacturer.Chaplin said the company has been “inundated with calls from U.S. state government officials with questions and concerns” since last Thursday regarding the new vaccination plan.“We will of course align our responses with our colleagues at the CDC, but we believe this alignment would have been better served before any announcement to ensure the best rollout,” Chaplin wrote.The new strategy is an attempt to stretch the U.S.’s limited supply of Bavarian Nordic’s Jynneos vaccine. There are more than 10,000 confirmed cases of monkeypox in the country and demand for the vaccine far exceeds supply.
‘People will die waiting’: America’s system for the disabled is nearing collapse - Private agencies that provide services for the intellectually and developmentally disabled have long warned that, without fresh state and federal funding, they would be unable to provide housing and staff support to the growing number of Americans who need care. Over the last 12 months, the Covid-19 pandemic’s lingering effects and once-in-a-generation inflation have turned dire predictions into sobering truths, and agency directors, who for years hobbled along on shoestring budgets, have done in 2022 what not long ago would have been unthinkable: closed their doors. Todd Goodwin, CEO at the John F. Murphy Homes in Maine, has closed four group homes over the past 18 months. Until this year, residents of a home that was closing would be transferred to another home with open beds. But in February, he couldn’t make the staffing ratios work — two residents, who have come to rely on the care his agency provides, would have to be sent back to their families. “These are people who have been with us for years; we love them,” Goodwin said. “They are losing their homes through no fault of their own. We have just run out of options.” In Connecticut, one provider has closed 10 group homes; in Oklahoma, dozens of residential units sit empty for want of staff; and in Texas, budgets are running increasingly in the red. Two decades after the Supreme Court ruled states must provide care for the disabled in the least restrictive setting possible, home- and community-based service providers are floundering. Many states, flush with cash thanks to a juiced economy and federal stimulus, may need to act following years of inadequate funding that left an already fragile system on the verge of collapse. In the unfolding pandemic, economic crisis and reckoning on race, governors and mayors are shaping our shared future. Who are the power players, and how are they driving politics and influencing Washington? Full coverage » Across the country, more than three-quarters of providers said they’ve turned away referrals, and more than half have discontinued programs, according to a survey from the American Network of Community Options and Resources, an advocacy group. What happens to the residents? They live with siblings or their elderly parents, some who are themselves in need of care, or they become wards of the state, sent to live in larger and larger facilities, the kind of institutionalized settings the country swore off nearly 50 years ago.
America, Land of the Dying? Alarming Study Shows U.S. Killing Its Own Population - With its economic and military might, America is hard to beat on technological wonders, space exploration, and top-notch universities. But when it comes to health, a fundamental prerequisite to a fulfilling life, the US isn’t delivering and hasn’t been for a long time. Researchers now find that the big picture of health failings is even graver than we already knew. Piles of studies have called attention to the fact that in the country ranking number one in healthcare spending per capita, people are living shorter lives, feeling more depressed, and are more likely to skip treatment due to cost than in many developed nations. In a performance ranking of 11 high-income countries compiled by the Commonwealth Fund in 2021, the American healthcare system came in dead last, with the worst outcomes of any of the nations studied. “The only wealth is life,” wrote the nineteenth-century critic John Ruskin. Recent research indicates that America may be rich in dollars, but getting poorer in ways that matter most. In a stunning new report, “Missing Americans: Early Death in the United States, 1933-2021,” Boston University professor of global health and epidemiology Jacob Bor and colleagues pored over data from the CDC and a global mortality database. During the period investigated, they compared U.S. mortality rates with those of Canada, Japan, and 16 Western European countries. How many American lives would have been saved each year, asked the researchers, if U.S. mortality rates had matched those of other wealthy nations? A staggering number, is the answer. According to the researchers, the U.S. started out of the gate in 1933 as a global health frontrunner, showing a significant advantage in mortality rates over the peer countries studied. But starting in the 1970s, something went awry. Overall, Americans began to die at higher rates than their peers, a trend that grew steadily and picked up steam in the 2000s. By the year 2019, the number of annual “excess deaths” had reached a stunning 656,353. Bor and his colleagues refer to these people who died as “missing Americans” — the friends, family members, and colleagues who would still be with us if only modern U.S. healthcare and social policy lived up to their early promise. Consider, the figure of 656,353 missing Americans is the number of excess deaths just in the year 2019 alone. In a single year, we lost – needlessly – more than the population of Detroit, Las Vegas, or Baltimore. More than Atlanta and Miami combined. And this was before the pandemic. In 2021, the number of missing Americans swelled to 1,092,293 – a whole lot more than you could put on milk cartons. Even worse: half of them were under age 65. Bor and his fellow researchers found that on average, not only were there more Americans dying relative to their peers abroad, the deaths were becoming younger. These are human beings who didn’t have to leave us. People who had children, elders, and neighbors to look after. Contributions to make. Love and laughter to share. The researchers found a haunting way to help us envision the profound depth of the tragedy. Based on the age at which Americans succumbed and the number of years they could have been expected to live had they been born in Finland, Spain, Japan, or the other countries studied, Bor and colleagues tabulate that in a single year, 2021, America sustained 25 million years of life lost.
New York Mayor Eric Adams blasts Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for busing migrants to city - New York Mayor Eric Adams greeted a group of migrants who arrived from Texas on Sunday morning, then slammed Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for sending buses of asylum seekers from the border to the city. “This is horrific, when you think about what the governor is doing,” Adams (D) said in a brief statement at the Port Authority bus terminal where the 14 migrants were dropped off, after three days of travel. Later in the day, Adams condemned Abbott (R) on Twitter, accusing him of using “innocent people as political pawns to manufacture a crisis.” He was referring to the governor’s repeated claims that a record-high influx of migrants, along with President Biden’s immigration policies, have led to a “humanitarian crisis” at the border. Since April, Abbott has been sending thousands of asylum seekers on buses to Washington in an effort to pressure the Biden administration into cracking down at the border as migrant crossings reach record levels. But critics argue that the governor, who is running for reelection, is also using the tactic to rally his conservative base. D.C. aid groups overwhelmed as migrants arrive from Texas, Arizona The idea of moving migrants out of border states to more-liberal areas is not new. In 2019, under President Donald Trump, White House officials pushed to release detainees in “sanctuary cities” as a form of retaliation against political adversaries, The Washington Post has previously reported. Sanctuary cities are those where local authorities refuse to hand over undocumented immigrants for deportation. The Texas governor has said the free and voluntary bus rides are meant to provide “some relief” to Texas’s “overwhelmed border communities” and keep them safe, while critics have dismissed it as a political tactic that does little to resolve the issue. Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) followed Abbott’s lead and started sending buses of migrants from his state to the nation’s capital in May. Adams said Sunday that some migrants who have arrived in New York were forced onto the buses — including some families who wanted to go to other cities. Some were falsely told they would be taken to their desired destination and found themselves bound for New York, he told local reporters. Adams said that officials expected 40 people to be on the bus but that some appeared to have gotten off at other stops along the route.
The Supreme Court’s Own Goal on Climate Change -A reading of the Court’s opinion in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in June provides abundant evidence of ignorance, bad faith, and, yes, mediocrity in the arguments presented in limiting the EPA’s authority. Despite all that, thanks to a sea change in the economy, the Court’s decision may have only a minor impact on efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. It could, however, hurt international efforts to coordinate action on climate change.To begin with, as noted in Justice Elena Kagan’s acid dissent, the Court chose to shove a phantom issue into its crowded docket. The Clean Power Plan, the Obama-era climate policy aimed at lowering emissions by 32 percent by 2030 that is at the center of the case, was not in effect and was not intended to go into effect as currently constituted. Worse, by limiting the EPA’s authority to regulate how power is generated in order to meet carbon reduction goals, the majority cites outdated, easily falsifiable costs were the plan to have gone into effect.Further, there is no expression of concern about the economic and societal effects of climate change, which include trillions of dollars in damage to the global economy, forced migration as people flee regions that become unlivable, and the potential for civil unrest and mass starvation. Nowhere in the majority opinion can one find stipulation that climate change is “the greatest environmental challenge of our time,” as Kagan describes it.The majority’s nonchalance stands in jarring contrast to the posture taken by most of the world’s governments, the global scientific community, the executive branch of the U.S. government, and even the otherwise polarized and paralyzed Congress. Last week, the Senate came to agreementon providing $369 billion in tax credits and other incentives for companies and homeowners in order to drastically lower U.S. emissions by 2030. This came as a surprise to many observers after Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said last month that he would not support a climate bill until inflation was addressed. But Manchin appears to have changed his view and made a deal with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). If passed, this would be the most ambitious agreement taken by the U.S. in the fight against climate change. For its part, the executive branch is also taking the climate crisis seriously, with President Biden announcing last year that he intended to cut U.S. emissions 50 percent below 2005 levels by 2030. In July, Biden presented new executive actions on protecting communities from extreme heat, lowering cooling costs for those same communities, and expanding offshore wind jobs. Many other government agencies have taken the climate crisis seriously for decades in their own capacities. The U.S. Defense Department and various intelligence agencies have treated climate change as a threat to national security going back to the 1990s. A review of the literature revealsdozens of studies, white papers, and other publications linking climate change and national security. The majority opinion of the Supreme Court, however, suggests that the most august court in the land remains oblivious to this threat. The only references to the costs of climate change in the majority opinion are indirect, in the form of citations of the concerns of the EPA and other groups. By contrast, in her dissent, Kagan devotes the first two paragraphs to the various costs of climate change and cites the 2021 Climate Risk Analysis 8 from the Defense Department that warns that the ultimate risk might be “state failure.” Given 34 years of a drum beat of news on global warming, it is inconceivable that the justices in the majority are ignorant of the threat. In recent years, all the justices had to do was look out the window or turn on the news, as the country has been besieged with record heat, wildfires, and floods, all tied to climate change. Is it possible then that the majority opinion and concurrence avoided any recognition of the scale of the threat because doing so would make the case that regulatory authority could help to avert it?
Opinion | The Supreme Court Wants to End the Separation of Church and State – Many legal scholars in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s radical decision to reverse Roe v. Wade have focused on the dangerous implications of the court’s centuries-old worldview on protections for things such as same-sex marriage and contraception. This concern is real, but there is another issue with equally grave constitutional consequences, one that portends the emergence of a foundational alteration of American government itself.Considered alongside two First Amendment rulings last term, the Dobbsdecision marks a serious step in an emerging legal campaign by religious conservatives on the Supreme Court to undermine the bedrock concept of separation of church and state and to promote Christianity as an intrinsic component of democratic government.The energy behind this idea was apparent in Justice Samuel Alito’s speech last month for Notre Dame Law School’s Religious Liberty Initiative in Rome. Calling it an “honor” to have penned the 6-3 majority opinion inDobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, and mocking international leaders for “lambast[ing]” the ruling, Alito spent the bulk of his remarks lamenting “the turn away from religion” in Western society. In his mind, the “significant increase in the percentage of the population that rejects religion” warrants a full-on “fight against secularism” — which Alito likened to staving off totalitarianism itself. Ignoring the vast historical record of human rights abuses in the name of religion (such as the Taliban in Afghanistan and even his own Catholic church’s role in perpetuating slavery in America), Alito identified the communist regimes of China and the Soviet Union as examples of what happens when freedom to worship publicly is curtailed. Protection for private worship, he argued, is not enough. Because “any judge who wants to shrink religious liberty” can just do it by interpreting the law, Alito insisted that there “must be limits” on that power.The limits that Alito is referring to have begun to emerge as the court explicitly seeks to anchor its understanding of constitutional rights in early American history—or even earlier, under the English monarchy. Alito and his fellow conservatives evidently pine for a return to a more religiously homogenous, Christian society but to achieve it they are deliberately marginalizing one pillar of the First Amendment in favor of another. The dots connecting Alito’s personal mission to inculcate religion in American life and what the conservative majority is doing to the Constitution are easy to see. They begin with Dobbs.Dobbs is significant not just because it reversed 50 years of precedent under the “due process clause” of the Fourteenth Amendment (under which the Court has recognized certain rights, even if unenumerated in the Constitution, as so bound up with the concept of liberty that the government cannot arbitrarily interfere with them). In Dobbs, Alito subverted that notion and fashioned a brand-new, two-part test for assessing the viability of individual rights: (1) whether the right is expressed in the Constitution’s text, and if not, (2) whether it existed as a matter of “the Nation’s history and tradition.” This second part of the test is the crucial one when it comes to religion — and in particular, its installation in government.
Lindsey Graham says same-sex marriage should be left to the states but pivots from question on interracial marriage --Sen. Lindsey Graham reiterated his stance that same-sex marriage should be a state-by-state issue but dodged a question on whether or not he feels the same way about interracial marriage. The South Carolina Republican was asked on Sunday by CNN "State of the Union" host Dana Bash whether or not he thinks Obergefell — the 2015 Supreme Court decision that established the right to same-sex marriage — should be overturned. "No. I'm saying that I don't think it's going to be overturned," he began. "The point I'm trying to make is — I've been consistent — I think states should decide the issue of marriage and I think states should decide the issue of abortion."Graham explained he trusts South Carolina voters, rather than the high court, to make those decisions via their elected representatives. Bash asked how many other issues that logic would apply to and asked specifically about Loving v. Virginia, the 1967 decision that protected the right to interracial marriage. Graham interjected: "No. No. Here's the point. We are talking about things that are not happening because you don't want to talk about inflation. You don't want to talk about crime. This is all politics my friends. Instead of trying to solve problems like unstable people having guns, we're talking about constitutional decisions that are still in effect." "But if you're going to ask me to have the federal government take over defining marriage, I'm going to say 'no,'" he said.
FBI search at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home tied to classified material, sources say — Former President Donald Trump said Monday that the FBI "raided" his home at Mar-a-Lago in Florida and even cracked his safe, with a source familiar with the matter telling NBC News that the search was tied to classified information Trump allegedly took with him from the White House to his Palm Beach resort in January 2021. Trump also claimed in a written statement that the search — unprecedented in American history — was politically motivated, although he did not provide specifics. “These are dark times for our Nation, as my beautiful home, Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided, and occupied by a large group of FBI agents,” Trump said in a lengthy email statement issued by his Save America political committee. “After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate,” Trump said before bemoaning: “They even broke into my safe!” Trump lawyer Christina Bobb, who said she was present for Monday’s search, told NBC News that Trump and his team have been “cooperative with FBI and DOJ officials every step of the way,” while adding that the bureau “did conduct an unannounced raid and seized paper.” A senior government official told NBC News that the FBI was at Mar-a-Largo “for the majority of the day” and confirmed that the search warrant was connected to the National Archives. Trump this year had to return 15 boxes of documents that were improperly taken from the White House, the National Archives and Records Administration, or NARA, said in February. “In mid-January 2022, NARA arranged for the transport from the Trump Mar-a-Lago property in Florida to the National Archives of 15 boxes that contained Presidential records, following discussions with President Trump’s representatives in 2021,” the National Archives said in a statement Feb. 7. The same month, the National Archives and Records Administration asked the Justice Department to examine whether Trump’s handling of White House records violated federal law, a story first reported by The Washington Post and subsequently confirmed by NBC News sources.
FBI searches Trump safe at Mar-a-Lago for classified documents - Former president Donald Trump said Monday that the FBI had raided his Mar-a-Lago Club and searched his safe — activity related to an investigation into the potential mishandling of classified documents, according to two people familiar with the probe.One of the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss its details, said agents were conducting a court-authorized search as part of a long-running investigation of whether documents — some of them top-secret — were taken to the former president’s private golf club and residence instead of sent to the National Archives when Trump left office. That could be a violation of the Presidential Records Act, which requires the preservation of memos, letters, notes, emails, faxes and other written communications related to a president’s official duties.Searching a former president’s property to look for possible evidence of a crime is highly unusual and would require approval at the top levels of the Justice Department. It represents a historic moment in Trump’s tortured relationship with the Justice Department, both in and out of the White House.A department spokeswoman declined to comment when asked whether Attorney General Merrick Garland approved the search. The FBI also declined to comment.In a lengthy statement in which he equated the raid to Watergate, Trump accused the FBI of “even” breaking into his safe. He provided no further details on what federal agents were looking for, or what else happened during their visit.“My beautiful home, Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided, and occupied by a large group of FBI agents,” Trump said in a statement released through his political action committee, Save America.The FBI searched former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club on Aug. 8 as part of an investigation into whether presidential documents were mishandled. (Video: Blair Guild/The Washington Post) Trump said the raid was “unannounced” and claimed it was not “necessary or appropriate.” The former president, without evidence, accused Democrats of weaponizing the “justice system” against him.
Top Republicans echo Trump’s evidence-free claims to discredit FBI search - Top Republicans on Monday rallied quickly behind Donald Trump’s efforts to discredit the FBI search of his Mar-a-Lago Club, embracing his claims, presented without evidence, that it was a political attack intended to impede Trump’s chances if he runs for president again.House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), a top Trump ally, responded with a threat to the Justice Department, vowing to investigate the agency if the Republicans win back the House in the midterm elections. Claiming without evidence that the department has “reached an intolerable state of weaponized politicization,” McCarthy warned, “Attorney General Garland, preserve your documents and clear your calendar.”The quick defense of Trump and combative posture by leading Republican officeholders and potential 2024 presidential aspirants underlined the former president’s status as a standard-bearer in the party, even as he was tainted anew by another investigation. With fewer than 100 days before the midterm elections, many Republicans continue to rally around Trump’s false claims about the 2020 election, his baseless attacks on a slew of officeholders and his divisive rhetoric. Democrats, meanwhile, weighed in more slowly, applauding the news of the search and urging the Justice Department to fully investigate the former president’s handling of classified information. “Good!” tweeted House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) in response to the news.Many of the Republicans aghast at the FBI raid had supported FBI probes of former secretary of state Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server in 2016. When then-FBI Director James B. Comey found no reason to charge Clinton after an initial investigation, and after another probe of emails on a laptop belonging to a Clinton aide shortly before the election, they asked whether the Democrat had gotten off easy.“Secretary Clinton’s fundamental lack of judgment and wanton disregard for protecting and keeping information confidential raises continued questions about the exposure of our nation’s diplomatic and national security secrets,” McCarthy said in 2016, after Comey initially announced the end of the investigation. Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), a onetime Trump critic turned Trump defender during the 45th president’s tenure, said Monday on Twitter: “We’re 100 days away from midterm elections. President Trump is likely going to run again in 2024.” He added, “Launching such an investigation of a former President this close to an election is beyond problematic.”Six years earlier, however, Graham was critical of the FBI after it found no crime to charge in its probe of Clinton’s email server. “We need a special prosecutor, someone outside the Justice Department, to look into this matter,” said Graham in an August 2016 interview on Fox News, 75 days before that year’s presidential election. “If you’re waiting on this Justice Department to hold anybody in the Obama-Clinton world accountable, you’ll die of old age. It’s sad but it’s true.”.
McConnell calls for ‘thorough and immediate explanation’ of Mar-a-Lago raid -- Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Tuesday called for a “thorough and immediate explanation” after the FBI executed a search warrant at former President Trump’sMar-a-Lago residence Monday. “Attorney General Garland and the Department of Justice should already have provided answers to the American people and must do so immediately,” McConnell said in a statement.The Tuesday evening comments marked the first time McConnell weighed in on the Florida search. The minority leader did not answer questions about the search at a press conference earlier in the day to address recent flooding in Kentucky.The FBI and Department of Justice (DOJ) have not said what they were searching for, but the search was reportedly focused on classified material taken from the White House.Republican lawmakers and prominent conservatives have slammed the FBI over the search andpressed the DOJ to justify it. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) called the DOJ’s move “weaponized politicization” and told Attorney General Merrick Garland to “clear your calendar,” vowing an investigation.
FBI search makes clear Trump is target of probe -The FBI search of Mar-a-Lago has answered one lingering question about Attorney General Merrick Garland: Yes, he’s willing to directly investigate former President Trump. But the unprecedented search of the former president’s home raises a number of questions about the breadth of the probe, the timing of the search, what investigators were seeking and what it means for Trump. What Trump referred to as a “raid” of his home was the FBI execution of a search warrant approved by a federal judge after prosecutors were able to provide probable cause that a crime had been committed and that evidence would likely be found during the search. But aside from a reported focus on White House documents in Trump’s possession, little is known about the investigation that prompted the extraordinary step or where it might lead. It’s unclear what was seized in the search or whether the Department of Justice (DOJ) has found evidence to support charging Trump himself. Still, the execution of a search warrant on Trump’s property is the first public confirmation that the former president is linked to an active criminal investigation by federal law enforcement, a development that Garland had been unwilling to reveal. “This was not a search conducted in the pro shop. It’s a search conducted in the former president’s residence and office. … The former president is a target of this investigation,” said Jeff Robbins, a former federal prosecutor and congressional investigative counsel. “This is something which no doubt has been worked on for weeks, if not months, has been drafted and reviewed by a squadron of FBI agents and personnel reaching up to the top levels of the FBI, reviewed by a squadron of Department of Justice prosecutors reaching up to the very highest level of the Department of Justice. And it’s fair to assume that it is an uncommonly specific showing of probable cause,” Robbins added. In January, Trump handed over 15 boxes of materials to government record-keepers amid concern he may have violated the Presidential Records Act. Then, in June, Justice Department investigators, including a senior counterintelligence official, returned to him and were shown a basement room that contained government records, including some that had classified markings, according to multiple reports. Trump and his allies in Congress have dismissed the FBI search as politically motivated. In an interview with a conservative media outlet on Tuesday, Christina Bobb, an attorney representing Trump who was present at Mar-a-Lago during the search, said the former president’s legal team had been cooperating with the DOJ in its inquiry and insisted that Trump had done nothing wrong. “They’re going to have a hard time proving that he actually even knew anything was in the boxes or anywhere else,” Bobb said in an appearance on the Right Side Broadcasting Network. “I don’t think there was anything of substance that was removed as far as the documents go. I think this is a case where DOJ and the FBI under the Biden administration is just trying to criminalize and really prosecute their predecessor, which is something we see in dictatorships and third-world countries,” Bobb added.
Feds likely obtained 'pulverizing' amount of evidence ahead of searching Trump's Mar-a-Lago home, legal experts say --For months, as new details emerged about the end of the Trump administration, the Justice Department confronted criticism over its slow, cautious approach to investigating the former president.Again and again, Attorney General Merrick Garland met that criticism with what has almost become his personal mantra: The Justice Department, he says, will follow the "facts and the law."On Monday, the facts and the law led FBI agents to former President Donald Trump's home.Trump confirmed Monday that federal agents had executed a search warrant at his South Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, in a search that several news outlets later reported was related to whether he mishandled classified government documents.Regardless of the raid's focus, legal experts quickly reached a consensus about it: A pile of evidence must have backed up the warrant authorizing the search."There's every reason to think that there's a plus factor in the quantum and quantity of evidence that the government already had to support probable cause in this case, knowing that they would be besieged with criticism in some quarters that this is politically motivated," said David Laufman, a former top official in the Justice Department's national security division who prosecuted cases involving allegations of mishandling classified documents."If I were a senior department official who reviewed this prior to pulling the trigger on presenting an affidavit to a magistrate judge, I would've wanted a sufficient quality and quantity of evidence that was so pulverizing in its effect to simply neutralize any arguments to the contrary," said Laufman, now a partner at the law firm Wiggin and Dana LLP.Indeed, for a deliberate Justice Department keen to turn the page from the politicization of the Trump era, the raid of Mar-a-Lago most likely required reviews at the highest levels and convincing evidence supporting a finding of probable cause, legal experts said."I cannot imagine the amount of probable cause set forth in a search warrant's supporting FBI affidavit of Trump's Florida home," said Gene Rossi, a former federal prosecutor from Northern Virginia. He added in an email to Insider that the number of "review levels" for the search warrant "must have been enormous, including by Trump's FBI appointee Christopher Wray."The search unfolded months after the National Archives confirmed, in February, that many records Trump left behind had been torn and taped back together — and that the former president had taken boxes of documents to his resort that the federal government needed to retrieve. Earlier Monday, Axios published photographs — obtained by the New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman — showing documents in a toilet bowl that White House staff suspected were flushed by Trump.Trump developed a reputation while in office as a notorious destroyer of documents and displayed a penchant for ripping presidential documents and leaving them for staffers to patch up, according to a report from Politico. Historians grew concerned over his tenure that his presidential records would be poorly preserved or destroyed — potentially violating the Presidential Records Act.The 1970s law requires presidents and White House staff members to preserve official documents and communications — including gifts received in office, letters, emails, text messages, and social-media posts — and turn those items over to the Archives at the end of a president's term."Trump is in deep legal trouble," Rossi said.For Trump, an inquiry into whether he mishandled classified material represents just one of several areas of legal risk. Trump, who was at Trump Tower in New York City during the search, is also facing scrutiny over his efforts to overturn his loss in the 2020 election to Joe Biden. At the same time, New York's attorney general, Letitia James, is investigating his business, an inquiry she said had uncovered evidence that the Trump Organization engaged in "fraudulent or misleading" practices.
How the FBI got the keys to Mar-a-Lago- The late-breaking news Monday about the search of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence shocked the political world. There is no obvious precedent in the nation’s history for the involuntary search of a former president’s home as part of a criminal probe by the Justice Department, so this was a surprising turn of events even for a man who has managed to test many political boundaries since announcing his candidacy seven years ago. How did this come about? The Justice Department has reportedly been investigating the potential mishandling and improper retention of classified information at Trump’s residence since the spring, after the National Archives disclosed that it had recovered 15 boxes of documents from Mar-a-Lago in January that should have been provided to the agency upon Trump’s departure from the White House. The inquiry appears to be legally and factually distinct from the Justice Department’s other investigative work concerning Trump’s conduct prior to and during the siege of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. There are at least a couple of criminal statutes that may be at issue. One of them prohibits the improper removal of classified information from government facilities. Another statute targets the improper destruction of government records — a subject that already happened to be back in the news this week based on additional reporting suggesting that Trump may have flushed White House documents down the toilet. Of course, criminal investigations into the mishandling of classified information are not exactly unprecedented. During the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump himself repeatedly led chants of “lock her up” in order to capitalize on the Justice Department’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of an email server as secretary of State during the Obama administration. (That investigation ended without charges.) Still, there is no obvious precedent for an investigation concerning a former president’s handling of government documents. In theory at least, any such investigation could be complicated by a president’s broad declassification authority. Thus far at least, Trump has provided no meaningful reason to believe that he properly declassified any classified material that he may have taken to Mar-a-Lago.
Judge who approved FBI’s Mar-a-Lago search represented clients linked to Jeffrey Epstein - — The federal magistrate judge who signed off on the warrant that allowed federal agents to search former President Donald Trump’s Florida residence once drew scrutiny for switching from his job as a federal prosecutor to working as a defense attorney on behalf of individuals connected to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The judge, known for his “meticulous” nature, is also well-respected within the Palm Beach legal community and had once worked in the Justice Department’s public integrity section. He had contributed to both Democrat and Republican candidates. Trump lawyer Christina Bobb told POLITICO that magistrate judge Bruce Reinhart signed off on the warrant and that agents removed about a dozen boxes of materials from the property. Bobb was said to be present at the time the FBI conducted the search of Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach. Reinhart’s decision to grant the FBI’s warrant request to search Trump’s resort has sparked a firestorm among Republicans, who have decried what they call the “weaponization” of the Department of Justice. But one local prosecutor described Reinhart — who has been a magistrate judge since 2018 — as “well respected” within the Palm Beach County legal community. Reinhart is married to Circuit Judge Carolyn Bell, a former federal prosecutor who was appointed to the bench by then-Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican who is now a senator. “He’s a former prosecutor and a defense attorney and he’s also known for being meticulous,” said Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg, a Democrat was who elected state attorney but who also once worked for Republican Attorney General Pam Bondi. “He’s not going to make a snap judgment,” Aronberg added. Reinhart could not be reached for comment. Magistrate judges are not appointed by the president but instead are appointed by district judges. Their duties can include dealing with bond hearings, handling technical issues in civil cases and signing off on whether to authorize a search warrant. Reinhart, who earned his law degree from University of Pennsylvania and also graduated from Princeton, worked for the Treasury Department, the public integrity section of the U.S. Department of Justice, and spent more than 11 years as an assistant United States attorney. During that time he handled more than 100 grand jury investigations including cases involving health care fraud, public corruption and tax fraud, according to a biography of Reinhart posted by the private law firm where he worked for about six years. His official bio on the U.S. District Court Southern District of Florida site appeared to be deactivated.
White House Claims It Had No Notice Of FBI Raid On Trump - The White House is claiming it was not informed ahead of time of the FBI’s raid on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort. A car passes in front of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla., in a Feb. 11, 2022, file photograph. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images) “We did not have notice of the reported action and would refer you to the Justice Department for any additional information,” a White House official told The Epoch Times via email. The Justice Department, which the FBI is a part of, has not responded to a request for comment. The FBI declined to comment. Trump announced the raid late on Aug. 8, calling it evidence of “prosecutorial misconduct” and a “weaponization of the Justice System.” The raid was not announced and was motivated because Democrats do not want Trump to run again for president in 2024, the former president said. Eric Trump, one of Trump’s sons, said the raid was conducted to see whether his father possessed any documents from his time in office. “The purpose for the raid, from what they said, was because the National Archives wanted to corroborate whether or not Donald Trump had any documents in his possession,” Eric Trump said on Fox News. The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) said in February that it received boxes of documents from Trump’s resort. “The Presidential Records Act mandates that all Presidential records must be properly preserved by each Administration so that a complete set of Presidential records is transferred to the National Archives at the end of the Administration,” David Ferriero, the archivist of the United States, said in a statement at the time. “NARA pursues the return of records whenever we learn that records have been improperly removed or have not been appropriately transferred to official accounts.”
DOJ asks court to unseal Trump search warrant --The Justice Department on Thursday moved to unseal a warrant authorizing a search of former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate this week following escalating demands for answers about the unprecedented investigation.“The public’s clear and powerful interest in understanding what occurred under these circumstances weighs heavily in favor of unsealing,” Justice Department lawyers wrote in a court filing submitted Thursday afternoon.The move is a departure from the department’s typical practice of staying silent about ongoing investigations, underscoring the significance of the first overt sign of an escalating criminal probe with a former president at the center.The filing coincided with a public statement from Attorney General Merrick Garland, his first since FBI agents executed the search warrant on Monday.Garland said he personally signed off on the decision to apply for and execute that search warrant, and that the decision was not made “lightly.”“All Americans are entitled to the even-handed application of the law, to due process of law and to the presumption of innocence,” Garland said in remarks at DOJ headquarters. “Much of our work is by necessity conducted out of the public eye. We do that to protect the constitutional rights of all Americans and to protect the integrity of our investigations. Federal law, long standing department rules and our ethical obligations prevent me from providing further details as to the basis of the search at this time.”Trump’s attorneys were provided a copy of the warrant and a receipt listing the seized materials, the Justice Department said in its court filing. The former president’s legal team has not publicly released those documents but his lawyer Christina Bobb has said during media appearances this week that the search concerned potentially classified information being stored at the Florida property.The court filing on Thursday also cited Trump’s own public comments as well as commentary from his legal team about the search as a reason for why it should be made public.“As such, the occurrence of the search and indications of the subject matter involved are already public,” the DOJ lawyers wrote.
Garland, in going public, pushes back at cable news firestorm --Attorney General Merrick Garland was quiet all week as former President Trump, GOP lawmakers and cable news pundits theorized about the FBI’s search on Monday of the former president’s Mar-a-Lago estate. On Thursday, Garland ended the silence, announcing that the Department of Justice (DOJ) would move to unseal the warrant authorizing the search and defending the integrity of the FBI, which had been under heavy attack all week. “I will not stand by silently when their integrity is unfairly attacked,” Garland said, adding that the FBI and DOJ had been subject to “unfounded attacks” on their professionalism. “The men and women of the FBI and the Justice Department are dedicated, patriotic public servants,” Garland said. The attorney general had been under pressure to speak, even though it is a standard for the DOJ not to comment publicly on details about active investigations. But in this case, the silence had been filled by the remarks of lawmakers, a former president and some cable news pundits who had gone so far as to suggest the FBI might have planted evidence at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence. On Thursday, Garland sought to push back, while putting the onus on Trump to agree to unseal the warrant — which could lead to more information about the fight between the ex-president and the DOJ over classified documents reportedly taken without authorization to Trump’s Florida residence. Following standard practice, investigators had provided Trump’s attorneys with their own copy of the search warrant and a receipt that would have itemized the materials seized during the search, neither of which the former president has publicly released. If a federal judge grants the DOJ’s motion, both documents would be made public, likely in addition to a law enforcement affidavit detailing the reasons why investigators suspected there was evidence of criminal conduct on Trump’s property.
A guide to classified information and the Trump Mar-a-Lago warrant - The Washington Post -- When a federal magistrate judge unsealed on Friday the court-authorized warrant used to search former president Donald Trump’s home, he also made public an inventory list of all the items taken in the high-profile raid.The unprecedented search was related to an investigation into the potential mishandling of classified documents, including material related to nuclear weapons, The Washington Post reported Thursday.The inventory of 28 seized items provides a glimpse of what was still being kept at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Florida residence and private beach club, more than a year after the National Archives and Records Agency began trying to retrieve presidential records improperly taken from the White House at the end of Trump’s presidency. It offers few details.Here’s what you need to know about classified information to help decode some of the items included in the inventory list.
Trump Critics Say FBI Mar-a-Lago Raid May Have Handed Him GOP Nomination, "Potentially The Presidency" - The FBI’s raid of the former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate “handed” the 2024 Republican presidential nomination to Trump and prompted moderate Republicans to vote for him, according to Joe Walsh, a former Republican congressman and a critic of Trump.Trump announced that his Florida property was “under siege” and “occupied by a group of FBI agents” in a statement late on Aug. 8, calling it evidence of “prosecutorial misconduct” and a “weaponization of the Justice System.”The raid was not announced and was motivated because Democrats do not want Trump to run again for president in 2024, the former president said.Walsh, who applauded the FBI’s raid on Twitter, said the move angered many GOP voters and pushed them to campaign and vote for Trump.“I’ve heard from so many GOP voters tonight who were cooling a bit these past few months on Trump but who are so pissed off about this raid and are back to completely & enthusiastically all in with their support for him,” Walsh later wrote in an Aug. 8 post.In another post, Walsh said the FBI’s move handed the GOP nomination to Trump.“Both things are true: 1. The Justice Department’s job is to pursue justice & uphold the rule of law. And they should NEVER let politics get in the way of that. Yesterday, they did their job. 2. What happened yesterday handed the 2024 GOP nomination to Donald Trump,” he said on Twitter.
Federal Court Rules Trump’s Tax Returns Can Be Released to Congress -A federal appeals court gave a House committee the green light on Tuesday to review former President Donald Trump’s tax returns in a major blow to Trump, who has for years been fighting the release of his personal financial information. In legal proceedings that have outlasted Trump’s time in office, the House Ways and Means committee first brought the case against the Treasury Department in 2019, after seeking the tax documents under an IRS provision that allows the committee to obtain tax information for legitimate legislative purposes. A lower court ruled last year that the documents could be disclosed to Congress, but Trump appealed the ruling. On Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rejected that appeal, allowing the tax documents to be sent to the House committee. The court determined that the request from the House committee does not exceed Congress’ investigative authority or violate the separation of powers, like Trump’s lawyers had argued. “It is understandable that the Committee would want to compare returns filed during the presidency with those filed in the years before and after to see what effect, if any, Mr. Trump being the sitting President had on how his returns were treated by the Presidential Audit Program,” the court’s ruling reads. The House Ways and Means committee said in a tweet on Tuesday that it expects to receive the tax documents “immediately.” But Trump could still appeal the ruling. The decision comes in the wake of the FBI executing a search warrant on Trump’s residence at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, on Monday, which is thought to be part of an investigation into the handling of presidential documents. The incident has triggered a political firestorm, as GOP leaders accuse the Biden administration of weaponizing government agencies to go after political opponents.
Opinion | Liz Cheney is the Obi-Wan to Trump’s Darth Vader - The Washington Post -Star Wars fans, remember that scene in “Episode IV: A New Hope” when Jedi master Obi-Wan Kenobi and Sith lord Darth Vader are light-sabering it out on the Death Star? Kenobi and Vader are monologuingover the crackle of their clashing weapons when Kenobi declares, “If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.” Then, in an act of self-sacrifice he hopes will hasten the destruction of the evil Empire, Kenobi allows Vader to do just that.A version of this battle is playing out in real life with Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) as Kenobi and former president Donald Trump as Vader. Now, I realize that Cheney’s father, former vice president Dick Cheney, has traditionally been known as Darth Vader, what with the Iraq War and“enhanced interrogation” techniques and all that. But work with me, people.Ever since Trump summoned a mob to the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in a failed effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election, Liz Cheney has made it her mission to destroy him. Well, by “destroy,” I mean hold him accountable for his violation of the Constitution and his oath to protect it — and ensure he never holds the high office ever again.As the vice chair of the Jan. 6 committee, Cheney has been merciless in that endeavor. Her remarks at the beginning and the end of each of the eight public hearings were a warning to the nation and a clarion call to her fellow Republicans about the danger to the republic that Trump remains.And like any power-mad wannabe despot, Trump has targeted Cheney for political elimination. Not satisfied by her removal from Republican House leadership, Trump endorsed her GOP primary challenger, who leads her by a whopping 22 points. There you have Trump’s Vader-like striking down; that the official vanquishing won’t occur until Wyoming’s Aug. 16 primary doesn’t much matter.But follow the analogy a little further: Cheney’s presumptive defeat won’t be the end of the story. As with Obi-Wan, it will make her more powerful than Trump and his enablers can possibly imagine. Thanks to her fearlessness against Trump in defense of the Constitution, the congresswoman from Wyoming’s lone district now has a national stature independent of her famous last name. And that has led to the inevitable and growing chatter that Cheney should run for president, which will only intensify once she is in all likelihood politically martyred.
Trump Refuses To Answer NY AG's Questions At Deposition - Former President Trump on Wednesday announced that he would not be answering questions in his court-ordered deposition in New York Attorney General Letitia James' three-year probe of his organization. After arriving just before 9 a.m. at the AG's NYC headquarters, Trump released a statement which reads in part: "accordingly, under the advice of my counsel and for all of the above reasons, I declined to answer the questions under the rights and privileges afforded to every citizen under the United States Constitution." "I did nothing wrong, which is why, after five years of looking, the Federal, State and local governments, together with the Fake News Media, have found nothing," the statement continues. "We cannot permit a renegade and out-of-control prosecutor to use this investigation as a means of advancing her political career." "I once asked, ‘If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?" Now I know the answer to that question," the statement continues.
Trump takes the Fifth - Former President Donald Trump declined to answer questions on Wednesday during a deposition with the office of New York Attorney General Tish James, asserting his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.Trump, who has long accused James of conducting a politically motivated probe into his family’s real estate business, said in a statement Wednesday that he had “absolutely no choice” but to take the Fifth during his under-oath interview with the attorney general’s office. James is leading an investigation into Trump Organization business practices, examining allegations that the former president’s company misstated asset values on financial documents.“I once asked, ‘If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?’ Now I know the answer to that question,” Trump said in a statement released by his post-presidential office. “When your family, your company, and all the people in your orbit have become the targets of an unfounded, politically motivated Witch Hunt supported by lawyers, prosecutors, and the Fake News Media, you have no choice.”A spokesperson for the state’s attorney general confirmed Wednesday that their office conducted a deposition of Trump and that the former president invoked his Fifth Amendment rights. The spokesperson declined to provide further details.“Attorney General James will pursue the facts and the law wherever they may lead. Our investigation continues,” the spokesperson said.A crush of media followed the former president from his Midtown Manhattan apartment at Trump Tower downtown to the attorney general’s office around 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday morning. Trump waved at onlookers and members of the media and held a fist in the air as he departed for the deposition.Secret Service agents and New York Police Department officers patrolled the garage entrance to James’ office where Trump’s motorcade drove in at about 9 a.m. The officers stood guard throughout the morning, with passersby gathered on sidewalks and street corners surrounding the entrance to the skyscraper.Trump’s deposition with the New York attorney general’s team came amid the office’s three-year-long investigation into whether the Trump Organization had misstated the value of assets on financial statements. Trump had tried for months to avoid Wednesday’s deposition — which comes at a high stakes moment for the former president just two days after the FBI raided his Florida home in an investigation into the alleged mishandling of White House records.The former president is also the subject of a parallel criminal investigation being conducted by the Manhattan district attorney’s office into whether he fraudulently inflated property values. It has been speculated for months that Trump would plead the Fifth in James’ probe to avoid incriminating himself in the district attorney’s investigation.Trump on the campaign trail in 2016 had suggested that not answering questions was a sign of guilt, saying at an event in Iowa, “If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?” But he walked back that implication in his Wednesday statement, admitting that he now knows “the answer to that question.”“If there was any question in my mind, the raid of my home, Mar-a-Lago, on Monday by the FBI, just two days prior to this deposition, wiped out any uncertainty,” Trump said.
Treasury sanctions crypto program that helped North Koreans launder funds - The Treasury Department issued sanctions Monday against a cryptocurrency service that has allowed North Korean hackers and others to launder billions of dollars’ worth of digital tokens stolen in virtual heists. The service, Tornado Cash, is what is known as a mixer, and it pools digital assets to obscure their ownership. Since its launch in 2019, the program has laundered more than $7 billion in digital assets, according to the Treasury Department. By adding the service’s website and 45 associated crypto wallets to the sanctions list, the administration makes it illegal for any American to transact with them. “Despite public assurances otherwise, Tornado Cash has repeatedly failed to impose effective controls designed to stop it from laundering funds for malicious cyber actors on a regular basis and without basic measures to address its risks,” Brian Nelson, Treasury’s undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, said in a statement. U.S. hasn’t stopped N. Korean gang from laundering its crypto haul Just in the last several months, cybercriminals used Tornado Cash to wash crypto funds stolen in a series of high-profile hacks, Treasury said. The Lazarus Group, a cybercriminal gang that international investigators have said is a key funding source for the North Korean weapons program, used the service to process more than $455 million they stole in April in the largest crypto heist to date. Hackers laundered more than $96 million from the June attack on the Harmony blockchain bridge — and at least another $7.8 million from the hack of the Nomad bridge last week.The sanctions mark the Biden administration’s second such move against a mixer. In May, it blacklisted a program called Blender, which the Lazarus Group also employed.. The mixer has not appeared to be operational since then, a senior Treasury official said in a background press briefing on Monday. “Treasury will continue to aggressively pursue actions against mixers that launder virtual currency for criminals and those who assist them,” Nelson said in his statement.
Banking groups plead with Biden administration for bigger crypto role -— The nation's top banking trade associations told the Biden administration that its cautious approach to digital assets is stifling the industry, while the broader crypto sector continues to operate with little government oversight. The comments, in response to a request from the Treasury Department in July, reiterate an argument that banks have made for years: that the highly regulated banking sector is one of the safest places to experiment with crypto, rather than its less-regulated nonbank counterparts. "The combination of these two approaches – inaction on the one hand to bring into the regulatory perimeter non-bank crypto companies, and limitation on the other of banks' ability to engage responsibly in the digital asset market – creates an environment that makes it nearly impossible for responsible financial innovation to occur in this space, causing it to remain in the Wild West," wrote Brooke Ybarra, head of the American Bankers Association's office of innovation. Banks are betting their industry's stricter oversight and stability will appear more enticing for regulators in the wake of the market turmoil that's wiped a huge amount of value from the crypto sector. At the same time, however, that caution to date may have played a key role in insulating the traditional financial industry from digital assets' plunging volatility, analysts say. Balancing the banking system's more robust supervision against its broader exposure to the U.S. economy will be key as regulators consider just how involved they want banks to be in the potentially lucrative future of crypto. "There's money to be made," said Hilary Allen, a law professor at American University and expert on financial stability. "The banking industry has shown us in the past that it can be very short term if there are profits to be made, even if it's potentially very destabilizing in the long-term. That's what we saw in the run-up to 2008, and that's what I worry about happening all over again."
Durbin, Whitehouse, Sanders join effort to revoke OCC crypto guidance — Three prominent Democratic senators joined an effort to eliminate Trump-era regulatory guidance that cleared national banks to explore digital assets and other crypto-related banking activity. In a letter first drafted and circulated last week by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts last week, the lawmaker urged the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to rescind a series of interpretive letters issued during the tenure of the acting comptroller, Brian Brooks. On Wednesday, Warren's office announced the letter had been sent to the OCC and that three additional senators had signed on to it: Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Sheldon Whitehouse, D-Rhode Island, and Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. Of the quartet, only Warren currently sits on the Senate Banking Committee. But Durbin, Sanders and Whitehouse have all served in the U.S. Senate for more than a decade and hold significant influence on Capitol Hill, and their support for Warren's letter will amplify the pressure on the OCC to further limit banks' crypto aspirations. (Banks, meanwhile, pleaded with the Biden administration this week to let them do more work with digital assets.) The lawmaker correspondence sent Wednesday was unchanged from the draft reported on by American Banker last week and urged current acting Comptroller Michael Hsu to revoke a total of four interpretive letters. Three of those were issued by Trump-era OCC chief counsel Jonathan Gould — Interpretive Letters 1170, 1172 and 1174 — and generally cleared banks to explore key elements of decentralized finance, including digital asset custody services and stablecoin payments. The lawmakers also asked Hsu to rescind Interpretive Letter 1179, a Biden-era memo written by the current OCC general counsel, Benjamin McDonough, that sought to limit the scope of the previous crypto letters, telling banks that they would need to receive approval from their regulators before diving into digital asset activity.
Celsius withdraws motion to hire CFO back at $92,000 a month - Embattled lending platform Celsius has withdrawn its motion to bring back ex-CFO Rod Bolger at $92,000 a month, prorated over a period of at least six weeks, according to a court document filed in the Southern District of New York on Friday. The notice of withdrawal came just ahead of a hearing scheduled for Monday to review it.While Bolger worked full-time with the company as CFO, the original motion shows that he had a base salary of $750,000 and a performance-based cash bonus of up to 75% of his base, in addition to stock and token options, bringing the top of his total income range to around $1.3 million. The filing also indicated that Bolger is technically still on the company's payroll."On June 30, 2022, Mr. Bolger gave notice to the Debtors that he was voluntarily terminating his employment," reads the filing. "In accordance with his Termination Notice and the terms of his Employment Agreement (as defined below), Mr. Bolger is required to give the Debtors eight weeks' notice, which he has done, and he is continuing to serve as an employee of the Debtors."Had the motion been approved, it is unclear whether Bolger potentially would have received compensation of $62,500 (his monthly base salary), in addition to the monthly $92,000 consulting fee Celsius had requested. The filing stated that he was continuing to serve as an employee of Celsius, but it also noted that Bolger was "not entitled to any severance payments."CNBC reached out to Celsius to ask about the terms of the proposed motion but did not immediately hear back to our request for comment, sent outside business hours.The decision to dismiss the motion came three days after CNBC first reported on the request to enlist the help of Bolger as a consultant during the bankruptcy process. It also follows a formal objection submitted byKeith Suckno, a CPA and Celsius investor who challenged the move by Celsius, alleging that "little detail" was given for why Bolger's services were necessary to the bankruptcy proceedings.In the original motion, Celsius said it needed Bolger to help it navigate the bankruptcy proceedings as an advisor, "because of Mr. Bolger's familiarity with the Debtors' business." It went on to say that during Bolger's tenure, he led efforts to steady the business during turbulent market volatility this year, guiding the financial aspects of the business and acting as a leader of the company.Bolger, a former CFO for Royal Bank of Canada and divisions of Bank of America, was previously with Celsius for five months before resigning on June 30, about three weeks after the platform paused all withdrawals.
Crypto mixing service Tornado Cash blacklisted by Treasury Department for alleged use in laundering - The U.S. Department of Treasury on Monday sanctioned the popular cryptocurrency mixer Tornado Cash, banning Americans from using a service that the government said, "launders the proceeds of cybercrimes.""Despite public assurances otherwise, Tornado Cash has repeatedly failed to impose effective controls designed to stop it from laundering funds for malicious cyber actors on a regular basis and without basic measures to address its risks," Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian Nelson said in a statement.Crypto asset mixers are designed to obscure trails of funds by blending someone's tokens with a pool of other individuals' assets on the platform. They go beyond traditional crypto platforms in further concealing the identity of the people involved in transactions.While Tornado Cash is used by some people just as a legitimate way to protect their privacy, the government says it fosters illicit activity, including "facilitation of heists, ransomware schemes, fraud, and other cybercrimes.""Virtual currency mixers that assist criminals are a threat to U.S. national security," the Treasury Department said.Tornado was used in some high-profile crypto heists this year, including the$615 million theft of tokens from Ronin, a network supporting the nonfungible token game Axie Infinity, and a $100 million attack on U.S. startup Harmony. Both were linked by security researchers with Lazarus Group, a North Korean state-backed hacking group.Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic found at least $1.5 billion in proceeds from crimes such as ransomware, hacks and fraud have been laundered through Tornado Cash, and that the entirety of the $100 million stolen from the Harmony bridge in June was laundered through the service. The U.S. Treasury quoted a much higher figure for Tornado Cash, and said it's been used to launder more than $7 billion worth of virtual currency since it launched in 2019. That figure refers to the total value of crypto assets that have been sent through Tornado Cash.Some blockchain analytics tools have managed to "demix" crypto sent through Tornado to identify the source of the funds. Elliptic says it was able to trace crypto stolen from Harmony to several new ether wallets, for example.The actions against Tornado Cash follow sanctions similarly imposed in May 2022 on another popular service, Blender.io."The United States will continue to pursue actions against mixers laundering virtual currency for criminals and those who assist them," said Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State, in a statement on Monday.The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), a watchdog falling under Treasury's purview, has added Tornado Cash and its associated crypto wallet addresses, to its "Specially Designated Nationals list." Any person interacting with these wallet addresses could now face criminal penalties, a cause of concern for some crypto holders with honest intentions.
Tornado Cash crackdown by Treasury puts honest crypto investors at risk of criminal exposure - The Treasury Department's crackdown on Tornado Cash was meant to stop criminals. But a lot of ordinary crypto investors with honest intentions are now at risk."Every U.S. person is going to have to be very careful about transacting with Tornado Cash," said Ari Redbord, head of legal and government affairs at research firm TRM Labs, in an interview. "Remember, sanctions are strict liability. Intent does not matter."Tornado Cash is used by some people as a legitimate way to protect their privacy in the still nascent crypto market. When a buyer pays for something using a crypto wallet, the recipient of the transfer has access to the purchaser's public crypto wallet, showing account details and history.Using a crypto mixing service like Tornado Cash masks those details by anonymizing the funds and concealing the identity of the buyer."There is a need for solutions that can help you cover your tracks, even when you're not doing anything illicit," said Tom Robinson, chief scientist for blockchain analytics firm Elliptic. In blacklisting Tornado Cash on Thursday, the Treasury Department said it was going after criminals, who used the service to launder more than $7 billion worth of virtual currency since it launched in 2019. Even though the goal of these sanctions by the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is to block a state like North Korea from converting illicit crypto funds into more usable traditional currencies to fund weapons proliferation, the knock-on effect to everyday investors will be harsh, experts told CNBC.
Payments billionaire found to have knowingly deceived customers --FleetCor Technologies Chief Executive Ron Clarke successfully pitched small businesses on "a better way to pay" for gas, making himself a billionaire in the process. But that success was built in part on falsely advertised rebates, concealed transactions fees and a host of other unfair practices — and Clarke knew it, a federal judge in Atlanta ruled this week in a case brought by the Federal Trade Commission. Clarke and FleetCor have long been dogged by accusations of unethical nickel-and-diming. He has previously dismissed such complaints as "fake news," but U.S. District Judge Amy Totenberg found the FTC had presented "overwhelming evidence" of customer harm. She ruled against FleetCor without a trial and also found Clarke individually responsible. "It is plain that Clarke had actual knowledge of FleetCor's unlawful practices or, at the very least, that he was recklessly indifferent," the judge wrote in her Aug. 9 order blocking the company from continuing such practices. She denied the FTC's request for a damages though, citing a 2021 Supreme Court ruling barring the commission from suing for monetary relief. FleetCor said it plans to appeal Totenberg's ruling. The company "takes governance and oversight matters seriously and is confident it has acted in accordance with applicable laws," lead independent board member Steven Sull said in a statement. 'Pervasive' violations A narrow niche in the digital-payments world, fuel cards like those offered by FleetCor are credit cards that companies with vehicle fleets can issue to employees for on-the-job purchases of gas and and other travel-related expenses. Totenberg said the FTC's evidence showed that FleetCor engaged in "pervasive and long-lasting" violations aimed at deceiving customers. She noted that FleetCor's ads made glowing promises that its cards carried no transaction or annual fees, but the actual terms-and-conditions contained a string of nebulous charges like "convenience network surcharge" or "minimum program administration fee" that often kicked in without prior notice. The judge pointed out that FleetCor's own internal documents stated that the most of its customers were small businesses that held fewer than 10 of its cards. A company study described them as "fairly unsophisticated" and "business owners not business people." For many of them, "English was not their first language," the study said.
Coinbase under SEC scrutiny over its crypto-staking programs --Coinbase Global said it's being probed by the Securities and Exchange Commission over its staking programs, which allow users to earn rewards for holding certain cryptocurrencies. The company "has received investigative subpoenas and requests from the SEC for documents and information about certain customer programs, operations and existing and intended future products," according to a quarterly regulatory filing. The requests relate to Coinbase's staking programs, asset-listing process, classification of assets and stablecoin products, the company said. Staking services are offered by many crypto exchanges as a key way to diversify revenue from trading, which tends to drop during market downturns. It allows users to generate yield on certain crypto holdings by delegating them to help verify transactions and secure the blockchain network. At Coinbase, blockchain-rewards revenue, primarily from staking, accounted for 8.5% of net revenue in the second quarter. It fell 16% sequentially to $68.4 million during the quarter, less than the decline in trading revenue. In a shareholder letter Tuesday, Coinbase said the SEC in May sent a voluntary request for information, including about its listings and listing process, and it doesn't know yet if the inquiry will become a formal investigation. The crypto exchange is under scrutiny by the SEC for potentially making unregistered securities available for trading, Bloomberg previously reported. "As with all regulators around the world, we are committed to productive discussion with the SEC about crypto assets and securities regulation," Coinbase said in the letter.
In Historic Overhaul, SEC Will Demand Hedge Funds Share Extensive Information, Including Strategy And Exposure -- While there may not be a hedge fund industry for much longer considering everyone is now positioned dead wrong into this "most hated rally" especially in the post-CPI meltup which sent the VIX < 20, with hedge fund net leverage at 1%-ile levels over the past decade, and redemption letters about to start flying in..... the SEC will vote to make lives for aspiring billionaires (who demand to be paid 2 and 20 for alpha which is really just levered beta) even more unbearable by proposing a rule that seeks to boost the quality of disclosures it receives from large private and hedge funds, including significantly more information about how funds are set up and their investment strategies."Such concentration or exposure may increase the risk of amplified losses for investors and gathering additional data ... would help regulators to protect investors and monitor systemic risk," SEC Chair Gary Gensler said in a statement.The rule, aimed to boost disclosures around leverage and investment strategies, will be proposed in conjunction with the CFTC, and forms part of ongoing scrutiny of the fund industry.According to Reuters, the measure would expand reporting requirements for advisors and large hedge funds with a net asset value of at least $500 million, and would require funds and their advisors spell out their investment strategy and exposure, including details around borrowing and financing arrangements with counterparties, open positions and certain large positions, among other details.As Bloomberg adds, the expansion of confidential filings that big managers must file quarterly with the SEC "would mark one of the biggest increases in regulation for the private-fund industry in a decade." The proposal - which the SEC will debate on Wednesday - could be the most controversial yet as it touches on the specific strategies that firms use. While specific data included on the so-called Form PF isn’t made public, regulators can use it in enforcement actions and to assess broader market risks. The proposal is part of a broader effort by the SEC to boost transparency of the private fund industry amid worries the industry is a growing source of systemic risk, and follows a January draft rule that boosted other Form PF disclosures.
Warren renews push for SEC to crack down on insider stock sales - A group of Democratic senators led by Elizabeth Warren is redoubling efforts to get Wall Street's main regulator to clamp down on executives' ability to use inside information to make well-timed stock trades. The Securities and Exchange Commission should quickly move to toughen its rules, the lawmakers said in a letter Friday to SEC Chair Gary Gensler. "Corporate insiders cannot be allowed to continue to trade based on insiders' knowledge with impunity," they wrote. Lawmakers joined consumer protection advocates to urge action on their legislation to address predatory overdraft fees. In December, the SEC proposed new restrictions for prearranged plans that senior executives often use to sell stock and avoid being accused of insider trading later. Among other things, the agency proposed forcing insiders to wait roughly four months from when they schedule a trade before they sell. The scheduled stock sales, so-called 10b5-1 plans, are common across Corporate America. Under the proposal, which could be finalized in the coming months, companies would be required to disclose in regulatory filings whether executives have adopted or made any changes to when they plan to sell stock. Employees would also be prevented from having multiple plans for trading the same security. While Warren and the other lawmakers lauded the plan as a solid first step, they're asking the regulator to go even further. The SEC declined to comment on the letter. "We urge you to consider additional, strong rules that would prevent these abusive practices and protect the integrity of our capital markets, and that you implement them without delay," said the letter, which was also signed by Democrats Chris Van Hollen and Tammy Baldwin and by Bernie Sanders, an Independent. A copy was reviewed by Bloomberg News. The senators asked the SEC to extend the "cooling-off period" between a trading plan's adoption and its execution to 180 days and said that the required delay should apply to more employees. The lawmakers also called for more limits on single-trade plans.
Bonds Celebrate CPI Miss With One Of The Strongest 10Y Auctions In History - One day after a stellar 3Y auction saw the lowest dealer award on record, which many said (correctly) hinted at a big CPI miss, moments ago we got the follow through to today's massive CPI miss when the Treasury sold $35BN in 10Y paper in one of the strongest auctions on record.The high yield in today's sale of $35BN in paper came in at 2.755%, down from 2.94% in July and the 2nd consecutive decline; the yield also stopped through the 2.7610% When Issued by 0.6bps, the first stop through for the 10Y tenor since February!The internals were just as strong, with Indirects awarded a whopping 74.5%, the third highest on record, the highest since February's 77.6% and way above the six-auction average of 67.7%. And with Directs taking down 15.6%, below the recent average of 17.6%, Dealers were left holding just 9.9%, the lowest since February (7.4%) and the second-lowest Dealers award on record.Overall, this was a 2nd consecutive stellar 10Y auction which just like inflation, has seen yields top and are now sliding fast as the US economy is headed for a recession, an outcome which will send 10Y yields far lower from here even as the curve inverts to even more grotesque levels. And as refunding week concludes tomorrow with another 30Y auction, expect nothing but fireworks as the scramble for duration kicks into high gear.
CFPB to crack down on financial firms' protection of consumer data -- Financial companies that don't protect consumer data may violate federal consumer protection law, a federal agency said. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau issued a circular that outlines financial firms' responsibilities to guard consumer data, saying that failure to do so could be a violation of the Consumer Financial Protection Act. The move is part of a set of broader policy statements and fines that signals a crackdown on tech and financial companies. On Wednesday, the agency said that digital marketing firms that use algorithms or other analytics to target specific customers can be held liable for violating federal law. "Financial firms that cut corners on data security put their customers at risk of identity theft, fraud and abuse," CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in a statement. "While many nonbank companies and financial technology providers have not been subject to careful oversight over their data security, they risk legal liability when they fail to take common sense steps to protect personal financial data." The CFPB said it's increasing its focus on the "potential misuse and abuse of personal finance data." In the circular, the agency specifies that acts and practices are unfair when they're likely to cause substantial harm, and when the financial company wouldn't put itself at a competitive disadvantage by preventing that harm. Specifically, the agency listed multifactor authentication, password management and timely software updates as methods financial companies should use to prevent consumer harm regarding personal data. If a company doesn't have any of these preventative measures, the CFPB said that's unlikely to have any countervailing benefits, and could cause substantial consumer harm.
CFPB says Big Tech digital marketers are liable for unfair, deceptive practices - The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said that digital marketing firms that use algorithms or other analytics to target specific customers with ads or content can be held liable for abuses under federal law. The CFPB on Wednesday issued an interpretive rule and CFPB Director Rohit Chopra gave aspeech to the National Association of Attorneys General in which he urged state officials to lead the charge to police unlawful conduct by Big Tech firms.Digital marketers can no longer claim an exemption from the Consumer Financial Protection Act, and are liable under the interpretive rule for "unfair, deceptive or abusive acts or practices," known as UDAAP violations, Chopra said. Digital marketers often are involved in the development of content strategy when they identify or select prospective customers and do not merely provide ad time and space that in the past would have qualified for an exception to the law, Chopra said. "Today, the CFPB has issued an interpretive rule explaining that the service provider exemption for "time or space" will typically not apply to the digital marketing services offered by major platforms," Chopra said at the attorneys general summit in Des Moines, Iowa. "While they may be providing space for ads, these firms are commingling many other features that go well beyond the exemption." Claims for misconduct by digital marketers that act as service providers can be pursued by state attorneys general for consumer protection violations, he added. The interpretive rule is just the latest in a string of changes to hold nonbank financial and technology firms accountable by bringing them under the CFPB's authority.
CFPB fines mobile savings app Digit $2.7 million for overdraft charges --The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau slapped the San Francisco technology firm Digit, a unit of the consumer lender Oportun, with a $2.7 million fine for failing to prevent consumers from triggering overdraft fees on their bank accounts. The agency also said the company pocketed interest on consumers' checking accounts. Digit engaged in deceptive acts or practices by using an algorithm that routinely caused customers' checking accounts to overdraft, the CFPB said Wednesday in a consent order. The mobile savings app pioneer did not always reimburse consumers for the overdraft fees, the CFPB said. Digit's automated savings tool uses algorithms to monitor checking accounts with low balances. It then transfers small amounts of money from a checking account to a savings account, allegedly without interfering with its customers' other charges or with paying bills. But consumers with little cushion in their checking accounts ran into trouble. The company received 70,000 complaints about overdraft fees since 2017, the CFPB said. "Digit positioned itself as a savings tool for consumers having trouble saving on their own. But instead, consumers ended up paying unnecessary overdraft fees," CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in a press release. "Companies have long been held to account when they engage in faulty advertising, and regulators must do the same when it comes to faulty algorithms." Digit, which was founded in 2013, offers banking services through a bank partner, the $6.9 billion-asset MetaBank in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, that sold its name to Facebook in a deal with Meta Platforms last year. The CFPB referred to the company as Hello Digit, though it does business as Digit.
MoneyGram, sued by CFPB, accuses it of 'venue shopping' When the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau sued MoneyGram International in April, the lawsuit was filed in New York because New York Attorney General Letitia James joined the lawsuit alleging repeat violations of remittance rules. But MoneyGram, which is headquartered in Dallas, is now asking a New York judge to transfer the case to Texas and in doing so, is publicly airing some of the unusual, behind-the-scenes actions taken by CFPB Director Rohit Chopra in litigation. Chopra has previously said he expects more litigation against companies accused of wrongdoing and has focused his attention primarily on large companies that are repeat offenders.. MoneyGram alleges that the CFPB recruited New York's top cop to join the lawsuit at the last minute and that New York's attorney general conducted no investigation or had any involvement until three months before the lawsuit was filed. New York's attorney general "never sought documents or testimony from defendants, never issued a subpoena, and never appeared to conduct any investigation whatsoever, " MoneyGram said in court documents filed last week. The company alleges that the CFPB only added James as a co-plaintiff "at the eleventh hour," in order to "bootstrap," itself into New York as a better venue.
Banks hint at legal challenges to CRA rewrite --— Banking groups asked for a longer time frame and significant changes to the rewrite of the Community Reinvestment Act, suggesting that legal challenges could be around the corner if bank regulators plow ahead. The comment letters from bank trade groups, submitted before the regulatory deadline last Friday, represent a shift in tone for the industry, which was cautiously optimistic shortly after the initial unveiling of the proposal earlier this year. But after months of reading the nearly 700-page overhaul proposed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., Federal Reserve and Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, banks criticized myriad elements, including the potentially tougher CRA exams, adjustments for online-based lending and the regulators' timeline for finalizing and implementing the new rule. "A 90-day comment period for a 700-page proposal that makes sweeping changes to the CRA framework, contains 180 questions and poses numerous alternatives, and yet proposes a 12-month implementation period for the final rule, suggests that the agencies are not seeking informed feedback on the rule, and instead are preparing to issue a final rule quickly with the goal of implementing it before a possible administration change in 2025," the American Bankers Association said in its comment letter. Regulators denied a request by 10 banking organizations to delay the proposal's comment period by 30 days, which would have pushed it to the end of September, the ABA said. "We do not understand the agencies' rationale in denying this request or why the agencies are proceeding with a comment period that is too short relative to the scope and magnitude of changes being proposed," the trade group said in its letter. The trade group said that if the rule is finalized as proposed, and absent any additional explanation or "meaningful opportunity to comment," it could be challenged.
Fannie, Freddie both pass 2022 stress test despite misalignment on risk rating -Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-backed mortgage companies, would face a combined credit loss of more than $17 billion under this year's stress test scenario.. Despite the losses, both enterprises are sufficiently capitalized to withstand the financial shocks of a severe recession, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency, which administers the annual test in accordance with Dodd-Frank requirements. Fannie Mae performed better under the 2022 scenario than it did last year, registering a total credit loss of $10.8 billion, compared with $14.2 billion in 2021. Freddie Mac, on the other hand, was slightly more adversely impacted, with credit losses of $6.3 billion in the current testing cycle, compared with $5.8 billion last year. Credit losses are defined as net charge-offs plus foreclosure expenses. Without establishing a special reserve to offset deferred tax assets, both GSEs would emerge from the stress scenario generating comprehensive income. When factoring in the impact of establishing a valuation allowance — a capital reserve to offset potential losses — on deferred tax assets, Fannie Mae registered a net loss of $6.3 billion. In response to this year's test results, the FHFA issued a bevy of guidance to both enterprises. It directed the groups to use aligned regional house price paths to project potential loan losses and set similar capital requirements. The agency also broadened its definition of counterparties that must be considered when assessing credit default risks to include mortgage insurers, unsecured overnight deposits, providers of multifamily credit enhancements, nonbank servicers and credit risk transfer reinsurance groups. The biggest expenses for both government-sponsored enterprises were provisions for credit losses, which combined for $34.9 billion, and losses from disruption to global securities trading markets, including counterparty defaults, which would cost them a combined $7.1 billion under the scenario. The projected losses would be offset by portfolio growth and rising home values over the course of the period examined, which spanned the first quarter of 2022 to the first quarter of 2024.
MBA: "Mortgage Delinquencies Decrease in the Second Quarter of 2022" -- From the MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Decrease in the Second Quarter of 2022The delinquency rate for mortgage loans on one-to-four-unit residential properties decreased to a seasonally adjusted rate of 3.64 percent of all loans outstanding at the end of the second quarter of 2022, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) National Delinquency Survey. For the purposes of the survey, MBA asks servicers to report loans in forbearance as delinquent if the payment was not made based on the original terms of the mortgage. The delinquency rate was down 47 basis points from the first quarter of 2022 and down 183 basis points from one year ago. “At 3.64 percent, the mortgage delinquency rate in the second quarter fell to its lowest level since MBA’s survey began in 1979 – even beating out the previous pre-pandemic, survey low of 3.77 percent in the fourth quarter of 2019,” said Marina Walsh, MBA’s Vice President of Industry Analysis. “Most of the improvement across all product types – FHA, VA, and conventional loans - resulted from a decline in the loans that were 90 days or more delinquent but not in the foreclosure process.” According to Walsh, of all the economic indicators that can lead to mortgage delinquencies, the U.S. unemployment rate seems to be the best gauge of loan performance. Despite inflationary pressures, stock market volatility, increases in mortgage rates, and two quarters of economic contraction – often defined as a recession – the job market remains incredibly strong. The unemployment rate was 3.5 percent in July – a half-century low that tracks closely with the record-low mortgage delinquency rate. Added Walsh, “Foreclosure inventory levels and foreclosure starts remain well below historical averages for the survey – a strong indication that servicers are able to help delinquent borrowers find alternatives to foreclosure. Such alternatives include curing, loan workouts, home sales - with possible equity to spare, or cash-for-keys and deed-in-lieu options.” This graph shows the percent of loans delinquent by days past due. Overall delinquencies decreased in Q2 to a record low.
Mortgage Applications Increase in Latest MBA Weekly Survey - Mortgage applications increased 0.2 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending August 5, 2022. ... The Refinance Index increased 4 percent from the previous week and was 82 percent lower than the same week one year ago. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 1 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index decreased 2 percent compared with the previous week and was 19 percent lower than the same week one year ago. “Mortgage rates remained volatile last week – after drops in the previous two weeks, mortgage rates ended up rising four basis points. Mortgage applications were relatively flat, with a decline in purchase activity offset by an increase in refinance applications,” said Joel Kan, MBA’s Associate Vice President of Economic and Industry Forecasting. “The purchase market continues to experience a slowdown, despite the strong job market. Activity has now fallen in five of the last six weeks, as buyers remain on the sidelines due to still-challenging affordability conditions and doubts about the strength of the economy.” , “Refinance applications increased over three percent but remained more than 80 percent lower than a year ago in this higher rate environment.” The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with conforming loan balances ($647,200 or less) increased to 5.47 percent from 5.43 percent, with points increasing to 0.80 from 0.65 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent loan-to-value ratio (LTV) loans.
House Prices in San Francisco & Bay Area Experience Steep Declines from April Peak Craziness, Down Year-over-Year - The median price of single-family houses in the San Francisco Bay Area peaked in April and has dropped every month since then. By July, the median price, at $1.33 million, was down by about $220,000 from the peak and by 2% year-over-year, undoing most of the huge gains in 2021 and early 2022. In San Francisco itself, the median price of single-family houses also peaked in April – at $2.06 million, according to the California Association of Realtors. And then it sagged, and then it plunged. In July, it hit $1.68 million. Median prices are volatile from month to month, and they’re easily skewed by a change in the mix of what sold, and by other factors, so we need to be careful here. But this is nevertheless a huge plunge at the wrong time of the year. Year-over-year, the median price in San Francisco dropped by 9% in July, the second month in a row of year-over-year declines, following the 4% year-over-year decline in June. The first time the median price hit this level was in February 2018. In this chart, the seasonal low points are generally Decembers and Januarys. The summer months tend to be in the upper part of the range – but obviously not this July. The purple line connects the Julys. Sales volume in July plunged by 38% year-over-year in the Bay Area, according to MLS data cited by Patrick Carlisle, Chief Market Analyst at Compass, San Francisco Bay Area. “Across the Bay Area, markets have continued to slow and cool, with dramatic changes in buyer demand, inventory, overbidding, price reductions, and year-over-year appreciation rates,” Carlisle said. “Median home sales price appreciation rates in the Bay Area have generally seen steep declines from those in 2021/early 2022, with some counties experiencing year-over-year median price declines in July,” Carlisle said. “These changes vary in degree by county and market segment – and monthly data can be volatile, fluctuating according to a wide variety of factors, including market seasonality – but the direction of these shifts is near universal,” Carlisle said. The spike in mortgage rates to over 5% is tough for homebuyers to digest, and for home sellers to adjust to, and it’s tough for them everywhere. But San Francisco, with its focus on tech and startups, has become heavily dependent on venture capital funding, and on SoftBank’s funding, and on the hiring by these and other companies, with employees getting huge salaries and fantastical stock options, and all this has become dependent on booming stock and crypto prices. Prices of the most speculative assets have plunged, such as cryptos and stocks that recently had their IPOs or SPAC mergers. Many of these stocks of companies that are headquartered or were headquartered in San Francisco have collapsed by 70% or 80% or 90% and have made it into my Imploded Stocks column. And more broadly, despite the blistering summer rally, the Nasdaq is down 21% from its November high.
August 8th Update: Housing Inventory Increases Slow --Inventory is still increasing, but the inventory build has slowed. Here are the same week inventory changes for the last four years: Inventory bottomed seasonally at the beginning of March 2022 and is now up 126% since then. Altos reports inventory is up 32.1% year-over-year and is now 24.4% above the peak last year. This inventory graph is courtesy of Altos Research. As of August 5th, inventory was at 544 thousand (7-day average), compared to 539 thousand the prior week. Inventory was up 0.9% from the previous week. Inventory is still historically low. Compared to the same week in 2021, inventory is up 32.1% from 412 thousand, however compared to the same week in 2020 inventory is down 11.2% from 613 thousand. Compared to 3 years ago, inventory is down 43.7% from 966 thousand.Here are the inventory milestones I’m watching for with the Altos data:
1. The seasonal bottom (happened on March 4th for Altos) ✅
2. Inventory up year-over-year (happened on May 13th for Altos) ✅
3. Inventory up compared to two years ago (currently down 11.2% according to Altos)
4. Inventory up compared to 2019 (currently down 43.7%).
Here is a graph of the inventory change vs 2021, 2020 (milestone 3 above) and 2019 (milestone 4).The blue line is the year-over-year data, the red line is compared to two years ago, and dashed purple is compared to 2019.Two years ago (in 2020) inventory was declining all year, so the two-year comparison will get easier all year. Based on the recent increases in inventory, my current estimate is inventory will be up compared to 2020 in September of this year.Mike Simonsen discusses this data regularly on Youtube.
Housing Inventory Growth Has Slowed in Recent Weeks -- Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Housing Inventory Growth Has Slowed in Recent Weeks
A brief excerpt: The third graph uses the Altos inventory data and shows the trend comparing to the same week in 2020 and 2019. The dotted red line is the recent trend compared to 2020 - and at the current pace, inventory will be up compared to 2020 in September. The dashed grey line is comparing to 2019, and based on the current trend, it is possible inventory will be back to 2019 levels in the first half of 2023. However, if inventory growth stalls, then it might take much longer to reach normal inventory levels....The current situation is very different from the post-bubble period. Following the housing bubble, many homeowners were forced to sell because they had little or no equity in their homes, and loans that they could no longer afford when teaser rates expired. This led to a huge surge in inventory starting in late 2005.
Now most homeowners have substantial equity, and fixed rate loans with low interest rates. This suggests there will be little forced selling, even if prices decline in some areas.Some people will always need to sell due to death, divorce, moving for work, etc., and some speculators might be forced to sell, but it is unlikely we will see a huge surge in inventory like in late-2005.I’ve been expecting inventory to return to 2019 levels in early 2023 with low demand and some normal levels of new listings. However, it is possible that it might take much longer to return to more normal inventory levels - inventory will tell the tale!
How the covid economy triggered soaring costs at this dream home - Carrie and Nate LaChance were watching HGTV from their home in Orlando in 2018 when montages of stunning, palatial houses popped up on the screen. They were hooked. And so the couple decided to move to the Dallas area — sight unseen — and build their dream home. What they discovered seemed serendipitous: an untouched, lakefront lot, which they bought that year for $260,000. They started their building plans in 2020, and Carrie, a model, started posting updates from the “Castle” on Instagram, taking her 1.1 million followers along for the groundbreaking, the selection of a 24-karat gold sink, and the arrival of glittery stone slabs named “Silver Mist.” Four years since they began, the LaChance’s home isn’t finished. Like a structure that withstands rain, snow, wind and hail, their home has been bombarded by every twist and turn in the pandemic economy. Labor shortages. Housing price run-ups. Supply chain snarls. Manufacturing problems. Inflation. The house is still missing windows. And every piece of the house — every plank of wood, every nail, every appliance — has cost far more than planned. The initial budget started around $3 million, but a torrent of global forces have added hundreds of thousands of dollars to the final product. The local lumber supplier’s costs doubled since the pandemic began, then fuel costs ramped up tenfold after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. An appliance company was hammered by an ongoing chip shortage and production issues that pinched things like refrigerators and washing machines. No one can plan for what their products or services will cost. “It was like a chain reaction,” said Joshua Correa, a Dallas native and the LaChance’s home builder. “Everybody started charging more — for everything.” The chaos swirling around the housing market has swept up millions of families — from those chasing their dream homes to those trying to become first-time buyers. Few builders or construction workers have been spared, especially in the Dallas area, which has some of the highestinflation rates in the country. This is the story of how the unusual forces shaping the covid economy collide under one (very expensive) Texas roof.
Leading Index for Commercial Real Estate increases in July -- From Dodge Data Analytics: Dodge Momentum Index Moves Higher In July The Dodge Momentum Index (DMI) increased 2.9% in July to 178.7 from the revised June figure of 173.6. The Momentum Index, issued by Dodge Construction Network, is a monthly measure of the initial report for nonresidential building projects in planning. The index is shown to lead construction spending for nonresidential buildings by a full year. In July, the commercial component of the Momentum Index rose 5.5%, while the institutional component fell 2.0%.Commercial planning in July was led by an increase in data center, office and warehouse projects, while fewer education and healthcare projects drove the institutional component lower. Compared to July 2021, the Momentum Index was 8%. The commercial component was 15% higher, while the institutional component was 3% lower than a year ago.July 2021.This graph shows the Dodge Momentum Index since 2002. The index was at 178.7 in July, up from 173.6 in June.According to Dodge, this index leads "construction spending for nonresidential buildings by a full year". This index suggested a decline in Commercial Real Estate construction through most of 2021, but a solid pickup this year and into 2023.
Vehicle Sales: Fleet Turnover Ratio and the Inflation Impact Back in early 2009, I wrote a couple of posts arguing there would be an increase in auto sales - Vehicle Sales(Jan 2009) and Looking for the Sun (Feb 2009). This was an out-of-the-consensus call and helped me call the bottom for the US economy in mid-2009.I wrote an update in 2014, and argued vehicle sales would "mostly move sideways" for the next few years.Here is another update to the U.S. fleet turnover graph.This graph shows the total number of registered vehicles in the U.S. divided by the sales rate through July 2022 - and gives a turnover ratio for the U.S. fleet (this doesn't tell you the age or the composition of the fleet). Note: the number of registered vehicles is estimated for 2021 and 2022.The wild swings in 2009 were due to the "cash for clunkers" program. And in April 2020, sales collapsed due to the onset of the pandemic.The estimated ratio for July is close to 21 years - well above the normal level.Note: in 2009, I argued the turnover ratio would "probably decline to 15 or so eventually" and that happened - and will likely happen again.The second graph shows light vehicle sales since the BEA started keeping data in 1967. The dashed line is current estimated sales rate. The current sales rate is still low mostly due to pandemic related supply constraints.Light vehicle sales were at a 13.35 million seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) in July.I expect vehicle sales to increase over the next couple of years.When the Fed fights inflation, housing is the primary transmission mechanism for Fed policy, since housing is interest rate sensitive. Usually, vehicle sales are impacted too by Fed policy, but probably not this time since sales are so low due to the supply constraints.
Plunge In Gas Prices Sparks Surge In Real Spending, But Low-Income Consumers Remain Stressed -- In the aftermath of the recent plunge in gas prices, which has pulled the national average price to just above $4.00, two months after hitting an all time high north of $5.00, traders have been curious to see how retail spending will be impacted by this welcome development. And while the official data will be published next Wednesday, today we got an early glimpse thanks to the latest BofA card spending data which measures aggregated BofA credit and debit card data, and which was up 5.3% year-over-year (yoy) on a per household (HH) basis in July. To be sure, the July number was artificially inflated in part by Prime Day and related promotions, which occurred in June last year. Which is why on an adjusted basis, July card spending per HH fell 0.2% month-over-month. It's also why BofA's economists forecast a 0.2% mom decrease in the Census Bureau’s July retail sales ex-autos figure, well below consensus of a +0.2% print. But in a favorable twist, July's ostensible weakness was partly due to the plunge in gas prices, which led to a 5.8% mom drop in gas spending According to BofA calculations, the share of gas in retail card spending ex autos fell by 0.7%, the largest single-month decline since April 2020 This has given consumers leeway to spend in other categories, and BofA expects a 0.9% mom increase in the Census Bureau’s core control retail sales print (retail sales ex autos gas, building materials and restaurants). And since the bank is forecasting soft headline inflation, it expects reported real (inflation-adjusted) consumer spending to rise sharply in July. Digging deeper, BofA finds that the intra-month data show a broad increase in yoy spending growth in the latter part of July, particularly among lower-income households... ... where categories that benefited include clothing, restaurants and airlines.
AAR: July Rail Carloads Up Slightly Year-over-year, Intermodal Down --From the Association of American Railroads (AAR) Rail Time Indicators. Rail traffic in July was evenly balanced between commodities with carload gains and those with declines. As such, it doesn’t provide definitive evidence regarding the state of the overall economy. Moreover, the traffic category historically most highly correlated with GDP is “industrial products,” a combination of seven other categories. Carloads of industrial products have fallen for four straight months, but the declines have all been extremely small. This graph from the Rail Time Indicators report shows the six-week average of U.S. Carloads in 2020, 2021 and 2022:In July 2022, U.S. railroads originated 906,903 total carloads — up 0.2% (2,213 carloads) over July 2021. The year-over-year gain was not large, but it was the first gain of any size in four months. Intermodal is not included in carload totals. The second graph shows the six-week average (not monthly) of U.S. intermodal in 2020, 2021 and 2022: (using intermodal or shipping containers):U.S railroads also originated 1.03 million intermodal containers and trailers in July 2022, down 3.0% (32,094 units) from last year. July marked the 11th decline in the past 12 months, but it’s also the smallest percentage decline in those 11 months.
Services Inflation Worst since 1982, Food Inflation Worst since 1979, Housing CPI Heats Up. But Energy Prices Plunge, Some Durable Goods Drop: Inflation Whack A Mole by Wolf Richter -- Inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index backed off a tad in July to a still ugly 8.5%, from the super-ugly 9.1% in June, as food prices continued to spike, but gasoline and natural gas prices fell sharply, and prices of durable goods backed off their crazy spike. But inflation in services rose to 6.25%, the highest since 1982. The CPI for services is still below overall CPI and is still pulling down overall CPI. But it has been getting worse every month for 11 months, and as other price spikes back off, the services CPI pushes to the forefront. That’s how inflation works after it’s entrenched: it cycles from category to category and pops up in different places, while backing off for a while in other places. The headline Consumer Price Index (CPI-U), released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, was unchanged for the month, after two ugly month-to-month spikes, and rose by 8.5% year-over-year: The Consumer Price Index for “all urban wage earners & clerical workers” (CPI-W) backed off to a still horrible 9.1% in July. The average of the July, August, and September readings will be used to determine the COLAs for Social Security benefits in 2023, and July’s 9.1% is the first month in this average of three months: The CPI for services continued its relentless spike, rising by 0.37% in July from June and by 6.25% year-over-year, the worst increase since 1982. Some services, such as airfares, are indirectly influenced by commodities (fuel). Others, such as insurance, healthcare, housing (based on rental factors), etc. are not, and a decline in the prices of commodities don’t reduce inflation in these services. Inflation in services is now where the action is, and it’s very tough to get inflation in services under control: Service categories where CPI rose year-to-year:
- Health insurance: +20.6%
- Rent of primary residence: +6.3%
- Rent, owner’s equivalent: +5.8%
- Motor vehicle maintenance, repair: 8.1%
- Auto insurance: +7.4%
- Medical care services: +5.1%
- Delivery services: +14.0%
- Pet services, including veterinary: +9.3%
- Airline fares: +27.7% (-7.8% monthly)
- Hotels & motels: +1.0% (-2.7% monthly)
- Other personal services (dry-cleaning, haircuts, legal services, etc.): 6.3%
- Admission to movies, theaters, concerts: +6.2%
- Video and audio services, including cable: +3.8%
- Water, sewer, trash collection services: +4.4%
Cleveland Fed: Median CPI increased 0.5% and Trimmed-mean CPI increased 0.4% in July -The Cleveland Fed released the median CPI and the trimmed-mean CPI this morning:
According to the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, the median Consumer Price Index rose 0.5% in July. The 16% trimmed-mean Consumer Price Index increased 0.4% in July. "The median CPI and 16% trimmed-mean CPI are measures of core inflation calculated by the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland based on data released in the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ (BLS) monthly CPI report". Note: The Cleveland Fed released the median CPI details here: "Motor Fuel" decreased at a 61% annualized rate in July! Note that Owners' Equivalent Rent and Rent of Primary Residence account for almost 1/3 of median CPI, and these measures were up between 3% annualized in the Northeast and almost 11% in the South with an average of close to 7.5%. The year-over-year increase was smaller in July than in June. This graph shows the year-over-year change for these four key measures of inflation. On a year-over-year basis, the median CPI rose 6.3%, the trimmed-mean CPI rose 7.0%, and the CPI less food and energy rose 5.9%. Core PCE is for June and increased 4.8% year-over-year.
Early Look at 2023 Cost-Of-Living Adjustments and Maximum Contribution Base - The BLS reported this morning: The Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) increased 9.1 percent over the last 12 months to an index level of 292.219 (1982-84=100). For the month, the index declined 0.1 percent prior to seasonal adjustment.CPI-W is the index that is used to calculate the Cost-Of-Living Adjustments (COLA). The calculation dates have changed over time (see Cost-of-Living Adjustments), but the current calculation uses the average CPI-W for the three months in Q3 (July, August, September) and compares to the average for the highest previous average of Q3 months. Note: this is not the headline CPI-U and is not seasonally adjusted (NSA). • In 2021, the Q3 average of CPI-W was 268.421. The 2021 Q3 average was the highest Q3 average, so we only have to compare Q3 this year to last year.
This graph shows CPI-W since January 2000. The red lines are the Q3 average of CPI-W for each year. Note: The year labeled is for the calculation, and the adjustment is effective for December of that year (received by beneficiaries in January of the following year). CPI-W was up 9.1% year-over-year in July, and although this is early - we need the data for July, August and September - my early guess is COLA will probably be around 8.5% to 9.0% this year, the largest increase since 11.2% in 1981 (and larger than the 7.4% increase in 1982). The contribution base will be adjusted using the National Average Wage Index. This is based on a one-year lag. The National Average Wage Index is not available for 2021 yet, but wages probably increased again in 2021. If wages increased 4% in 2021, then the contribution base next year will increase to around $153,000 in 2023, from the current $147,000. Remember - this is an early look. What matters is average CPI-W, NSA, for all three months in Q3 (July, August and September).
Producer price index July 2022: Wholesale inflation fell 0.5% --Wholesale prices fell in July for the first time in two years as a plunge in energy prices slowed the pace of inflation, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday. The producer price index, which gauges the prices received for final demand products, fell 0.5% from June, the first month-over-month decrease since April 2020, the month after Covid-19 was declared a pandemic. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been expecting an increase of 0.2%. On an annual basis, the index rose 9.8%, the lowest rate since October 2021. That compares with an 11.3% increase in June and the record 11.7% gain in March. Most of the decline came from energy, which dropped 9% at the wholesale level and accounted for 80% of the total decline in goods prices, which fell 1.8%. The index for services rose 0.1%. Stripping out food, energy and trade services, PPI increased 0.2% in July, which was less than the expected 0.4% gain. Core PPI rose 5.8% from a year ago. The numbers come a day after the consumer price index showed that inflation was flat in July though up 8.5% from a year ago. The easing in the CPI also reflected the slide in energy prices that has seen prices at the pump fall below $4 a gallon after hitting record nominal levels above $5 earlier in the summer. "Cooling prices paid by producers portend a further cooling for consumer prices, as producer prices are further up the inflation pipelines," "We expect producer prices to ease as supply chains improve. It could take up to three months for improved supply chains to affect prices for the end consumer." Federal Reserve officials are watching the inflation data closely for clues about where the economy stands after more than a year of wrestling with high inflation. Before July's easing, prices had been running at their highest levels in more than 40 years. Supply chain issues, demand imbalances, and high amounts of fiscal and monetary stimulus associated with the pandemic had driven the annual CPI rate past 9%, well above the Fed's 2% long-run target. This week's data could give the Fed reason to dial back rate increases that have come in successive 0.75 percentage point increments in June and July. Markets are now pricing in a 0.5 percentage point move in September. A separate Labor Department report Thursday showed that weekly jobless claims totaled 262,000 for the week ended Aug. 6, an increase of 14,000 from the previous week though 2,000 below the estimate. Claims have been elevated in recent weeks in a sign that a historically tight labor market is shifting. Continuing claims rose 8,000 to 1.43 million.
U.S. Producer Prices Fall in July; Weekly Jobless Claims Climb (Reuters) - U.S. producer prices unexpectedly fell in July amid a drop in the cost for energy products and underlying producer inflation appears to be on a downward trend, while jobless claims rose for a second straight week in a labor market that remains tight. The producer price index for final demand declined 0.5% last month, the first negative monthly reading since April 2020, the Labor Department said on Thursday. The PPI climbed 1.0% in June. In the 12 months through July, it increased 9.8% after advancing 11.3% in June. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast the PPI would rise 0.2% in July and increase 10.4% on a year-on-year basis. There was a drop of 1.8% in goods prices after a gain of 2.3% in June. A 16.7% fall in gasoline prices accounted for 80% of that decline. The prices of diesel fuel, liquefied petroleum gas and residential natural gas also fell sharply. However, food prices gained 1.0% after declining 0.2% in the prior month, while the cost of services edged up 0.1% after advancing 0.3% in June. GRAPHIC: PPI (https://graphics.reuters.com/USA-STOCKS/znpnerxydvl/ppi.png) The government on Wednesday reported consumer prices were unchanged in July, helped by a drop in gasoline prices after a surge earlier this year, but underlying price pressures nevertheless remained high. Excluding the volatile food, energy and trade services components, producer prices rose 0.2% in July. The so-called core PPI increased 0.3% in June. In the 12 months through July, the core PPI advanced 5.8% after rising 6.4% in June. The Federal Reserve is mulling whether to raise its benchmark overnight lending rate by another 50 or 75 basis points at its next policy meeting on Sept. 20-21 in its bid to tame inflation running at more than three times its 2% target.
Weekly Initial Unemployment Claims increase to 262,000 - The DOL reported:In the week ending August 6, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 262,000, an increase of 14,000 from the previous week's revised level. The previous week's level was revised down by 12,000 from 260,000 to 248,000. The 4-week moving average was 252,000, an increase of 4,500 from the previous week's revised average. The previous week's average was revised down by 7,250 from 254,750 to 247,500. 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 252,000.
Multiple Jobholders are 4.8% of All Employed - What are the long-term trends for multiple jobholders in the US? The Bureau of Labor Statistics has two decades of historical data to enlighten us on that topic, courtesy of Table A-16 in the monthly Current Population Survey of households. At present, multiple jobholders account for just 4.8 percent of civilian employment. The survey captures data for four subcategories (in pie chart at right) of the multi-job workforce, the current relative sizes of which are illustrated in a pie chart. The distinction between "primary" and "secondary" jobs is a subjective one determined by the survey participants. Note: Not included in the statistics are the approximately 0.33% of the employed who work part-time on what they consider their primary job and full time on their secondary job(s). Let's review the complete series to help us get a sense of the long-term trends. Here is a look at all the multiple jobholders as a percent of the civilian employed. The dots are the non-seasonally adjusted monthly data points, which are quite volatile, and a 12-month moving average to highlight the trend. The moving average peaked in the summer of 1997 and then began trending downward. It is now at 4.8%, and the latest monthly data point is 4.7%. The next chart focuses on all four subcategories referenced in the pie chart. The trend outlier is the series illustrated with the red line: Multiple Part-Time Jobholders. Its trough was in 2002 and trended higher in early 2007, long before Obamacare. At about the same time we also see a steepening decline in the trend for the employed whose hours vary between full- and part-time for either their primary or secondary job. Here is a closer look at the two cohorts that have changed the most since the mid-2000s. We've rescaled the vertical axis to give us a clearer view of the trends. The Great Recession noticeably increased the percentage of multiple part-time jobholders. This metric leveled out in 2010 and 2011, but it has subsequently resumed a slow upward trend. It seems likely that the downward trend for the cohort whose hours vary for their primary or secondary job (the green line) has to some extent contributed to the rise of exclusively part-timers (the red line).
Democrats' climate bill would create a scramble for clean energy workers - The low-carbon energy growth envisioned in Democrats' climate bill will come with a big challenge: finding enough trained workers to support it. The plan — if signed into law — would finance more renewable power, clean energy equipment manufacturing, installation of home heat pumps and efficiency upgrades, electric vehicles, hydrogen development and much more. This kind of scale-up would boost demand for workers in industries that would receive new or expanded tax subsidies and other support. The Princeton-led REPEAT Project, in their analysis of new projects the bill would spur, cautions that the ability to hire and train a clean energy workforce is among the various "difficult to model" constraints that may limit growth rates.Philip Jordan of BW Research, a firm that studies workforce trends, said labor shortages are already a problem in clean energy industries. Solar Energy Industries Association Association (SEIA) president Abigail Ross Hopper said the group sees the solar and energy storage workforce quadrupling from its current level of slightly over 250,000. "In this tight labor market, that's a challenge — figuring out where do we get these employees? How do we train them, ensuring that they reflect the diversity of our nation?" she said on a call with reporters Monday. The clean energy research firm Energy Innovation estimates that jobs related to the bill would grow a lot in coming years, reaching 1.5 million created in 2030. University of Massachusetts researchers estimate the bill's mix of tax credits, grants, and loans — and the private sector capital they enable — will create an average of over 900,000 jobs annually over 10 years. Jordan, of BW Research, said the largest job gains will come in construction and installation of equipment like wind turbines, energy efficiency upgrades, transmission, battery storage, solar panels, and other areas."A lot of those are going to be unionized. And labor unions are actually quite good at rapidly meeting needs and expanding," said Jordan, a VP with the firm that studies energy workforce trends. But he cautions: "We are going to be creating a challenge when there's lots of activity happening across lots of different types of infrastructure that need lots of the same types of workers." Hopper said one important provision in the bill is the larger tax credits available for projects that meet certain apprenticeship requirements. She said they would give project developers incentives to train new workers. "There's going to need to be investments to make sure that we're not only creating the workforce that we need, but we're also really targeting investments in disadvantaged communities to make sure that opportunities are available," Jordan said. The bill contains several provisions to address "environmental justice" — a term for addressing the greater environmental burdens that poor people and communities of color often face. "I'm cautiously optimistic that that the federal government and states and municipalities will plan accordingly for what's coming," Jordan said.
Long COVID is sidelining millions of workers from their jobs - More than two years after Georgia Linders first got sick with COVID, her heart still races at random times. She's often exhausted. She can't digest certain foods. Most days, she runs a fever, and when her temperature gets up past a certain point, her brain feels like goo, she says. These are commonly reported symptoms of long COVID. Linders really noticed problems with her brain when she returned to work in the spring and summer of 2020. Her job required her to be on phone calls all day, coordinating with health clinics that service the military. It was a lot of multitasking, something she excelled at before COVID. After COVID, the brain fog and fatigue slowed her down immensely. In the fall of 2020, she was put on probation. After 30 days, she was given another 90-day probation, but she decided to take medical leave. On June 2, 2021, Linders was terminated. She filed a discrimination complaint with the government, but it was dismissed. She could have sued but wasn't making enough money to hire a lawyer. As the number of people with post-COVID symptoms soars, researchers and the government are trying to get a handle on how big an impact long COVID is having on the U.S. workforce. It's a pressing question, given the fragile state of the economy. For more than a year, employers have faced staffing problems, with jobs going unfilled month after month. Now, millions of people may be sidelined from their jobs due to long COVID. Katie Bach, a senior fellow with the Brookings Institution, drew on survey data from the Census Bureau, the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis and the Lancet to come up with what she says is a conservative estimate: 4 million full-time equivalent workers out of work because of long COVID. "That is just a shocking number," says Bach. "That's 2.4% of the U.S. working population." The Biden administration has already taken some steps to try to protect workers and keep them on the job, issuing guidance that makes clear that long COVID can be a disability and relevant laws would apply. Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, for example, employers must offer accommodations to workers with disabilities unless doing so presents an undue burden.
American Told 10-Year-Old Passenger's Mom She Couldn't Pick Her up - American Airlines told the mother of a 10-year-old passenger that she couldn't pick up her daughter after its system failed to correctly record who was collecting her from the airport. Alexis Westergren's daughter was flying unaccompanied to Chicago on July 9 from Portland, where she had been visiting her father. Westergren went to the AA ticketing desk to get a gate pass but was told that she was not authorized to take her daughter home. "They said that her dad was supposed to pick her up," she told Insider.An information sheet attached to a lanyard worn by the child showed that Westergren was listed as the person meeting her at the destination. Flight details and other information have been verified by Insider.The child's father wrote down Westergren's contact details before their daughter left Portland and gave it to the ticketing agent, who should then have put that information into the system, Westergren said.She said AA staff told her the child's father, who had dropped her off at Portland airport, was also listed as the contact picking her up in Chicago."He looked at me and said 'ma'am, I can't release her to you.' I almost lost my mind," she said. "Not once did they say 'let's wait for the plane to land and check the information on her lanyard'."
Thousands raised in online fundraiser after Michigan library is defunded over LGBTQ+ books - Nearly $100,000 has been raised in an online fundraising campaign for a Michigan library that was defunded earlier this month after it refused to take books featuring LGBTQ+ identities and issues off the shelves.Residents of Jamestown Township – a conservative stronghold in western Michigan – in an Aug. 2 vote defeated a proposal to renew a property tax millage that funds most of its local library’s budget.The president of the Patmos Library board, Larry Walton, told the Associated Press following the vote that without the millage, he expects the library to close its doors permanently before the end of next year. Patmos Library will retain its millage until the spring of 2023.Speaking to Bridge Michigan last week, Walton called the vote “short-sighted” and “disappointing.”“I wasn’t expecting anything like this,” he said. “The library is the center of the community.”In the months leading up to the vote, members of the group Jamestown Conservatives put up yard signs and distributed flyers to other community members that accused the library and its staff of “grooming children for sexual exploitation” by making LGBTQ+ books accessible to young readers.“They are trying to groom our children to believe that it’s OK to have these sinful desires,” Amanda Ensing, a member of Jamestown Conservatives, said of library officials, Bridge Michigan reported. “It’s not a political issue, it’s a Biblical issue.” Two days after the vote, on Aug. 4, Jamestown resident Jesse Dillman created an online fundraiserfor the library with a goal of $245,000, or one year of operating expenses. As of Thursday, the GoFundMe campaign had accrued nearly $99,000 from more than 2,000 donors.
Oakland, California, school security guards violently suppress anti-school closure protest - On August 4, Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) security guards attempted to end an occupation at Parker Elementary School in Oakland, California, through the use of force, resulting in two activists needing to go to the hospital. Activists have occupied the school building for roughly 2 months in opposition to the OUSD Board of Education permanently closing the school as part of a larger set of budget cuts. The occupation of Parker Elementary School is the latest expression of widespread opposition to school closures that were announced by OUSD superintendent Dr. Kyla Johnson-Trammell in January and reaffirmed by multiple votes by the OUSD Board of Education. Since the initial announcement of closures teachers, parents and students have held demonstrations and hunger strikes, as well as voiced opposition at board meetings. The plan would involve the closure of seven schools by the end of the 2023 school year as a component of roughly $50 million in budget cuts over two years. Parker Elementary and Community Day School already held their last day of classes at the end of the 2022 school year. The group occupying Parker Elementary organized and operated a free summer program for children in the neighborhood under the name “Parker Community School.” Officials from OUSD and demonstrators have made conflicting claims about the start of the confrontation between security guards and protesters. OUSD spokesperson John Sasaki alleged that guards found the building empty on Thursday, and OUSD staff changed the locks and set an alarm before protesters somehow reentered the building. Members of the occupation have stated that they were informed that staff were coming to relocate items from the building to other schools but did not know they would be locked out of the building. They then mobilized members of the community in order to reestablish the occupation. Regardless of the exact chain of events, it is clear that OUSD guards attempted to end the occupation through physical force. Demonstrators have posted numerous videos on social media, in which guards—who are easily identifiable by their uniforms—are shown slamming protesters into walls and tables. Other footage shows security guards twisting protesters’ arms behind their backs.
The teacher shortage is driven by politics, violence and disrespect. - There’s no teacher shortage. Sure, schools across the country are grappling with a vacancy rate so high that they’re cutting the school week down to four days, loosening certification standards and even hiring veterans who have never taught. But it’s not a shortage of teachers that’s causing this nationwide crisis. The teachers are out there. They’ve just had enough of the real shortage that is decaying their profession: respect, value, common sense and safety. “I think people needed someone to be angry at,” said Maggie McCabe, a Stafford County, Va., English teacher who was one of thousands of teachers across the country who quit this year when their dream job became toxic. “Teachers became Public Enemy No. 1,” McCabe told the Culpeper Star Exponent. “I had to delete so many friends [on social media] because I couldn’t get up and do my job the next day because of how we were being talked to.” Advertisement It happened across the nation. “I was a teacher for 21 years and I retired last year,” Charla Detjens, who was stunned at how toxic her ordinarily supportive small town on the West Coast became toward teachers, said when we chatted online. “I will go work retail or something rather than go back into the classroom after the vitriol from the community about teachers and covid.” We used to ask teachers only to work long hours, discipline the children parents failed to parent, coach a team, head a committee, run the bake sale and carve pieces off a meager salary to buy school supplies. In the past two years, America also has suggested they carry guns to protect kids, risk their health to go into classrooms of unmasked children at the height of the pandemic, endure preposterous culture wars over curriculum that question their experience and education, all while withstanding shrill and unfounded accusations of “grooming” children for sexual purposes.
Columbus, Ohio public school teachers poised to strike - The Columbus Education Association (CEA) on Thursday issued a 10-day strike notice for 4,500 Columbus City Schools teachers and staff. More than 2,500 teachers attended a membership meeting that evening, an indication of the degree of anger felt by teachers towards the district’s “final offer.” The potential strike is the latest sign of major opposition building among the country’s education system. More than two years into the pandemic, schools are once again poised to reopen for the fall semester with no meaningful COVID protections in place, leading to mass infections and death. Franklin County, where Columbus is located, has reported some of the highest COVID-19 rates in the state throughout the pandemic. In Niles, Ohio, in the eastern portion of the state, 151 teachers have also voted to strike beginning September 1. About 100 teachers attended the July 28 school board meeting holding signs pointing to the low pay and lack of staff faced by teachers. The strike notice also comes after thousands of Columbus, Ohio area Kroger workers rejected a sellout contract brought by the United Food and Commercial Workers union by 71 percent. The Columbus teachers’ strike would begin when their current contract expires on August 21, one day before teachers are expected to return to the classroom, and just two days before the start of the new school year. Last month, in a meeting which lasted only one minute, the Columbus school district presented the union bargaining committee with its “final offer.” The deal fails to meet their basic needs and the basic needs of their students. Teachers are demanding full funding for school support staff, funding for arts programs, decreased class sizes, and the elimination of the district’s proposal to change school beginning and end times and shorten lunch and other breaks. Even more pressing, according to teachers, are HVAC upgrades to cool down dangerously hot classrooms. The last school year was delayed, in fact, as August temperatures soared to the extent that many classrooms were unsafe. In a show of defiance against the proposed contract, Columbus teachers protested outside the Columbus City Schools’ administrative building multiple times last week. One teacher at the protests, Evan Shelton, told The Columbus Dispatch, “We don’t want to strike, we want to be in our classrooms with our kids, we want to be getting ready for the school right now, we can’t because the board is in the way.” Shelton’s primary concern is not for his own livelihood, he said, but also for his students “who rely on school lunch,” and “on their trips to the school nurse for referrals to Children’s Hospital.”
Why Americans are increasingly dubious about going to college - Even as freshmen nervously arrive on campus for the fall semester, policymakers are grappling with what they say has become an “alarming” decline in the number of high school graduates willing to invest the time and money it takes to go to college.A little-understood backlash against higher education is driving an unprecedented decline in enrollment that experts now warn is likely to diminish people’s quality of life and the nation’s economic competitiveness, especially in places where the slide is most severe.“With the exception of wartime, the United States has never been through a period of declining educational attainment like this,” said Michael Hicks, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research at Ball State University’s Miller College of Business.There are 4 million fewer students in college now than there were 10 years ago, a falloff many observers blame on Covid-19, a dip in the number of Americans under 18 and a strong labor market that is sucking young people straight into the workforce.But while the pandemic certainly made things worse, the downturn took hold well before it started. Demographics alone cannot explain the scale of this drop. And statistics belie the argument that recent high school graduates are getting jobs instead of going to college: Workforce participation for 16- to 24-year-olds is lower than it was before Covid hit, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, or BLS, reports.Focus groups and public opinion surveys point to other, less easily solved reasons for the sharp downward trend. These include widespread and fast-growing skepticism about the value of a degree, impatience with the time it takes to get one, and costs that have finally exceeded many people’s ability or willingness to pay. There has been a significant and steady drop nationwide in the proportion of high school graduates enrolling in college in the fall after they finish school — from a high of 70% in 2016 to 63% in 2020, the most recent year for which the figure is available, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.The decline is even worse in some states, though not all have data for the same periods of time.The proportion of high school graduates in Tennessee who are going directly to college, for example, has fallen to 53% — down 11 percentage points since 2017. In Indiana, it dropped to 53% in 2020, down 12 percentage points from five years earlier and a pace state Commissioner for Higher Education Chris Lowery has called “alarming.”In West Virginia, 46% of 2021 high school graduates went on to college the following fall, 10 percentage points below that state’s high of 56% in 2010. Fifty-four percent of 2021 high school grads in Michigan went straight to college, down 11 percentage points from 2016.In Arizona, 46% of high school graduates in 2020 went to college the following fall, a drop from more than 55% in 2017. In Alabama, recent high school graduates’ college-going in 2020 fell to 54%, down 11 percentage points since 2014. And in Idaho, college-going has plunged to 39%, down 11 percentage points since 2017.Americans are increasingly dubious about the need to go to college. Fewer than 1 in 3 adults now say a degree is worth the cost, according to a survey by the nonprofit Strada Education Network, which conducts research into and financially supports ways of expanding access to higher education.
Are Federal Student Loans Even “Loans?” From Forbearance to Forgiveness to Taxpayer Expense. Fairer: Allow Bankruptcy - By Wolf Richter - One person’s loan is another person’s asset. If the loan is canceled, the asset is destroyed. That’s how it is.No one is making payments on government-backed student loans anymore, after two years of forever-forbearance, countless campaign promises of forgiveness, various targeted forgiveness programs already in effect, and now the biggie, the general forgiveness program being hashed out. Total student loans outstanding, assuming they’re even still “loans,” remained at $1.59 trillion in Q2 compared to Q1, according to the New York Fed’sHousehold Debt and Credit Report. They have been relatively stable since the Q1 2020, as new loans were being added, while practically no one made payments, and as the numerous forgiveness programs are whittling down the tally from the other side. Federal student loans account for about $1.3 trillion of this $1.59 trillion in total student loans, according to a separate report from the New York Fed. The remainder are Family Federal Education Loans (FFEL) owned by commercial banks, and private loans.It’s the $1.3 trillion in federal loans that were all moved into forever-forbearance in the spring of 2020, and that are now up for forgiveness.The median balance of federal student loans is $18,773 – meaning half of the federal student loans balances are lower than $18,773, and half are higher. The outliers everyone is talking about, the $150,000 and $200,000 loan balances, were accrued by a small percentage of borrowers going to law school, medical school, etc., most of whom are now in high-paying careers and don’t need loan-forgiveness at all. The amount of student loans that were 30 days or more delinquent plunged from the official 9.4% of total balances before the pandemic to just 1%.For federal student loans, the delinquency rate is 0%. All of them were automatically enrolled in forbearance programs in the spring of 2020, which have been renewed over and over again and are still in effect. When a loan is moved into forbearance, it is reclassified as “current,” not “delinquent,” regardless of payment status. In addition to the list of existing student loan forgiveness programs – Public Service Loan Forgiveness, Teacher Loan Forgiveness, Closed School Discharge, and others – there is now the forgiveness when students feel that the educational-industrial complex screwed them.So just on Thursday, a federal judge granted preliminary approval of a settlement that would cancel $6 billion in student loans of over 200,000 students who claimed they were defrauded at 153 mostly for-profit colleges. Few of those schools have been held to account. So it’s the taxpayers that will pay the $6 billion, not the educational-industrial complex that got the $6 billion over the years, laughing all the way to the bank.And the biggie, a general forgiveness program is currently being hashed out by the administration. The proposal started out with $10,000 in forgiveness per borrower. But this stinginess of the taxpayers is leaving a lot of voters deeply frustrated, and the anger is boiling over, putting politicians under pressure to buy more votes, or re-buy the same votes, by raising the forgiveness amount to $50,000, maybe with income caps.The average transaction price of new vehicles is nearly $46,000, and the average advertised price of used vehicles is $28,000. By comparison the median government-backed student loan is $18,773. Just another consumer loan. It’s not the end of the world having to make a $200 payment every month for 10 years – and wage increases and inflation over 10 years will reduce that burden. And if people cannot even make a $200-payment, they cannot make a $400-payment or $800-payment on an auto loan either. So when are we going to buy votes with promises of auto-loan forgiveness? It’s unfair that people who bought a car because they need to drive to work would be forced to pay off those loans. We need to have general auto-loan forgiveness. The government could just buy up all the auto loans outstanding and then forgive them, up to $50,000 each, maybe with some income caps, such as $250,000 per individual and $500,000 per married couple filing jointly. Think of it this way: It would be a huge boost for the economy because, instead of making car payments, those folks could then blow their money on other stuff.
Bill Maher Slams "Fat Celebration" And "Body Positivity" -- Talk show host and comedian Bill Maher railed against the pro-obesity 'body positivity' movement, saying that not only is it pathetic, it's a national security risk. "There is a disturbing trend going on in America these days," Maher began, adding that people are "rewriting science to fit ideology to just fit what you want reality to be.""We’ve gone from fat acceptance to fat celebration. That’s new. That is new," Maher said. "To view letting yourself go as a point of pride? We used to at least try and be fit and healthy and society praised those who succeeded""Now the term body positivity is used to mean, ‘I’m perfect the way I am because I’m me,’" the HBO host continued, adding "It’s Orwellian how often positivity is used to describe what’s not healthy!""Of course, you can get away with anything bad for you when you’re young," then said, adding "Let me ask you this: Have you ever seen a fat 90-year-old?"Maher then noted that the military is having a harder time finding in-shape recruits, as well as how obese people have fared worse during COVID-19."At some point acceptance becomes enabling, and if you’re in any way participating in this joyful celebration of gluttony that goes on now, you have blood on your hands," he said, adding "You can make believe you’re fighting some great social justice battle for a besieged minority, but what you’re really doing is enabling addicts – which I thought we decided was bad." Watch:
Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 Can’t Be Neutralized by Prior Infection -The Omicron COVID-19 variant continues to mutate, with its subvariants accounting for the majority of new infections. This week, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that new COVID-19 cases in the US were 87.1% BA.5, 6.6% BA.4, and 4.8% BA 4.6.One study, published in Nature Communications, examined whether contracting a previous strain of Omicron provides sufficient protection against its new subvariants. The investigators also analyzed the efficacy of COVID-19 vaccination at neutralizing the BA.4 and BA.5 variants.In March 2022, BA.4 and BA.5 were detected by genomic surveillance in South Africa, and subsequently led to a wave in infections. Excess all-cause mortality, previously correlated with BA.2, did not sharply increase with the emergence of BA.4 and BA.5.The Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 sub-lineages do not differ from each other in their spike sequence, but have changes relative to the BA.1 and BA.2 strains, including L452R and F486V mutations and R493Q reversion in the spike receptor binding domain (RBD).The investigators isolated live BA.4 and BA.5 viruses to determine whether they could be neutralized by BA.1 infection. They considered prior BA.1 infection in conjunction with COVID-19 vaccination, prior BA.1 infection alone, and COVID-19 vaccination with no infection history.To quantify neutralization, the investigators reported 50% focus reduction neutralization test value, the inverse of the plasma dilution required for a 50% reduction in the number of infection foci relative to the no antibody control in a live virus neutralization assay.They found that in individuals with prior BA.1 infection and no vaccination history, neutralization decreased 7.6-fold for BA.4 and 7.5-fold for BA.5. For individuals who were fully vaccinated and had contracted BA.1, neutralization capabilities dropped 3.2-fold for BA.4, and 2.6-fold for BA.5. Their fold-drop versus ancestral virus neutralization was 4.0-fold for BA.1, 12.9-fold for BA.4, and 10.3-fold for BA.5.Finally, vaccinated individuals with no prior infection saw BA.4 and BA.5 escape neutralization at rates similar to BA.1. Fold-drop relative to the ancestral COVID-19 virus was 19.8-fold for BA.1, 19.6-fold for BA.4, and 20.9-fold for BA.5.From these results, the investigators determined BA.4 and BA.5 significantly evaded the immunity generated by a prior BA.1 infection, even in conjunction with COVID-19 vaccination. BA.4 and BA.5 were especially adept at avoiding neutralization in BA.1-infected, unvaccinated individuals. The study highlights the necessity of addition booster vaccination, potentially with the impending variant-specific booster shots expected this fall.
Covid-19: What we know about the BA.4 and BA.5 omicron variants | The BMJ - Two omicron subvariants have come to dominate infections worldwide. BA.4 and BA.5 were first detected in South Africa in January and February 2022, respectively.1 They are offshoots of the omicron variant BA.2, though their additional mutations seem to have given them a transmission advantage.2The World Health Organization has said that BA.5 now accounts for more than half of the world’s cases, while BA.4 accounts for just over one in 10.3Why BA.5 has overtaken BA.4 is a mystery, because they’re so similar. Speaking at a Royal Society of Medicine event, Thomas Peacock, a virologist at Imperial College London, said, “They have identical spikes, more or less. So that means it has to be something outside the spike. And really our understanding of that from a virological perspective is very poor.”The number of covid patients admitted to hospital rose steadily from around 550 a day at the end of May to more than 2200 in the second week of July. However, this has since begun to drop, to around 1700 in late July. Daily deaths with covid-19 recorded on the death certificate also rose from the beginning of June, from around 30 to a high of 134 in mid-July.4The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on 22 July that cases, deaths, and hospital admissions were all rising, fuelled by BA.5, which accounted for an estimated 78% of cases. The seven day daily average of new hospital admissions was 6180 (13-19 July), a 4.7% increase from the previous week (5902).5 It has since started to drop. In China, reports suggest that the country is bracing for yet more lockdowns as the omicron subvariants continue to spread.6 The US Food and Drug Administration has warned that the effectiveness of current vaccines against SARS-CoV-2, which are based on the original virus found in Wuhan, has begun to wane against omicron variants. After a meeting at the end of June the FDA said that its advisory committee had voted in favour of rolling out an updated version of the vaccine for omicron as a booster in autumn 2022.In a statement the FDA said, “Vaccine manufacturers have already reported data from clinical trials with modified vaccines containing an omicron BA.1 component, and we have advised them that they should submit these data to the FDA for our evaluation prior to any potential authorization of a modified vaccine containing an omicron BA.4/5 component.”7What about BA.2.75?This subvariant, like BA.4 and BA.5, has evolved from BA.2. First detected in India in May,8 BA.2.75 has garnered numerous headlines raising concerns over its immune evasion ability. However, despite these worries, it does not appear to have taken hold in any of the countries in which it has been detected.Eric Topol, professor of molecular medicine at the Scripps Research Institute in California, says, “We’ve seen BA.2.75 appear in many countries around the world, and in none of those places is there any evidence of spread. The only places are two provinces in India where there hasn’t been BA.5. So there’s no evidence it can compete with BA.5. It’s not trivial to India, but it’s just not getting routed anywhere else.”.Are more covid restrictions needed?Stephen Griffin, associate professor in the University of Leeds school of medicine, believes so, although he emphasises that restrictions do not mean lockdowns but rather individual actions such as mask wearing. He said, “Let’s remember that the R number is only just above 1 in the UK—for all of our mixing and for all of our ignorance at the moment of what’s going on, we’re talking 1.3 or 1.4. The effort involved in getting that back down wouldn’t be that hard.”Topol says, “We know BA.5 is not where this ends, unfortunately. We have further variants to work through for an indeterminate period of time. It’s a matter of when not if at this point. I really liken this to the boiling frog. We keep thinking it’s not so bad right now, with BA.5, that we’ll get through it. But actually it’s worse than any prior variant.”Christina Pagel, professor of operational research at University College London, is most worried about the cumulative effect. “This is our third wave this year. What worries me is that with every wave we take out a few more people, in terms of the people who, sadly, died, which is fewer than it was, but it’s by no means trivial. We’ve still had almost 50 000 deaths since last summer.”
Study suggests BA.5 evolved to induce enhanced inflammation when compared to prior Omicron subvariants - In a recent study posted to the bioRxiv* preprint server, researchers evaluated the comparative pathogenicity of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Omicron sub-variants BA.1, BA.2, and BA.5, in vitro and in vivo. Omicron subvariant BA.5 recently emerged from South Africa in parallel with BA.4 and subsequently has been detected in several countries worldwide. By August 2022, it outcompeted BA.2 to become the dominant Omicron sub-variant in the world. Though BA.5 and BA.4 appear to be the descendants of Omiron sub-variant BA.2 in genome sequencing and evolutionary analyses, they seem to be acquiring enhanced pathogenicity, transmission ability, and potential of escaping neutralizing antibodies induced by vaccination or infection.Additionally, BA.5 contains some unique mutations in its spike (S) protein, including L542R, which confers enhanced fusogenicity and resistance to the immunity induced by prior infection with early variants. The emergence of BA.5 raises concerns that SARS-CoV-2 is continuously evolving to acquire mutations that would increase its pathogenicity; thus, there is an urgent need to characterize BA.5 to intervene early and mitigate its spread. Study findings: The key study finding was that while BA.5 was less pathogenic than the ancestral Omicron strain B.1.1, yet, it had evolved to induce a stronger inflammatory response than other Omicron sub-variants, including BA.1 and BA.2. Despite similar in vitro growth kinetics as other Omicron sub-variants, BA.5 was more fusogenic than BA.1 and BA.2. Inside VeroE6/TMPRSS2 and Calu-3 cell lines, BA.2 and BA.5 showed replication comparable to B.1.1, but BA.1 showed a lower replication rate. Conversely, in the iPS cell-derived alveolar epithelium cells, B.1.1, BA.1, and BA.5 exhibited high replication efficiency than BA.2.B.1.1 formed larger syncytia than Omicron subvariants, and concomitantly exhibited the highest S cleavage efficiency. However, among all the Omicron sub-variants, BA.5 exhibited the most efficient S cleavage, indicating its evolution towards efficient fusogenicity in VeroE6/TMPRSS2 cells. The airway-on-a-chip method allowed researchers to evaluate SARS-CoV-2’s ability to disrupt the respiratory endothelial and epithelial barriers. Among all Omicron sub-variants, BA.5 possessed the highest barrier disruption capacity.In a hamster model, the dynamics of weight changes of BA.5-infected animals were significantly different from that of the BA.2-infected and uninfected hamsters. Moreover, in BA.1-, BA.2- and BA.5-infected hamsters, the Penh value was significantly lower, and the Rpef value was substantially higher than those in B.1.1-infected hamsters. Although lower than B.1.1, among Omicrn sub-variants, BA.5 caused the most severe inflammation. Additionally, BA.5 infection caused upregulation of four interferon-stimulated genes (ISGs) viz., CXC-chemokine ligand 10 (CXCL10), interleukin-6 (IL-6), ISG15, and MX Dynamin Like GTPase 1 (MX-1).Conclusions: The current study comprehensively investigated the in vitro and in vivo characteristics of three clinical isolates of Omicron sub-variants BA.1, BA.2, and BA.5 and highlighted the significance of continuous coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) mitigation measures. Kawaoka et al. showed that the clinical isolate BA.5 exhibited lower pathogenicity than the ancestral Delta in hamster models. Also, they showed that the weight loss dynamics during BA.5 infection were slightly higher than during BA.2 infection. Consistent with the previous findings, the current study results also showed that though the virulence of the Omicron sub-variants was less than that of the ancestral lineage B.1.1, BA.5 is acquiring enhanced pathogenicity by evolving to improve inflammatory response. Additionally, BA.5 is acquiring higher fusogenicity and more robust barrier disruption capacity than other Omicron sub-variants.
The features of the newly emerging SARS-CoV-2 Omicron BA.2.75 subvariant - In a recent study posted to the bioRxiv* preprint server, researchers evaluated all the features, especially the antigenic properties and transmission potential of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Omicron sub-variant BA.2.75.Concerning its emergence, BA.2.75 emerged independently from another BA.2 descendant, BA.5. The results of cell-based fusion, airway-on-a-chip, and plaque assays showed that it acquired higher fusogenicity after it diverged from BA.2, similar to BA.5. The authors noted that the L452R substitution in BA.5 S caused higher fusogenicity. Conversely, the N460K substitution in BA.2.75 S made it more fusogenic.Further, the authors observed that the D339H mutation, which is unique in the BA.2.75 S, contributed to its increased ACE2 binding affinity. The structural model computed by AlphaFold2 revealed that the D339H substitution influenced the position of the linoleic acid binding loop between residues 367–378 and thereby increased binding affinity to ACE2.In vitro experiments revealed that BA.2.75 replicated more efficiently than BA.2 in alveolar epithelial cells but not in airway epithelial cells, further confirming its higher fusogenicity via S protein evolution independently of BA.5. Despite both being the descendants of BA.2, BA.2.75 and BA.5 exhibited different immunogenicity. While BA.2.75 immunogenicity was comparable to BA.2, it was highly resistant to the BA.5-induced immunity. Furthermore, its G446S mutation made it resistant to the antiviral effects of BA.2- and BA.5-infected hamster sera. The authors also noted that three of the five NTD substitutions in BA.2.75 were closely associated with its evasion potential from BA.5-induced humoral immunity. In the future, BA.2.75 might further mutate the W152 residue to evade neutralization by sera from convalescent or vaccinated individuals.Thankfully, BA.2.75 retained the sensitivity to three major anti-SARS-CoV-2 drugs, including Remdesivir, EIDD-1931, and Nirmatrelvir, and was more sensitive to Remdesivir. Conclusions: The systematic evaluation of the virological properties of the new SARS-CoV-2 Omicron subvariant BA.2.75 revealed that it had a higher growth rate in the human population, fusogenicity, and intrinsic pathogenicity than BA.2. It poses a greater risk to global health, and due to significantly higher Re than BA.2 and BA.5 in India, as observed via genome surveillance, the authors predicted that BA.2.75 has the potential to outcompete BA.2 and BA.5. Due to its higher resistance to the BA.5-induced immunity, BA.2.75 might also more efficiently spread in those countries where BA.5 is circulating (e.g., Australia). Overall, the study highlighted the need for continuous and careful monitoring of BA.2.75 through worldwide cooperation for viral genomic surveillance.
How does COVID-19 increase clotting risk? --An in-depth review article describing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-related coagulopathy has recently been published in the journal Nature Reviews Immunology. Hyperinflammation and hypercoagulation are two major hallmarks of COVID-19, a novel disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). In critically ill COVID-19 patients, coagulopathy has been found to associate with multiorgan injury or failure, which in turn increases the risk of mortality.Complex interactions between the innate immune system, coagulation and fibrinolytic pathways, and vascular endothelial cells are collectively responsible for COVID-19-related coagulopathy.ascular endothelium acts as an antithrombotic system by secreting various molecules that prevent platelet activation and coagulation. In COVID-19, a dysregulated vascular antithrombotic system is believed to be responsible for hypercoagulation and vasculopathy, which are life-threatening conditions.SARS-CoV-2 infects type II pneumocytes in the lungs and causes alveolar vasculature injury. In addition, in some cases, it has been observed that the virus directly infects endothelial cells to induce vascular endothelial dysfunction. Collectively, these conditions result in abnormal immune and inflammatory responses. It is well established that SARS-CoV-2 infects respiratory epithelial cells by interacting with cell membrane receptor angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2). In normal physiological conditions, ACE2 regulates the renin-angiotensin system and the kallikrein-kinin system. Kinins are vasoactive peptides that increase vascular permeability.The interaction between SARS-CoV-2 and ACE2 results in reduced cell surface expression of ACE2 at the site of infection. This further leads to activation of the kallikrein-kinin system, induction of vascular permeability, fluid accumulation, and organ injury.Besides respiratory illness, COVID-19 is associated with a wide range of neurological symptoms. In autopsy analysis of COVID-19 patients, microthrombi and microinfarcts have been observed in the brain.A few studies have suggested that SARS-CoV-2 directly infects brain tissue to induce neurological consequences. However, the majority of studies have highlighted the involvement of indirect mechanisms. According to these studies, viral proteins, such as SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, cross the blood-brain barrier and trigger innate immune response and hyperinflammation in brain microvascular endothelial cells. The main protease of SARS-CoV-2 contributes to neuropathology by cleaving NF-κB essential modulator (NEMO) in endothelial cells, leading to vascular endothelial dysfunction. Collectively, all these factors contribute to hypercoagulation, thrombosis, and brain pathologies in COVID-19 patients.
Can COVID rapid tests detect contagiousness amid new variants? - The alarming spread of omicron subvariants — particularly BA.5, which has quickly become the dominant coronavirus strain in the U.S. — has again put a spotlight on how well COVID-19 rapid antigen tests work at this stage in the pandemic.While some early research and anecdotes have suggested that at-home test kits may not be as good at spotting omicron’s sneaky subvariants, Bay Area infectious disease experts say the rapid antigen tests are still an effective way to diagnose infection.But they add that variants like BA.5 only drive home the importance of using rapid antigen testing as effectively as possible to avoid a false negative result.Also, experts say it’s still the case that while rapid tests are quicker and easier than PCR tests, they are also less sensitive and therefore more prone to inaccurate results.That problem has been magnified by this summer’s surge, during which some people with COVID-19 symptoms have reported initially testing negative, said Stanford virologist Robert Siegel. But the reasons for that may not be limited to BA.5 or omicron subvariants alone, infectious disease experts say.Rapid antigen tests may generally give a good indication of whether an infected individual is contagious, but as has been the case throughout the pandemic, they are not foolproof.A recent report combing the results of 155 studies, known as a Cochrane meta-analysis, concluded that antigen tests correctly identified COVID-19 infection in an average 73% of people who were symptomatic and 55% of people who were not.The study also found that tests were more accurate when used in the first week after symptoms began. As a rule of thumb, rapid antigen tests work best when there is a high “pretest probability” that someone is infected (i.e., that they have symptoms or know they were exposed), when they are done every day, and are from a reliable manufacturer, experts said.So, how does that change with BA.5? Experts say the answer is complicated.The subvariant is very new on the pandemic scene, first detected around the beginning of this year. Peer-reviewed and preprint literature on the performance of rapid antigen tests does not yet seem to include anything specifically about BA.5 — though at least one study has shown that a combined nasal/throat swab demonstrated improved sensitivity compared to swabbing the nasal passages alone, said Benjamin Pinsky, director of the Clinical Virology Laboratory at Stanford.Initial small studies have suggested that in the earliest stage of infection, omicron might be most concentrated in the throat, rather than the nose or nasal pharanyx. However, “I’m not sure (that theory) has panned out with large numbers of individuals,” said UCSF infectious disease expert Peter Chin-Hong.Although some experts have backed throat-plus-nose swabs for at-home tests, neither the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention nor the Food and Drug Administration has endorsed that approach.Most infectious disease experts still recommend people follow the CDC’s guidance on proper use of antigen tests, as well as the instructions provided with each test, to ensure their accuracy. Another factor that could interfere with rapid tests is immunity gained from past infection or vaccination, both of which yield antibodies that could produce an early false negative, Siegel said.
Double mRNA COVID-19 vaccination found to increase SARS-CoV-2 variant recognition - In a recent study posted to the bioRxiv* preprint server, researchers evaluated the impact of double BNT162b2 messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) vaccination in recognition of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) variants of concern (VoCs).Studies have reported that double coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccinations generate high titers of SARS-CoV-2 S-targeted antibodies (Ab), Bmem and T lymphocytes; however, VoCs with SARS-CoV-2 S receptor-binding domain (RBD) mutations can evade humoral immune responses. Booster doses have been reported to enhance VoC recognition by Abs; however, it is not clear whether VoC recognition is enhanced due to higher Ab titers or due to the increased capacity of Ab binding to S RBDs. In the present study, researchers evaluated the benefit of double BNT162b2 vaccinations on SARS-CoV-2 VoC recognition. In total, 28, 30, and 30 samples were obtained pre-vaccination, after three weeks of the first dose and after four weeks of the second dose, respectively. All the participants remained SARS-CoV-2-naïve throughout the study without anti-SARS-CoV-2 N antibodies. Most participants (n=22) induced NAbs after the first vaccination, and the NAb titers after the second vaccination had IC50 values >100. Double BNT162b2 vaccination generated robust NAb responses among all study participants. Immunoglobulin G+ (IgG+) and IgM+ RBD-targeted Bmem were generated after the first vaccination, and IgG1+ Bmem counts increased after the second vaccination. Most RBD-targeted Bmem showed binding with Delta and/or Gamma VoCs, which increased significantly after the second vaccination. The RBD-targeted Bmem compartment comprised mainly IgG1+ or IgM+ cells, and contrastingly, the total Bmem compartment comprised more IgG2+ cells and fewer IgG1+ cells compared to the RBD-targeted Bmem compartment. After the second vaccination dose, RBD-targeted IgG1, 2 and 3-expressing Bmem populations expanded significantly, although the total Bmem lymphocyte compartment was unaltered. [...] Anti-Wuhan S RBD- IgG titers exhibited partial recognition of the Beta, Gamma and Delta VoCs with more prominent reductions for Gamma and Beta VoCs than for the Delta VoC. The second vaccine BNT162b2 dose significantly enhanced anti-Wuhan RBD antibody binding to Gamma and Beta VoCs; however, the neutralization potency of vaccine-induced NAbs against Gamma and Beta was lesser than for Delta. Delta RBD and Gamma RBD were recognized by 50% and 70% of RBD-targeted Bmem lymphocytes after the first and second vaccinations, respectively, and the increase in VoC-recognizing Bmem counts was largely due to elevated IgG1+ Bmem counts. Conclusion: Overall, the study findings showed that the second BNT162b2 vaccination elevated NAb titers and SARS-CoV-2 RBD-targeted Bmem counts and that double BNT162b2 vaccination was especially needed for Delta and Gamma VoC recognition. The findings indicated that the second vaccine dose improved S RBD-targeted Bmem counts and the Bmem affinity to overcome VoC mutations.
How does COVID-19 rebound after Paxlovid treatment differ between the BA.5 and BA.2.12.1 subvariants? - In a recent article posted to the medRxiv* preprint server, scientists analyzed the differences between severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) rebound associated with the Omicron BA.2.12.1 and BA.5 sublineages post-Paxlovid therapy in the United States (US). The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved Paxlovid for treating mild-to-moderate SARS-CoV-2 infection. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published a Health Alert Network Health Advisory in May 2022 on the possibility of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) rebound following Paxlovid therapy. The SARS-CoV-2 Omicron BA.5 sublineage has become the predominant viral variant in the US from June 2022. Moreover, it was more immune to neutralizing antibodies than the prior Omicron BA.2.12.1 subvariant. There are still unanswered questions regarding how the Omicron BA.2.12.1 and BA.5 subvariants differ in COVID-19 rebound following Paxlovid treatment.According to the study results, the only difference between the Omicron BA.2.12.1 and BA.5 cohorts was that the BA.5 group included a higher proportion of Hispanics. However, the two groups were comparable following propensity-score matching.In the BA.2.12.1 cohort and the BA.5 cohort, the cumulative probability of SARS-CoV-2 rebound infection two to eight days following Paxlovid therapy was 3.42% and 2.81%, respectively. The BA.5 group had a higher immediate threat of rebound symptoms versus the BA.2.12.1 group, but there was no difference in the likelihood of rebound infections. Following propensity-score matching, the BA.5 cohort had higher immediate odds of rebound infections and symptoms versus the matched BA.2.12.1 group.The study limitations include the possibility of under-, mis-, and overdiagnosis across patient EHRs. Besides, variables like medication adherence and treatment regimen completion were unmeasured. Nevertheless, according to the authors, since the TriNetX dataset served as the source for both comparison populations, these problems might not significantly impact the relative risk assessments.
How common is chronic fatigue syndrome among patients with long COVID-19? - In a recent study posted to the medRxiv* preprint server, researchers found that myalgic encephalitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) was common in long coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).Although most patients recover from severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection within weeks, some present debilitating symptoms that linger beyond the acute phase. The overall prevalence of the post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 (PASC) is estimated at 0.43%. The post-COVID-19 conditions are increasingly detected even in asymptomatic cases or those with mild disease. PASC is characterized by post-exertional malaise, brain fog, headaches, sleep disturbance, dyspnea, and chest pain. In a multinational survey of more than 3,700 participants, post-exertional malaise, fatigue, and brain fog were reported most frequently six months after COVID-19. These symptoms share similar features with ME/CFS, another disease that is often debilitating. In two small cohort studies of COVID-19 patients, nearly 45% of subjects met the diagnostic criteria for ME/CFS. Six of the 140 patients referred to the clinic were excluded due to incomplete questionnaires or the lack of SARS-CoV-2 diagnostic test results. The median age of the remaining patients was 47 years. Most were females (59%) and White (49.3%). Seventeen patients were hospitalized during acute COVID-19; two required intensive care. Sixty-two patients had comorbidities predisposing them to severe COVID-19. Functional limitations were noted in 109 patients, including 45 subjects with significantly compromised wellbeing. The median duration of symptoms at the initial clinic visit was 285.5 days, and the median number of symptoms was 12 per patient. Fatigue, post-exertional malaise, unrefreshing sleep, brain fog, and sleepiness during the day were common. Notably, the median number of symptoms was greater in females than males, with fatigue, dysgeusia, and insomnia being more frequent among females. The authors found a significant correlation between the severity and frequency of symptoms. Principal component analysis revealed that fatigue, post-exertional malaise, brain fog, daytime sleepiness, and unrefreshing sleep were more likely to co-occur. Symptoms persisted longer than six months for 105 patients, with fatigue, brain fog, post-exertional malaise, insomnia, daytime sleepiness, and unrefreshing sleep being the most common and severe. Forty-eight patients met the IOM criteria, and the final ME/CFS cohort (after exclusions) comprised 45 patients. Most patients in this cohort were females, healthy, and non-hospitalized (during acute COVID-19), with obesity as the most common comorbidity. More than half of the cohort had a significant decrease in their functionality. Conclusions: Most patients referred to the PASC clinic had not been hospitalized or supported with oxygen during acute COVID-19. Females had significantly more symptoms than males. In conclusion, 43% of patients with PASC and symptoms for longer than six months met the criteria for ME/CFS. The ME/CFS-PASC phenotype, like ME/CFS, was more prevalent in non-hospitalized females. The clinical similarities between ME/CFS-PASC and ME/CFS suggest common pathobiology. Notably, these findings are from a single clinic in Northern California with a bias towards specific populations and a lower proportion of minority populations. Thus, large multicenter studies with a diverse population are required to corroborate the results.
Coronavirus dashboard for August 9: BA.5 dominant, with a slow waning; a model for endemicity --BIobot’s most recent update, through last week, shows a decline of 15% of COVID in wastewater, consistent with about 460,000 “real” new infections per day: All 4 Census regions (not shown) are participating in the decline. Confirmed cases (dotted line below) have declined by a roughly similar percent, to 105,500. Deaths (solid line) are close to a 4 month peak at 489: Hospitalizations have plateaued for the past 3 weeks at about 44-47,000, and were 44,800 yesterday (the last year is shown for comparison purposes): Meanwhile, the CDC has updated its variant information. BA.4,4.6, and 5 now account for 98% of all infections. BA.5 has slightly increased its share from 84.5% to 87%. BA.4.6 has not meaningfully increased its share: It does not appear that BA.4 or BA.4.6 are going to make substantial inroads into BA.5’s dominance, although BA.4.6 makes up over 10% of infections in the High Plains (regional map not shown). BA.2.75 does not appear at all. With no new variant ready to overtake BA.5, I continue to suspect in the immediate future there is further slow waning in cases, that will show up shortly in lower hospitalizations, and then lower deaths. Finally, Trevor Bedford has a very informative thread about what endemic COVID is likely to look like, based on the rate of mutations and the period of time that previous infection makes a recovered person resistant to re-infection. https://twitter.com/trvrb/status/1554890588121493504 Here are a few highlights: “Based on the experience in winter 2020/2021, seasonal influence on SARS-CoV-2 transmission is quite clear … “we can gain some intuition from simple epidemiological models… “In particular, we can use an SIRS system in which individuals go from Susceptible to Infected to Recovered, and then return to the Susceptible class due to immune waning / antigenic drift of the virus… “ with flu-like ~5 year rate of waning (in blue), we get winter epidemics and summer troughs, while with faster waning we see greater levels of circulation and less variation between winter and summer (in yellow and red)… “If what we've seen with Omicron evolution in 2022 becomes largely the norm, then this result would imply waning of ~24% in the span of ~6 months, or very roughly waning from R→S on a ~1.8 year time horizon, ie close to the yellow curve in the above SIRS model.” He indicates he is not making a prediction, but rather to “illustrate a scenario where we end up in a regime of year-round variant-driven circulation with more circulation in the winter than summer, but not flu-like winter seasons and summer troughs.”
Covid-19 trends haven't budged for weeks, and no one knows what's next - -The United States seems to have hit a Covid-19 plateau, with more than 40,000 people hospitalized and more than 400 deaths a day consistently over the past month or so. It's a dramatic improvement from this winter -- there were four times as many hospitalizations and nearly six times as many deaths at the peak of the first Omicron wave -- but still stubbornly high numbers. And there are big question marks around what might happen next, as the coronavirus' evolution remains quite elusive 2½ years into the pandemic. "We've never really cracked that: why these surges go up and down, how long it stays up and how fast it comes down," said Dr. Eric Topol, a cardiologist and professor of molecular medicine at Scripps Research. "All these things are still somewhat of a mystery." BA.5 remains the dominant subvariant in the US for now, causing most new cases as it has since the last week of June. Data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, published Tuesday, shows that the Omicron offshoot accounted for 87% of new cases in the first week of August, inching up a few percentage points from the week before. That slight increase in prevalence is a sign that no other variants are outcompeting it -- and promising for future trends. BA.5 "has been very formidable because it's so transmissible and has so much immune evasion," Topol said. But the plateau in hospitalizations is "encouraging" because it means the subvariant probably has worked its way through most of the hosts it can find. "Right now, the question is what comes as we descend from BA.5. It could take weeks." CDC ensemble forecasts predict stable trends in hospitalizations and deaths over the coming weeks, and experts agree that the worst of the wave has probably passed. But it's hummed along at a high level because it continues to find people whose immunity from vaccination or infection has waned over time -- something that will continue to happen, said William Hanage, an epidemiologist and associate professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. And with children going back to school, a change in seasons and other variants on the horizon, it's unclear when the plateau will drop -- and by how much. "I would expect things to decline at least for the next month or so," said Trevor Bedford, an epidemiologist and genomic scientist at the University of Washington's School of Public Health. "But, of course, there are other things waiting in the wings. If it's not variant-driven, it will be seasonality-driven," he said, with case rates likely to rise as more people head indoors for colder weather. Even if trends don't improve as expected, though, it's unlikely that potential future waves will be as devastating as with Delta or the original Omicron variant. Alpha, Delta and Omicron "are cousins, not children," Hanage said. They each made a significant impact on the population because they were so different from each other. But the turnover that's happened this year -- from BA.2 to BA.2.12.1 to BA.5 -- has all "emerged from within Omicron," and the subvariants are much more similar to each other. If the next variant is as different as the change from Delta to Omicron, it would be "quite a change" from what's been happening recently, he said. That's not impossible, and close attention is being paid to the latest subvariants that have popped up. Over the past week, BA.4.6 grew from about 4% of cases in the US to just under 5%, according to CDC data. Its mutations aren't "especially worrisome" when it comes to immune evasion, Topol said, but we just don't know yet. Even a small increase in prevalence is growth, and "if it keeps growing, that means it's got an advantage. The more it grows, the more we'll have to be concerned about it." Another Omicron offshoot, BA.2.75, has not made it to the CDC's variant tracker. It accounts for less than 1% of cases in the US, according to gene sequencing company Helix. But people are watching "with a degree of trepidation" because it has more changes on the spike gene that could lead to more substantial immune escape or transmissibility, Hanage said. Still, so much is unknown. Combinations of changes like this have sometimes led to the next variant of concern, and other times they've gone nowhere, he said. Looking ahead, Hanage says, "there's likely to be one step forward, two steps back" when it comes to progress in the Covid-19 pandemic. And if deaths stay above 400 a day for a full year, that's more than twice as bad as the worst recent flu seasons, he said. "So those are numbers we've got at the moment, at a point when things are, relatively speaking, good," he said. "This is something which I think a lot of people don't grasp."
Why BA.5 became the dominant COVID variant - Never say the pandemic hasn't been educational, as COVID-19 has certainly given all of us a crash course in evolution. Charles Darwin's notion of the survival of the fittest, one of the tenets of his theory of evolution, epitomizes the manner in which subsequent mutations of the virus that are better-suited to spread have outcompeted each other — typically eradicating earlier, less-fit virus variants in the process. Indeed, from the primordial alpha variant to the delta variant to omicron, new variants emerge when unique mutations make a strain either more contagious, or more capable of evading immunity from previous infections and vaccines.RNA viruses like SARS-CoV-2 are always mutating; every replication in a hosts' cells creates a moment for a chance mutation to emerge. While viruses are technically not alive, it is their nature to mutate and evolve as they infect hosts' cells and replicate. Indeed, this is how they survive.In most cases, mutations are harmful to the virus' ability to reproduce, and thus often eliminated in the process of natural selection. However, if a mutation has a competitive advantage — like increased transmissibility — that mutation can outcompete a previous variant. Indeed, that is what has been driving the mutations we've seen evolve over time.In early July, federal officials announced that BA.5 became the most dominant strain in the U.S., meaning that it makes up a majority of the infections. This came nearly four months after BA.2 was named the most dominant strain. Both are subvariants of the omicron variant.According to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), BA.5 is now responsible for nearly 87 percent of COVID-19 infections in the U.S. "The omicron sub-variant BA.5 is the worst version of the virus that we've seen." But the latest variant to take hold across the world is — according to some infectious disease experts — the most concerning one yet."The omicron sub-variant BA.5 is the worst version of the virus that we've seen," Dr. Eric Topol, founder and director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute, wrote in late June. "It takes immune escape, already extensive, to the next level, and, as a function of that, enhanced transmissibility, well beyond Omicron (BA.1) and other Omicron family variants that we've seen (including BA.1.1, BA.2, BA.2.12.1, and BA.4)." But just how much more transmissible is BA.5 than previous subvariants — some of which were also dubbed the most transmissible and/or concerning variants at the time? Scientists are still debating exactly how much more contagious BA.5 is than its predecessors. One Australian researcher believes that each person who got BA.5 could spread it to 18 others, but other researchers have disagreed with that claim.In Topol's article, he explains that BA.5 has become the dominant strain not merely because of its high transmissibility, but because of its ability to evade immunity, too, ."You can see that the antigenic distance from BA.1 to BA.2 is far greater than the ancestral strain to Delta or Beta or Gamma," Topol explained, pointing to an antigenic map of the subvariant. Antigenic distance refers to how different a variants' genetics are compared to its peers; because of the way the immune system works, a strain that was genetically distant (compared to a strain that someone previously contracted or was vaccinated against) would be better at evading immunity. "This is the basis for the immune escape of BA.5 — our relatively poor recognition of and response to the spike protein," Topol continued. Spike proteins comprise little points that stick out of the side of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in artistic depictions, and such proteins are crucial to the virus' ability to enter human cells. Hence, BA.5's mutation in its viral spike protein has strengthened its ability to latch onto host cells and evade some immune responses.
Omicron BA.2.75 Centaurus variant topped BA.5 in India and 'may prevail' elsewhere - The only Omicron subvariant with its own name may become the next globally dominant strain of COVID-19.The so-called Centaurus strain, scientifically known as BA.2.75, has quickly become India’s dominant strain of COVID-19 in recent weeks and now accounts for roughly two-thirds of the country’s new cases, according to Shahid Jameel, a virologist at the University of Oxford. A Twitter user named Xabier Ostale gave BA.2.75 the unofficial name Centaurus in July, saying he named the strain after the galaxy, and it has taken off among some experts and media outlets.This week, Chinese researchers released a new preprint study on the strain suggesting that Centaurus “may prevail” as the globally dominant strain of COVID-19 following the current BA.4 and BA.5 waves. Centaurus’s “growth advantage over BA.5 in India has become clearer” since the researchers looked at data nearly one month ago, one of the study’s authors, Yunlong Richard Cao, an assistant professor of biochemistry and immunology at Peking University, wrote on Twitter. Centaurus does not appear to be driving a surge in hospitalizations or deaths in India. The country has reported 49 COVID-related deaths per day in the past week, the same daily rate as two weeks ago, according to the New York Times. The Chinese researchers wrote it “remains unclear” why the strain appeared more infectious in India than other strains. But they suggested a key mutation related to the virus’s ability to bind to human cells may explain why Centaurus has displaced other subvariants in the country. India suffered a deadly wave of Delta infections in the summer of 2021, and Cao believes that because BA.5 shares a specific mutation with Delta, people in India may be better protected against BA.5 than people elsewhere, giving Centaurus room to flourish.Centaurus also does not appear to be taking off in other countries. In the U.S., BA.5 cases make up 87.1% of all COVID infections, while other Omicron sub-strains, BA.4 and BA.4.6, account for the second and third most cases at 6.6% and 4.8%, respectively, according to recently published data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. BA.2.75, meanwhile, has not registered enough cases to be officially listed in U.S. data.
Costa Rica’s New Government Overturns Covid-19 Vaccine Mandate, Launches Investigation Into Pfizer Contract - The recently elected President of Costa Rica Rodrigo Chaves last week announced the end of compulsory vaccination against COVID-19. Speaking alongside his health minister, Joselyn Chacón, Chaves said that not only are the vaccines no longer mandatory; any action taken against anyone who does not want to get vaccinated will be in violation of the law. Chaves also called for unvaccinated workers who had lost their jobs to be reinstated and announced the launch of an investigation into the vaccine contracts the previous government signed with Pfizer-BioNTech.Costa Rica was the first country in Central America to implement a COVID-19 vaccine mandate. That was in September 2021, when Chaves’ predecessor, Carlos Alvarado Quesada, was holding the reins. In November 2021, Costa Rica became the first country in the world to mandate Covid-19 vaccines for minors, with all children 5 and older obligated by law to get vaccinated, barring medical exemptions. It was a hugely controversial decision that, as in the US and other countries, represented a line in the sand for many parents.The mandate meant that a child could get vaccinated even if their parents did not consent, said Roman Macaya Hayes, then-director of Costa Rica’s Social Security Institute. Macaya Hayes is now under investigation by the Deputy Prosecutor’s Office of the 1st Judicial Circuit of San José for alleged prevarication. So too is Daniel Salas, the former Minister of Health who now works in the US with the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), as well as six members of the National Vaccination and Epidemiology Commission (CNVE), two of whom purportedly participated in decisions regarding COVID-19 immunization even though their appointments to the CNVE had expired.That alone is enough to invalidate the acts agreed upon by the CNVE, says President Chaves. His government will also investigate the former Alvarado government’s massive purchase of COVID-19 vaccines in April 2022, even as the vaccination campaign was losing steam.“We are going to investigate why it is they bought so many vaccines when the data available showed the market was already saturated,” Chaves said in his weekly press conference last week. “Millions of dollars’ worth of vaccines were purchased at a time that the vaccination rate was already waning. I have no idea how much money was squandered on vaccines that are not going to be used and are going to expire”.Of course, Chaves, a right-wing populist and former World Bank-economist, could be doing all of this just to score political points against his predecessor. However, given his predecessor, Carlos Alvarado Quesada, was already a political corpse on leaving government with an approval rating of just 18%, while Chaves has an approval rating of 70% following his first two and a half months in office, it is unlikely.Costa Rica’s health minister, Joselyn Chacón, said she could not divulge any of the details of the Pfizer contract due to secrecy clauses embedded deep within the contract. She also alleged that Beatriz Solís Worsfold, the daughter of former President of Costa Rica Luis Guillermo Solís (2014-18) and a corporate lawyer with Pfizer since 2018, was instrumental in drawing up the contract: “If we release details of the contract we could end up in jail because we would be violating a contract drawn up by the daughter of former president Luis Guillermo Solís.”
China’s Hainan Starts Mass Covid Testing, Imposes More Lockdowns – - China’s Hainan started mass Covid-19 testing from Sunday and imposed more lockdowns as infections rise in the southern island province. Hainan reported 182 local infections as of noon Sunday, boosting the total to more than 1,100 this month, state broadcaster CCTVreported, citing a briefing by the local government. That follows 483 infections on Saturday. Authorities are also imposing restrictions in other areas, including the lockdown of the southeastern city of Wanning, according to the news report.
Hundreds Exposed to Polio After Virus Found in Wastewater: NY -New York health officials said there may be "hundreds" of people infected with polio after the virus was detected in wastewater. Officials are warning anyone who hasn't been vaccinated against the virus to do so as soon as possible, according to a Department of Health statement on Thursday."Based on earlier polio outbreaks, New Yorkers should know that for every one case of paralytic polio observed, there may be hundreds of other people infected," said State Health Commissioner Dr. Mary Bassett.The virus was first detected in wastewater samples in June in Rockland County, near New York City, and has since been detected in neighboring Orange County, the statement said. "Coupled with the latest wastewater findings, the Department is treating the single case of polio as just the tip of the iceberg of much greater potential spread," Bassett said. "As we learn more, what we do know is clear: the danger of polio is present in New York today."Seven positive samples were detected, all "genetically linked" to anunvaccinated individual in Rockland County who developed paralytic polio in mid-July. That individual was not "the source of the transmission" and the "case investigation into the origin of the virus is ongoing," officials said in the statement."This unprecedented circulation of polio in our community from a devastating disease that was eradicated from the United States in 1979 must be stopped," said Dr. Patricia Schnabel Ruppert, Rockland County Health Commissioner. "Any unvaccinated children and adults should receive a first polio immunization immediately."
US doctor issues warning of many undiagnosed polio cases - A health official in New York State has told the BBC there could be hundreds or even thousands of undiagnosed cases of polio there.It follows an announcement last month that an unvaccinated man had been paralysed by the virus in Rockland County, New York. His case has been linked genetically to traces of polio virus found in sewage in London and Jerusalem.Developed countries have been warned to boost vaccination rates.Dr Patricia Schnabel Ruppert, health commissioner for Rockland County, said she was worried about polio circulating in her state undetected."There isn't just one case of polio if you see a paralytic case. The incidence of paralytic polio is less than 1%," she said."Most cases are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic, and those symptoms are often missed."So there are hundreds, perhaps even thousands of cases that have occurred in order for us to see a paralytic case."Dr Ruppert confirmed that scientists are looking at "a linkage" between the New York paralysis case and traces of poliovirus found in wastewater in London and Jerusalem, after genome sequencing was conducted on samples from the three locations."This is a very serious issue for our global world - it's not just about New York. We all need to make sure all our populations are properly vaccinated," she said. The US man who was paralysed has a form of "vaccine-derived" polio, which occurs because some countries use a weakened form of the virus in their vaccinations.In rare cases, it can mutate and then be transmitted through poor hygiene to others who are unvaccinated.Global travel means these cases can crop up in countries which are not used to seeing polio, but where there are pockets of low vaccination.Although weaker than the original or "wild" form of the disease, vaccine-derived polio can still cause serious illness. The virus can attack the nerves in the spine and base of the brain. This can cause paralysis, usually in the legs, but if the breathing muscles are affected too, it can also be life-threatening.The US and most developed countries use a newer form of the vaccine, which does not contain any live virus.Dr Ruppert said she never thought she would see a case of polio in the US in her lifetime.Some areas of Rockland County have historically low vaccination rates of only 60%. In 2018, there was an outbreak of measles there.Field teams are now being sent into these areas to encourage better uptake of polio vaccination, particularly in children.In the UK, more testing is currently being carried out after traces of polio virus were found over several weeks at Beckton sewage works during wastewater surveillance.The UK Health Security Agency is expected to release more details soon about which areas of London are most affected.
How Polio Crept Back Into the U.S. — About a month ago, British health authorities announced they’d found evidence suggesting local spread of polio in London. It was a jolt, to be sure. The country was declared polio-free in 2003. But at least no one had turned up sick. The proof came from routine tests of sewage samples, which can alert health officials that a virus is circulating and allow them to intervene quickly. Based on genetic analysis of those samples, officials in the United Kingdom moved to protect the city’s children by reaching out to families with kids under 5 who hadn’t been fully vaccinated. Polio’s first appearance in almost a decade in the U.S., confirmed late last week by health officials in New York, would play out quite differently. In the U.S., public health agencies generally don’t test sewage for polio. Instead, they wait for people to show up sick in doctor’s offices or hospitals — a reactive strategy that can give this stealthy virus more time to circulate silently through the community before it is detected. In New York, the first sign of trouble surfaced when a young man in Rockland County sought medical treatment for weakness and paralysis in June. By the time tests confirmed he had polio, nearly a month had passed. Because the majority of polio infections cause no symptoms, by the time there’s a case of paralysis, 100 to 1,000 infections may have occurred, said Dr. Yvonne Maldonado, a professor of pediatrics at the Stanford School of Medicine who chairs the American Academy of Pediatrics’ committee on infectious diseases. “You’re already chasing your tail if you’re going to wait for a case to show up,” she said. Only after the case was identified did New York health officials start the sort of surveillance the British did, testing wastewater samples from Rockland County and beyond to help determine if the virus is spreading and where. Like many parts of the U.S., New York already was collecting sewage and analyzing it to track the spread of COVID-19. Health officials say they’re now testing stored samples for signs of polio. They say they’ve detected polio in a few Rockland County samples but need to analyze more to understand what the initial results represent. High U.S. vaccination rates, topping 90%, made the risk of such diseases incredibly low, though there have long been pockets of population in which rates are far lower. Rockland County, a suburban area northwest of New York City, is one such place. It suffered an extended outbreak of measles, another vaccine-preventable disease, in 2018 and 2019 that was largely concentrated in its Orthodox Jewish community, where many opt out of vaccines. Several news organizations have reported that the polio patient is a member of that community.
Novel zoonotic Langya virus identified in China -In a recent report published in The New England Journal of Medicine, scientists discuss their discovery of the novel Langya henipavirus (LayV) in eastern China. To date, a total of 36 patients have been diagnosed with acute LayV infection in the Shandong and Henan provinces. While monitoring febrile patients who reported recent contact with animals in eastern China, LayV infection was first identified through metagenomic analysis of a patient’s throat swab sample. This analysis revealed that the LayV genome consists of 18,402 nucleotides and is phylogenetically related to the Mojiang henipavirus that was previously discovered in southern China in 2014.After their initial discovery of this infected patient, the researchers identified an additional 35 patients with acute LayV infection. Notably, 26 of these individuals were infected with LayV alone.Of these 26 patients, 100% presented with fever, 54% with fatigue, 50% with anorexia and cough, 46% with myalgia, 38% with headache, and 35% with vomiting. Thrombocytopenia and leukopenia were reported in 35% of patients, whereas liver and kidney function were reported in 35% and 8% of these patients, respectively.The researchers who identified the first LayV virus also surveyed 25 species of wild small animals as potential hosts for this virus. To this end, LayV ribonucleic acid (RNA) was identified in 27% of the surveyed shrews, thus suggesting that this animal is the most likely reservoir for this virus. Other domestic animals that were seropositive for LayV included 2% and 5% of surveyed goats and dogs, respectively. Other notable viruses of the henipavirus genus include the Nipah virus (NiV) and Hendra virus (HeV). Both NiV and HeV are naturally found in Pteropus spp bats; however, their spillover into mammals ultimately led to their ability to infect human beings.Since LayV was the only pathogen identified in a majority of the patients with acute LayV infection, the researchers are confident that LayV was the primary cause of their febrile illness. Notably, contact tracing of 15 people who interacted with nine LayV-infected patients did not reveal that human-to-human transmission occurred; however, the small sample size of the study does not eliminate the possibility that human-to-human transmission of this virus is possible.Sentinel surveillance of similar febrile illnesses reported among people who recently interacted with shrews or other potential reservoirs of LayV is essential to better understand this human illness. Due to the sporadic and often unpredictable nature of henipavirus outbreaks, it is essential to isolate suspected cases of LayV infection and maintain open communication with public health agencies on new data as it becomes available.
U.S. monkeypox cases surpass 10,000 as CDC still aims for "containment" - More than 10,000 Americans have now tested positive in the monkeypox outbreak across the U.S., according to figures published late Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as federal health officials say they are still racing to contain the virus.Cases have been reported in every state but Wyoming while 15 states and the District of Columbia have reported more than a hundred cases. The largest numbers are in New York, California and Florida.No U.S. deaths have so far been reported, out of the 12 monkeypox fatalities the World Health Organization has tallied so far this year. Health officials say the virus is mostly spreading through close interactions between men who have sex with men, either through direct skin-to-skin contact or shared linens like towels and bedding. However, the CDC has tallied at least 50 cases in people who were female at birth, including at least one pregnant woman. A handful of suspected infections have also been spotted in young children, although health authorities recently said some may have actually been false positives. Federal health authorities have warned for weeks that they expected the U.S. outbreak to accelerate through August, especially as availability of testing ramped up, following the course of some other European countries that saw cases swell earlier in the year. The U.S. has reported the most infections of any country in the world since late July. The American sum of cases is now roughly double the size of Spain, the European nation that had previously reported the most cases ahead of Germany and the United Kingdom.The pace of new cases now appears to be slowing in some countries abroad. When measured relative to the size of each nation's population, the CDC's tally is still smaller than in those European nations, though the accelerating U.S. outbreak now appears on pace to eclipse those rates too. For states with more than 25 cases, CDC officials recently estimated that the pace of new monkeypox infections is doubling every 8.6 days on average. On Wednesday, 1,391 new cases were reported nationwide to the CDC — the largest single-day increase so far. The first known case in the current U.S. outbreak was reported in mid-May."We are still operating under a containment goal, although I know many states are starting to wonder if we're shifting to more of a mitigation phase right now, given that our case counts are still rising rapidly," Jennifer McQuiston, the CDC's top monkeypox official, told a group of the agency's outside advisers on Tuesday.
Opinion | We’re making the same mistake with monkeypox that we made with HIV/AIDS - I’ve watched the rise of monkeypox with great sadness and horror. Sadness because of all the people suffering from what can be an excruciating infection. And horror because it seems we are watching as public health officials make the same mistakes they made during the HIV/AIDS pandemic.As HIV/AIDS surged in previous decades, the government scrambled to address the strange illness that seemed to afflict mostly men who had sex with men. In fact, it was first referred to as “gay-related infectious disease,” or GRID, and other names that resulted in people viewing it as a “gay disease” for decades.I fear we are making the same messaging errors with monkeypox. Yes, the vast majority of cases so far are among men who have sex with men. But history has taught me that no singular community is exclusively at risk for a disease.The near-exclusive emphasis on gay men regarding HIV/AIDS set up the public health response for failure in two respects. First, it heaped stigma, shame and blame on gay men like a truckload of garbage dumping at a waste site. Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) even proposed isolating people living with the disease like a leper colony.Second, it left other groups — especially Black and Brown women — with a false sense of security. Many women, myself included, believed that we couldn’t contract HIV. “I’m not gay, and I certainly do not have sex with gay men,” we would think. “Therefore, I am not at risk.”By the time we learned that many men who had sex with men also had sex with women, thousands of women had contracted the virus. Black women made up the majority of AIDS cases among women in the United States. I was one of them. Many of these women contracted the virus because of a culture known as the “down low.” That included men who lived double lives and men coming home from prison, who didn’t consider themselves gay and returned to their heterosexual relationships, with HIV in tote. Women also contracted HIV from their partners who used intravenous drugs. Additionally, about 52 percent of women contracted HIV from their own drug use. Neither had anything to do with men who had sex with men.Even after it was understood that HIV was not exclusive to men who have sex with men, by and large the information campaign and the medical community held on to their gay-centered approach, with grave consequences for treating women living with HIV/AIDS. Some women went misdiagnosed because their symptoms didn’t match those seen in gay men with AIDS.Even the initial definition of AIDS was shaped by how the disease presented itself in men, locking women out of critical government benefits because we didn’t meet the “criteria” of having AIDS. An HIV-infected man with recurrent candidiasis in the throat, for example, qualified for disability, while an HIV-infected woman with cervical cancer and a low T-cell count did not. The definition was finally changed in 1993 to include women, almost 12 years into the pandemic. Even when I applied for disability benefits two years after the definition was changed, with an extremely low T-cell count, I was still denied.
WHO asks people not to attack monkeys over monkeypox - With cases of monkeypox surging around the world, it’s not a good time to be a monkey.The primates have, in recent days, been physically attacked — and even killed — by poisoning and stoning attacks in Brazil, according to local media reports that cite police officials.of the marmoset and capuchin types were found displaying signs of intoxication or aggression, leading to fears that they had been poisoned, according to Brazilian news site G1. Seven of the monkeys died, while the others are under observation at a zoo in São José do Rio Preto, a municipality in the state of São Paulo.The assaults have led to the World Health Organization — which declared monkeypox a global health emergency last month — issuing a reminder that despite the virus’s name, monkeys should not be blamed for its transmission.“What people need to know very clearly is the transmission we are seeing is happening between humans to humans,” Margaret Harris, a WHO spokesperson told reporters Tuesday. “They should certainly not be attacking any animals.”“It’s close-contact transmission. So the concern should be about where it’s transmitting in the human population and what humans can do to protect themselves from getting it and transmitting it,” Harris said, adding that the virus was seen “much more commonly in various rodents” than monkeys and that work was ongoing to consider whether the virus should be renamed.Brazilian officials believe it is possible that the recent outbreak of the virus is driving anti-monkey sentiment and behavior, although they also noted that the “deliberate” attacks could also be linked to animal trafficking.Following the attacks, environmental military police officers are patrolling the forest of Rio Preto to prevent attacks on the animals, local media reported, as the National Network to Combat Wildlife Trafficking blamed the “persecution” of monkeys and attacks on “a lack of information” in Brazilian society. Globally, there are almost 32,000 confirmed cases of monkeypox,according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Cases have been reported in 89 countries, and the outbreak is prominent in Europe, where most of the infections have been recorded following an outbreak that began in the spring.
Study warns of a potential Sindbis virus epidemic in 2022 In a recent Eurosurveillance study, researchers seek to raise awareness of a potentially impending Sindbis virus (SINV) epidemic due to its high incidence throughout Finland in 2021.Although ribonucleic acid (RNA) viruses are not typically found in humans, they are responsible for many zoonotic diseases that eventually reach humans. Different types of birds, especially migratory and game birds, act as amplifying hosts for the SINV, which is primarily transmitted by mosquitoes.Among these RNA viruses includes alphaviruses like SINV, which originated near Sindbis, Egypt. The Pogosta disease, which is caused by infection with SINV, manifests as a rash, myalgia, arthralgia, and fever. Arthralgia and myalgia due to this disease may persist for up to several months or years, which can have a detrimental impact on the affected individual’s quality of life.Enzyme-linked immunoassay (ELISA) is typically used to diagnose the Pogosta disease, with positive results reflecting the presence of either SINV immunoglobulin M (IgM) and IgG antibodies in a single serum sample or when seroconversion has occurred between two serum samples. As of 1995, laboratory-confirmed cases of Pogosta disease have been reported to the National Infectious Diseases Register (NIDR).Although SINV has been detected in mosquitoes and birds throughout the globe, symptomatic human infections are primarily reported in Finland, Russia, Sweden, and South Africa. Notably, in 2021, the transmission of SINV in Finland led to a major outbreak involving 566 laboratory-confirmed human cases that were distributed throughout the country.Late-winter heavy snowfall in 2022 rendered surplus melting water, which facilitated the early breeding of mosquitos. Thus, the weather throughout 2022 has been conducive to mosquito breeding.Furthermore, there has been an increase in bird populations in Finland, which also provides more amplifying hosts for SINV. Taken together, these elements rendered favorable conditions for increased SINV transmission in 2022.The Pogosta disease is likely underrecognized in Finland, particularly in places where the condition is scarce. The definitive diagnosis of SINV patients is crucial due to the potential burden of long-lasting joint discomfort. In Finland and Sweden, 24.5% and 39% of diagnosed patients, respectively, have experienced these symptoms.
Study Connects Climate Hazards to 58% of Infectious Diseases - Climate hazards such as flooding, heat waves and drought have worsened more than half of the hundreds of known infectious diseases in people, including malaria, hantavirus, cholera and anthrax, a study says. Researchers looked through the medical literature of established cases of illnesses and found that 218 out of the known 375 human infectious diseases, or 58%, seemed to be made worse by one of 10 types of extreme weather connected to climate change, according to a study in Monday’s journal Nature Climate Change. The study mapped out 1,006 pathways from the climate hazards to sick people. In some cases downpours and flooding sicken people through disease-carrying mosquitos, rats and deer. There are warming oceans and heat waves that taint seafood and other things we eat and droughts that bring bats carrying viral infections to people. Doctors, going back to Hippocrates, have long connected disease to weather, but this study shows how widespread the influence of climate is on human health. “If climate is changing, the risk of these diseases are changing,” said study co-author Dr. Jonathan Patz, director of the Global Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Doctors, such as Patz, said they need to think of the diseases as symptoms of a sick Earth. “The findings of this study are terrifying and illustrate well the enormous consequences of climate change on human pathogens,” said Dr. Carlos del Rio, an Emory University infectious disease specialist, who was not part of the study. “Those of us in infectious diseases and microbiology need to make climate change one of our priorities, and we need to all work together to prevent what will be without doubt a catastrophe as a result of climate change.” In addition to looking at infectious diseases, the researchers expanded their search to look at all type of human illnesses, including non-infectious sicknesses such as asthma, allergies and even animal bites to see how many maladies they could connect to climate hazards in some way, including infectious diseases. They found a total of 286 unique sicknesses and of those 223 of them seemed to be worsened by climate hazards, nine were diminished by climate hazards and 54 had cases of both aggravated and minimized, the study found. The new study doesn’t do the calculations to attribute specific disease changes, odds or magnitude to climate change, but finds cases where extreme weather was a likely factor among many. Study lead author Camilo Mora, a climate data analyst at the University of Hawaii, said what is important to note is that the study isn’t about predicting future cases. “There is no speculation here whatsoever,” Mora said. "These are things that have already happened.” One example Mora knows first-hand. About five years ago, Mora’s home in rural Colombia was flooded — for the first time in his memory water was in his living room, creating an ideal breeding ground for mosquitoes — and Mora contracted Chikungunya, a nasty virus spread by mosquito bites. And even though he survived, he still feels joint pain years later. Sometimes climate change acts in odd ways. Mora includes the 2016 case in Siberia when a decades-old reindeer carcass, dead from anthrax, was unearthed when the permafrost thawed from warming. A child touched it, got anthrax and started an outbreak.
New Cancer Study Results Confirm Lasting Effects on 9/11 First Responders -Research investigating the physical and mental health consequences of being at the WTC site during and after the terrorist attacks has been instrumental in obtaining health care coverage for thousands of individuals. These exposures include known and suspected carcinogens such as asbestos, arsenic, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, polychlorinated biphenyls, polychlorinated furans, and dioxins.1-6Ten years ago, the FDNY WTC research team published the first study investigating cancer risk among FDNY firef ighters who worked at the WTC site.7 Over the past decade, this research has been expanded with nearly a dozen additional manuscripts about FDNY WTC–exposed rescue/recovery workers.8-15 During this time, additional studies from outside research teams have investigated cancer risk among other non-FDNY WTC-exposed rescue/recovery workers compared with the general population.16-18 These studies have produced some consistent findings.In the studies, the incidence rates for all cancers combined were elevated compared with general population rates, although not all were statistically significant. Each study also reported elevated rates of prostate and thyroid cancer, but a reduced rate of lung cancer compared with the general population rates.7,16-18 Earlier in 2022, published findings from a study combining all of the WTC-exposure rescue/recovery worker cohorts showed that although the incidence rate for all cancers combined was no longer greater than the general population, the rates of prostate, thyroid, cutaneous melanoma, and tonsil cancer were elevated. Reduced rates were observed for several gastrointestinal, respiratory, and female reproductive cancers.19Being that the FDNY cohort included mostly firefighters who were, on average, healthier than the general population but also exposed to carcinogens during routine firefighting activities, the question of whether the elevated rates were due to their occupational exposures rather than WTC exposures still needed to be answered. As part of the Career Firefighter Health Study, investigators compared FDNY firefighters with a cohort of non–WTC-exposed firefighters from Chicago, Illinois; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and San Francisco, California.20 The rate of prostate cancer was approximately 30% higher among FDNY firefighters, and the rate of thyroid cancer was more than 2-fold higher.8,21In this study, investigators conducted deep targeted sequencing of 237 genes frequently mutated in hematologic malignancies and then evaluated the relationship between WTC exposure and clonal hematopoiesis (CH)–associated mutations. CH is the acquisition of somatic mutations in blood cells in individuals without a hematologic malignancy, dysplasia, or cytopenia. CH-associated mutations with smoking and exposure to genotoxic stimuli increase the risk of leukemia and are associated with higher morbidity and mortality rates from a variety of inflammatory conditions and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease.23-25 Investigators observed the odds of CH-associated mutations in the WTC-exposed first responders was more than 3-fold greater than in the non-WTC–exposed cohort (odds ratio, 3.12; 95% CI, 1.63-5.99; P = .0006) after controlling for age, sex, and race/ethnicity. This relationship between WTC exposure and CH-associated mutations held when investigators also controlled for smoking status. Smoking history was not significantly associated with the prevalence of pathogenic somatic mutations.’
The EPA Has Identified 23 U.S. Facilities Whose Toxic Air Pollution Puts People at Risk — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday announced plans to “engage and inform” nearly two dozen communities across the country where air pollution from commercial sterilizer plants has significantly increased lifetime cancer risks for nearby residents. The facilities use a toxic gas called ethylene oxide to sanitize medical and dental equipment and fumigate certain food products. Theannouncement comes after the EPA’s inspector general and news publications including ProPublica and The Texas Tribune highlighted the agency’s yearslong failure to inform communities of their risks.The EPA said that its analysis of the industry’s self-reported emissions data showed that about a quarter of the nearly 100 commercial sterilizers the agency regulates are exposing nearby residents to unacceptable cancer risks from ethylene oxide. It posted risk maps and other information online for each of the high-risk facilities and announced dates for national and community-specific webinars and in-person meetings in the coming weeks. The EPA is also putting the finishing touches on a proposal to place stricter limits on how much ethylene oxide commercial sterilizers can release into the outside air; it plans to unveil the plan later this year. The agency said Wednesday that it is planning to propose limits on ethylene oxide usage inside such facilities to better protect workers who handle the chemical, as well as people who work or attend school nearby.Existing regulations on commercial sterilizers, as well as other facilities that manufacture or use ethylene oxide, do not account for the EPA’s latest research on the chemical that shows it is far more toxic than the agency knew.In 2016, the agency concluded that ethylene oxide was 30 times more carcinogenic than previously thought for people who continuously inhale it as adults and 50 times more carcinogenic for those who are exposed since birth. The conclusion fueled a backlash from the chemical and sterilizer industries, which say that the EPA’s findings are deeply flawed. They have made it clear they plan to fight the EPA’s forthcoming regulatory proposals. The EPA has known since at least 2018 that some of the communities it identified on Wednesday are at risk from ethylene oxide pollution and has even directed regional offices to hold public meetings. Those occurred in many places; in some more affluent and white communities, residents used the information to pressure elected officials to sue and even shutter sterilizer plants and enact stricter regulations of the chemical at the state level. Last year, an unprecedented analysis of five years of industry data by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune found that a 38-year-old commercial sterilizer located in close proximity to an elementary school in Laredo was the most toxic facility of its kind in the country. Yet none of the more than 100 residents contacted by reporters, including local officials, were aware of the risk; all but one said they didn’t even know the plant existed. The EPA told ProPublica and the Tribune last year that it was holding off on public engagement in certain communities while it gathered more recent emissions data from each of the nearly 100 commercial sterilizers that it regulates. This data collection is a key step in the agency’s work to craft updated regulations of the facilities. The agency’s analysis of that data served as the basis of Wednesday’s announcement. It found that ethylene oxide emissions from 23 sterilizers across the country created an excess cancer risk for nearby residents of at least 1 in 10,000. That means that if 10,000 people are exposed to that amount of ethylene oxide over their lifetimes, at least one of them would likely develop cancer as a result of the exposure. (That’s in addition to any cancer risk caused by factors like lifestyle and genetics.) The EPA stressed that the amount of ethylene oxide the facilities are emitting is not high enough to pose short-term health risks.
A Mining Company Buys Out Homeowners to Avoid Cleanup — ProPublica - The “death map” tells the story of decades of sickness in the small northwest New Mexico communities of Murray Acres and Broadview Acres. Turquoise arrows point to homes where residents had thyroid disease, dark blue arrows mark cases of breast cancer, and yellow arrows mean cancer claimed a life.Neighbors built the map a decade ago after watching relatives and friends fall ill and die. Dominating the top right corner of the map, less than half a mile from the cluster of colorful arrows, sits what residents believe is the cause of their sickness:22.2 million tons of uranium waste left over from milling ore to supply power plants and nuclear bombs.“We were sacrificed a long time ago,” said Candace Head-Dylla, who created the death map with her mother after Head-Dylla had her thyroid removed and her mother developed breast cancer. Research has linked both types of illnesses to uranium exposure. Beginning in 1958, a uranium mill owned by Homestake Mining Company of California processed and refined ore mined nearby. The waste it left behind leaked uranium and selenium into groundwater and released the cancer-causing gas radon into the air. State and federal regulators knew the mill was polluting groundwater almost immediately after it started operating, but years passed before they informed residents and demanded fixes.The failures at Homestake are emblematic of the toxic legacy of the American uranium industry, one that has been well-documented from its boom during the Cold War until falling uranium prices and concerns over the dangers of nuclear power decimated the industry in the 1980s. Uranium mining and milling left a trail of contamination and suffering, from miners who died of lung cancer while thefederal government kept the risks secret to the largest radioactive spill in the country’s history.But for four decades, the management of more than 250 million tons of radioactive uranium mill waste has been largely overlooked, continuing to pose a public health threat.ProPublica found that regulators have failed to hold companies to account when they missed cleanup targets and accepted incorrect forecasts that pollution wouldn’t spread. The federal government will eventually assume responsibility for the more than 50 defunct mills that generated this waste. At Homestake, which was among the largest mills, the company is bulldozing a community in order to walk away. Interviews with dozens of residents, along with radon testing and thousands of pages of company and government records, reveal a community sacrificed to build the nation's nuclear arsenal and atomic energy industry.Time and again, Homestake and government agencies promised to clean up the area. Time and again, they missed their deadlines while further spreading pollution in the communities. In the 1980s, Homestake promised residents groundwater would be cleaned within a decade, locals told the Environmental Protection Agency and ProPublica. After missing that target, the company told regulators it would complete the job around 2006, then by 2013.In 2014, an EPA report confirmed the site posed an unacceptable cancer risk and identified radon as the greatest threat to residents’ health. Still, the cleanup target date continued shifting, to 2017, then 2022.Rather than finish the cleanup, Homestake’s current owner, the Toronto-based mining giant Barrick Gold, is now preparing to ask the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the independent federal agency that oversees the cleanup of uranium mills, for permission to demolish its groundwater treatment systems and hand the site and remaining waste over to the U.S. Department of Energy to monitor and maintain forever.
'Dead fish everywhere' in German-Polish river after feared chemical waste dump --Thousands of fish have washed up dead on the Oder river running through Germany and Poland, sparking warnings of an environmental disaster as residents are urged to stay away from the water. The fish floating by the German banks near the eastern town of Schwedt are believed to have washed upstream from Poland where first reports of mass fish deaths were made by locals and anglers as early as on July 28. German officials accused Polish authorities of failing to inform them about the deaths, and were taken by surprise when the wave of lifeless fish came floating into view. In Poland, the government has also come under heavy criticism for failing to take swift action. Almost two weeks after the first dead fish appeared floating by Polish villages, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Friday that "everyone had initially thought that it was a local problem". But he admitted that the "scale of the disaster is very large, sufficiently large to say that the Oder will need years to recover its natural state." "Probably enormous quantities of chemical waste was dumped into the river in full knowledge of the risk and consequences," added the Polish leader, as German Environment Minister Steffi Lemke urged a comprehensive probe into what she called a brewing "environmental disaster". "We are standing on the German side—we have dead fish everywhere," Michael Tautenhahn, deputy chief of Germany's Lower Oder Valley National Park, told AFP. "I am deeply shocked... I have the feeling that I'm seeing decades of work lying in ruins here. I see our livelihood, the water—that's our life," he said, noting that it's not just fish that have died, but also mussels and likely countless other water creatures. "It's just the tip of the iceberg." The Oder has over the last years been known as a relatively clean river, and 40 domestic species of fish make their home in the waterway. But now, lifeless fish—some as small as a few centimetres, others reaching 30-40 cm—can be seen across the river. Occasionally, those still struggling to pull through can be seen flipping up in the water, seemingly gasping for air. Officials believe that the fish are likely to have been poisoned. "This fish death is atypical," said Axel Vogel, environment minister for Brandenburg state, estimating that "undoubtedly tonnes" of fish have died. Fish death is often caused by the distortion of oxygen levels when water levels are too low, he explained. "But we have completely different test results, namely that we have had increased oxygen level in the river for several days, and that indicates that a foreign substance has been introduced that has led to this," he said. Tests are ongoing in Germany to establish the substance that may have led to the deaths.
Hotter summers mean Florida’s turtles are mostly born female (Reuters) – Florida’s sea turtles are grappling with a gender imbalance made worse by climate change. Recent heat waves have caused the sand on some beaches to get so hot that nearly every turtle born was female.“The frightening thing is the last four summers in Florida have been the hottest summers on record,” said Bette Zirkelbach, manager of the Turtle Hospital in Marathon, a city in the Florida Keys, a string of tropical islands stretching from the southern end of the state.“Scientists that are studying sea turtle hatchlings and eggs have found no boy sea turtles, so only female sea turtles for the past four years,” Zirkelbach said, whose turtle center has operated since 1986. When a female turtle digs a nest on a beach, the temperature of the sand determines the gender of the hatchlings. Zirkelbach said an Australian study showed similar statistics – “99% of new sea turtle babies are female.” Instead of determining sex during fertilization, the sex of sea turtles and alligators depends on the temperature of developing eggs, according to the National Oceanographic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). If a turtle’s eggs incubate below 81.86 Fahrenheit (27.7 Celsius), the turtle hatchlings will be male, whereas if they incubate above 88.8 F (31C), they will be female, according to NOAA’S National Ocean Service website https://bit.ly/3zJdreP.“Over the years, you’re going to see a sharp decline in their population because we just don’t have the genetic diversity,” said Melissa Rosales Rodriguez, a sea turtle keeper at the recently opened a turtle hospital at the Miami Zoo. “We don’t have the male-to-female ratio needed in order to be able to have successful breeding sessions.”The two turtle hospitals are also battling tumors in turtles known as fibropapillomatosis, also known as FP. These tumors are contagious to other turtles and can cause death if not treated. With climate affecting the future of turtles and the disease being so widespread, Zirkelbach sees the need to save every turtle she can and open more rehab centers.
1st Sea Turtle Nest Found on Mississippi Beach Since 2018 - Beach crews have found the first sea turtle nest on the Mississippi mainland in four years. A Harrison County Sand Beach crew that was cleaning up found what appeared to be turtle tracks just east of the Pass Christian Harbor, officials said. They protected the area and called the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies in Gulfport, which followed the tracks to a nesting site that is now marked off with stakes and tape. The eggs likely belong to a protected loggerhead sea turtle or an even rarer Kemp’s ridley sea turtle, which is the most critically endangered species of sea turtle, said Moby Solangi, president of the marine studies group. The exact species of turtle won't be known until the eggs hatch in 50 to 60 days. Only about 1 in 10,000 sea turtle eggs reach adulthood. Turtles lay between 60 to 100 eggs in a nest and have multiple nests during a season, Solangi told The Sun Herald in Biloxi. This is the first sea turtle nest on mainland Mississippi since 2018, although there have been unofficial reports of nests on uninhabited barrier islands, officials said. The Mississippi Sound and Gulf of Mexico are important sea turtle habitats, but the 2010 oil spill and the 2019 opening of the Bonnet Carré Spillway hurt the turtle population, Solangi said.
Climate change stress is prematurely aging lizards - As temperatures rapidly rise, some lizards are giving birth to young that are already old. In central France, temperatures are accelerating so quickly that many lizards enter the world with DNA that’s already damaged and aged, according to new research published Monday, diminishing their chances of survival. The findings add to the growing body of research showing the menace that climate change poses to reptiles and other wildlife as hundreds of thousands of plants and animals are threatened with extinction in a warming world. Hotter summers are not just a human problem: Around the world, heat waves send wildlife scrambling for shade. Scorched vegetation deprives animals of lifesaving cover from predators. In some cases, droughts get so bad that populations die en masse of dehydration. In the case of the lizards in France, the degradation of DNA over generations may send populations into a death spiral from which they can’t recover. Unlike in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” the F. Scott Fitzgerald story in which a man ages in reverse, fewer of the lizards “born old” are expected to make it to reproductive age. “Once you are in this circle of events, it’s quite complicated to come back,” said Andréaz Dupoué, a biologist at Ifremer, a research institute in France, and co-author of the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. “It can become a vicious circle.” Dupoué’s team focused on a species called the viviparous lizard, or the common lizard. In the lab, the team measured caps at the ends of the lizards’ chromosomes called telomeres. Like a hem at the edge of a piece of fabric, telomeres shield the rest of the DNA from fraying or tangling. But the caps wear away as the body ages, until they can no longer provide protection. The stresses of life — including rising temperatures — can trim telomeres prematurely. Newborn lizards in declining, heat-stressed populations had abnormally stubby telomeres, Dupoué and his colleagues found. As female lizards living in hotter places potentially pass their shortened telomeres to their offspring, damaged chromosomes may accumulate across generations and drive populations down. As temperatures rise, the problem may only accelerate. “The most relevant result of the paper is the detection of a very worrying tendency towards shorter telomeres — and thus, faster aging — in populations exposed to the more demanding climatic conditions for the species,”
Maine’s newest invasive species are here thanks to climate change - Maine is under attack from species that don’t belong here. And they are getting a great deal of help from the effects of climate change. The Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry’s Division of Animal and Plant Health has added 27 plant species to it “do not sell” list. As of the end of this year these plants may no longer be bought or sold in the state due to the threats they pose to native species. Several of those terrestrial plants added to the list landed there thanks to warming temperatures making Maine a more hospitable place for them to put down their roots. Luckily, Maine’s winters are so far still cold enough to keep potentially destructive invasive mammals from moving in. Warming temperatures due to climate change have made conditions favorable for some invasive plants to thrive and outcompete native species, according to Gary Fish, state horticulturist with the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry. “Climate change will exacerbate the invasiveness of almost all the plants listed in 2018 and the ones scheduled to be banned in 2024,” Fish said. “One of the main ones we looked at is the Bradford or callery pear tree,” Fish said. “In other states where it has established itself there are actually bounties on it.” Fish does not think Maine will set up a bounty on the popular southern ornamental that has lovely flowers but a smell often compared to rotting fish. He did say if it does get a foothold in the natural landscape it would have a devastating effect on native species such as paper birch, aspen and cherries by taking over and crowding them out. Also new to the list are two kinds of bamboo that, at the moment, are not able to withstand Maine’s coldest months. Fish said as the state continues to experience warmer winters, they could establish themselves and easily crowd out native species. The two bamboos — golden bamboo and yellow groove bamboo — are among the fastest growing bamboo species. They spread via underground plant stems that can easily escape confinement. Once free, the bamboo forms a dense monoculture and thick layer of leaf litter that destroys native plants and takes over an ecosystem. Leafy branches and red berries make European mountain ash an attractive ornamental. But it can also be easily spread by birds who eat those berries and poop out the seeds. Once it starts growing in the wild, European mountain ash can become the dominant species and crowd out even native ash trees. Others you can no longer purchase in Maine after the end of the year include creeping Charlie, which is often recommended as an alternative to lawn grass; sea buckthorn; dwarf honeysuckle; Christmas berry; and coltsfoot. “Invasive plants are a direct threat to Maine’s natural and working landscapes,” he said. “The aggressive growth of invasive plants increases costs for agriculture, can affect forest regeneration, threatens recreational experiences, and reduces the value of habitats for mammals, birds and pollinators.”
'Unprecedented' rain, flooding shuts Death Valley National Park - - Death Valley National Park, famous for its parched, otherworldly landscapes, closed completely Friday due to historic rainfall and flash flooding, trapping about 500 visitors and 500 staff members in the park after the closures. No major injuries were reported, though about 60 vehicles were damaged. The park experienced “unprecedented amounts of rainfall” of 1.46 inches measured at Furnace Creek, which caused substantial flooding. The rainfall total is just below the previous daily record of 1.47 inches. The total represents nearly three-fourths of a year’s worth of rain for the park, which sees yearly average precipitation of 2 inches. No additional rainfall is expected Friday, but the incident marks the second time flash flooding has hit the park this week. On Monday, flooding affected many roads, and a Facebook post from the park showed a vehicle buried up to its headlights in dirt and gravel. Sunny and hot conditions are expected to return to Death Valley this weekend, with highs in the 80s and 90s.
Record floods strand 1K people in Death Valley National Park (AP) — Record rainfall Friday trigged flash floods at Death Valley National Park that swept away cars, closed all roads and stranded hundreds of visitors and workers. There were no immediate reports of injuries but roughly 60 vehicles were buried in mud and debris and about 500 visitors and 500 park workers were stuck inside the park, officials said. The park near the California-Nevada state line received 1.46 inches (3.71 centimeters) of rain at the Furnace Creek area. That’s about 75% of what the area typically gets in a year and more than has ever been recorded for the entire month of August. Since 1936, the only single day with more rain was April 15, 1988, when 1.47 inches (3.73 centimeters) fell, park officials said. “Entire trees and boulders were washing down," said John Sirlin, a photographer for an Arizona-based adventure company who witnessed the flooding as he perched on a hillside boulder where he was trying to take pictures of lightning as the storm approached. "The noise from some of the rocks coming down the mountain was just incredible,” he said in a phone interview Friday afternoon. Park officials didn’t immediately respond to requests for an update Friday night. The storm followed another major flooding event earlier this week at the park 120 miles (193 kilometers) northeast of Las Vegas. Some roads were closed Monday after they were inundated with mud and debris from flash floods that also hit western Nevada and northern Arizona hard. Friday's rain started around 2 a.m., according to Sirlin, who lives in Chandler, Arizona, and has been visiting the park since 2016. “It was more extreme than anything I’ve seen there,” said Sirlin, the lead guide for Incredible Weather Adventures who started chasing storms in Minnesota and the high plains in the 1990s. “A lot of washes were flowing several feet deep. There are rocks probably 3 or 4 feet covering the road,” he said. Sirlin said it took him about 6 hours to drive about 35 miles (56 kilometers) out of the park from near the Inn at Death Valley. “There were at least two dozen cars that got smashed and stuck in there,” he said, adding that he didn’t see anyone injured "or any high water rescues.” During Friday's rainstorms, the "flood waters pushed dumpster containers into parked cars, which caused cars to collide into one another. Additionally, many facilities are flooded including hotel rooms and business offices,” the park statement said. A water system that provides it for park residents and offices also failed after a line broke that was being repaired, the statement said. A flash flood warning for the park and surrounding area expired at 12:45 p.m., Friday but a flood advisory remained in effect into the evening, the National Weather Service said.
Major flash flooding hits Death Valley after nearly a year’s worth of rain in a couple of hours, California - Major flash flooding hit Death Valley National Park on Friday, August 5, 2022, closing all roads, burying cars, and stranding around 1 000 people. The extremely hot and dry park in the California desert received 37.1 mm (1.46 inches) of rainfall in a couple of hours, breaking the previous rainfall record for August 5, set in 1936 at 27.9 mm (1.10 inches). Friday’s total is 10.9 mm (0.42 inches) below the park’s annual precipitation average of 48 mm (1.9 inches). It is also more than has ever been recorded at the park during the entire month of August. Normal August rainfall at the park is just 2.5 mm (0.10 inches). According to park officials, over 60 cars were found buried in rubble, and approximately 500 visitors and another 500 employees of the park were left stranded. There were no initial reports of anybody being injured, and the California transport authority projected that it would take between four and six hours to open a route that would enable park visitors to exit the site.
Torrents drench Denver as Death Valley recovers from 1,000-year deluge - Flash flood warnings were posted for parts of Denver on Sunday night as exceptional downpours overwhelmed roads, stranded cars and forced high-water rescues. The flooding in Denver came about 48 hours after a historic deluge in Death Valley, Calif., on Friday that stranded about 1,000 people and was classified as a 1-in-1,000 year event. And the Death Valley flood followed three 1-in-1,000 year rain events across the Lower 48 to close July and begin August in St. Louis, eastern Kentucky and southern Illinois. 10 steps you can take to lower your carbon footprint Excessive rainfall continued to plague parts of the Lower 48 on Monday morning, with counties west and south of Chicago under flash flood warnings after seeing up to half a foot of rain. Every deluge is operating in a warmer atmosphere because of human-caused climate change and is capable of unleashing more extreme amounts. In Denver, thunderstorms blasted parts of the northern metro area on Sunday evening, drenching them with up to an inch and a half of rain in just 20 minutes. In some areas, rainfall of this intensity is only expected to occur every several hundred years. Numerous roads were closed, including a section of Interstate 70. Denver’s ABC affiliate described a “traffic nightmare” with drivers stranded for hours along the interstate and nearly 20 people needing rescue. “Looks like our heaviest report came in at 2.5 inches of rain,” said David Barjenburch, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Boulder, although radar showed the possibility of locally higher amounts. He explained that most areas only had storms for about 40 minutes at any given location. They were moving at about 15 mph. “This is the peak [time of year] in terms of monsoonal rainfall,” said Barjenburch, referring to the Southwest monsoon — a seasonal wind shift that helps moisture to drift north over the desert Southwest, Four Corners region and, at times, the Colorado Front Range. “July, early August is typically our flash flood season. And this time we had abundant moisture, a lot more than we typically have here.”
Experts warn California of a disaster 'larger than any in world history.' It's not an earthquake. Megadrought may be the main weather concern across the West right now amid the constant threat of wildfires and earthquakes. But a new study warns another crisis is looming in California: "Megafloods." Climate change is increasing the risk of floods that could submerge cities and displace millions of people across the state, according to a study released Friday. It says that an extreme monthlong storm could bring feet of rain – in some places, more than 100 inches – to hundreds of miles of California. Similarly unrelenting storms have happened in the past, before the region became home to tens of millions of people. Now, each degree of global warming is dramatically increasing the odds and size of the next megaflood, the study says. When floods hit in a warmer planet, “the storm sequence is bigger in almost every respect,” said Daniel Swain, UCLA climate scientist and co-author of the study, in a news release. “There’s more rain overall, more intense rainfall on an hourly basis and stronger wind.” In fact, the study found that climate change makes such catastrophic flooding twice as likely to occur. Swain said that such massive statewide floods have occurred every century or two in California over the past millennia, and today's risk of such events has been substantially underestimated. WATCH: Calif. climate migrant family settles in Vermont Long before climate change, California’s Great Flood of 1862 stretched up to 300 miles long and 60 miles across. According to the study, a similar flood now would displace 5 million to 10 million people, cut off the state’s major freeways for perhaps weeks or months with massive economic damage, and submerge major Central Valley cities as well as parts of Los Angeles.
What’s driving the massive, destructive rainfalls around the country - At one weather station in Fairbanks, Alaska, each hour of rainfall is about 50 percent more intense, on average, than it was a half-century ago. The Wichita area is experiencing rains about 40 percent more fierce these days. Huntington, W.Va., and Sioux City, Iowa, are seeing deluges roughly 30 percent more extreme than in 1970. Places around the nation are facing more frequent, more extreme precipitation over time — a reality laid bare once again by the record-shattering rains and catastrophic flooding in eastern Kentucky and St. Louis last week.The warming atmosphere is supercharging any number of weather-related disasters — wildfires, hurricanes, crippling heat waves. But as it also fuels once-unthinkable amounts of rain in single bursts, the problem of so much water arriving so quickly is posing serious challenges in a nation where the built environment is not only outdated but increasingly outmatched.
Biden pledges help for flood-ravaged communities - President Joe Biden today vowed that the federal government will help rebuild storm-ravaged communities in Kentucky.“We’re staying until everybody’s back to where they were,” Biden said today as he toured the state with Kentucky officials.Dozens of people were killed after the state experienced historic flooding. The National Weather Service has warned of more thunderstorms through Thursday (Greenwire, Aug. 8). Biden pointed to bipartisan infrastructure legislation as a resource that can help the state rebuild. If a community is rebuilding a water line, he said, it can also dig a new line for internet connections.“We’re gonna come back better than before,” the president said. “We’re the only country in the world that has come out of every major disaster stronger than we went into it.” At least 37 people have died in the state since a historic storm dropped 8 to 10 ½ inches of rain in only 48 hours, according to the Associated Press.
FEMA assistance denied to many Eastern Kentucky flood victims -- The Federal Emergency Management Agency has turned away too many Eastern Kentuckians seeking help in the aftermath of July’s catastrophic flooding that left 38 people dead and hundreds more without homes, state leaders said Thursday. “Too many people are being denied. Not enough people are being approved,” Gov. Andy Beshear said during a news conference. “This is the time that FEMA’s gotta get it right, to change what has been a history of denying too many people and not providing enough dollars.” State Sen. Brandon Smith, R-Hazard, said in news release, he has received “countless phone calls from desperate eastern Kentucky residents” outlining FEMA’s “alleged inaction, denials and an indication of surprisingly inadequate financial assistance to rebuild their homes and lives.” Smith said one family told his office they received only $8,000 after being approved for FEMA assistance. “To me, that means the federal government has decided the total value of this families’ livelihood, literally everything they have to their name, is only worth $8,000,” Smith said in the release. “I am speechless, I am heartbroken, and I am angry.” Similarly, Beshear recounted a story of an 82-year-old woman who was told during a site visit that her application for aid was good to go, only to receive a denial via email later that night. FEMA has approved 12 counties for residents to receive individual assistance and 13 counties for public assistance to help with infrastructure, Beshear said. Survivors in any of the 12 counties approved for individual assistance are eligible to get $500 in critical needs assistance; more than 6,000 applicants have received this help, he said.
Almost No One in Kentucky Has Flood Insurance, Hindering Recovery - Kentucky residents who are struggling to rebuild after devastating flooding face huge financial obstacles because almost nobody in the state has flood insurance. The area hit by the flash floods that began in late July and killed at least 37 people has a large concentration of low-income families. Only 17,250 property owners in Kentucky have federal flood insurance, government records show. The public program provides the vast majority of flood policies in the United States. A recent Federal Emergency Management Agency report found that Kentucky has a low rate of flood coverage and ranks just behind New Mexico in the percentage of residences with flood insurance. In the 10 counties in eastern Kentucky that sustained significant flood damage in recent weeks, just 2,485 property owners have coverage through FEMA’s National Flood Insurance Program, an E&E News analysis of federal records shows. That’s about 2.3 percent of households in the 10-county area. Many Kentucky residents decline to buy flood insurance because they think the premiums are too costly and the risk of being flooded is too remote, said Britney Hargrove, a spokesperson for Knott County, which sustained extensive flood damage. “A lot of families don’t have that extra money to pay for something that may or may not happen,” Hargrove said. Flood insurance costs an average of about $1,000 a year through FEMA. The median household income in Knott County is $32,500 — half the nationwide median of $65,000.
'I can't do it again': Can Appalachia blunt the devastating impacts of more flooding, climate change? Teresa Watkins worked to salvage a few mud-caked belongings from her home on a Breathitt County branch of the Kentucky River after July 28 floods slammed her neighborhood for the second time in 17 months. The 54-year-old, who has lived off Quicksand Road since she was a teenager, said the flooding in recent years—"more and more, worse and worse"—has left difficult dilemmas in a county where median household incomes of $29,538 are less than half the national average. She pointed to a mobile home one family abandoned last year. Now, more say they're leaving for safer areas, she said, but it's not that easy. "I don't know how they can afford it, or where they're going to go. Any property is basically along the river line or creek banks," she said. "And if they go up on the mountains, the mountains slide." Devastating floods that killed at least 37 people in Kentucky and recent damage in other parts of Appalachia, including Virginia and West Virginia, are fueling urgent questions about how to mitigate the impact of hazardous flooding that is only expected to increase as climate change fuels more extreme weather. But in one of America's most economically depressed regions, there are few easy answers. The region's mountainous landscape, high poverty rates, dispersed housing in remote valleys, coal-mining scarred mountains that accelerate floods and under-resourced local governments all make solutions extremely difficult. Measures such as flood wells, drainage systems or raising homes are expensive for cash-strapped counties. Buyouts or building restrictions are difficult in areas where safer options and new home construction are limited. Many are unable or unwilling to uproot. And tamping down extreme weather by reducing climate-changing emissions nationwide is a goal that is politically fraught, including in a region with coal in its veins, that promises no quick relief. "If we had all the money in the world, and we had the political will and cooperation, we could go a long way towards solving these problems," said William Haneberg, director of the Kentucky Geological Survey and a professor of Earth & Environmental Sciences at the University of Kentucky.
How are floods in Kentucky and a drought at Lake Mead happening at the same time? - On Monday, President Joe Biden flew to eastern Kentucky to visit families affected byhistoric flooding that struck the Midwest in late July and early August, leaving at least 35 dead and hundreds missing. “It’s going to take a while to get through this, but I promise you we’re not leaving,” Biden said. “As long as it takes, we’re going to be here.”About 2,000 miles away, the water in Lake Mead — the largest reservoir in the country, and a crucial water source for millions of people in the West — sat at a historic low, exacerbating a drought now in its third year. One part of the country has too much water; another has too little. These two things are related. They were also expected.“This has been a slow-motion crisis for two decades now,” said Michael Crimmins, a climatologist at the University of Arizona. “It’s just converging at this moment.”The short answer for why these seemingly opposite things are happening at once is that climate change is making our atmosphere thirstier. Or, in more scientific terms, as the Earth warms, its atmosphere can hold more water vapor. This happens at an exponential rate: The back-of-the-napkin math is that the atmosphere can store about 7 percent more waterper degree Celsius of warming, and we’re currently at about 1.2°C above pre-industrial temperatures. The result is an atmosphere that takes longer to get saturated with water, which means fewer rainstorms, but when they do occur, those storms dump more water at once, resulting in floods.Paradoxically, our changing atmosphere is also a perfect recipe for drought. Higher temperatures mean water evaporates faster, and when it falls, it’s less likely to fall as the snow that has historically fed many of the American West’s rivers and streams. The rain isn’t very helpful either, since lifting a drought requires a combination of snowfall and long, sustained rainy seasons instead of short, extreme bursts.“Water infrastructure in the West is built around snowpack,” said Noah Diffenbaugh, a climate scientist at Stanford University. “It doesn’t need to be stored in a reservoir if it’s being stored in the snowpack.” Reservoirs have limited capacity, Diffenbaugh pointed out, so if an extreme rainstorm filled a reservoir beyond capacity, that water — which otherwise might have fallen as snow, or over a longer period of time — would have to be released. Instead, we see a vicious cycle: As the soil and vegetation in drought-prone regions dry up, they become prone to wildfires and less able to retain water, so when extreme rainstorms roll in, they trigger floods and erosion. The heat makes the water dry up before it has any particular impact on the drought, and the erosion makes the soil even less able to retain water, so the next flood becomes ever so slightly worse. We saw this kind of mid-drought flooding just a week before the floods in the Midwest, when monsoon rains swept through Flagstaff, Arizona.
How coal mining increased East Kentucky’s flood risk -Appalachian states like Kentucky have a long, turbulent history with coal and mountaintop removal — an extractive mining process that uses explosives to clear forests and scrape soil in order to access underlying coal seams. For years, researchers have warned that land warped by mountaintop removal may be more prone to flooding due to the resulting lack of vegetation to prevent increased runoff. Without trees to buffer the rain and soil to soak it up, water pools together and heads for the least resistant path—downhill.In 2019, a pair of Duke University scientists conducted ananalysis of floodprone communities throughout the region for Inside Climate News that identified the most “mining damaged areas.” These included many of the same Eastern Kentucky communities that saw river levels rise by 25 feet in just 24 hoursthis past week. “The findings suggest that long after the coal mining stops, its legacy of mining could continue to exact a price on residents who live downstream from the hundreds of mountains that have been leveled in Appalachia to produce electricity,” wrote Inside Climate News’ James Bruggers at the time.Now, in 2022, those findings feel tragically prescient. From July 25 to 30, Eastern Kentucky saw a mixture of flash floods and thunderstorms bringing upwards of 4 inches of rain per hour, swelling local rivers to historic levels. To date, the flooding has claimed at least 37 lives.Nicolas Zégre, director of West Virginia University’s Mountain Hydrology Laboratory, studies the hydrological impacts of mountaintop removal mining and how water moves through the environment. While it’s too early to know how much the area’s history of mining contributed to this year’s flooding, he said he thinks of Appalachia as “climate zero,” a region built on the coal industry, which contributed to rising global temperatures and increased carbon in the atmosphere. “Whether it was the 2016 flood in West Virginia or the recent floods in Kentucky, there’s more intense rainfall due to warmer temperatures,” Zégre said, “and then that rainfall was falling on landscapes that have had their forests removed.The link between flood risk and mining damage means coal country flooding is more than an Appalachian issue. But Zégre told Grist that acknowledging the extraction process, and properly funding research to study the impacts, often gets pushed to the wayside, just like the region. “Because [mountaintop removal mining] happens in backwoods Appalachia, nobody really thinks about it happening,” Zégre said. “They’re just people in D.C. who are just grateful to be able to turn on their light and have inexpensive electricity to charge their cars.”
Heavy rains flood South Korea's capital Seoul, submerging cars - Intense downpours fell over central South Korea, including the capital of Seoul, inundating city streets and leaving people wading through floods late Monday. Photos and video from across the region Monday night showed half-submerged cars, people walking through waist-deep water and subway stations overflowing. Are you on Telegram? Subscribe to our channel for the latest updates on Russia's war in Ukraine. One particular image sparked online worry and intrigue: a man in a suit sitting atop the hood of a submerged car in Seoul’s upscale Gangnam district. “Nothing is more precious than life and safety. The government will thoroughly manage the heavy rain situation with the central disaster safety measures headquarters,” President Yoon Suk-yeol wrote in a Facebook post late Monday local time. He added that the government is working to evacuate residents from high-risk areas, as well as to implement emergency measures for those who cannot return home because of flooding. Blackouts hit some parts of the city, and residents living in lower areas were told to evacuate, the Yonhap News Agency reported Monday. The Korea Meteorological Administration issued downpour alerts through Monday night across different central regions, warning that some areas would see 50 to 100 millimeters (1.9 to 3.9 inches) of rain per hour. It also sent out heat advisories across eastern South Korean provinces. Yonhap reported that while not yet official, precipitation data surpassing 136.5 millimeters (5.37 inches) per hour in one Seoul region might be record-breaking for the capital..
Heavy rains flood South Korea's capital Seoul, killing at least 8 - The Washington Post— At least eight people have died after record rainfall in South Korea on Monday and Tuesday, including the capital, Seoul, inundating city streets and flooding subway stations.Photos and videos from the Seoul metropolitan area, home to about 25 million people, showed half-submerged cars, people walking through waist-deep water and subway stations overflowing. Eight people died in floods, landslides and other incidents, according to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety. Seven other people are missing, including four in Seoul’s Seocho district, where South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol lives. Yoon was getting briefed about the rain and giving instructions remotely overnight from his high-rise apartment, which was partly flooded on the ground level, according to his office.“Nothing is more precious than life and safety. The government will thoroughly manage the heavy rain situation with the central disaster safety measures headquarters,” Yoon wrote in a Facebook post Monday. On Tuesday, Yoon visited basement apartments in the Gwanak district of southern Seoul, including one where a 13-year-old and two adults drowned. Basement homes, where many of Seoul’s poorest residents live, exist throughout the city. He pointed out how “the marginalized groups in the society are even more vulnerable to disasters” and called for improvement of residential areas with poor safety, according to his spokeswoman. The record rainfall — which had not ended as of Tuesday afternoon local time — was the worst in some parts of Seoul since 1904, the year officials began documenting precipitation. About 15 inches (381.5 millimeters) of rain hit southwestern Seoul on Monday, according to the Korea Meteorological Administration. The next-highest rainfall day was Aug. 2, 1920, when 14 inches (354.7 millimeters) fell in Seoul. The weather agency said additional torrential rain could fall in the days ahead.
Heaviest rainfall in 115 years hits Seoul, leaving 8 people dead and 7 others missing, South Korea - (videos) Record-breaking rainfall hit parts of South Korea’s capital Seoul and surrounding regions on August 8, 2022, leaving at least 8 people dead and 7 others missing. At least 14 people have been injured and more than 80 rescued from flooded streams. 391 people in the capital area were left homeless. Parts of Seoul, Incheon, and Gyeonggi Province experienced above 100 mm/h (3.93 inches/h) of rain Monday night, with Seoul’s Dongjak district receiving 141.5 mm/h (5.57 inches/h).1 The hourly precipitation total of 141.5 mm (5.57 inches) in Dongjak is also the greatest for Seoul, beating the previous record of 118.6 mm (4.66 inches) set in the summer of 1942. The automated weather station in Dongjak of the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) recorded daily precipitation of 381.5 mm (15.01 inches) on Monday, which was significantly higher than the official record of 354.7 mm (13.96 inches) set in August 1920 and the highest since the country’s first modern weather record system was implemented in 1907. However, KMA said that the most recent data would not be included in the official record book since it was not taken at the agency’s standard weather observation station in the Jongno neighborhood of Seoul. As of 06:00 LT on August 9, the country’s central and other regions were receiving rains of up to 50 mm (1.96 inches) per hour, with the accumulated precipitation in Seoul reaching 422 mm (16.6 inches) from August 8 to 08:00 LT on August 9. The resulting floods killed 5 people and left 4 others missing in Seoul, while in Gyeonggi Province, 3 people had died and 2 others were missing. One individual is still missing in Gangwon Province. At least 765 facilities were damaged, while about 80 highway segments, 3 subterranean roadways, and 26 riverfront parking spaces were closed due to safety concerns. The downpours also rendered numerous public facilities inoperable, with 8 instances of flooded railroads reported in Seoul, Incheon, and other cities, as well as the temporary suspension of service on sections of several railway and subway lines, including Seoul Subway Line 4 and the Gyeongin Line. As of August 9, 8 passenger ferry routes remained out of operation while access remains restricted to 156 hiking trails in five national mountain parks, including Mount Bukhan on the northern outskirts of Seoul. The meteorological office predicts up to 300 mm (11.81 inches) of rain in the metropolitan region from August 9 to 11, with southern Gyeonggi Province expected to get more than 350 mm (13.77 inches).
Seoul, South Korea flooding: Photos show damage, flooded roads; 9 dead – Some of the heaviest rain in decades swamped South Korea's capital region, turning Seoul's streets into car-clogged rivers and sending floods cascading into subway stations. At least nine people were killed – some drowning in their homes – and six others were missing, with more rain forecast, officials said Tuesday. More than 18 inches of rain was measured in Seoul's hardest-hit Dongjak district from Monday to Tuesday evening. Precipitation in the area exceeded 5.5 inches per hour at one point Monday night, the highest hourly downpour measured in Seoul since 1942. Deserted cars and buses were scattered across streets as the water receded on Tuesday. Workers cleared uprooted trees, mud and debris with excavators and blocked off broken roads. Landslide warnings were issued in nearly 50 cities and towns, and 160 hiking paths in Seoul and mountainous Gangwon province were closed. Dozens of roads, including major expressways, were closed because of rising water levels or partial flooding. "The heavy rainfall is expected to continue for days … we need to maintain our sense of alert and respond with all-out effort," President Yoon Suk Yeol said at the government's emergency headquarters. The military was prepared to deploy troops to help with recovery, Defense Ministry spokesperson Moon Hong-sik said. The rain began Monday morning and strengthened through the evening. By nightfall, people were wading through thigh-high waters in one of Seoul's most bustling business and leisure districts, where cars and buses were stuck in mud-brown waters. Commuters evacuated as water cascaded down the stairs of the Isu subway station. In the nearby city of Seongnam, a rain-weakened hillside collapsed into a university soccer field. Rescue workers failed to reach three people – two sisters in their 40s and a 13-year-old girl – who called for help before drowning in a basement home in Seoul on Monday. Another woman drowned in her home and a public worker died while clearing fallen trees, likely from electrocution. Choi Seon-yeong, an official from the Dongjak district office, said it wasn't immediately clear what the cause of death was. Three people were found dead in the debris of landslides and a collapsed bus station in nearby cities.
38 people killed, historic buildings and scores of homes collapse after heavy rains hit Yemen - (videos) Heavy rains and floods affecting parts of Yemen over the past 2 days claimed the lives of at least 38 people and completely destroyed at least 10 historic buildings in the capital Sanaa. According to Houthi officials, at least 80 other buildings in the capital have been heavily damaged and are in need of urgent repairs.1 The worst affected were Sanaa and the provinces of Dhamar and Ibb, where scores of homes collapsed.2 Abdullah Al-Kabsi, the Houthi administration’s minister of culture, said in a statement that they are collaborating with foreign groups and requesting assistance in coping with the devastation. Yemen’s annual rainy season lasts from May to August, but the country has seen heavier-than-usual rains accompanied by thunderstorms this year.
Gambia experiences worst floods in nearly half a century - Flash floods that hit most of Gamia on July 30 and 31 and on August 5 and 6, 2022, have been the worst that have hit the country in nearly half a century. The worst affected were the West Coast Region, North Bank Region, and the Greater Banjul Area. The floods affected a total of 37 104 people, including 7 843 children between zero and five years old, and 2 446 pregnant and breastfeeding women. According to the analysis of satellite images conducted by the World Food Programme and the European Joint Research Center, 48 127 ha (118 924 acres) of land have been flooded, of which 67 ha (165 acres) are cultivated areas.1 Floods that hit the country in late July claimed the lives of at least 2 people and severely affected 230 households.2 According to the Gambia’s Department of Water Resources, the country experienced its highest rainfall since 1998 between July 30 and 31, when it rained continuously for 20 hours.
Salt in fresh water sources becoming worrisome in D.C. region, experts say - The Washington region is growing — a metropolis of nearly 6 million people where area officials are pressing to build another 320,000 homes by the end of this decade. And with that growth comes an increasing, largely unregulated problem: Salt. Lots of it. Paved streets, sidewalks and parking lots need de-icing in winter, with the sodium chloride in road salt running off into streams. Washing machines drain sodium-containing detergents and industrial firms discharge sodium-laden water into wastewater systems, which already treat the human waste of a society addicted to salty foods and drinks. All these sources contribute to what environmental scientists refer to as a “freshwater salinization syndrome” that is damaging local waterways, harming wildlife and affecting the quality of drinking water throughout the United States — posing risks to people who are sensitive to the two elements in salt: sodium and chloride. While drinking water quality remains safe for most people now, the compounding effects of a mineral that has been so central to daily life are accelerating and may become irreversible, researchers say. That’s particularly so in urban areas like metropolitan D.C., studies on the problem show. Water utilities, warily monitoring the problem, say they may need to invest several hundred million dollars in new desalinization plants to reverse the trend. “Salt is probably the most serious problem in world history related to water,” said Sujay Kaushal, a University of Maryland biogeochemist, adding that the damaging effects on streams and aquatic life are early red flags to a predicament that could eventually consume the region. He compared the cumulative effects on the region’s watersheds to the hardening arteries of someone with a high-salt diet. “Eventually, we know, in the human body, that when you harden the arteries, you create hypertension and all these health problems,” Kaushal said. “It’s the same in the environment. You start crossing these thresholds where you see all these environmental impacts.”
Lake Michigan water levels are expected to stay well below the near-historic highs of 2020 - The Great Lakes region is enjoying another year of lower water levels and wider beaches. July water levels on Lake Michigan and Lake Huron are down more than 2 feet from 2020, a year of near historic highs when waves devoured cherished stretches of sandy coastline. With the exception of Lake Ontario, the other Great Lakes are falling as well. And over the next six months, Lake Michigan water levels are expected to remain well below 2020 levels, according to Keith Kompoltowicz, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Detroit District Watershed hydrology section chief. "There's really no perfect water level," said Kompoltowicz. "I can say that during the record highs that we recently experienced there was a ton of erosion and property damage and a lot of concerns about houses collapsing into the Lake." In 2020, Lake Michigan set a string of monthly records, hovering near the 1986 record high. Highs and lows have come and gone throughout the historical record, and climate change may bring increasing variability between the swings. Water levels have dropped due to a decline in rain and snow. In July, rainfall on Lake Michigan and Lake Huron was about 82% of the average, or a little less than normal, according to Lauren Fry, a physical scientist at NOAA Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory. Lake Michigan was still 8 inches above average in July but 26 inches below the high in 2020. In other months, the lake was similarly above average but below records set in 2020 and 1986. According to the six-month forecast, Lake Michigan is expected to remain roughly 8 inches above average. The 2020 high followed several years of very wet conditions—some of them record-setting—on the Great Lakes, according to Kompoltowicz. That year, 2020, was drier, allowing lake levels to fall in 2021, Kompoltowicz said. "In 2022, we're seeing more average conditions, and the lake level has responded in a manner we would typically expect: a nice, healthy seasonal rise in spring," he said.
NJ is under statewide drought watch, residents asked to conserve water | Video - New Jersey is officially under a statewide drought watch, with no significant rainfall in the forecast. The state Department of Environmental Protection is urging residents and businesses to conserve water. The result of typically high summer demand combined with the ongoing dry spell, a drought watch is the first step before a full drought is declared. The DEP is reporting steep declines in reservoir levels across north and central Jersey. Groundwater levels in South Jersey are also significantly low. If the summer’s hot, dry conditions don’t abate, water restrictions may become necessary, according to the DEP. In some towns, local utilities have already put limits on daily lawn watering and other unnecessary water use. Research warns that climate change puts New Jersey at higher risk of drought, with rainfall increasingly focused in heavy downpours that are spaced out by longer dry spells.
Drought affecting New Hampshire farmers, resources -As drought persists across New Hampshire, the state’s Drought Management Team convened Monday to discuss the impact it’s having on agriculture, forests, tourism, and drinking water supplies.Right now, most of the state is in a moderate drought, with a slice of the Southeast in a severe drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. Conditions across the state are likely to persist until autumn, state officials said, and could intensify.Ted Diers, who administers the Watershed Management Bureau at the Department of Environmental Services, said drought is a unique kind of threat.“Drought is a slow motion disaster. And so at the end of June, you know, we were a little worried,” he said. “As we head towards the middle of August, it's pretty concerning.”Mary Stampone, New Hampshire’s state climatologist, said the drought was considered a rapid-onset drought, with the state moving into moderate and severe drought within a few weeks of developing abnormally dry conditions. The state has received between 50% and 75% of normal precipitation over the past few months, she said.Groundwater levels in the Connecticut River Valley are particularly troubling, Diers said. That’s the underground water that makes up much of the supply communities use for public drinking water and agriculture.“Not only are we seeing very low conditions; in some of these wells which have data going back a few decades, these are historically low conditions,” he said. Some wells have suffered from a lack of snowpack over the winter, and never fully recovered from the droughts of 2020 and 2021, Diers said. “One of the largest vegetable farms in New Hampshire, they're using hundreds of gallons of diesel per week to keep the pumps running. Diesel is not cheap right now. They're going to likely suffer yield losses,” Jeremy DeLisle, a field specialist at the University of New Hampshire’s cooperative extension, said.Some farms are seeing smaller sized fruits and vegetables, lower yields, and poor growth. Hay growers are reporting lower than average production. Some farms are hauling water from miles away, he said.The heat is having an impact, too. On hot days, it’s harder for some farmers to ventilate high tunnels, DeLisle said. And some farms are releasing crews early, which could also lead to losses.In the forest, “things are definitely burning deep,” said Steve Sherman, chief of Forest Protection for the state. As the national demand for firefighters picks up due to conditions in other states, some of New Hampshire’s firefighters get deployed to other emergencies. But based on fire danger in the Granite State, some of those people will start to be held back, Sherman said.Stacy Lemieux, an officer with the White Mountain National Forest, said tree species are getting stressed because of the drought. The forest is still getting a lot of visitor traffic, but trails suffer under dry conditions, she said.
Government says over half of MA suffering from severe drought – - The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that 57% of Massachusetts is in a severe drought, with 95% experiencing moderate drought conditions as the hot, dry weather takes its toll. “Conditions seemed to have worsened over the course of the summer so far, and the secretary of the EEA just declared a level three drought in four of our regions,” said Director for Water Policy at the Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs Vandana Rao.The Charles River separating Dedham and West Roxbury is looking more like a mud flat with puddles than a river. The dry conditions are leading to problems for the local wildlife and kayakers.“I don’t remember seeing the Charles or its tributaries look like this ever,” said Massachusetts River Alliance Executive Director Julia Blatt.Over the past seven years, there have been droughts in five of them, two being severe.“All signs indicate that this is climate change, that this is how Massachusetts is and we’ll continue to experience the changes in our climate,” said Rao. Farmer Mark Parlee has been struggling with his crops at his 100-acre farm in Tyngsboro, working day and night to make sure they are moist. Parlee’s water supply, a manmade pond, is down about three feet. Parlee said it is enough water to run his elaborate irrigation system keeping the peaches, blueberries, strawberries and flowers thriving. “If you run out of water, then you run into trouble, but we have a good water supply,” said Parlee. “Before we put an acre in, we pipe it with irrigation.” Cape Cod was upgraded to a level two significant drought Wednesday.
Pennsylvania has so far been able to avoid wildfires. Climate and forestry scientists warn that could change --Wildfires could make their way into the keystone state and possibly into your backyard, climate, fire and forestry scientists say. As wildfires become increasingly common across the western United States, Pennsylvania and its residents have so far remained insulated from the flames destroying communities worldwide. But forest and climate experts say that because of increasingly drier and hotter weather due to climate change over the next few decades, the chances of larger, more severe forest fires in the commonwealth will grow. "The big picture is that by mid-century they think that the risk for large wildfires in sort of Western Pennsylvania down into West Virginia will probably about double," Alan Taylor, a Penn State University professor of geography and ecology who studies fires, said. The period in which large fires are likely to occur in parts of Pennsylvania and down the Appalachians is expected to about double by mid-century due to warming temperatures and longer dry spells, according to a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report. Pennsylvania has averaged about 600 wildfires per year that vary in amount and severity depending on the given year, officials said. Those fires tend to be on a smaller scale, burning about an acre each, and Mr. Taylor noted those wildfires result from the burning of forests' understory, which are the small shrubs and trees between the forest canopy and floor. The largest fire in recent memory was the 16-mile fire near Cresco, Monroe County, in 2016 that burned through more than 8,000 acres of forest and cost emergency services $2 million to extinguish. Mr. Taylor said the size of the wildfires in Pennsylvania wouldn't match the ferocity and danger of the millions of acres burning in the western U.S. because Pennsylvania's wet climate prevents massive flame spread. But, he added that due to warming temperatures and human influence, the state could experience big fires in the future. Climate extremes, which scientists say have become less predictable, could prompt the drought and extreme heat that dries up the state's dense undergrowth and could serve as the fuel and kindling to a wildfire in the region. "We are seeing and expecting more drying, drought and heat waves through our summers, and there's a logical link between drought, drying, heat, flammability and therefore fire that can occur," . "There's a number of ways that, within (Pennsylvania's) geography, there is a reason for concern of how fire could change with climate change," she added. According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, the frequency, and severity of wildfires have soared since the mid-1980s. In Pennsylvania, forest fires are most likely to occur during the driest season in the late spring and early autumn months, Mr. Kern said. The National Park Service reported that about 85% of wildfires are started by humans, with the other fires starting through lighting or overheating. But in Pennsylvania, 99% of wildfires are caused by people, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation & Natural Resources.
Temperatures rise as France tackles its worst drought on record - (Reuters) - France on Sunday braced for a fourth heatwave this summer as its worst drought on record left parched villages without safe drinking water and farmers warned of a looming milk shortage in the winter. Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne's office has set up a crisis team to tackle a drought that has forced scores of villages to rely on water deliveries by truck, prompted state-run utility EDF to curb nuclear power output and stressed crops. Temperatures were expected to hit 37 Celsius in the southwest on Sunday before the baking hot air spreads north early in the week. "This new heatwave is likely to set in," La Chaine Meteo, similar to the U.S. cable service The Weather Channel, said. National weather agency Meteo France said it was the worst drought since records began in 1958 and that the drought was expected to worsen until at least the middle of the month. On average, less than 1cm of rain fell across France in July. The corn harvest is expected to be 18.5% lower this year compared with 2021, the agriculture ministry has said, just as Europeans contend with higher food prices as a result of lower-than-normal grain exports from Russia and Ukraine. Meanwhile, a shortage of fodder because of the drought meant there could be a shortage of milk in the months ahead, the National Federation of Farmers' Unions said. Nuclear operator EDF last week reduced its power output at a plant in southwestern France due to high river temperatures on the Garonne, and it has issued rolling warnings for reactors along the Rhone river. The hot weather has compounded the utility's problems, with corrosion problems and extended maintenance at half of its 56 reactors reducing capacity as Europe faces an energy crunch. Water restrictions are in place across almost all of mainland France to conserve water, including in many places hosepipe and irrigation bans.
France in Midst of 4th Heat Wave Amid Historic Drought — France was in the midst of its fourth heat wave of the year Monday as the country faces what the government warned is its worst drought on record. National weather agency Meteo France said the heat wave began in the south and is expected to spread across the country and last until the weekend. Overall, the southern half of France expects daytime temperatures of up to 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) ad won't drop at night below 20 C (68 F). The high temperatures aren't helping firefighters battling a wildfire in the Chartreuse Mountains near the Alps in eastern France, where authorities have evacuated around 140 people. Meteo France said this week's heat wave will not be as intense as the one last month, when several regions experienced record-breaking temperatures. But the high temperatures come during the most severe drought ever recorded, according to the government. Last month was the driest July since measurements began in 1959. Some French farmers have started to see a drops in production especially in soy, sunflower and corn yields. Water restrictions in place range from daytime irrigation bans to limiting water usage to people, livestock and to keep aquatic species alive. The government said last week that more than 100 municipalities can't provide drinking water through taps and need water truck supplies. The heat also forced energy giant EDF to temporarily cut power generation at some of its nuclear plants, which use river water to cool reactors.
Climate activists fill golf holes with cement after water ban exemption - Climate activists in southern France have filled golf course holes with cement to protest against the exemption of golf greens from water bans amid the country's severe drought. The group targeted sites near the city of Toulouse, calling golf the "leisure industry of the most privileged". The exemption of golf greens has sparked controversy as 100 French villages are short of drinking water. Golf officials say greens would die in three days without water. "A golf course without a green is like an ice-rink without ice," Gérard Rougier of the French Golf Federation told the France Info news website. He added that 15,000 people worked in golf courses across the country. The recent action targeted courses in the towns of Vieille-Toulouse and Blagnac. It was claimed by the local branch of the Extinction Rebellion movement. In a petition, the activists said the exemption showed that "economic madness takes precedence over ecological reason". While residents cannot water their gardens or wash their cars in the worst-hit municipalities, golf courses have escaped the nationwide restrictions.
France battles extremely violent wildfire, officials warn additional flare-ups could cause it to spread further - (videos) France is battling a massive fire in its drought-stricken southwestern region of Gironde for the third day in a row. On August 11, officials are warning that new flare-ups could cause it to spread further. The fire, dubbed the Landiras fire, ignited in July, destroying 14 000 ha (34 600 acres) of land before it was contained, but it continued to smolder until it reignited on August 8.1 In two days to August 11, an additional 6 000 ha (15 000 acres) of pine forest burned and 17 homes were destroyed near the village of Belin-Beliet. Gironde prefecture is warning the fire is now spreading toward the A63 motorway, a major artery linking Bordeaux to Spain.1 “We battled all night to stop the fire from spreading, notably to defend the village of Belin-Beliet,” Lieutenant Colonel Arnaud Mendousse of the Gironde fire and rescue service told journalists.2 Since Tuesday, August 9, nearly 10 000 people evacuated, but no further orders to leave the area are expected for the time being, Mendousse said. Eight major wildfires are currently raging across the country. According to the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), the fire risk is expected to be from very high to extreme on August 11 and 12 over most of France, particularly in southern and western areas.
Government has ‘no plan’ for ‘preventable’ drought that threatens wildfires and food supplies --The government has been accused of having no plan to deal with drought conditions that have seen record-breaking wildfires. Millions of people in southern England are subject to hosepipe bans, farmers are concerned about their crops and natural habitats are under pressure as months of dry weather push the country towards dwindling water supplies, with another heatwave on the horizon. It is only set to get worse, with the climate emergency expected to bring drier, hotter summers to the UK and, with them, the potential for more frequent droughts. “This crisis in our system was entirely predictable and the government should have both anticipated and planned for it,” Jim McMahon, the shadow secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs, told The Independent. “In a country with plenty of rain outside of mid-summer, we should not need to rely on hosepipe bans to get us through the dry months.” It comes as The Independent can exclusively reveal that more wildfires broke out in England and Wales in July than there were in the whole of last year, as the dry and warm weather created conditions for fires to tear through the countryside and into cities. There were 244 wildfires recorded in both countries in July, compared with only 11 in July last year – more than 22 times as many, and more than the 237 recorded in the whole of 2021, according to the National Fire Chiefs Council’s wildfire lead Paul Hedle. Faced with hotter, drier summers, farmers are among those calling for decisive action from the government. “I don’t think anybody is really prioritising the strategic importance of water,” Tom Bradshaw, the deputy president of the National Farmers’ Union, said of the government. “That’s something that we need them to really value – the importance of water and underwriting our food security – far more than they do at the moment.” Mr Bradshaw said earlier this week that the dry weather had caused the earliest start to the harvest for many farmers since 1976, prompting fears about the impact on food production and crop planting.
Weather Agency: July Was Spain's Hottest Month on Record (AP) — Spain has never had a month as hot as July in more than six decades, the national weather office AEMET said Monday. For the first time since weather records started in 1961, July registered an average temperature of 25.6 degrees Celsius (78 degrees Fahrenheit), that was 2.7 C (36 F) above the recorded average for any month of July. The southern Andalusian town of Morón de la Frontera posted the highest temperature of the month with 46 C (115 F) on July 24. The northwest Galicia region posted a record temperature of 44 C (111 F) in the city of Ourense. The extreme heat and lack of rain has caused many wildfires and worsened a drought in many areas. The European Forest Fire Information System says 2022 has been the worst year so far in terms of scorched territory and the number of fires for Spain. The agency says 240,000 hectares (585,00 acres) have been razed in more than 370 fires in Spain. Neighbouring Portugal's weather service IPMA also said July was the hottest since national records began in 1931. The average temperature was 25.1 degrees Celsius (77.3 degrees Fahrenheit), it said. That was almost 3 degrees C higher than the expected July average. To the north in France, last month was the driest July since measurements began in 1959.
Europe’s Worst Drought in 500 Years- The drought scorching much of the European Union is set to be the worst endured since the sixteenth century, a senior scientist at the European Commission’s (EC) drought service has warned. Sixty-three percent of land in the European Union and United Kingdom -- an area nearly the same size as India -- is now under either drought warnings or alerts, according to data published by the European Drought Observatory on Wednesday. “At the moment... this seems to be the worst” year in 500 years, although a full analysis will need to happen retrospectively, said Andrea Toreti, senior researcher at the EC’s Joint Research Centre, who compiles data for the European Drought Observatory. “We haven’t analyzed fully the event, but based on my experience I think that this is perhaps even more extreme than in 2018,” he said, responding to a question from Sky News during a briefing. “2018 was so extreme that looking back at this list of the last 500 years, there were no other events similar,” due to the compounding hot and dry weather, explained Toreti, who published a study on historical droughts a year after the event four years ago. That year, particularly dry and hot weather left central and northern Europe with yields of key crops up to 50% lower, but “favorable” wet conditions in southern Europe saw harvests shoot up. The extremely rare “seesaw” effect buffered the bloc from the impacts of the regional drought by preventing higher volatility and price spikes. This year “on the contrary, most of Europe” is exposed to compounding heatwaves and dry weather, he said, as droughts impact food and energy production, drinking water and wildlife. “This year is really exceptional,” he added. The latest data from the EDO shows some 47% of the bloc’s territory under “warning” conditions, the second of three drought categories, during the 10 days leading to July 30. More worrying is the 17% of land that has moved into the most severe “alert” state, meaning not only is the soil drying out after low rain, but plants and crops are suffering too. The EDO combines measurements taken on the ground, satellite data and imagery and complex computer modeling to paint a picture of how the territory is coping. Italy is one of the worst affected by the current ongoing drought, declaring a state of emergency for areas surrounding the River Po, which accounts for more than a third of the country’s agricultural production. France has set up a crisis team to deal with its worst drought on record that has left parched villages without safe drinking water and farmers warning of a milk shortage in winter. Large areas of Romania, Hungary and Ukraine are also withering, and tinderbox conditions are fuelling wildfires in Spain and Portugal. The growing lack of water in reservoirs, rivers and stored underground means the territory now needs higher than normal rain to compensate, Toreti said. The amount of land in drought is expected to creep up further still. “We have estimated a worsening of the situation in most of Europe,” Toreti said. Climate breakdown is making drought in the Mediterranean more severe and more likely, although it is not to blame for all droughts globally. Causes of drought are complex, but climate change affects it in two key ways. It concentrates rainfall into shorter and more intense bursts, making it harder to retain, and brings hotter temperatures which evaporates more water.
Historic drought threatens to cripple European trade -In the midst of an arid summer that set heat records across Europe, the continent's rivers are evaporating. The Rhine - a pillar of the German, Dutch and Swiss economies for centuries - is set to become virtually impassable at a key waypoint later this week, stymieing vast flows of diesel and coal. The Danube, which snakes its way 1,800 miles through central Europe to the Black Sea, is gummed up too, hampering grain and other trade. Across Europe, transport is just one of the elements of river-based commerce that's been upended by climate change. France's power crisis has worsened because the Rhone and Garonne are too warm to effectively cool nuclear reactors, and Italy's Po is too low to water rice fields and sustain clams for "pasta alle vongole." While disruptions to waterways would be a challenge at the best of times, the region is already on the brink of recession as Russia's invasion of Ukraine fuels inflation by squeezing food and energy supplies. The situation - just four years after a historic halt to Rhine shipping - adds urgency to European Union efforts to make inland shipping more resilient. The continent's rivers and canals convey more than 1 ton of freight annually for each EU resident and contribute around $80 billion to the region's economy just as a mode of transport, according to calculations based on Eurostat figures. But the fallout from dried-up waterways goes deeper. "It's not just about commercial navigation. It's about freshening up when it's hot, it's about irrigating and so many other things," said Cecile Azevard, director at French water operator VNF. "Rivers are part of our heritage." The poor conditions are expected to drag down the region's economies far worse than the 5 billion-euro ($5.1 billion) hit caused by Rhine transit issues in 2018, according to Albert Jan Swart, a transportation economist at ABN Amro Bank NV. "The capacity for inland shipping is going to be severely limited as long as there's not a lot of rain in the area," he said. "You also get the damage caused in Germany by the high electricity prices. We're talking billions." Even seasoned veterans are shocked. Gunther Jaegers, managing director at Rhine stalwart Reederei Jaegers, said he fell off his chair earlier this month when he saw the cost of shipping, with one barge rate surging by 30% in a single day. "I've never, ever, seen this," he said. "It is insane." While Jaegers and other shippers might be able to charge more per ton of cargo, they're limited in how much they can carry as the lower water means they have to take on smaller loads to sail safely. And there's no relief in sight. If you look at the weather forecasts, "it's like desert," he said. At the southern end of the Rhine Gorge - an area known for Riesling wines - terraced vineyards have turned brown, while in Cologne, a popular floating restaurant ran aground after waters retreated. A sandbank has emerged some 20 kilometers (12 miles) upstream from Kaub, the site of a difficult passage near the famed Lorelei cliffs. The river's depth at the town west of Frankfurt is forecast to drop to 40 centimeters (just under 16 inches) on Friday. At that level, barges are effectively unable to sail. The water is predicted to fall as low as 37 centimeters the following day, the German Federal Waterways and Shipping Administration said on Wednesday.
European Power Hits Records as Plants Start to Buckle in Heat -Benchmark power prices in Europe hit fresh records Friday as utilities are increasingly reducing electricity output in western Europe because of the hot weather. Next-year contracts in Germany and France, Europe’s biggest economies rose to new highs after Switzerland’s Axpo Holding AG announced curbs at one of its nuclear plants. Electricite de France SA is also reducing nuclear output because of cooling water restrictions, while Uniper SE in Germany is struggling to get enough coal up the river Rhine. Europe is suffering its worst energy crunch in decades as gas cuts made by Russia in retaliation for sanctions drive a surge in prices. The extreme heat led to the driest July on record in France and is underscoring the impact that a warming climate is having on vital infrastructure. Water levels on Germany’s Rhine have fallen so low that the river may effectively close soon, impacting supplies of coal to the plants next to it. The Rhone and Garonne in France and the Aare in Switzerland are all too warm to be used to cool nuclear plants effectively. The German year-ahead contract gained as much as 2% to 413 euros a megawatt-hour on the European Energy Exchange AG. The French equivalent rose 1.9% to a record 535 euros. Long-term prices are coming under pressure because producing less power from nuclear and coal will increase the demand for natural gas, which is badly needed to fill storage sites ahead of the winter. Uniper SE said on Thursday that two of its coal-fired stations along the Rhine may need to curb output during the next few weeks as transporting coal along the Rhine becomes impossible.
Europe Braces for Extreme Heat as Power Infrastructure Wobbles - Another scorching heat wave is set to hit northwest and central Europe this week, putting further pressure on the continent’s strained power infrastructure.Sizzling temperatures are expected to hit the UK, Germany and France -- reaching almost 36 degrees Celsius (96.8 Fahrenheit) on Friday -- according to Maxar Technologies LLC. The heat will boost demand for cooling, aggravating already dry conditions that hurt crops and force limits on water use.Extreme heat has already taken its toll on the continent, with France registering the driest July on record and England the driest in almost 90 years, underscoring the impact that a warming climate is having on vital infrastructure. Water levels on the Rhine River, a vital artery for the transport of commodities and industrial goods, are so low that trade is at risk of coming to a halt on some sections of the waterway.The weather has sparked fires near London, triggered warnings that railway lines could buckle, and forced power stations to operate at low levels to prevent overheating. In France, regulators granted Electricite de France SA a temporary waiver for five nuclear plants to discharge hot water into rivers that may breach environmental standards as the nation struggles with an energy crisis.Although temperatures this aren’t likely to reach the record breaking levels set in July, the heat wave comes amid a historic energy-supply crunch as Russia tightens its grip on natural gas flows to the region. The crisis has contributed to soaring inflation, threatening to tip some of Europe’s largest economies into recession. Power prices in Germany and France have surged to records in recent days.
Europe’s streets go dark to save energy – -- Pushed by a looming energy crisis, cities across Europe are switching off the lights.While Spain has made such measures mandatory, ordering shops to turn their lights off at night, in other places local authorities are voluntarily hitting the switch, arguing it's a good time to trial light-saving measures.Berlin is switching off the spotlights illuminating 200 of its historic buildings and monuments, and a number of towns and cities in Austria, Germany and Italy have reduced street lighting or turned off commercial signs.In France, 14 communes in the Val d'Oise department north of Paris are trialing measures to fully switch off public lighting at night. Local authorities estimate shutting off street lights for three-and-a-half hours every night will help curb energy consumption by about a quarter.“The energy [price] boom made us take the step and try this experiment,” Yannick Boëdec, mayor of the Cormeilles-en-Parisis commune, told BFMTV in June.The towns join some 12,000 communes in France that already either fully or partially switch off public lighting at night.These measures are backed by light pollution activists and scientists, who argue that excessive artificial light wreaks havoc on human health and the environment.Turning off the lights is the "easiest" measure to take as it "costs almost nothing and ... immediately pays off in euros, in kilowatt hours saved and in reduction of light pollution,” said Anne-Marie Ducroux, the spokesperson of ANPCEN, a French association fighting light pollution.The plans are part of the bloc's response to the energy crunch, but some worry that turning off street lights will make cities less safe.
Extreme drought in Somalia displaces more than 1 million people - Extreme, multi-season drought in Somalia has displaced more than 1 million people, as of August 11, 2022. The Horn of Africa has experienced its fourth consecutive failed rainy season, with the last one (March – May) considered the worst on record. Extreme drought conditions are killing livestock and crops, displacing populations, increasing the risk of disease and malnutrition, and pushing children and families to the brink of death and destitution. As climate models predict a continuation of La Niña conditions, the Horn of Africa is now facing its fifth failed rainy season. June and July saw another large spike in displacement in Somalia, as people who were hoping for rains to arrive lost hope after an unprecedented fourth back-to-back season failed.1 Bay region, where most new arrivals were recorded in July (40%), is of particular concern. Of these new arrivals, 99% originated from other areas within the Bay region where the global acute malnutrition rate has been found to be above 30%. Across the Horn of Africa (Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya and Somalia), more than 20 million people, including at least 10 million children, are currently experiencing severe drought conditions.2 More than 8.5 million people, including 4.2 million children, are facing dire water shortages across the region. The nutrition situation in the region is becoming catastrophic as malnutrition rates are increasing, particularly in Ethiopia, and in the arid and semi-arid lands (ASALs) of Kenya and Somalia with more than 1.8 million children expected to be wasted in 2022. Overall, 15 million children are now out of school in the region and an additionally estimated 3.3 million children are at risk of dropping out due to drought. With climate models predicting a continuation of La Niña conditions, the Horn of Africa will most likely face its historic fifth failed rainy season from October to November.
Antarctica's ice shelves could be melting faster than we thought -A new model developed by Caltech and JPL researchers suggests that Antarctica's ice shelves may be melting at an accelerated rate, which could eventually contribute to more rapid sea level rise. The model accounts for an often-overlooked narrow ocean current along the Antarctic coast and simulates how rapidly flowing freshwater, melted from the ice shelves, can trap dense warm ocean water at the base of the ice, causing it to warm and melt even more. The study was conducted in the laboratory of Andy Thompson, professor of environmental science and engineering, and appears in the journal Science Advances on August 12. Ice shelves are outcroppings of the Antarctic ice sheet, found where the ice juts out from land and floats on top of the ocean. The shelves, which are each several hundred meters thick, act as a protective buffer for the mainland ice, keeping the whole ice sheet from flowing into the ocean (which would dramatically raise global sea levels). However, a warming atmosphere and warming oceans caused by climate change are increasing the speed at which these ice shelves are melting, threatening their ability to hold back the flow of the ice sheet into the ocean. "If this mechanism that we've been studying is active in the real world, it may mean that ice shelf melt rates are 20 to 40 percent higher than the predictions in global climate models, which typically cannot simulate these strong currents near the Antarctic coast," Thompson says. In this study, led by senior research scientist Mar Flexas, the researchers focused on one area of Antarctica: the West Antarctic Peninsula (WAP). Antarctica is roughly shaped like a disk, except where the WAP protrudes out of the high polar latitudes and into lower, warmer latitudes. It is here that Antarctica sees the most dramatic changes due to climate change. The team has previously deployed autonomous vehicles in this region, and scientists have used data from instrumented elephant seals to measure temperature and salinity in the water and ice. Antarctica's ice shelves could be melting faster than we thought Researchers traveling to Antarctica to take measurements of ocean temperature and salinity. Credit: Andy Thompson The team's model takes into account the narrow Antarctic Coastal Current that runs counterclockwise around the entire Antarctic continent, a current which many climate models do not include because it is so small."Large global climate models don't include this coastal current, because it's very narrow—only about 20 kilometers wide, while most climate models only capture currents that are 100 kilometers across or larger," Flexas explains. "So, there is a potential for those models to not represent future melt rates very accurately."
Methane satellites find landfills with the same climate impact as several hundred thousand cars - Methane is almost thirty times more powerful as a greenhouse gas than CO2. Researchers from SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research therefore scan the entire globe for large methane leaks. A landfill in Buenos Aires turns out to emit tens of tons of methane per hour, comparable to the climate impact of one and a half million cars. They also detect large emissions from landfills in India and Pakistan, identifying new low-hanging fruit in the battle against climate change. The work was published on August 10 in Science Advances. Methane is the second largest anthropogenic contributor to the greenhouse effect, after CO2. This is due to its large global warming potential over 100 years (GWP-100). Methane is almost 30 times more potent per ton as a greenhouse gas than CO2. When methane is released through human activity—by oil installations, coal mines, cattle sheds or landfills—it can be made less harmful by flaring it and thereby converting it to CO2. Even better, if you capture it, you can put it to good use in boilers or stoves. Researchers from SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research have now used satellite data to locate a number of landfills that are low-hanging fruit in the fight against climate change. Four landfills in Argentina, India and Pakistan emit several or even tens of tons of methane per hour. The SRON methane research team used the Dutch space instrument Tropomi to identify cities with high methane emissions. Buenos Aires, Delhi, Lahore and Mumbai stood out, with urban emissions on average twice as high as estimated in global inventories. Next, the team asked the Canadian satellite GHGSat to zoom in, which revealed that landfills are responsible for a large fraction of emissions in these cities. The landfill in Buenos Aires emits 28 tons of methane per hour, comparable to the climate impact of 1.5 million cars. The three other landfills are responsible for, respectively, three, six and 10 tons of methane per hour, which still amounts to the impact of 130,000 to 500,000 cars. "Methane is odorless and colorless, so leaks are notoriously difficult to detect," says lead author Bram Maasakkers (SRON). "But satellites are ideally suited for this. With Tropomi, we detect super-emitters that pump large amounts of methane into the atmosphere. That is painful to watch because you can solve it with relatively little effort. You could, for example, separate and compost the organic waste, which would drastically reduce methane production. And even in the case of mixed waste, you can still collect or flare the methane produced. Methane has a lifetime of only about 10 years in the atmosphere, so if we act now, we will quickly see results in the form of less global warming. Of course, reducing methane emissions is not enough, we also need to limit CO2, but it does slow down near-term climate change."
The Supreme Court’s Own Goal on Climate Change -A reading of the Court’s opinion in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in June provides abundant evidence of ignorance, bad faith, and, yes, mediocrity in the arguments presented in limiting the EPA’s authority. Despite all that, thanks to a sea change in the economy, the Court’s decision may have only a minor impact on efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. It could, however, hurt international efforts to coordinate action on climate change.To begin with, as noted in Justice Elena Kagan’s acid dissent, the Court chose to shove a phantom issue into its crowded docket. The Clean Power Plan, the Obama-era climate policy aimed at lowering emissions by 32 percent by 2030 that is at the center of the case, was not in effect and was not intended to go into effect as currently constituted. Worse, by limiting the EPA’s authority to regulate how power is generated in order to meet carbon reduction goals, the majority cites outdated, easily falsifiable costs were the plan to have gone into effect.Further, there is no expression of concern about the economic and societal effects of climate change, which include trillions of dollars in damage to the global economy, forced migration as people flee regions that become unlivable, and the potential for civil unrest and mass starvation. Nowhere in the majority opinion can one find stipulation that climate change is “the greatest environmental challenge of our time,” as Kagan describes it.The majority’s nonchalance stands in jarring contrast to the posture taken by most of the world’s governments, the global scientific community, the executive branch of the U.S. government, and even the otherwise polarized and paralyzed Congress. Last week, the Senate came to agreementon providing $369 billion in tax credits and other incentives for companies and homeowners in order to drastically lower U.S. emissions by 2030. This came as a surprise to many observers after Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said last month that he would not support a climate bill until inflation was addressed. But Manchin appears to have changed his view and made a deal with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). If passed, this would be the most ambitious agreement taken by the U.S. in the fight against climate change. For its part, the executive branch is also taking the climate crisis seriously, with President Biden announcing last year that he intended to cut U.S. emissions 50 percent below 2005 levels by 2030. In July, Biden presented new executive actions on protecting communities from extreme heat, lowering cooling costs for those same communities, and expanding offshore wind jobs. Many other government agencies have taken the climate crisis seriously for decades in their own capacities. The U.S. Defense Department and various intelligence agencies have treated climate change as a threat to national security going back to the 1990s. A review of the literature revealsdozens of studies, white papers, and other publications linking climate change and national security. The majority opinion of the Supreme Court, however, suggests that the most august court in the land remains oblivious to this threat. The only references to the costs of climate change in the majority opinion are indirect, in the form of citations of the concerns of the EPA and other groups. By contrast, in her dissent, Kagan devotes the first two paragraphs to the various costs of climate change and cites the 2021 Climate Risk Analysis 8 from the Defense Department that warns that the ultimate risk might be “state failure.” Given 34 years of a drum beat of news on global warming, it is inconceivable that the justices in the majority are ignorant of the threat. In recent years, all the justices had to do was look out the window or turn on the news, as the country has been besieged with record heat, wildfires, and floods, all tied to climate change. Is it possible then that the majority opinion and concurrence avoided any recognition of the scale of the threat because doing so would make the case that regulatory authority could help to avert it?
Summit Carbon Solutions continues work toward easements, acquisitions for pipeline - Summit Carbon Solutions continues work toward acquiring land easements for the construction of a pipeline that would carry carbon dioxide from 31 ethanol plants (six being in Nebraska) to a storage site in North Dakota. Rob Latimer and Ben Fuller, representing the company, met with the York County Commissioners this week, to provide an update on the project. The Green Plains ethanol plant east of York would be one of the participating plants; therefore, the pipeline would run through York County, from the Green Plain site to Central City. The proposed line, in York County, would run at a southwest angle from the local plant, crossing land between Benedict and Bradshaw and then crossing the York County line near Polk. Ethanol plants would benefit from the capture process because it would qualify them for tax incentives as well as allow them to charge a premium cost for their product. The Summit company then would share in the increase of revenue. Ethanol plants are paying nothing for this project – the company shares in their increased premiums for cutting their carbon emissions. The company’s investment will be $4.5 billion and no government subsidies or assistance are going to be used, Summit representatives have said in past meetings. Latimer said the project would result in 318 miles of pipeline in Nebraska, with 18.69 miles of 4-inch pipe running through York County. He said the total investment in York County would be just over $43 million, generating about $964,000 in new property taxes annually. Latimer said the project has a tentative construction start date of August of 2023. “Regarding land acquisition, in Nebraska we have 108 miles acquired,” Latimer said. “Work continues every day toward this. The survey work continues as well. The core of the project is to make ethanol plants economically secure. This is a not a huge pipeline (in diameter), it will go to North Dakota where the CO2 will be sequestered in rock formations forever. This will help ensure ethanol plants continue to be an integral and important part of our agricultural economy.” “When you say ‘start date,’ do you have a starting point, as far as where the pipeline construction would start?” asked Commissioner Randy Obermier. Fuller said there would be multiple construction crews going at the same time, in different locations. “But you will be kept in the loop,” Latimer said. “How many landowners have given you permission in York County?” asked Commissioner Jack Sikes. “The mileage we’ve acquired so far, in York County, is 2.6 miles” (of the 18.69 needed), Latimer said. “We haven’t acquired it all yet.”
Carbon Capture Didn’t Make Sense 12 Years Ago And It Doesn’t Make Sense Now - It appears the reconciliation bill that includes some $370 billion in energy-related spending is going to become law. The measure includes a panoply of tax credits for alternative energy technologies, including incentives for electric vehicles, hydrogen, energy storage, and of course, billions of dollars in tax credits for wind and solar energy. The measure also includes, according to the Congressional Budget Office, some $3.2 billion in tax credits for carbon capture and sequestration, a technology that has plenty of supporters but precious little in the way of commercially successful projects. Back in 2018, Al Gore blasted CCS, calling it “nonsense” and an “extremely improbable solution.” The new tax credits for CCS remind me that I published a piece in the New York Times on May 12, 2010, about the technology. In looking back, the piece is still relevant today. In fact, I wouldn’t change a word of it. Furthermore, my prediction about the difficulty of siting the pipelines needed to move the CO2 has already come true. For proof, see this August 6, Wall Street Journal article about the opposition to a proposed CO2 pipeline in Iowa. In any case, here’s my 12-year-old take on why CCS is a bad bet: Capturing carbon dioxide from the flue gas of a coal-fired electric generation plant is an energy-intensive process. Analysts estimate that capturing the carbon dioxide cuts the output of a typical plant by as much as 28 percent. Given that the global energy sector is already straining to meet booming demand for electricity, it’s hard to believe that the United States, or any other country that relies on coal-fired generation, will agree to reduce the output of its coal-fired plants by almost a third in order to attempt carbon capture and sequestration. Here’s the second problem. The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory has estimated that up to 23,000 miles of new pipeline will be needed to carry the captured carbon dioxide to the still-undesignated underground sequestration sites. That doesn’t sound like much when you consider that America’s gas pipeline system sprawls over some 2.3 million miles. But those natural gas pipelines carry a valuable, marketable, useful commodity. By contrast, carbon dioxide is a worthless waste product, so taxpayers would likely end up shouldering most of the cost. Yes, some of that waste gas could be used for enhanced oil recovery projects; flooding depleted oil reservoirs with carbon dioxide is a proven technology that can increase production and extend the life of existing oilfields. But the process would be useful in only a limited number of oilfields — probably less than 10 percent of the waste carbon dioxide captured from coal-fired power plants could actually be injected into American oilfields. The third, and most vexing, problem has to do with scale. In 2009, carbon dioxide emissions in the United States totaled 5.4 billion tons. Let’s assume that policymakers want to use carbon capture to get rid of half of those emissions — say, 3 billion tons per year. That works out to about 8.2 million tons of carbon dioxide per day, which would have to be collected and compressed to about 1,000 pounds per square inch (that compressed volume of carbon dioxide would be roughly equivalent to the volume of daily global oil production). In other words, we would need to find an underground location (or locations) able to swallow a volume equal to the contents of 41 oil supertankers each day, 365 days a year.
US Set to Deliver More Offshore Wind Energy in New Climate Bill - The strong gusts blowing off the coasts of Puerto Rico, Guam and other US territories offer big green energy potential -- but for decades, a quirk in federal law meant renewable developers have been barred from tapping them. Now, a tax and climate bill passed by the Senate on Sunday would lift that prohibition, opening coastal waters around the five US territories to offshore wind development and compelling the US Interior Department to pursue potential lease sales there. The shift, which the House must still must clear as part of the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, is being cast as a win for island territories that are heavily reliant on fossil fuels, including diesel, for electricity and are especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change.
How the climate bill would shift offshore wind in 4 states - - The Democrats’ climate bill would erase former President Donald Trump’s 10-year moratorium on offshore wind in the U.S. Southeast, but few experts are betting on a regionwide surge in projects.Signed by Trump in 2020, the moratorium banned new leasing for all types of energy off the coasts of Florida, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina. It went into effect last month (Energywire, Sept. 29, 2020).The “Inflation Reduction Act” — which the Senate passed over the weekend and is expected to be taken up by the House soon — would strip away the ban on offshore wind lease sales, while leaving it in place for oil and gas drilling.But wind power has not generally experienced warm welcomes in the Southeast. Just one onshore wind farm — the Avangrid-owned Amazon Wind Farm near Elizabeth City, N.C. — currently generates electrons across the four moratorium states. Interest in offshore wind also has been mixed.Lifting the moratorium may not transform that reality, even if Democrats’ climate bill becomes law, some clean energy advocates and environmentalists acknowledge.In places such as Florida, Georgia and South Carolina, state officials largely haven’t enacted measures to promote offshore wind. This is in stark contrast to the state guarantees to buy offshore wind power that were crucial to the industry’s emergence in the Northeast and the Mid-Atlantic.North Carolina stands out as the region’s clear exception, taking concrete steps to embrace the industry. One of its major utilities, Duke Energy, won the right to generate power from federal lease areas for offshore wind in May, as did French oil and gas major TotalEnergies SE. The state’s Democratic governor, Roy Cooper, also has laid out specific targets for the sector: 2.8 gigawatts by 2030, and 8 gigawatts a decade later.Across other states, however, little groundwork has been done to establish offshore wind’s foothold as a future resource. And it remains unclear if, or how quickly, official indifference might transform into boosterism.In South Carolina, for instance, Republican Gov. Henry McMaster recently signed a law calling for a first study of how offshore wind’s need for locally made parts and staging ports could benefit the state economically.That could help convince South Carolinians that their state is well positioned to host the industry, said Hailey Deres, program associate at the Southeastern Wind Coalition.Still, Deres added, “I don’t think that there is going to be any immediate push for an offshore wind project even if the moratorium is lifted.” Action on offshore wind is probably farthest off in Georgia, where initial explorations from Georgia Power a decade ago haven’t led to firm commitments, and Florida, where the federal government has yet to begin preliminary offshore wind scoping that would allow for commercial development.
Ohio Supreme Court upholds permit for offshore wind farm on Lake Erie - The Ohio Supreme Court upheld a decision Wednesday granting a permit for developers to build the nation’s first offshore, freshwater wind farm off the coast of Lake Erie. In a 6-1 ruling, the court rejected arguments from Bratenahl residents who claimed the wind turbines posed a lethal threat to birds and bats. The justices sided with the Ohio Power Siting Board and the development company behind the project, both of whom determined that the risks posed to the birds is small and the company’s monitoring and mitigation plans are sufficient. “The board determined that any environmental impact would be severely reduced by the project’s small scale, its location several miles offshore, and the flight patterns of migrating birds,” wrote Justice Jennifer Brunner for the court’s majority. “We hold that the board’s determinations in that regard were amply supported by the record.” The judgement ends a drawn-out application process started in September 2016 by Icebreaker Wind Inc. The company plans to build a six-turbine farm about eight miles off the Lake Erie shoreline in Cleveland. The company plans to use the comparatively small-scale project to assess the viability of larger scale projects elsewhere in the Great Lakes. In a statement, the Lake Erie Energy Development Corp. (LEEDCo) — a coalition mostly comprised of local cities and counties behind the project — praised the decision. They said the ruling lends the project enough certainty to market its energy to customers. LEEDCo claims the project would create more than 500 jobs and inject $253 million into the regional economy. Ronn Richard, chairman of the board and the CEO of the Cleveland Foundation, said the ruling shows Ohio supports not just clean energy but the economic benefits it promises as well. “This decision will create jobs, attract talent from outside our region and retain the best and brightest minds from right here in Ohio,” he said in a news release. “It also shows that we’re committed to improving health outcomes for Ohioans by cleaning up the air we breathe and the water we drink. It’s our hope that LEEDCo can now resume selling the remainder of the power and turn this dream into a reality.”
U.S. solar faces new barriers after year of 'crisis' - The solar industry’s recent doomsday predictions gave way to unequivocal optimism yesterday after the Democratic climate bill cleared the Senate, even as other obstacles to expansion await the technology. Leaders of the biggest solar trade group, the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), said during a media call that the varied policy supports in the “Inflation Reduction Act” would have a “monumental” contribution to solar’s future if passed into law. They cited the bill’s many new or extended tax incentives for solar, including for power production, project investment and domestic manufacturing, among other benefits. “These were provisions and policies and certainty that we have been advocating for and lobbying for the last decade,” said Abby Ross Hopper, SEIA’s CEO and president. Still, the legislation’s many boosts to solar might not overcome other counterweights, such as ongoing supply shortages, allegations of forced labor, uncertainty about a federal probe on tariffs and lengthening queues for solar farms to get on the electric grid, according to observers. Even so, Hopper predicted that the solar-manufacturing workforce in the U.S. would double as a result of the legislation. “I anticipate that we will see a number of groundbreakings and announcements right after this gets signed into law,” she said. Numerous companies had told her that they were “waiting in the wings” to launch new U.S. production of solar equipment, if and when the bill was signed into law, she added. “This is one of those moments where as a human being, I’ll remember where I was when the Senate passed it,” said Hopper. Her remarks stood in contrast with the alarm bells rung again and again by solar advocates for much of Joe Biden’s presidency — a singularly tumultuous period when sky-high expectations met unexpected blows to the industry’s growth. Just four months ago, Hopper told reporters that the industry was in the midst of “the most serious crisis we have faced in our collective history,” while unveiling a survey of SEIA members in which half of respondents claimed at least 80 percent of their 2022 project pipelines were at risk of delay or cancellation (Energywire, April 6).By contrast, a Princeton University report last week concluded that the bill’s incentives could cause a fivefold increase in solar generation through 2025-2026, as compared to 2020 levels. That is higher than the growth rates envisioned by the Energy Department in one road map for a carbon-free grid, known as the Solar Futures Study (Energywire, Sept. 9, 2021).The earlier crisis was blamed partly on a Commerce Department probe into new tariffs on solar equipment from four Southeast Asian countries that make up the bulk of imports. The probe was requested by California panel-maker Auxin Solar, which accuses Chinese manufacturers of undermining U.S. producers by exporting cut-rate panels from the four countries.Commerce’s probe is ongoing, meaning new tariffs could eventually materialize. Those would hypothetically go into effect for solar importers at the end of a two-year forgiveness period established by Biden earlier this summer in an executive order (Energywire, June 7).
The Collapsing Clean-Energy Transition - In March, the Bureau of Land Management submitted its fiscal year 2021 report on “Public Land Renewable Energy” to Congress extolling the Biden administration’s goal to site 25 gigawatts of solar, wind, and geothermal energy on public lands. Public lands, the report noted, have a unique role to play in meeting the administration’s goal of a carbon-free sector by 2035.Five months later, President Biden’s embrace of renewable energy project siting on public lands is on life support. The danger signs began flashing last year, when the administration started backing away from a seamless clean-energy transition. Biden’s campaign promise, widely celebrated in climate and environmental circles, to end fossil fuel leasing on public lands (a pledge punctuatedwith three periods no less), went poof, finally sacrificed as a gift to Joe Manchin in exchange for reviving the president’s sputtering climate agenda.Despite Biden’s issuance of a January 2021 executive order pledging to halt new oil and gas leases, the White House went ahead with previously negotiated deals, including drilling in half the Alaska National Petroleum Reserve and swearing off trying to reverse President Trump’s lifting of an Obama-era freeze on coal leases. In July, the administration announced that it planned to pursue leases in Alaska and in the Gulf of Mexico after halting them.So the administration had already veered way off a clean-energy transition course on public lands, whether because of the threat of lawsuits or the scarcity of oil and gas as the Russian attack on Ukraine raged. The Inflation Reduction Act codified that climate-averse decision-making. Under the bill, if the federal government fails to offer at least two million acres onshore and some 60 million acres offshore for gas and oil production annually for leasing for the next ten years, rights of way cannot be granted for any utility-scale renewable-energy project on public lands or waters. Since the federal government historically has offered vastly more land for leasing than fossil fuel producers have procured for production, the actual repercussions on public lands may be less than feared. It’s unclear whether oil drillers will actually want any new leases. Oil and gas production primarily occurs on private land these days, most of the choice spots are already sold off, and investors aren’t all that interested in new exploration anyway, mindful of losing their shirts during the pandemic crash. But over the long term, it does severely restrict the possibility of siting renewables on that public land. Renewable-energy supporters have grudgingly accepted the IRA as the price of doing business to get zero-carbon technologies closer to parity and ultimately supplant fossil fuel generation and stave off the worst effects of the climate crisis. But in communities where extraction takes place, and certainly will continue with these siting requirements, the IRA was a gut punch.
Australia’s Grand Plans to Export Solar – A Lesson from the ‘Gas Crisis’ - As perverse as it seems, achieving the dream of linking Australian renewable energy to Asian energy buyers may generate a household electricity crisis as artificial as the current gas crisis. As with LNG, large scale solar projects are set to largely, perhaps even entirely, bypass domestic demand. Australian LNG exports increased radically in the 2010’s, although not as quickly as American exports. Australia now vies for the title of largest exporter of LNG with Qatar and the USA.Even with this abundance of gas, the price of gas in Australia has skyrocketed, with wholesale gas prices in the first quarter of 2022 up 141% from the same period last year.Not only have prices gone up, but there is even talk of a gas shortfall next year. To protect against this, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) recommended in its 1 August 2022 report that the government initiate the first steps of the Australian Domestic Gas Security Mechanism, the so-called ‘gas trigger’.Sun Cable, an Australian company founded by David Griffin, plans to add the largest solar plant in Australia, with a total capacity of 17-20GW. This single project would be nearly three times larger than the total currently installed large-scale solar. This enormous solar farm will be installed near the town of Elliott in the Northern Territory. With a population of 339, Elliot clearly won’t need all that power, but nor will the other residents of the NT, some 250,000 people.The stated plan is to export this power via 4,200 km of submarine cables to Singapore. The name of the proposed Australia link, the Australia-Asia PowerLink (and sometimes Australia-ASEAN PowerLink) shows their larger ambitions. A 2020 document that was part of Environment Protection Act compliance outlined the company’s plans:The company vision is to establish a high-voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission network across the Indo-Pacific region supplied by large-scale solar and storage facilities utilising the abundant high-quality solar resource in northern Australia.As it is currently forecast, the solar plant will provide power to residents in the Northern Territory, but will not be connected to the National Energy Market, a unified power network that provides electricity to most Australians outside Western Australia and the Northern Territory.Experts have posed technical questions about the buildout, which needs to run the world’s longest power cable through busy Indonesian waters to Singapore, as well as about the financial viabilityof the reportedly A$30b project. Even though Sun Cable has announced plans to sell electricity to Singapore, Singapore has not announced any plans to buy electricity from Sun Cable. Singapore’s dependence on imported gas and high electricity prices might make it an appealing beacon for Sun Cable, but its neighbors in Malaysia and Indonesia have far greater national energy resources.
Norway To Limit Electricity Exports, 'Cannot Rule Out' Rationing - Norway on Monday announced that due to an 'uncertain and demanding situation' over sky-high electricity prices - caused by low water levels at hydroelectric stations (in what they refer to as a "weather-dependent power supply"), as well as the "dramatic situation in Europe" regarding Ukraine, the government will be limiting electricity exports "when the water level in the reservoirs drops to very low levels." Norway has notably been referred to as the "battery of Europe" thanks to its ability to generate and export massive quantities of hydroelectric power. They also won't rule out the 'low probability' of having to ration electricity in the spring.So far this year, far less electricity (11.6 TWh) has been produced in southern Norway than at the same time last year - 18 per cent less. In South-West Norway, the total production of adjustable hydropower last week was the lowest we have seen so far this year.Collectively, this results in historically high electricity prices and a situation where, for the first time in many years, we cannot completely rule out a period of electricity rationing in the spring. But our professional authorities emphasize that the probability of this is low. -Minister of Petroleum and Energy, Norway MUST READ: Statement from the Norwegian government on the electricity situation in the country (exports controls are coming, and for the first time, it flags risk of "rationing" in spring). Only available in Norwegian, so link here is Google Translate: https://t.co/EIWY6I0wMy "This is not something people can afford to pay," said Morten Frisch, a Norwegian energy consultant based in the United Kingdom, in a statement to the Daily Telegraph, adding that the cost of energy in Norway has already risen between 10 and 20 times the price people were paying last year. "When they run dry, they run dry, and it's likely to take a minimum of three months, possibly six months, before they can be refilled by rain," Frisch continued.
Washington Tribes Call on Governor to Reject Clean Energy Project Proposal -- In a July 28 letter, most of the federally recognized tribes in Washington pushed the state to deny permits to a developer because its project along the Columbia River would mean the unavoidable destruction or damage to sites sacred to the area’s tribal nations. Tribal leaders in Washington are pressing the state to reject permits for a proposed hydropower project that they say will have disastrous effects on more than a dozen important tribal sites and resources. On July 28, 17 of Washington’s 29 federally recognized tribes sent a letter to Gov. Jay Inslee, urging him to deny permits for the proposed Goldendale Energy Storage Project because it would destroy irreplaceable sacred sites and violate hunting, fishing and gathering treaty rights reserved by the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation when the tribes ceded millions of acres to the federal government in the 19th century. Yakama Nation Chairman Delano Saluskin separately sent a letter to Inslee recently, reiterating the tribe’s long-held opposition to the project and asking him to not issue any state permits that the project needs to move forward. “We Treaty Tribal Leaders stand with the Yakama Nation in their fight to protect their cultural and natural resources,” the leaders said in their letter. “We call on the state and federal governments to do better. Uphold the Treaties and respect the rights of our Sovereign Nations. Deny the permits for the Goldendale pumped storage project on Yakama Nation’s sacred lands. Rye Development has pitched the more than $2 billion project in an area of Klickitat County near the John Day Dam and the city of Goldendale as a way for the state and region to meet renewable energy goals. It would be the largest so-called pumped storage project in the region, generating enough energy to power about 500,000 homes. The project, proponents say, could be especially useful during times of higher energy needs or when other forms of renewable energy, like wind or solar, are unable to keep up with demand. To generate electricity, the nearly 700-acre project would include two approximately 60-acre reservoirs separated by more than 2,000 feet of elevation. Water draining from the upper reservoir overlooking the Columbia River to the lower one adjacent to the river would generate power when it passes through turbines. Water would be pumped back uphill to the upper reservoir when energy demands are lower, storing the energy potential for when it’s needed again.
Climate bill could help electrify more USPS mail trucks -French postal service La Poste operates nearly 40,000 electric delivery vehicles. In Germany, Deutsche Post recently added the 20,000th EV to its delivery fleet. The U.K.’s Royal Mail plans to operate 5,500 electric vehicles by early next year, while Japan Post owns 1,200small electric vans.The U.S. Postal Service, meanwhile, has about two dozen electric mail trucks — and some212,000 gas-guzzlers that it’s looking to replace.Democratic policymakers and environmental groups are pushing for the independent federal agency to electrify its entire mail-truck fleet, a measure that would significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and curb toxic tailpipe pollution in neighborhoods all around the country. Yet the Postal Service has been reluctant to fully embrace EVs mainly because, it says, battery-powered models are more expensive to buy than petroleum-powered vehicles.The major climate and tax bill moving through Congress this week aims to alleviate some of that sticker shock.Known as the Inflation Reduction Act, the legislation would provide $3 billion for the Postal Service to buy zero-emission delivery vehicles and install necessary charging infrastructure at post offices and central mail facilities. (That’s triple the amount of direct funding in the bill for heavy-duty vehicles like garbage trucks and school buses.)The Postal Service has previously stated that, should Congress provide more support, the agency could increase the number of electric vehicles it plans to introduce.“This bill is trying to put to bed their argument that they need more resources,” said Adrian Martinez, a senior attorney for Earthjustice. The environmental group is one of several organizations that are suing to scrap the Postal Service’s original mail-truck plan.The humble, boxy delivery vehicle has become a political flashpoint over the last year because it represents an important crossroads: Either the agency helps accelerate the nation’s shift to cleaner cars — or it locks in fossil-fuel use and associated emissions. New mail trucks are expected to operate for 20 years, if not longer; many existing mail trucks have been carrying letters and packages for over three decades. The Postal Service has argued that its vehicle-buying strategy is meant to be flexible, and it has gradually increased its EV ambitions in the face of mounting pushback. In March, the agency doubled the number of electric mail trucks it initially planned to order from 5,000 to10,000. Then it announced a new plan in July that would order at least 33,800 electric trucks — 40 percent of its initial 84,500-truck order. The rest would run on gas.
Miners Face Supply Chain Overhaul to Meet U.S. EV Credit Deadline (Reuters) - Miners will struggle to expand operations in the United States in record time to meet a deadline for sourcing key minerals domestically or from select countries as set out by a bill likely to be passed on Friday, companies and industry watchers said. The requirement is part of a sweeping bill that includes climate and clean energy policies and rules on electric vehicle (EV) battery materials such as cobalt, lithium, nickel and graphite. The U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote nL1N2ZJ02X on the measure Friday. "Considering it takes seven years to build a mine and refining plant but only 24 months to build a battery plant, the best part of this decade is needed to establish an entirely new industry in the United States," said Simon Moores, chief executive of Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) includes a $7,500 tax credit for new electric vehicles, but to win the full credit, EV makers have to source in 2023 at least two-fifths of battery materials from the United States or free trade agreement (FTA) partners such as Canada, Chile and Australia or recycle it in North America. The guidelines exclude Indonesia and Argentina, two providers of key metals - nickel and lithium respectively - and increase the material sourcing target to 80% by 2026. Automakers had pressed Congress to expand the number of eligible nations. "The most feasible option is to use recycling ... yet the impact of recycling will be very limited when there are barely any EVs coming off the road," said Max Reid, analyst at WoodMac Battery Raw Materials Service. The United States is home to some of the world's largest automakers, including Ford Motor and General Motors, as well as automotive parts suppliers, but limited home-grown battery manufacturing and refining capacity. Top lithium producer Albemarle Corp, which aims to build a lithium processing facility in the U.S. Southeast later this decade, said "The conditions and timeline for the credit on electric vehicles is challenging as the battery industry largely operates in Asia and the domestic supply chain is in early development,"
The EV revolution depends on mines like this one in Minnesota - — Electric cars are still rare in this marshy stretch of central Minnesota, where it is more common to pass a flock of wild turkeys on the country roads than a Nissan Leaf.But the region could have an outsize impact on America’s transition to zero-emission vehicles. Tamarack, sitting atop a treasure trove of metal used to power electric cars, is fast becoming a test case of whether the auto industry can meet this critical climate moment by sourcing colossal amounts of battery materials domestically and sustainably.The climate package awaiting a vote in the House as early as Friday gives new momentum to companies such as Talon Metals, working to persuade locals that it can extract thousands of tons of nickel without making an environmental mess. The legislation includes billions of dollars in tax credits available only to purchasers of electric cars built with components from the United States or a handful of friendly nations.Few car models would even qualify right now. The climate package would push automakers to remedy deep instabilities in their supply chains and confront the unnerving control China and other rival nations hold over the minerals crucial to scaling up electric vehicle production.Yet companies like Talon Metals, which aims to mine in Tamarack, face big hurdles. Americans have long been content to outsource mining and its legacy of contaminating water and air.“The history with these types of mines is pretty terrible in the U.S.,” said Tom Anderson, whose family has owned property in Tamarack since his great grandfather built a homestead three miles from the proposed mine in 1896. “They could make it clean if they spent enough money, but nobody has ever done that.”Adding to the challenge faced by Talon — and mine developers across America — are concerns from tribal communities that the projects will contaminate pristine lands. Some tribal officials here are already girdingto fight.“This area is just too precious to leave to chance,” said Jean Skinaway-Lawrence, chairwoman of the Sandy Lake Band of Mississippi Chippewa. It is a growing conundrum for climate activists: meeting the Biden administration’s ambitious goals for cutting car emissions hinges on the quick approval of large, invasive projects environmentalists are predisposed to resist. Mining companies are trying to use the timelines for the energy transition to their advantage, promising wary conservation and tribal groups to shape projects around community concerns.
Massive sinkhole in Chile among the deepest in the world - A massive sinkhole that formed in Chile’s Atacama region on July 30, 2022, ranks among the deepest sinkholes ever discovered. The sinkhole is located in the town of Tierra Amarilla, on land operated by a Canadian Lundin Mining copper mine, about 665 km (413 miles) north of Santiago. A similar event took place in Tierra Amarilla in 2013, although the hole was not nearly as large as this one. At the time, officials said it was normal for this type of incident to happen in large mines. On August 1, the Chilean National Geology and Mining Service said the sinkhole was 25 m (82 feet) wide but on August 2 it increased the diameter to 32 m (105 feet). According to the agency, the hole is around 200 m (625 feet) wide, making it one of the deepest known sinkholes in the world. “There is a considerable distance, approximately 200 m (656 feet), to the bottom,” the agency’s director David Montenegro said in a statement. “We haven’t detected any material down there, but we have seen the presence of a lot of water.”1 At the moment, it’s not clear if the collapse is the result of mining activity or something else, but SERNAGEOMIN has launched an official investigation and suspended all activities in the mine on August 6. The first investigations indicate that it could be the collapse of a mansion or cavern that appears once all the mineral is extracted. In this context, the owner of the mine assured that “it will continue working with the authorities in order to determine the cause of the sinkhole to guarantee the peace of mind of the community [Tierra Amarilla].”2 “The closest home is more than 600 m (1 969 feet) away while any populated area or public service are almost 1 km (0.62 miles) away from the affected zone,” the company said.1 A similar event occurred in November 2013, also in Tierra Amarilla, when 30 m (98 feet) wide and 30 m deep sinkhole appeared due to the collapse of a cavern located 450 m (1 476 feet) from the surface. The crater appeared on a hill located in one of the seven most important mining operations that were then in Tierra Amarilla, and also near a populated area, which led the neighbors to file a complaint. Then, the person in charge of Minería de Atacama demanded that the company responsible for the mine immediately close the tunnel, located about 600 m (2 000 feet) from an inhabited area, and assured that it is “usual” for this type of incident to happen in large mines.2
U.S. Energy Production Noted Record Drop In 2020 - In 2020, energy production in the United States fell by record amounts compared with 2019, mostly due to decreased economic activity during the Covid-19 pandemic, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said. Wyoming had the largest drop in total energy production among the states, decreasing by 1,264 trillion thermal units, mostly due to decreased coal production. According to EIA, seven states saw their largest annual energy production decline in at least 60 years. To calculate U.S. total energy production and to compare different types of energy reported in different physical units (such as barrels, cubic feet, tons, kilowatt-hours, etc.), the EIA converts sources of energy to common units of heat, called British thermal units (Btu). The EIA uses a fossil fuel equivalence to calculate the electricity consumption of noncombustible renewables for wind, hydropower, solar, and geothermal. U.S. coal production fell by a record 25 percent in 2020 to its lowest level since 1965. Coal production during 2020 fell by 37 percent in Indiana, 33 percent in Kentucky, and 21 percent in Wyoming, as several coal mines closed. In absolute terms, coal production in Wyoming, the nation’s largest coal producer, decreased by more than 1,000 trillion Btu, the most of any state. In 2020, coal production in Arizona stopped entirely with the closure of its last coal mine. U.S. crude oil production fell by a record 8 percent in 2020. Production fell in 29 of the 32 states that produce crude oil, in part because of reduced demand for transportation fuels during the pandemic. One notable exception was in New Mexico, where crude oil production increased by 216 trillion Btu – an 11 percent increase from 2019. New Mexico became the nation’s second-largest crude oil-producing state in 2021. The U.S. marketed natural gas production decreased by less than 1 percent in 2020, as natural gas demand and prices declined during a slightly warmer year. Marketed natural gas production in Oklahoma decreased by over 300 trillion Btu as shale production in the state fell by nearly 20 percent. In Ohio, despite a 289 trillion Btu drop in 2020, marketed natural gas production in the state was 31 times larger than in 2010. U.S. renewable energy production increased by less than 1 percent in 2020, as solar production increased by 19 percent and wind by 13 percent, but biofuels fell by 10 percent, and hydropower by 2 percent. Hydroelectricity generation in California fell by 45 percent in 2020, the largest decline of any state, mostly because of extensive drought. U.S. annual nuclear generation fell by 2 percent in 2020, mostly because of nuclear power plant closures in Massachusetts (Pilgrim) and Iowa (Duane Arnold).
Texas governor takes control of search for new CEO over state power grid - When Brad Jones was tapped as interim CEO of the nonprofit that runs the state’s power grid following the deadly February 2021 winter storm that left most of Texas without power for days, he said he would help stabilize the grid and get it through the summer. Jones was clear that he wasn’t interested in keeping the job long term. Now, 15 months after Jones became interim CEO — and more than a month after the June target date when Jones had told colleagues and conference crowds that he wanted to step down — the Electric Reliability Council of Texas’ new board of directors still has not selected his successor. Eight sources from across the power industry who spoke to The Texas Tribune say Gov. Greg Abbott — who has no formal role in the process — has put a stranglehold on the CEO search. The board of directors, installed by a group of three people who are appointed by the governor, lieutenant governor and House speaker, and a contracted search firm have presented CEO candidates to Abbott for final say, according to three sources who spoke to the Tribune on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive issues. The governor has already vetoed Steve Berberich, a Texan who was vice president of Irving-based TXU Energy and later became CEO of California’s power grid operator and who appeared to have strong support from both the power industry and ERCOT’s board of directors, two people familiar with the matter said. “The only explanation we got was because he came from California,” said a power industry source familiar with the discussions about Berberich. “Obviously California has its share of problems, but you can’t argue with his qualifications.”
Mon Power Reaches Settlement To Keep 2 Coal Plants In Operation - Mon Power has reached a settlement to keep its two West Virginia power plants operating past 2028. The settlement, which is pending approval by the state Public Service Commission, will upgrade wastewater treatment at the Fort Martin and Harrison power plants. The company’s West Virginia ratepayers will cover the $142 million cost. That will add 49 cents a month to the average residential customer’s bill of 1,000 kilowatt/hours. Last year, the PSC approved similar upgrades for Appalachian Power and Wheeling Power’s John Amos, Mountaineer and Mitchell plants. The projects are needed to comply with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency effluent limitation guidelines for coal-fired power plants issued in 2020 under the Trump administration. The Biden administration could make the rule more stringent as part of its push for clean energy. It’s not known what impact that could have on any of the West Virginia plants.
U.S. coal plants delay closures in hurdle for clean energy transition | Reuters - Alliant Energy Corp's Edgewater coal-fired plant in Sheboygan is one of at least six across the country that this summer have announced delays or potential delays to their planned closures, citing concerns about energy shortages. A key culprit: renewable energy deployment, which was meant to replace these coal plants, has taken a hit in recent months because of COVID-19-related supply chain hiccups. Utilities say import tariffs on solar panels imposed by US Commerce Department make it hard to keep up with robust power demand. In addition to the closure delay of its 400 megawatt (MW) Edgewater plant in Sheboygan, Alliant's 1.1 gigawatt Columbia Energy Center in Portage will close by June 2026, a delay of about 18 months. WEC Energy Group Inc has delayed the closure of remaining units at its 1,135 MW Oak Creek power plant near Milwaukee for up to 18 months until May 2024 and late 2025. Indiana's NiSource Inc blamed solar project delays of up to 18 months for its postponing the shutdown of the 877 MW Schahfer coal plant for two years until 2025. In Nebraska, the board of the Omaha Public Power District will vote on Aug. 18 on whether to keep the 645 MW North Omaha plant open until 2026, a delay of up to three years, due to siting delays and backlogs in studies in switching to natural gas and solar. And in New Mexico, PNM Resources Inc delayed the closure of a unit at the San Juan plant by three months until September, as drought threatened hydropower supplies and heat boosted power demand. When burned, coal emits more of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide than any other fossil fuel. It also releases nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide, precursors to haze and smog that harm human lungs and hearts. All of the companies said that despite the delays, and potential delays, they will meet their long-term voluntary goals on carbon emissions and that scrubbers and other pollution devices have removed most of the criteria pollutants of their emissions. Holly Bender, a senior director of energy campaigns at the Sierra Club environmental group, said the delays do not portend a resurgence in coal use. Nearly 360 US coal plants have shut or plan to shut in recent years, compared with about 170 plants that remain active, according to the organization. Rather, Bender said, the delays serve a "warning sign of the failure to plan for the kind of clean energy growth that is needed." . The US coal industry has been slammed by a surge of cheap natural gas, declining prices for renewables, and regulations cracking down on pollution that causes direct health issues and threatened ones on carbon dioxide. Coal generated about 20 per cent of US electricity last year, down from about 50 per cent in 2006. But cutting emissions further will not be easy. "It's imperative that we increase accountability on utilities, regulators, and planners to ensure ... the transformation of our power sector off coal," Bender said. Estimating the health effects of coal plant emissions on people in exact areas is difficult as their high smokestacks disperse pollution into the wind. Pollution from vehicles and industry also harm air quality. Still, like many densely-populated, industrial US areas, parts of Sheboygan county have been out of compliance for revised US ozone standards since 2018, while all of Milwaukee county has been out of compliance since then, according to the federal Environmental Protection Agency.
Coal miners urge passage of permanent funding for federal black lung benefits - With the Inflation Reduction Act poised to pass the U.S. House, coal miners, including those in Virginia, could finally secure permanent funding for a federal trust fund that pays for medical treatment of miners suffering from black lung if the responsible coal company doesn’t pay. “This is real important to us and to every coal miner, because you can see that actually (black lung) doesn’t get any better. It gets worse,” said Vonda Robinson, vice president of the National Black Lung Association and a Southwest Virginia resident, during an Aug. 4 press call organized by nonprofit ReImagine Appalachia. Federal law requires coal mine operators to pay benefits to miners disabled by black lung, an incurable disease caused by the inhalation of coal dust, which has been especially persistent in the Appalachian region.If the operator no longer exists, has no successor or is unable to pay the benefits, the government will step in to bear the cost through the Black Lung Disability Trust Fund, a pot of money funded by an excise tax on coal. Congress, however, has failed to consistently extend the tax. On Jan. 1, the rate was more than halved, despite a 2018 report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office that found failure to extend the higher rate would increase the trust fund’s debt from roughly $5 billion to $15 billion by 2050. The fund’s finances have also been strained by the bankruptcies of coal giants such as Alpha Natural Resources, James River Coal Company and Patriot Coal. Those three bankruptices alone led to the transfer of $865 million in benefit liability for over 3,300 miners from the companies to the federal trust fund. A 2019 report by the Congressional Research Service found that historically, the excise tax “has not generated enough revenue to meet the trust fund’s obligations.”
Entergy New Orleans customers will get $10.2 million bill for power plant outage, utility says - From the shutdown of a massive nuclear power station in Mississippi to brief blackouts caused by squirrels, Entergy New Orleans reliability big and small was put under a microscope at a City Council hearing Wednesday. For the first time, utility officials explained what led to a month-long outage at the Grand Gulf Nuclear Station that will cost local ratepayers an estimated $10.2 million. With Entergy bills already sky-high before the outage, utility officials said help is on the way in the form of a one-time, $150 credit for some low-income customers. However, City Council Vice President JP Morrell said Entergy must do much more to make customers whole for the shutdowns that have plagued the plant for years. “What is the relief we give to customers based on Grand Gulf’s unreliability?” said Morrell “Why is it fair that consumers take it all on the chin when it comes down?” Two related issues loomed over the Utility Committee meeting: the hefty bills customers are encountering because of high natural gas prices, and the further spikes that could come from 32 days of unplanned outages at Grand Gulf in June and July. In normal times, nearly a third of the city's power is generated at the Port Gibson, Mississippi, plant, which is owned by the Entergy holding company. The plant was down for most of July, however. Bill Maguire, the chief operating officer for nuclear at Entergy, described a series of mishaps. A June 30 lightning strike to the plant's water pumps from the Mississippi knocked it out until July 3. On July 4, plant employees found a broken stem on one of the plant’s four, critical turbine control valves. The plant reduced power to 60% and started preparing for an outage at a more opportune time. But eight days later, operators found a faulty stem on another valve. The plant’s managers put it into full shutdown mode to avoid damage to the turbine, said Maguire. There was an all-hands-on-deck push to get the plant online, Maguire said. In addition to the two broken stems, Entergy replaced a third nearing the end of its operational life. On Monday, the plant came back online.
'More Worrying Than Chernobyl': Fighting Rages At Europe's Biggest Nuclear Power Plant - The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) raised grave concerns on Saturday about the shelling the previous day at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine, saying the action showed the risk of a nuclear disaster.IAEA chief Rafael Mariano Grossi said he was "extremely concerned" by the attacks on Europe's largest nuclear power plant. These strikes threaten "the very real risk of a nuclear disaster that could threaten public health and the environment in Ukraine and beyond," Grossi said."Any military firepower directed at or from the facility would amount to playing with fire, with potentially catastrophic consequences," he added. He followed this with Monday remarks warning that "Any attack on nuclear power plants is a suicidal thing."The New York Times reported Saturday: "Fighting raged on Saturday near a sprawling nuclear power plant in the south of Ukraine, despite warnings from nuclear safety watchdogs earlier this week that conditions there were posing risks and “out of control.”The Times also reported: "Mr. Grossi said he was far more worried about Zaporizhzhia than he was about Chernobyl, the site of the 1986 nuclear disaster, also in Ukraine, that radiated the surrounding area and imperiled Europe." Ukraine said parts of the facility were "seriously damaged" by Russian military strikes.Live briefing: Russia and Ukraine are accusing one another of shelling Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, the Zaporizhzhia plant, triggering fears of an international nuclear crisis. https://t.co/GOk6s1nN6p Energoatom, the Ukrainian state enterprise operating all four nuclear power stations in Ukraine said in a statement Saturday: "It is highly probable that all of this will cause a nuclear and radiation disaster.""As a result of the attack, the nitrogen-oxygen unit and the combined auxiliary building have been severely damaged. The risks of hydrogen leakage and emission of radioactive substances persist, the fire hazard is also high," Energoatom said. As the warring sides trade blame for damage at the plant, speculation abounds over the accuracy of claims and counter-claims...
Ohio Bill Creates Tax Breaks for Natural Gas Infrastructure Projects | Marcellus Drilling News -Last week two Ohio state House members, Reps. Jon Cross, R-Kenton, and Jay Edwards, R-Nelsonville, introduced House Bill (HB) 685 to promote the use of the state’s natural gas energy resource. The bill would create “ENERGIZEOhio Zones” to attract new investment in areas that are disadvantaged due to lack of energy resources. The designation allows natural gas infrastructure projects (like pipelines) to receive tax abatements and speed up depreciation to lower the overall cost of development.
Legislation on Additional Infrastructure to Address 'Energy Deserts' – State Representatives Jon Cross (R-Kenton) and Jay Edwards (R-Nelsonville) have introduced House Bill 685, the ENERGIZEOhio bill, to promote the use of Ohio’s abundant natural gas energy resource. Ohio is a leader in the production of natural gas. Unfortunately, too many communities across the state have been locked out of future job growth and economic development opportunities due to limited energy infrastructure to deliver Ohio’s natural gas to them. Modeled after successful economic development programs already used in Ohio, ENERGIZEOhio will create a series of programs and incentives geared toward lowering energy costs and growing energy infrastructure in the state. “We’ve been hearing from communities that are locked out of future job growth because of the high cost of energy infrastructure in the state,” Cross said. “These ‘energy deserts’ see limited job growth because there just isn’t the infrastructure in place to deliver energy at a reasonable price. House Bill 685 is a step in the right direction to address the problem and bring jobs and affordable energy to every corner of the state.” “I’ve heard from communities that are really suffering because they don’t have the energy they need, even though there is robust supply in the state and strong local demand,” Edwards said. “Energy infrastructure construction costs have just gone through the roof due to inflation. We can’t wait for Washington to solve our problems. The General Assembly needs to pass this legislation to help deal with these increases in costs.” House Bill 685 would permit the creation of locally led “ENERGIZEOhio Zones,” which will serve as designated areas in need of investment. Within the ENERGIZEOhio Zone, natural gas infrastructure projects would receive tax abatements and accelerated depreciation to lower the overall cost of the development. In addition, House Bill 685 would permit the State of Ohio to offer low-cost financing to support projects and provide a revolving loan fund to allow local officials to facilitate pipeline easements. Finally, the bill provides financial incentives to gas companies to encourage the development of natural gas pipelines in ENERGIZEOhio zones..
Hilcorp Seeks New Utica Permits in Columbiana County - Business Journal Daily – Houston-based Hilcorp Energy Co. has applied for four new permits to enhance its exploration efforts in Columbiana County, according to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources. Hilcorp has applied for three permits to deepen existing wells and a single permit to drill a new horizontal well along Fairmount Road in Elk Run Township, records show. According to the most recent data, energy companies have drilled 97 wells across the county that target the Utica/Point Pleasant shale formation. Hilcorp’s wells in Elk Run Township are some of the most productive in the county, according to oil and gas production data that energy companies provide to ODNR. During the first quarter of 2022, Hilcorp’s Elk Run Baker 7H well produced the most natural gas among wells drilled in Columbiana. Over a period of 90 days, the well yielded a total of 697.9 million cubic feet of gas, according to data. Other nearby wells on the Elk Run Baker pad also proved strong gas and oil producers. The Baker 4H produced 578.5 million cubic feet, records show, while the Baker 2H yielded 500 million cubic feet of gas for the quarter. The Baker 3H produced 466.9 million cubic feet of gas during the quarter. None of the wells produced significant amounts of oil. Data show that Hilcorp has drilled 27 wells across Columbiana County targeting the Utica/Point Pleasant formation. EAP Ohio, also based in Houston with local offices in Louisville, Ohio, has 58 active wells in the county. Wells in Mahoning and Trumbull counties produced little oil and gas during the quarter, data show. The most productive gas well in Mahoning County was Hilcorp’s Poland CLL2 6H well with 56.9 million cubic feet produced over 90 days. Pin Oak Energy Partners’ Kibler 2-3H well in Lordstown, Trumbull County, yielded the most gas in that county with 80.6 million cubic feet. These results pale in comparison to the strong oil and gas wells found in the southeastern portion of the state, according to ODNR. Gulfport Appalachia boasted the most productive gas well in Ohio during the first quarter – the Angleo well in Jefferson County, which produced more than four billion cubic feet of gas during the quarter. Ascent Resources’ Betts 7H well in Guernsey County yielded the most oil during the three-month period, with 103,438 barrels produced.
Ascent Resources Turns Profitable, Drills 22 New Wells in 2Q | Marcellus Drilling News - Ascent Resources, originally founded as American Energy Partners by gas legend Aubrey McClendon, is a privately-held company that focuses 100% on the Ohio Utica Shale. Ascent is Ohio’s largest natural gas producer (337,000 leased acres) and the 8th largest natural gas producer in the U.S. The company issued its second quarter update yesterday. Ascent averaged production of 2.0 Bcfe/d for the quarter, the same as 1Q22 and virtually the same as 2Q21. By the end of June, Ascent was producing 2.2 Bcfe/d. Nearly all of Ascent’s production (93%) was natural gas, while the rest was oil and NGLs.
Ascent Closes on 27K Utica Acres for $270M – Finally Names Seller -- Marcellus Drilling News - On July 1, just as everyone was heading out the door for summer vacation, Ascent Resources announced it is buying another 26,800 acres in the Ohio Utica for $270 million (see Ascent Resources Buys Another 27K Utica Acres for $270 Million). The announcement withheld the identity of the seller but did say Ascent was buying *all* of the seller’s Ohio Utica shale assets, which touched off speculation about who is doing the selling. We now know. On Friday, Ascent announced it has closed on the deal. The seller was XTO Energy, an ExxonMobil subsidiary…
Why Ascent Resources moved up some of next year's fracking to this year - Inflationary pressures and higher gas prices are leading a Utica Shale driller to move up some of the hydraulic fracturing and well completions that it was planning for next year.Ascent Resources Utica Holdings LLC, one of the biggest privately held natural gas producers in the United States, said it was adding a frack crew late in this quarter to finish pads and turn on the gas spigot instead of in 2023 like previously scheduled. Ascent has production of about 2 billion cubic feet per day and 708 wells in the Utica in Ohio. The move doesn't mean that Ascent will veer from the industry's strategy of so-called maintenance capital, which is the amount of drilling and hydraulic fracturing that leads to a steady state of gas production and the corresponding, so far this year, higher free cash flow. Utica and Marcellus Shale producers say that even with the higher prices for natural gas, until pipelines are built to carry away gas outside the region, production isn't likely to skyrocket. Gas was $8.01 per million British Thermal Unit on the Henry Hub spot market as of Aug. 2, compared to $3.74 per million BTU at the beginning of the year,according to the Energy Information Administration. Instead, it's all about inflation and a tight market for service providers, particularly hydraulic fracturing, as the demand for oil and natural gas in the U.S. and around the world skyrockets. "We think it's a prudent decision given commodity prices and more importantly the relative scarcity of goods and services in the field," said EVP/COO Keith Yankowsky. The crews will be working to complete bigger and more complex well pads that have already been drilled.CEO Jeff Fisher told investors in a conference call Thursday that the company was moving the money it would have spent next year into this year's capital expenditures amid higher expected costs and tight market for service providers next year. "This is simply an acceleration of capital from 2023 and is not a permanent increase to our development plan," Fisher said. In fact, the four drilling crews that Ascent has working right now is expected to drop to three by the fourth quarter and will remain that way in 2023. Executives said they weren't providing any further details about their drilling plans for 2023 but said that it was likely going to continue to be maintenance capital level. Ascent is planning to start drilling between 80 and 85 wells for the full year, about the same it forecast. But it will turn inline — bring into full production — between 85 and 90 wells in 2022, compared to the 75-80 it had expected it would in January. It turned inline 31 wells in the second quarter, half in June alone. The move will bump up Ascent's capital spending from $710 million to $770 million forecast in January 2022 to between $920 million and $950 million now foreseen. Most of that is in drilling and completions operations and also includes the impact of inflation in places like fuel costs, tubular steel and labor and service-related expenses.Fisher said that production in 2022 will end up at the higher end of the previous guidance of 2 billion to 2.1 billion cubic feet of production a day.
BP to shed interest in Toledo refinery - Cenovus Energy Inc. has agreed to purchase partner bp PLC’s 50% ownership interest in jointly held BP-Husky Refining LLC’s 160,000-b/d refinery in Toledo, Ohio.As part the proposed deal, Cenovus will pay $300 million in cash for bp’s stake in the refinery, plus the value of inventory, bp and Cenovus said in separate releases on Aug. 8.Upon finalizing the transaction, Cenovus—which has held the other 50% interest in the BP-Husky Refining partnership since merging with Husky Energy Inc. in 2021—will take 100% ownership of the venture, as well as assume operatorship of the refinery from bp (OGJ Online, Oct. 26, 2020).In addition to the refinery sale, the parties confirmed signing a multi-year product supply agreement, further details of which were not revealed.Pending customary closing conditions, the companies said they expect to complete the deal by yearend 2022.bp said it expects more than 580 bp employees currently employed at the Toldeo refinery to become Cenovus employees upon the deal’s closing.For Cenovus, the proposed acquisition will provide an additional 80,000 b/d of downstream throughput capacity, including 45,000 b/d of heavy oil refining capacity, enabling the operator to further optimize its heavy oil value chain through integration with its upstream assets, particularly the ability to run advantaged Canadian crude feedstock, the company said in an Aug. 8 presentation to investors.“Fully owning the Toledo refinery provides a unique opportunity to further integrate our heavy oil production and refining capabilities,” said Alex Pourbaix, Cenovus’ president and chief executive officer.“Operating the refinery will open up additional synergies and capital efficiency opportunities, including connectivity with our nearby [175,000-b/d refinery in Lima, Ohio]. This transaction solidifies our refining footprint in the US Midwest and increases our ability to capture margin throughout the value chain,” Pourbaix added.The company is also eyeing potential turnaround efficiencies via sequencing maintenance events between the Lima and Toledo refineries, the latter of which completed a major turnaround and feedstock optimization project this year to increase the site’s capacity to run high-TAN crude volumes to about 55,000 b/d from 28,000 b/d, Cenovus told investors.Regarding divestment of its stake in the bp-Husky Toledo refinery, bp said the sale will support the operator’s strategy to instead focus investment on its remaining two US refineries—including the fully owned 152,000-b/d refinery in Whiting, Ind., and 238,450-b/d Cherry Point refinery in Blaine, Wash.—both of which are strategically positioned to serve customers in the US Midwest and Pacific Northwest. Including the Toledo refinery, bp presently operates seven refineries that include 800,000 b/d of net capacity in the US and 1.6 million b/d internationally.
Energy Transfer held criminally responsible for damage from Mariner East pipeline construction -- The state attorney general says Texas-based pipeline builder Energy Transfer is “accepting criminal responsibility” for dozens of charges related to construction of its Mariner East pipeline project and the 2018 explosion of the Revolution pipeline in Beaver County.Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced the company waived its preliminary hearing scheduled for Friday. Energy Transfer pleaded no contest to the charges, meaning the company will have a permanent criminal record for causing damage to drinking water, wetlands and waterways across the state during five years of construction on the liquified natural gas pipeline system.“Every time Energy Transfer bids for a new project here in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania or somewhere across this country their criminal conduct will stick with them forever,” Shapiro said at a news conference announcing the plea.Energy Transfer did not contest the evidence, and Shapiro said the company agreed their case would lead to a conviction. In October 2021, the Attorney General released a grand jury presentment dozens of pages long that detailed sinkholes, drilling mud spills, and drinking water contamination at 22 sites in 11 counties across Pennsylvania. Those 48 charges included a felony count of failing to report pollution. In February, the AG charged the company with nine additional criminal charges related to the 2018 explosion of the Revolution Pipeline in Beaver County.The plea includes the charges related to the Revolution pipeline. It does not include the felony count related to Mariner East. The AG’s office did not say why that charge was not included in the plea.From the outset, the Mariner East project faced roadblocks when its initial permit applications to the Department of Environmental Protection weredeemed deficient and challenged by environmental groups. Almost immediately after the construction began, it created damage and further galvanized communities who had initially opposed the eminent domain takings required to build the 350-mile pipeline project that contains two new lines and a reconfigured third line.Construction caused dozens of drilling mud spills into wetlands and waterways across the state, led to dangerous sinkholes in Chester County, and polluted drinking water supplies across the length of the project. The company purchased at least five homes in Chester County after its work damaged the aquifer and left gaping holes in resident’s backyards.“After many years of deceiving the public, Energy Transfer is finally being brought to justice for criminal conduct,” said Clean Air Council executive director Joe Minott, whose organization led litigation efforts challenging pipeline permits issued by the DEP. “A pipeline that has had so many criminal violations of the law should not even be allowed to operate.”Shapiro acknowledged that much of the damage would not have been known without documentation by local residents. “We have reached this achievement in large part because of citizens, because of the good people of Pennsylvania,” he said. “The women and men who served on these grand juries and the many neighbors who brought us evidence from their backyards and from nearby streams. To every member of the public who helped us bring about this conviction I want to truly say ‘Thank you.'”
Energy Transfer Affiliates Convicted of Environmental Crimes for Pennsylvania Pipeline Incidents - Energy Transfer LP (ET) affiliates have reached a plea deal and accepted criminal charges related to the Mariner East 2 (ME2) and Revolution pipeline projects in Pennsylvania, resolving cases brought by state Attorney General (AG) Josh Shapiro since last year. ET affiliates pleaded no contest to 23 counts against both pipelines without admitting guilt. Another 34 counts were dropped. Under the plea deal, ET agreed to pay for independent evaluations of potential water quality impacts for homeowners affected by ME 2 construction. The company has also offered to restore or replace private water supplies. Shapiro, a Democratic candidate for governor, said Friday ET would pay an additional $10 million to improve “the health and safety” of water sources along the pipeline routes. ET said in a statement that the $10 million fund was a voluntary collaboration with the state, noting that the fines levied against it related to the cases were limited to $57,500. The AG’s office last October filed 48 counts of environmental crimes for misconduct during construction of the ME 2 natural gas liquids pipeline, which crosses the entire state. Earlier this year, Shapiro filed nine counts of environmental crimes against the company for failing to properly oversee construction of the Revolution natural gas pipeline in Western Pennsylvania, which ruptured and exploded in 2018. A statewide grand jury investigation determined that ET repeatedly allowed thousands of gallons of drilling fluid to escape underground during ME 2 construction. The project was completed earlier this year, five years after work started. It was stymied by regulatory, legal and construction delays. Sinkholes, leaks and water well problems disrupted neighborhoods and prompted state regulators to periodically halt work on the project. The company paid millions in fines. The grand jury investigation also found that an ET affiliate allegedly ignored environmental protocols and custom plans that were created to minimize erosion and the possibility of a landslide, which ultimately led to the Revolution explosion. The incident in Beaver County’s Center Township scorched nearby forests, destroyed a home, barn and vehicles, and caused six high voltage electric transmission towers to collapse. There were no injuries. The pipeline returned to service last year.
Williams, PennEnergy Move Certified Appalachian Natural Gas to Growing Domestic, LNG Markets - Williams is partnering with PennEnergy Resources LLC to market and deliver certified natural gas from the Appalachian Basin to meet growing demand in the United States and beyond. Through its Sequent business unit, purchased from Southern Co. in 2021, Williams is building a marketing portfolio to sell the low-carbon natural gas to utilities, LNG export facilities and other clean energy users. Sequent was among North America’s largest natural gas marketers by sales volumes, and now Williams secures a top spot. It ranked No. 7 on NGI’s first-quarter ranking of top North America natural gas marketers. The PennEnergy gas supplies included in the agreement would come from the company’s 378 production wells in southwest Pennsylvania that have achieved Project Canary’s TrustWell certification. Every well pad inspected achieved platinum status, the highest rating available, according to PennEnergy. The certification covers operational, environmental, social, and governance data points on a per-well and midstream asset basis.Earlier this year, the Appalachia-based exploration and production (E&P) company said it had deployed monitoring units to detect and measure methane and other emissions in real time. Focused on the Marcellus and Utica shales and Upper Devonian formation, PennEnergy’s operations span three Southwest Pennsylvania counties. Williams’ Chad Zamarin, senior vice president of Corporate Strategic Development, said the partnership with PennEnergy builds on its multifaceted strategy to grow the delivery of “next-gen gas” to markets across the United States and overseas.“With our large-scale gathering and processing footprint in the best U.S. production basins, our connectivity to the nation’s biggest natural gas customers and our industry-leading Sequent marketing platform, we are extremely well-positioned to facilitate the efficient gathering, marketing and transportation of responsibly sourced natural gas,” he said. PennEnergy CEO Rich Weber added, “PennEnergy welcomes higher standards in the marketplace, which play to our strengths, highlighting our dedication and investments made over many years to ensure the safety of our employees, the community and the environment.”The E&P is one of several that have pursued gas production certification, including Chesapeake Energy Corp., PureWest Energy LLC, Vermilion Energy Inc. and EQT Corp. and Seneca Resources Corp.
Marcellus Activity Slows as U.S. Drilling Total Falls in Latest Baker Count - Driven in part by a slowdown in Marcellus Shale activity, the U.S. rig count eased one unit lower to finish at 763 for the week ended Friday (Aug. 12), according to updated figures from oilfield services provider Baker Hughes Co. (BKR). Net changes domestically for the week included a three-rig increase in oil-directed drilling. However, declines of one natural gas-directed rig and three miscellaneous units drove the overall domestic tally lower, according to the BKR numbers, which are based partly on data from Enverus. The 763 active U.S. rig count as of Friday is up from 501 rigs active in the year-earlier period. Land drilling declined by four rigs for the week, partially offset by a two-rig increase in the Gulf of Mexico and the addition of one rig operating in inland waters. Horizontal rigs fell by five overall, while directional and vertical rigs each increased by two. The Canadian rig count dropped two units to end the week at 201, versus 164 in the year-ago period. Net changes there included a decline of three oil-directed rigs, partially offset by a one-rig increase in natural gas-directed drilling. Broken down by major drilling region, the Marcellus dropped three rigs from its total week/week, ending with 35 active rigs. That’s up from 29 in the year-earlier period. Elsewhere among plays, the Ardmore Woodford dropped two rigs week/week, while one-rig declines were recorded in the Arkoma Woodford, the Barnett Shale and the Permian Basin. Two rigs were added in the Cana Woodford, while the Utica Shale picked up one rig week/week, the BKR data show. In the state-by-state count, Louisiana added two rigs for the period, while Oklahoma and West Virginia each added one. Pennsylvania saw a two-rig decrease week/week, while Alaska and Texas each dropped one from their respective totals, according to BKR.
With Seneca Resources Shift, NFG Foresees Appalachian Natural Gas Growth - A sizable boost in quarterly output from the exploration arm, as well as stronger midstream volumes, have helped fuel Appalachian Basin-focused National Fuel Gas Co. (NFG) as it shifts focus to undeveloped acreage in the Marcellus and Utica shales. Management told investors during a third quarter conference call the firm’s performance reflected its approach to balanced spending. That approach is helping the company maintain momentum as it prepares for the energy environment of the future, management said. New York-based NFG operates across four different segments: exploration and production through its Seneca Resource Co. subsidiary, pipeline and storage, gathering and utility services in western New York and northwestern Pennsylvania. NFG combined production for the quarter was 92 Bcfe, compared with 83 Bcfe year/year. Midpoint production guidance has been increased for the year by 2.5 Bcfe to a range of 350-355 Bcfe. NFG attributed most of the growth to Seneca’s development program in the Appalachian Basin, boosting natural gas volumes. NFG’s natural gas production totaled 89,293 MMcf for 3Q2022 from 79,745 MMcf in the year-ago period. Seneca is running two rigs in the Appalachian. NFG CEO Dave Bauer said that plan will largely continue, but the activity is shifting in 2023 to Tioga County, PA, acreage in the Utica. “We’ve had great success on the initial development of the acreage we acquired there, so it makes sense to overweight that area,” Bauer said. The strategy change wouldn’t substantially increase upstream spending levels, Bauer said, but would be an emphasis of its capital plan for the next two years as NFG builds out infrastructure to the interstate pipeline system. Bauer said NFG’s midpoint guidance for Fiscal Year 2023 capital spending was $830-940 million, a 10% increase year/year. Oil production volumes dropped slightly when compared year/year, which the firm attributed to a “natural production decline in California.” Oil volumes totaled 526,000 bbl in 3Q2022, compared with 558,000 in 3Q2021. NFG recently closed the sale of Seneca’s California assets, reportedly netting $241 million.
Southwestern Energy Boosts Spending to Fight Inflation, Prepare for 2023 - Southwestern Energy Co. said Friday it would increase both production and spending this year in response to inflation. The company also plans for a 2023 maintenance program, and free cash flow would be strengthened by the move. COO Clay Carrell said a second company-operated fracture fleet would be added in Appalachia by the end of September, displacing a third-party crew. It also plans to reposition a Southwestern-owned rig to the Haynesville later this year, “which we expect to further improve performance, compress cycle times and reduce costs,” he said. The company-owned fleet and equipment are expected to help control ballooning oilfield costs. Southwestern is now guiding for 1.715-1.745 Tcfe of production this year, up from its previous range of 1.683-1.723 Tcfe. Spending for the full year was increased toto $2.1-2.2 billion from a previous range of $1.9-2.0 billion. The company is spending about 55% of this year’s capital in the Haynesville Shale and 45% in the Appalachian Basin, a split that isn’t likely to change much next year, said CEO Bill Way. Longer-term the company is continuing efforts to gain more exposure to growing U.S. LNG exports. “The U.S. natural gas market continues to move from structural oversupply to a more balanced market, with the potential for further excess demand, especially in the Gulf Coast region,” Way said. Southwestern is among the nation’s largest natural gas and natural gas liquids producers. It is the largest producer in the Haynesville, and “with complimentary firm transportation from Appalachia,” around 65% of the company’s production reaches the Gulf Coast market, he added. The company produced 438 Bcfe in the second quarter, well above the 276 Bcfe for the same period last year. The jump came after the company acquired GEP Haynesville and Indigo Natural Resources LLC last year, boosting its assets significantly in Louisiana.
R.I. reaches $1.8m settlement with gas companies over contamination - – Three energy giants will pay a combined $1.8 million to Rhode Island to resolve the state’s lawsuit over soil and groundwater pollution caused by a gasoline additive, Attorney General Peter Neronha announced Thursday.The settlement from Chevron, Irving, and Valero will go toward emergency response and ongoing remediation of contamination by methyl tertiary-butyl ether, or MTBE. Rhode Island settled with other energy companies earlier this year for $17 million. “MBTE contamination of public water supplies poses a significant public health and safety risk, one which oil and gas companies knew about well before the public did,” Neronha said in a news release announcing the settlements, which were entered in Rhode Island federal court. “The work to remediate contaminated water supplies continues, and the funds recovered to date, including today, will be exclusively dedicated to doing that work. In the meantime, this Office remains strongly committed to ensuring that the remaining oil and gas defendants are held responsible for the damage they have caused to the people of Rhode Island and the environment.”
Why Is Inflation Reduction Act a Big Deal for Natural Gas, Oil Industries? - The U.S. Senate on Sunday passed a massive spending bill that would invest hundreds of billions of dollars to reshape the energy sector and try to slow climate change, creating far-reaching implications for oil and natural gas, as well as the economy broadly. The bill moves to the Democrat-controlled House, which convenes on Friday, and “looks to be on track for passage,” policy analysts at ClearView Energy Partners LLC said Monday. Tax credits in the bill include $30 billion to hasten the production of solar panels and wind turbines, among other renewable energy infrastructure. It would spend another $10 billion on facilities to manufacture electric cars and future innovations. The legislation also calls for $60 billion to develop clean energy sources in poor communities. The bill would also roll back former President Trump’s 10-year moratorium on offshore wind leasing. Tax incentives in the bill would enable consumers to receive subsidies for energy-efficient products, as well as a $7,500 tax credit to buy electric vehicles. Notably, the legislation would reward natural gas and oil companies that address methane leaks and penalize with fines those that do not. In addition to a new minimum 15% corporate tax, it also establishes a 1% excise tax on company stock buybacks. Energy companies have rewarded shareholders with multiple rounds of buybacks over the past several quarters. That noted, Democrats allowed key fossil fuel provisions to win the support of West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, whose state’s economy is driven in large part by natural gas and coal production. The bill ensures oil and gas drilling leases in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska’s Cook Inlet. It also would require that the federal government continue to hold regular auctions for oil and gas leases alongside any new plans for wind or solar projects on federal land. Companies also would be rewarded for investing in carbon capture technology with tax credits. In doing so, the legislation would enable plants that burn gas or coal to remain open if they use the evolving technology. It also encourages alternative forms of energy such as hydrogen. The American Petroleum Institute (API) said the package falls short of addressing U.S. energy needs. “While we’re encouraged that the bill will likely open the door to more federal onshore and offshore lease sales and will expand and extend tax credits for carbon capture, we remain opposed to policies that raise taxes and discourage investment in U.S. oil and natural gas,” CEO Mike Sommers said Monday.
Manchin’s Donors Include Pipeline Giants That Win in His Climate Deal - The New York Times— After years of spirited opposition from environmental activists, the Mountain Valley Pipeline — a 304-mile gas pipeline cutting through the Appalachian Mountains — was behind schedule, over budget and beset with lawsuits. As recently as February, one of its developers, NextEra Energy, warned that the many legal and regulatory obstacles meant there was “a very low probability of pipeline completion.”Then came Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia and his hold on the Democrats’ climate agenda.Mr. Manchin’s recent surprise agreement to back the Biden administration’s historic climate legislation came about in part because the senator was promised something in return: not onlysupport for the pipeline in his home state, but also expedited approval for pipelines and other infrastructure nationwide, as part of a wider set of concessions to fossil fuels.It was a big win for a pipeline industry that, in recent years, has quietly become one of Mr. Manchin’s biggest financial supporters.Natural gas pipeline companies have dramatically increased their contributions to Mr. Manchin, from just $20,000 in 2020 to more than $331,000 so far this election cycle, according to campaign finance disclosures filed with the Federal Election Commission and tallied by the Center for Responsive Politics. Mr. Manchin has been by far Congress’s largest recipient of money from natural gas pipeline companies this cycle, raising three times as much from the industry than any other lawmaker.NextEra Energy, a utility giant and stakeholder in the Mountain Valley Pipeline, is a top donor to both Mr. Manchin and Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, who negotiated the pipeline side deal with Mr. Manchin. Mr. Schumer has received more than $281,000 from NextEra this election cycle, the data shows. Equitrans Midstream, which owns the largest stake in the pipeline, has given more than $10,000 to Mr. Manchin. The pipeline and its owners have also spent heavily to lobby Congress.The disclosures point to the extraordinary behind-the-scenes spending and deal-making by the fossil fuel industry that have shaped a climate bill that nevertheless stands to be transformational. The final reconciliation package, which cleared the Senate on Sunday, would allocate more than $370 billion to climate and energy policies, including support for cleaner technologies like wind turbines, solar panels and electric vehicles, and put the United States on track to reduce its emissions of planet-warming gases by roughly 40 percent below 2005 levels by the decade’s end.
Virginia says no to anti-gas ban bill, still aims to protect gas users -The Virginia General Assembly took steps to prevent a sudden shutdown of municipal natural gas utility service in cities combating climate change, but lawmakers opted against joining at least 20 other states that have prohibited local governments from restricting gas use in buildings.The passage of Virginia House Bill 1257 was the latest sign that the push to adopt gas ban preemption bills, known as fuel choice laws among supporters, may have plateaued. While these bills have attracted some bipartisan support, Republican proponents have suffered a series of defeats in politically divided states over the past year.Still, Virginia's bill showed that some gas stakeholders are seeking assurances as building electrification mandates spread and cities in purple states like Virginia consider how to implement climate action plans. An overhaul of House Bill 1257 balanced opposition to preempting local authority over climate policy with concerns about suddenly halting service to Virginia businesses and manufacturers that depend on gas.The attempt to preempt local gas bans in Virginia was short-lived. On Feb. 14, the Republican-controlled House of Delegates passed House Bill 1257, which sought to protect customer access to natural gas and propane. The bill would have prohibited the state, counties, cities and towns from adopting an ordinance, resolution or building code that would restrict access to gas utility service and propane.Another provision in the bill would establish guidelines for a municipal utility that plans to terminate natural gas distribution service. The provision was a direct response to the Richmond City Council's September 2021 climate resolution, which committed to phasing out gas use, according to Brett Vassey, president and CEO of the Virginia Manufacturers Association. In the resolution, the council said the city's operation of Richmond Gas Works was an obstacle to achieving its climate goals. Charlottesville and Danville also operate municipal utilities in Virginia.The prospect of the cities suddenly winding down municipal gas distribution service presented an "existential threat" to dozens of Virginia manufacturers that rely on natural gas, Vassey said in an interview. Meanwhile, environmentalists and Democrats opposed the gas ban preemption provision, which they said would strip local governments of their ability to set climate policy. While HB 1257 received unanimous support among House Republicans, just 6% of voting Democrats cast their ballots in the bill's favor. This ranks among the lowest levels of Democratic support in 46 statehouse votes on gas ban preemption bills across the country as reviewed by S&P Global Commodity Insights.
U.S. natural gas drops 6% on record output, less hot forecasts U.S. natural gas futures fell about 6% to near a three-week low on Monday on record output and forecasts for cooler weather and lower air conditioning demand over the next two weeks than previously expected. Also weighing on prices was a drop in pipeline exports to Mexico from Texas and the ongoing outage at the Freeport liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plant in Texas, both of which leaves more gas in the United States for utilities to inject into stockpiles for next winter. Freeport LNG, the second-biggest LNG export plant in the United States, was consuming about 2 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) of gas before it shut on June 8. Freeport expects to return the facility to at least partial service in early October. Front-month gas futures fell 47.5 cents, or 5.9%, to settle at $7.589 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), their lowest close since July 19. So far this year, the front-month is up about 103% as much higher prices in Europe and Asia feed strong demand for U.S. LNG exports. Global gas prices soared this year as several countries around the world cut their use of Russian energy after Moscow invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24. Gas was trading around $57 per mmBtu in Europe and $44 in Asia. Data provider Refinitiv said average gas output in the U.S. Lower 48 states has risen to 97.9 bcfd so far in August from a record 96.7 bcfd in July. With the weather expected to be less hot, Refinitiv projected average U.S. gas demand, including exports, would fall from 100.5 bcfd this week to 97.7 bcfd next week. Those forecasts are lower than Refinitiv’s outlook on Friday. The average amount of gas flowing to U.S. LNG export plants has slid to 10.8 bcfd so far in August from 10.9 bcfd in July. That compares with a monthly record of 12.9 bcfd in March. The seven big U.S. export plants can turn about 13.8 bcfd of gas into LNG. The reduction in U.S. exports from Freeport is a problem for Europe, where most U.S. gas exports have gone this year as countries there wean themselves off Russian energy.29dk2902l Russia, the world’s second-biggest gas producer, has provided about 30% to 40% of Europe’s gas, totaling about 18.3 bcfd in 2021. The European Union wants to cut Russian gas imports by two-thirds by the end of 2022 and refill stockpiles to 80% of capacity by Nov. 1 and 90% by Nov. 1 each year beginning in 2023. Gas stockpiles in Northwest Europe – Belgium, France, Germany and the Netherlands – were about 4% below the five-year (2017-2021) average for this time of year, according to Refinitiv. Storage was currently about 67% of capacity. That is much healthier than the situation for U.S. inventories, which were about 12% below their five-year norm.
Natural Gas Futures, Cash Prices Recover as Production Nosedives -- After holding steady for several days, production took a tumble on Tuesday and drove a swift rebound for natural gas futures. The Nymex September gas futures contract settled 24.4 cents higher day/day at $7.833/MMBtu. October futures climbed 24.7 cents to $7.825. Cash prices also recovered some of the prior days’ losses despite thunderstorms set to ease temperatures across large swaths of the country. NGI’s Spot Gas National Avg. picked up 5.5 cents to $7.900. Just as natural gas traders had started to gain some confidence that production levels would hold near all-time highs, output plunged 2 Bcf day/day amid maintenance activities in multiple supply basins. Wood Mackenzie said its top day estimates showed production falling to around 96 Bcf/d on Tuesday. About 850 MMcf/d of the decline was seen in Texas, with about 590 MMcf/d off in the Northeast, roughly 150 MMcf/d down in the New Mexico portion of the Permian Basin and around 120 MMcf/d off in the Rockies. In East Texas, a one-day event Tuesday on Gulf South along Index 129 was impacting East Texas/North LA receipts by up to 100 MMcf/d. A force majeure on Natural Gas Pipeline Co. of America also was restricting about 495 MMcf/d on the Gulf Coast #3 mainline between compressor stations (CS) 304 and 303 until Friday (Aug. 12). In the Texas portion of the Permian, decreases were concentrated along El Paso Natural Gas with maintenance on Line 110 and at the Afton CS that was restricting about 50 MMc/fd until Friday. These events are also impacting Permian New Mexico, according to Wood Mackenzie. In the Northeast, the declines were concentrated in Pennsylvania, split equally between the Northeast and Southwest portions of the state. In Northeast Pennsylvania, the decreases were along Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Co. and Millennium Pipeline, but Wood Mackenzie said there were no posted notices of maintenance. In Southwest Pennsylvania, the declines were along the Texas Eastern Transmission and Eastern Gas Transmission and Storage system, but again, no maintenance events were posted. “However, there is maintenance along Equitrans Midstream on the Cain Ridge Compressor Station in the Eureka Lean Gathering System that is expected to conclude on Aug. 11,” Wood Mackenzie analyst Laura Munder. Meanwhile, weather models saw little change overnight but the midday data did confirm a cooling trend on the horizon. NatGasWeather said weather patterns for beginning Wednesday through Aug. 22 have gone from “solidly bullish” to now “only neutral.” This is most apparent in the European Centre model, which shows comfortable temperatures arriving in the Great Lakes and eastern third of the country. “When combined with strong production and soft LNG exports due to Freeport remaining offline, weekly storage builds have potential to print larger than normal for the second half of August,” NatGasWeather said. Of course, the background state remains bullish for now with storage deficits near 335 Bcf, according to the forecaster. Conditions also remain hot in Texas where strong power burns are being aided by light wind energy generation in the state.
U.S. natgas jumps 5% on forecasts for higher demand, lower output (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas futures jumped about 5% to a one-week high on Wednesday with output on track to drop for a second day in a row and forecasts for more demand this week than previously expected. That price increase came despite forecasts for less hot weather through mid August and the ongoing outage at the Freeport liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plant in Texas, which has left more gas in the United States for utilities to inject into stockpiles for next winter. Freeport LNG retracted the force majeure it initially declared after the explosion in June, a development that could cost its buyers billions of dollars in losses. Freeport LNG, the second-biggest U.S. LNG export plant, was consuming about 2 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) of gas before it shut on June 8. Freeport expects the plant to return to at least partial service in early October. Front-month gas futures rose 36.9 cents, or 4.7%, to settle at $8.202 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), their highest since Aug. 3. So far this year, the front-month is up about 121% as much higher prices in Europe and Asia feed strong demand for U.S. LNG exports. Global prices soared this year as several countries cut their use of Russian energy after Moscow invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24. Gas was trading around $62 per mmBtu in Europe and $45 in Asia. Data provider Refinitiv said average gas output in the U.S. Lower 48 states rose to 97.8 bcfd so far in August from a record 96.7 bcfd in July. On a daily basis, however, output was on track to drop by a preliminary 2.2 bcfd over the past couple of days since hitting a record 98.3 bcfd on Monday. Preliminary data is often revised later in the day. With less hot weather expected, Refinitiv projected average U.S. gas demand, including exports, would fall from 101.5 bcfd this week to 97.2 bcfd next week. The forecast for this week was higher than Refinitiv's outlook on Tuesday. The average amount of gas flowing to U.S. LNG export plants held at 10.9 bcfd so far in August, the same as July. That compares with a monthly record of 12.9 bcfd in March. The seven big U.S. export plants can turn about 13.8 bcfd of gas into LNG.
Natural Gas Futures Slip, then Pop After EIA’s Near-Average Storage Injection - The Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported a larger-than-expected 44 Bcf injection into natural gas storage facilities for the week ending Aug. 5. The build ultimately had little bearing on prices. Futures were trading sharply higher ahead of the EIA report because of further day/day declines in production. Choppy price action was seen after the data was published. The September Nymex futures contract was trading 14.0 cents higher day/day at around $8.340/MMBtu in the minutes before the EIA’s storage data was published. As the print hit the screen, the prompt month slid to about $8.30. By 11 a.m. ET, however, it was at $8.390, up 19.0 cents from Wednesday’s close. By region, the South Central delivered the biggest surprise to the market with a net 9 Bcf increase in inventories, according to EIA. This included a 10 Bcf build in nonsalt stocks and a 2 Bcf withdrawal from salts. Storage inventories elsewhere rose by 20 Bcf in the Midwest and by 15 Bcf in the East, according to EIA. The Mountain region picked up 1 Bcf, while the Pacific lost 1 Bcf. Participants on the online energy discussion platform Enelyst noted that wind generation was much stronger during the reference week when compared to the current week. Enelyst managing director Het Shah said wind production averaged 44 GWh for the week ending Aug. 5. He expects wind to average 32 GWh for the current week ending Friday (Aug. 12). Production also hit fresh highs at around 98 Bcf/d last week before succumbing to maintenance in recent days. Bloomberg data showed output down to around 96.5 Bcf/d on Thursday.
Freeport LNG Plant in Texas Still Pulling in Natgas to Produce Power (Reuters) -U.S. liquefied natural gas (LNG) company Freeport LNG said on Thursday it was still pulling in small amounts of natural gas from pipelines at its shuttered LNG export plant in Texas to fuel a power plant. The company has said it expects the liquefaction plant, which shut due to a fire on June 8, to return to at least partial service in early October. U.S. gas futures jumped about 8% on Thursday on talk of increased gas flows to the Freeport LNG plant, a drop in gas output and forecasts for more demand for the fuel over the next two weeks than previously expected. [NGA/] Freeport LNG started to pull in small amounts of pipeline gas to feed a power plant that sold electricity to the Texas grid in mid-July. Meanwhile, Freeport LNG retracted the force majeure it initially declared after the explosion in June, a development that could cost its buyers billions of dollars in losses. "Freeport LNG is currently drawing a small amount of gas off pipeline connections ... to fuel a gas-turbine generator at its natural gas pretreatment facility in order to generate and export about 50 (megawatts) of power to the state’s electricity grid," Freeport LNG spokesperson Heather Browne said in an email. Data provider Refinitiv said about 22 million cubic feet per day (mmcfd) of gas flowed to the plant from July 19 until earlier this week. That compares with an average of 2.0 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) during the month before the plant shut. Gas markets in the United States and Europe have swung wildly on developments at the Freeport LNG plant. Prices in Europe jumped about 40% in the week after the plant shut because the world was already short on gas supplies due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February.
Natural Gas Futures Finish Lower After Wild Ride; Power Burns Boost Cash - After plunging close to $8.50/MMBtu just before the open, natural gas futures clawed most of the way back throughout Friday’s session despite little day/day change in fundamentals. The September Nymex gas futures contract settled at $8.768/MMBtu, down 10.6 cents from Thursday’s close. October fell a steeper 11.9 cents to $8.744. Spot gas prices continued to strengthen despite the typical demand lull seen during the three-day delivery period. NGI’s Spot Gas National Avg. ticked up 3.0 cents to $8.360. No doubt it’s been an interesting week in the gas market. Futures have flown higher much of this week in the face of cooler weather. Early Friday, it appeared the continuingly cooling outlook was finally starting to bring futures prices back down to earth. The September Nymex contract touched an $8.516 low ahead of the open but then rallied all the way back to $8.919. NatGasWeather said there were no major day/day changes for natural gas traders to cling to and potentially explains why prices were choppy on Friday. Of course, there were three straight days of “impressive” gains, too, it noted. The overnight European weather model held a seasonal national demand pattern for much of the next 15 days as weather systems are forecast to track across the eastern half of the United States. The midday Global Forecast System model lost a little demand for the eight- to 15-day forecast, but it is still much hotter than the European model and is expected to shed demand in time since it has been running much too hot in recent weeks. “Essentially, the natural gas markets made it clear this week they were moving higher despite cooler trending and less impressive weather patterns,” NatGasWeather said. “History suggests when this occurs, bears best not fight it.” At the same time, hefty storage deficits remain with only 12 reporting periods left in the traditional injection season. Mobius Risk Group noted that with total inventories still trailing far behind historical levels, for there to be any chance of reaching the 3.5 Tcf mark ahead of winter, there would have to be a string of triple-digit builds in October.
Oil and gas built Port Fourchon; now the seaport is finding its role in a future without it - Travel south to where Louisiana’s land gives way to the sea, and then keep going. It might feel like you’re driving to the end of the world, traveling across a tall, winding bridge above broken marsh to reach the state’s southernmost port. Beyond that lies the industry, the port’s customers. Massive warehouses and wide slips hold large ocean-faring ships. Towering storage tanks hold fuel and water for the vessels to carry to oil and gas platforms miles offshore.As one of the country’s premier oil and gas seaports, Port Fourchon plays an essential role in maintaining one-sixth of the nation's oil supply. Its clients service 95% of the Gulf of Mexico’s fossil fuel production. But the port is also increasingly threatened by global warming, driven in large part by the industries it serves. That was evidenced by Hurricane Ida. Nearly a year later, the storm’s fingerprints remain visible. Some warehouses have yet to be repaired and wooden wharves sit broken. The port’s 1,700 acres sit right on the Gulf of Mexico, making it the first to feel the effects of worsening hurricanes and accelerated sea level rise. That’s on top of coping with the state’s ongoing land loss crisis. The environment surrounding the oil and gas port is personal to Chiasson and much of the port staff. It’s where they grew up. Chiasson himself is a Larose native, who now lives about 30 miles north of Fourchon in Cut Off. He’s witnessed the coast erode.“I'm 45. I've watched it, for 45 years, wash away,” Chiasson said. “Although we are very pro-industry and pro-energy, we're environmentalists because we grew up that way.”Their connection to the local wetlands drove them to build more with sediment they dredged to maintain the port, bolstering the habitat around for local species and flood protection. Now, for the first time, they’ve begun thinking about their industry’s role in climate change, and they’re reimagining the port’s future as the world looks to transition away from fossil fuels.That starts with being transparent about greenhouse gas emissions, reports that have long been lacking in the maritime industry.Globally, the maritime industry is responsible for about 3% of all planet-warming emissions, according to estimates from the International Maritime Organization. But industry experts said greenhouse gas emissions weren’t a consideration on ships, something that’s only begun to change in the past decade. Port Fourchon is one of the first seaports in the U.S. to begin filling in the information gaps. Four months ago, the staff installed sensors across the port to conduct real-time air monitoring, track emissions at different locations and see their origin.Chiasson said they’re still gathering that data and have yet to set any firm decarbonization goals. A plan will come in time, and SailPlan, the same company that installed the sensors, will also look to help the port strategize after establishing a baseline.The monitoring represents a break from the past. Dan Hubbell, who focuses on shipping emissions for the Ocean Conservancy, said air monitors still aren’t widely used. Instead, companies rely on estimates based on how much fuel their ships use, which often leads to undercounting. Ruytenbeek said the maritime industry faces increasing pressure to lower emissions after neglecting for decades to do any tracking. And the oil and gas industry that Port Fourchon’s clients serve is in the same boat.
Coast Guard: Thousands of gallons of crude oil spilled into Louisiana Gulf Coast on Monday --Recovery crews were on-site on the Louisiana Gulf Coast after officials say an oil tank platform collapsed near Terrebonne Bay, dumping thousands of gallons of oil into the water on Monday.According to the Coast Guard 8th District Heartland the district was notified by the National Response Center about the platform, which encountered a structural failure at the Hilcorp Caillou Island facility, located about 25 miles south of Houma. The collapse then caused a tank to enter the water, spilling fuel into the Gulf.While officials with Hilcorp are unsure exactly how much crude oil entered the water, they believe the total is less than 14,000 gallons. No reports of wildlife impact have been made so far. The company Environmental Safety & Health Consulting Services has been hired to help mitigate the hazard, which includes spreading 4,500 feet of containment boom to restrain and absorb the oil. Eight vessels have also been dispatched to the area to skim the area and help clear the water.
Cleanup underway of oil spill in a Louisiana bay - An oil spill cleanup is underway at a site where an oil tank platform collapsed in a Louisiana bay, the Coast Guard said. The spill of crude oil occurred at Hilcorp’s Caillou Island facility in Terrebonne Bay, Louisiana, according to a news release emailed late Monday. Hilcorp estimates that less than 14,000 gallons (53,000 liters) spilled, and no wildlife had been affected as of late Monday, the statement said. The cause of the collapse is being investigated. The Coast Guard said 4,500 feet (1,370 meters) of containment boom have been deployed and three skimming vessels and five response vessels were on scene. Environmental Safety & Health Consulting Services has been hired to clean up the spill. Hilcorp said people affected by the spill may call a claims line at 281-486-5511, according to the news release. The Houston-based company did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent through its website.
Oil residue from Deepwater Horizon spill still detectable along Louisiana coast: Study -Traces of oil spilled in the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion remained in areas along the Gulf Coast, beyond the reach of cleanup efforts, a decade later, according to research published in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science. Researchers, led by retired Louisiana State University environmental chemist Edward Overton, analyzed about a decade of research on the aftereffects of the spill combined with their own data. The research was funded by the Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative, an independent research program created with BP funds in the wake of the spill. They determined that while about 90 percent of the oil degraded, evaporated or was broken down by bacteria in the first few months following the spill, 10 percent remained as solid residue that does not dissolve in water. Much of this sank as marine snow, the term for organic material that descends to the deeper ocean from near the surface. Meanwhile, a portion of the residue also washed up on shore. While the residue washing up on the beach could be cleaned up, the same was not true of the portion that ended up in wetlands, which are inaccessible by the equipment used for cleanup. Coastal marshes comprise about 10,700 square miles of the coastline, and the state has the most salt-marsh acreage of any state. While most of the residue stayed within the first 30 meters (about 98 feet) of marsh coastline, events such as hurricanes moved it farther into marshlands in some cases, Overton and his team found. “Most environmental consequences from oil spills are caused by hydrocarbon material whose composition has changed, to lesser or greater degree, when compared to the initial spilled material,” researchers added. “In many cases, the alterations represent significant compositional alterations affecting the residue material’s chemical, physical, toxic properties and affecting routes of exposure, and thus their potential for environmental impacts and remediations.”
Climate bill backs oil leasing: How much of a CO2 problem? - The Democrats’ massive climate deal is catching heat from environmental activists for guaranteeing years of oil and gas leasing on federal lands and off the nation’s coast. But is the oil trade-off such a bad compromise in the larger fight to reduce emissions and slow climate change? While the “Inflation Reduction Act” brokered by pro-oil Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Senate majority leader from New York, would entrench oil’s footprint on public lands and waters for years, some climate experts say the benefits of the $369 billion commitment to expand clean energy and electric vehicles, the emergent hydrogen space, and nuclear energy far outweigh the downside of more fossil fuel leasing. That’s partly because leasing on federal lands is a preliminary step that doesn’t guarantee companies will drill for oil and gas, or that those hydrocarbons will be burned up in cars, planes and power plants contributing to global warming. “We find that the oil and gas leasing provisions have a negligible impact on emissions and are far outweighed by the emissions reductions in clean energy, clean vehicle, and energy efficiency deployment,” Ben King, Rhodium Group’s associate director, said in a statement. Samantha Gross, energy security and climate initiative director at the Brookings Institution, said the trade-offs in the bill have been overstated. The legislation is primarily focused on reducing society’s demand for oil by offering alternatives — the critical shift that needs to take place to truly reduce emissions — while the lease sales it would mandate represent an extension of the status quo. “This isn’t like some giant giveaway of a completely new size and scope,” she said. The controversial provisions would force the administration to hold oil and gas lease sales if it wants to also lease for renewable energy, like President Joe Biden’s push for offshore wind. Additionally, the bill would reinstate an oil sale vacated last year by a federal judge and order the administration to hold three other offshore oil sales that it had canceled, kneecapping the Interior Department’s ability to thwart new offshore leasing in a five-year oil and gas plan currently under consideration. The bill also includes several reform measures, such as increasing oil and gas royalty payments and beefing up cleanup regulations, which oil and gas reform activists have long pushed for. Hailed as a great compromise by many Democrats, the bill passed the Senate on a 50-50 party-line split Sunday, with the tie broken by a vote from Vice President Kamala Harris (E&E Daily, Aug. 7). It now heads to the House, where the Democratic majority is expected to pass the bill and send it to the president for his signature. Activists who’ve lobbied the Biden administration to retire the federal oil program expressed disappointment in the landmark deal. “This bill should not be considered a climate victory,” Jim Walsh, policy director for Food & Water Watch, said in a statement last week. Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth, praised the renewable aspects of the bill but also said in a statement that “communities and the climate continue to be sacrificed to Sen. Manchin’s fossil fuel demands.” Nina Turner, a progressive political activist and former Ohio state senator, panned the agreement on Twitter last week as a false sell: “A climate bill that requires expanding oil drilling if you expand green energy isn’t a climate bill.” Jean Su, energy justice program director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said the administration should now declare a climate emergency, which would allow Biden to “confront the deadly fossil fuel industry head on.” “The bill’s commitment to massive federal oil and gas expansion is dangerously at odds with scientific reality,” she said
The Inflation Reduction Act promises new oil leases. Drillers might not want them. --The U.S. Senate passed the largest climate action bill in American history on Sunday, clearing the path for hundreds of billions of dollars for clean energy and other climate-related measures (in addition to billions for other Democratic Party priorities). But because the so-called Inflation Reduction Act bears the imprint of swing-vote Senator Joe Manchin, it also includes numerous provisions that support oil and gas producers. The fossil-fuel policy that has drawn the most attention in the weeks since Manchin and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer unveiled their deal is a provision that requires the federal government to auction oil and gas leases on federal land and in the Gulf of Mexico. Though presidential administrations of both political parties have historically leased this territory for drilling, the Biden administration has attempted to halt the federal leasing program; recent lease auctions have also been delayed by litigation from environmental groups. The reconciliation bill reinstates old auctions that the Biden administration has tried to cancel and forces the administration to hold several new auctions over the coming years. The legislation also requires that the government auction millions of acres of oil and gas leases before it can auction acreage for wind and solar farms. The Center for Biological Diversity, one of many environmental organizations to oppose these provisions, said they turned the bill into a “climate suicide pact,” since they have the potential to prolong the lifespan of the domestic oil industry. However, energy and climate experts who spoke to Grist said that the provisions may not add significantly to U.S. emissions — in part because the fossil fuel industry may not be all that interested in what the government has to offer. That’s for one simple reason: Even if the government does keep auctioning off federal territory, it’s far from certain that oil and gas companies will want to build new drilling operations on that territory. The industry has shifted resources away from federal lands and the Gulf of Mexico in recent years, and there’s currently less capital available than ever for new production in these areas The issue with Manchin’s lease provision is not so much that it will open up a bonanza of new oil production, but instead that it won’t do anything to make energy more available or affordable in the short term — and may even slow down the buildout of renewables in the long run. The American oil industry was built on federal land and water. Massive companies like Exxon, Chevron, and Hess rose to prominence in the twentieth century by drilling the Gulf of Mexico for all it was worth, and further expansion of so-called “conventional” production took place on federal lands across the West. Over the past 20 years, though, the industry has shifted its capital elsewhere. The fracking revolution unlocked massive shale oil reserves in the Bakken Formation of North Dakota and the Permian Basin of Texas, where almost all land is in private hands; most analysts now expect that the future of American oil production hinges on the Permian, which accounts for around 40 percent of U.S. oil production. Meanwhile, large companies like Exxon have cultivated young oil fields in countries like Guyana, where production could surpass U.S. offshore production in just a few years, and Suriname, which is expected to start exporting oil in 2025. These basins are far less developed than the Gulf of Mexico, which means the cheapest-to-drill oil in them still hasn’t been tapped as thoroughly as it has in the Gulf. The only producers who still have any appetite for offshore acreage, according to LeBlanc, are the largest oil majors, like Hess and Shell, who can afford to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on rig projects that may take as long as a decade to build. These offshore rigs are far costlier to start up than new shale drilling rigs, and they come with significant legal and environmental liabilities.“[New production sites] are going to be in deep water, they’re going to be high-tech, high-capital, and there’s only really a handful of players that have chosen to play in the deep water,” said LeBlanc. “It’s not like the onshore [auctions], where you may have a party and nobody shows up, but people are also not crazy for this.” LeBlanc added that many companies are expecting oil demand to decline as a result of the energy transition, and therefore may not want to commit to decades-long projects.
Oil Supermajors Continue to Hold Back on Investment - Oil supermajors continue to hold back on investment as mid-year guidance remains mostly firm, a new report from Fitch Solutions Country Risk & Industry Research has noted. Overall, the group will raise annual capital expenditure by 19 percent in 2022 versus earlier guidance growth of 17 percent, the report, which was sent to Rigzone recently, revealed. “The mild rise in investment is coming from Shell, the sole exception in the group, who have boosted 2022 capital expenditure guidance by 17 percent since our previous report,” analysts at Fitch Solutions stated in the report. “Brent crude prices have averaged $105 per barrel for the first half of 2022, a gain of 48 percent over 2021’s annual average price. However, the sharp gains in Brent have failed to spur similar increased investment across the supermajors peer group,” the analysts added in the report. “On the downstream side record refining margins have helped boost the profits significantly as the global contraction in refining capacity during pandemic supercharged fuel prices as post lockdown economies boomed,” the analysts continued. In the report, the analysts noted that the record earnings should be the catalyst for increased long-term investment but added that the current guidance from the supermajors “leaves little hint of capital expenditure excess”. “The difficulty in making multi-billion-dollar investments over the long-term term continues to be dogged by uncertainty raised by the energy transition and most majors have chosen to exercise caution and remain balanced in guidance for capital expenditure in 2022,” the analysts added. The lack of increased investment is another strong indicator for tight supply in the coming years, according to the Fitch Solutions analysts. “After years of low investment and threats to Russia’s access to global trade, markets remain on edge in fear of supply shortages helping to keep the price outlook elevated,” the analysts stated in the report. “Although higher interest rates from hawkish central banks have raised near-term concerns for oil demand the outlook for supply remains muted supporting the case for high oil prices,” the analysts added. Fitch Solutions’ report examined BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Shell, and TotalEnergies. In its second quarter results, BP reported an underlying replacement cost profit of $8.5 billion, compared to $2.8 billion during the same period last year, while Chevron reported a net income of $11.6 billion, compared to $3 billion during the same period last year. Exxon Mobil Corporation announced estimated second-quarter 2022 earnings of $17.9 billion, compared to $4.69 billion in 2Q 2021, Shell posted adjusted earnings of $11.4 billion in 2Q, compared to adjusted earnings of $5.5 billion in 2Q 2021, and TotalEnergies reported adjusted net income of $9.8 billion in 2Q, which was 2.8 times higher than the same period last year.
Pioneer CEO Says Tax Bill May Crush USA Mom-N-Pop Oil Drillers - The proposed new minimum tax on corporations and fees for methane emissions, both of which are in a sweeping bill passed by the US Senate this week, could make life impossible for many small US oil and gas producers, according to one of the country’s biggest independent producers. The ultimate impact of Democrats’ landmark climate bill on the roughly 15,000 small oil and natural gas explorers in the US could be fewer wells being drilled in the future, Scott Sheffield, chief executive officer at Pioneer Natural Resources Co., said Tuesday in a Bloomberg TV interview. “There’ll be more pressure on that small mom-and-pop independent,” Sheffield said. “It may put a lot of them out of business.” While some energy industry groups have protested at the Biden administration’s tax, health and climate bill, some of the largest US oil and gas companies have been supportive, particularly on the steps to mitigate methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. Pioneer along with Devon Energy Corp. and ConocoPhillips last month announced its commitment to reduce methane emissions by joining the Oil and Gas Methane Partnership 2.0 Initiative. Pioneer expects to not pay a tax on emissions as a result of its plan to ban routine flaring by 2025, Sheffield said.
Would the climate bill slash methane? It depends - -- “Inflation Reduction Act” provisions aimed at cutting methane emissions would be a boon for the high-tech companies that sell detection equipment, but it may not have a big effect on the broader oil and gas industry’s emissions, analysts say.The bill — which passed the Senate last Sunday — includes $1.5 billion to promote methane detection and measurement in the oil and gas sector. Those funds could help the growing group of companies, many of them supported by the Department of Energy, that are deploying lasers, drones, satellites and other technology to help producers spot fugitive methane emissions (Energywire, Oct. 25, 2021). But another provision — a fee of up to $1,500 per ton on emissions from oil and gas producers, pipeline operators and others — may have a muted effect on the industry. The charge wouldn’t apply to the entire oil and gas sector, and would miss roughly 60 percent of the industry’s emissions, noted Robert Kleinberg, a researcher at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy. EPA’s pending regulations on methane from the oil and gas industry, along with pressure from investors, is likely to remain the main factor that pushes companies to cut their emissions, according to several observers. “There are a whole bunch of loopholes” in the methane fee’s structure, Kleinberg said. Some of the best-known companies, like Exxon Mobil Corp. and pipeline giant Energy Transfer LP, also were already working on ways to curb their methane emissions before the bill moved through Congress. “All the big operators, they understand that this is the reality,” said Dan Katz, CEO of Orbital Sidekick, which provides satellite-based monitoring systems for pipeline operators and other energy companies. “Even if it wasn’t going to come in the form of hard regulation, the entire industry is moving in this direction” of cutting emissions, he added. The oil and gas industry is one of the biggest sources of methane pollution — the gas is produced alongside oil and frequently leaks from wells, pipelines, compressors and other equipment. Methane traps more than 20 times more heat than carbon dioxide when it’s released into the atmosphere. Separately, EPA has been developing regulations to control methane leaks from existing oil and gas fields, which are expected to be finalized sometime next year. If implemented, the methane fee in the climate bill would be the first federal tax on a greenhouse gas (Climatewire, Aug. 3). At the same time, environmentally sensitive investors have been pushing oil producers and other companies to cut their emissions as a way to protect their bottom line. Exxon Mobil announced last year that it will cut its greenhouse gas emissions to the equivalent of zero by the end of the decade in its Permian Basin operations, which cover parts of Texas and New Mexico. Energy Transfer, which operates 120,000 miles of gas, crude oil and other pipelines around the country, has promoted its own plans to cut its emissions, including replacing outdated equipment and installing electric pumps.
Elder questions Red Valley oil spill cleanup effort - Navajo Times --A pipeline owned by Capitol Operating Group that helps transport oil and its byproduct, saltwater, has broken, causing a spill. The mixture of oil and saltwater, known as brine in the oil industry, according to Navajo EPA worker Dariel Yazzie, was being pumped to a storage tank. Yazzie said he and his team were told about 50 barrels, or about 2,500 gallons, spilled into a ravine that traveled nearly four miles down the mountain and into the valley. When they arrived to the spill site, Yazzie said he immediately smelled oil, which prompted them to request the company to provide a sample of what was being pumped in the pipeline. Yazzie assessed the amount spilled and estimated that possibly more than 80 barrels, or 4,000 gallons, might have been released into the fragile environment of cedar trees and other vegetation. Signs of oil soaked into the ground and dark-colored liquid could be seen in the ravine among sagebrush and the roots of cedar trees. Lifelong resident, Richard Lee, 88, whose family alerted Delegate Amber Crotty of the spill, said the damage could be permanent. Lee said he was told a chemical agent would be sprayed that would help the oil spill biodegrade. “Díídí akʼah kǫ́ǫ́dí chʼínʼaʼígíí, Diné tó ndeiłkaahígíí, jóʼ éí yinéełʼį́į́ʼo anóo éí, ‘Tʼóó spray ádoolnííł, tʼááleʼé bikʼijįʼ ndoozoł,’” Lee explained. Lee wasn’t convinced the spray would thoroughly clean the spill. “Shí éí doodahshį́į́,” he said, disagreeing with the company’s decision to use a spray to clean up the spill. “Díí akʼah éí nilǫǫ kʼad daatsʼí Damóo daatsʼí dóó yíwohjįʼ ákó ałtsxo łeehíínaʼ.” Lee said the brine probably already soaked deep into the ground and underneath the rocks where the spray would not reach. Yazzie explained the process of how brine is extracted from deep within the earth when fracking for oil. “If you’re going to extract oil, you’re going to pump up your crude oil, and it’s not going to be one hundred percent oil,” Yazzie said. “What you’re going to get is you’re going to get a mixture of oil as well as saltwater. “They extract the saltwater,” he said. “They have two options – they can discharge it or they can inject it back. And that’s what this operation is, they inject the water back.” Yazzie and his team obtained a sample from the company, which he said they’d test so they can have a clearer idea of what was spilled in the valley. Crotty said the Lee family notified her and the Navajo EPA of the spill on Sunday. When she arrived at the area, she used a stick and prodded the dark-colored liquid in the ravine. “That looks like oil,” she told the family.
North Dakota intervening in oil and gas leasing lawsuit - A federal judge is allowing North Dakota to intervene in a lawsuit by environmental groups that challenges the government's resumption of oil and gas lease sales on federal lands. The Biden administration announced in April that it was resuming oil and gas lease sales on federal lands after a pause of more than a year. The Bureau of Land Management ordered a sale in late June offering 23 parcels in eastern Montana and the western North Dakota counties of McKenzie, Mountrail and Williams. Environmental groups believe the sales are climate-harming; the state maintains the sales are important to North Dakota's economy. President Joe Biden in January 2021 halted oil and gas lease sales on the nation’s public lands and waters during his first days in office, and issued an executive order announcing a review of the program “to restore balance on America’s public lands and waters to benefit current and future generations.” Oil- and gas-producing states including North Dakota sued to try to force leasing to continue, and scored a victory in June 2021 when a court ordered the government to resume sales. The federal review concluded a few months later, with the U.S. Interior Department recommending the government raise royalty rates. Several climate and conservation groups are suing over the resumption of oil and gas leasing, including one lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that challenges approval of lease sales in several states including North Dakota. The groups including the Dakota Resource Council and the Sierra Club maintain that the sales will result in social and environmental harm. The North Dakota Attorney General's Office in late July filed a motion to intervene in the case. Special Assistant Attorney General Paul Seby wrote that the state seeks "to protect its significant sovereign rights and economic interests." State officials have argued that North Dakota's situation is unique due to the checkerboard nature of mineral ownership in the state. They say that prohibiting drilling through federal minerals could prevent the development of private minerals and state-owned minerals in the surrounding area. North Dakota also receives a portion of revenue from oil and gas leasing on federal lands.
Idaho-Wyoming natural gas pipeline needs environmental study (AP) — U.S. officials won’t approve a natural gas pipeline from Idaho to Wyoming until additional environmental studies are completed. A U.S. District Court on Wednesday approved an agreement between the U.S. Forest Service and two environmental groups that filed a lawsuit to stop the 50-mile (80-kilometer) Crow Creek Pipeline Project. The Forest Service agreed to complete a supplemental environmental impact statement before authorizing the project that partially crosses Forest Service land. The timeline for completing the environmental study isn't clear. Wyoming-based Lower Valley Energy wants to build the pipeline that would start near Montpelier, Idaho, and run to Afton, Wyoming. But the Alliance for the Wild Rockies and Yellowstone to Uintas Connection say it will harm protected grizzly bears and other wildlife. "The ruling is a huge victory for the climate as well as free-roaming endangered species like grizzly bears, wolverines, and lynx,” said Mike Garrity, executive director of the Alliance for the Wild Rockies. A lawsuit the groups filed in 2020 contended an 18-mile (29-kilometer) portion of the pipeline would cut a corridor through Caribou-Targhee National Forest and create a road through six roadless areas. The 2001 Roadless Rule prevents road construction and timber harvest in designated roadless areas, which are typically 5,000 acres (2,000 hectares) or larger. The environmental groups argued the pipeline corridor would be a permanent motorized trail through the roadless areas. "This unique area that links the Northern and Southern Rocky Mountains must be protected and managed as a wildlife corridor for our endangered wildlife species,” said Jason Christensen, director of Yellowstone to Uintas Connection. Lower Valley Energy — which intervened in the case on the side of the Forest Service, as did the state of Wyoming — has previously said it has been trucking natural gas to Afton, but that delivery has been unreliable and the town has sometimes nearly run out. Lower Valley Energy spokesman Brian Tanabe didn’t immediately return a call Wednesday from The Associated Press. The Forest Service, before the lawsuit, approved building the pipeline through the forest with a temporary 50-foot (15-meter) wide right-of-way for construction and then a 20-foot (6-meter) utility corridor as a permanent right-of-way. In all, the construction phase would use about 110 acres (45 hectares) of forest land and the permanent right-of-way about 45 acres (18 hectares). About 26 miles (40 kilometers) of the pipeline crosses private land and about 4 miles (6 kilometers) crosses state land.
U.S. oil refiners, pipeline companies expect strong demand for rest of 2022 (Reuters) - U.S. oil refiners and pipeline operators expect energy consumption to be strong for the second half of 2022, even though analysts and industry watchers have worried that demand could falter if the global economy enters a recession or high fuel prices deter travelers. The company outlooks suggest a stronger view than recent data showing weakness in U.S. fuel demand, particularly in gasoline, where consumption recently hit its lowest level since February even though this is the middle of the peak summer driving season. U.S. gasoline product supplied over the past four weeks recently fell below 2020's level for the same time of year, when the United States was in the depths of the pandemic. Energy companies including Energy Transfer LP and PBF Energy Inc say energy demand will be strong in the second half of 2022, according to a Reuters review of company earnings calls. "Management sees what's going on on the ground so any time they're calling out positivity when demand data has been showing otherwise, we find that interesting," said Kian Hidari, an analyst at Tudor, Pickering, Holt and Co. "It's still a strong environment for gasoline compared to historical levels." U.S. refiners are also benefiting from high exports of transportation fuels to Latin America, and plants are expected to run at high utilization rates to restock inventories that were drawn down when fuel supply cratered earlier this year. Refiner exports of finished petroleum products were largely in line with five-year seasonal averages at 3.02 million barrels per day (bpd) in May, the latest data available, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That was nearly 65% higher than the pandemic low reached in May 2020. U.S. oil output has recovered to 12.1 million bpd, helping boost pipeline and terminal volumes for many midstream companies for the second quarter from a year ago. Energy Transfer reported a stronger-than-expected second quarter performance and boosted its guidance for the rest of the year, said Co-Chief Executive Thomas Long. Of the 16 midstream companies that reported earnings last week, more than half revised guidance higher, said James Mick, Portfolio Manager at Tortoise Capital Advisors. The four-week average of implied demand for gasoline fell to just under 8.6 million barrels per day (bpd) in the week to July 29, lowest since February, according to EIA data, though the weekly figures can be volatile.
Interior Department backtracks on public comment period for Willow Project - For more than three weeks, the Alaska Native Village of Nuiqsut, Congressional Democrats, and conservation groups have been urging the Department of the Interior to extend the public comment period on a draft environmental impact statement for one of the largest proposed onshore oil and gas development projects in the United States. If approved, the ConocoPhillips venture, known as the Willow Project, would allow for construction of up to 250 wells, a network of gravel roads and pipelines, and a new central processing facility in the government-managed National Petroleum Reserve, about 35 miles west of Nuiqsut.Democrats in the House of Representatives had asked for a response to their letter requesting an extension by July 22, but the Interior Department missed that deadline, Grist reported last week. Environmental groups hoped for an answer in advance of several public meetings on the draft environmental statement, the first of which took place Monday evening. They also still haven’t heard back. The city of Nuiqsut, however, got an answer from the Interior Department on Friday. According to three sources with direct knowledge of the correspondence, the Bureau of Land Management’s Alaska office told the city that the comment period would be extended until the end of September. City officials were also informed that a public meeting in Nuiqsut scheduled for Thursday, August 11 would be moved to the middle of next month, giving residents more time to balance the seasonal demands of the summer subsistence harvest with having to comment on a project that will have a dramatic effect on the region for decades to come. According to two Interior employees who were not authorized to speak on the record, the agency had begun to prepare a federal register notice to announce the new schedule.Over the weekend, though, the department reversed course. On Monday morning, Mayor Rosemary Ahtuangaruak received a phone call, she told Grist, from the Willow Project manager, Stephanie Rice, telling her that the public comment period would not be extended. The Interior Department was reverting to the minimum 45-day public comment period required by law, despite telling Nuiqsut officials just days before that it would honor requests for an extension.According to one source in the Biden administration briefed on the latest decision, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution, political considerations regarding the passage of the Democrats’ major climate and energy bill contributed to the abrupt reversal. The legislation, which was unexpectedly unveiled by Senators Chuck Schumer and Joe Manchin on July 27, passed the Senate on Sunday by a narrow party-line vote. It is expected to be voted on in the House by the end of this week. Manchin has not publicly discussed Willow in connection with the new bill, but the West Virginia Democrat explicitly tied his support for the legislation to the fast-tracking of some fossil fuel infrastructure projects, including the Mountain Valley Pipelinein his home state. The Willow Project is a top priority for Manchin’s Republican ally, Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski, who faces a tough reelection fight this year. Interior officials did not respond to specific questions from Grist about why the department reversed course over the weekend. But in a written statement, an agency spokesperson did confirm that the comment period would end on August 29 — the original deadline. “We intend to hear from the public and people on the North Slope during that time,” the Bureau of Land Management spokesperson wrote. “We also are committed to continuing government-to-government consultations.”
88 Energy Makes 1 Billion Barrel Oil Announcement | Rigzone -88 Energy Limited has reported a maiden, independently certified prospective resource estimate of 1.03 billion barrels of oil - on a gross mean, unrisked basis - for the Project Icewine East development, which the business holds a 75 percent net working interest in. According to the company, significant prospective resources have been estimated across all the recently mapped Shelf Margin Delta (SMD), Slope Fan System (SFS), Basin Floor Fan (BFF) and Kuparuk (KUP) play fairways on the Icewine East acreage. The maiden independent prospective resource report was completed by Lee Keeling and Associates, Inc (LKA). The initial total prospective resource follows a period of review of an extensive data suite that included seismic data, well logs from Icewine-1 and nearby wells adjacent to the Icewine East acreage, recent petrophysical analysis and mapping, 88 Energy highlighted. LKA is an independent U.S. based expert petroleum geoscience and engineering consulting firm which has significant and recent experience in providing resource estimates globally, as well as more specifically in Alaska. “Importantly, it is worth noting that the Icewine East acreage has been significantly de-risked by the recent Pantheon drilling and flow tests on their adjacent acreage, as well as data from the Icewine-1 well logs, and more recently the leased Franklin Bluffs 3D data set. This work substantially increases our confidence in unlocking the potential of the Icewine East acreage and is by far, the most compelling data suite the company has analyzed ahead of drilling any well,” 88 Energy Managing Director Ashley Gilbert said in a company statement. The managing director went on to note that full interpretation of the recently licensed FB3D data is ongoing, including AVO analysis, to define “sweet spots” for each play and determine optimal future exploration and appraisal drilling locations, the first of which Gilbert said is planned for 2023. Back in June, 88 Energy announced that a licensing agreement had been signed with SAExploration, Inc. for use of its Franklin Bluffs 3D seismic survey data (FB3D), which 88 Energy noted covers a “significant area over the Project Icewine East leases”. In May, 88 Energy revealed that a third-party evaluation of the Icewine East mapping was complete. 88 Energy’s Icewine project is one of several the company has on the Alaska North Slope. Others include the Peregrine, Umiat, and Yukon projects, all of which 88 Energy has a 100 percent interest in.
Cuban oil facility on fire, leaves 1 dead, 17 missing and 121 injured --A fire set off by a lightning strike at an oil storage facility raged uncontrolled in the Cuban city of Matanzas, where four explosions and flames injured 121 people and left 17 firefighters missing. Cuban authorities said a unidentified body had been found. Firefighters and other specialists were on Saturday still trying to quell the blaze at the Matanzas Supertanker Base, where the fire began during a thunderstorm Friday night, the Ministry of Energy and Mines tweeted. Authorities said about 800 people were evacuated from the Dubrocq neighbourhood closest to the fire. The government said it had asked for help from international experts in friendly countries with experience in the oil sector. Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernndez de Cosso said the US government had offered technical help to quell the blaze. On his Twitter account, he said the proposal is in the hands of specialists for the due coordination. Minutes later, President Miguel Daz-Canel thanked Mexico , Venezuela, Russia, Nicaragua, Argentina and Chile for their offers of help. A support flight from Mexico arrived on Saturday night. The official Cuban News Agency said lightning hit one tank, starting a fire, and the blaze later spread to a second tank. As military helicopters flew overhead dropping water on the blaze, dense column of black smoke billowed from the facility and spread westward more than 100 kilometers toward Havana. Roberto de la Torre, head of fire operations in Matanzas, said firefighters were spraying water on intact tanks trying to keep them cool in hopes of preventing the fire from spreading. Cuba's Health Ministry reported that 121 people were injured with five of them in critical condition. The Presidency of the Republic said the 17 people missing were firefighters who were in the nearest area trying to prevent the spread. Later on Saturday, the Health Ministry said in a statement that a body had been found and officials were trying to identify it. The accident comes as Cuba struggles with fuel shortages. There was no immediate word on how much oil had burned or was in danger at the storage facility, which has eight giant tanks that hold oil used to fuel electricity generating plants.
Cuba's Largest Thermoelectric Power Plant Offline Amid Depot Blaze - Cash-strapped Cuba was forced to take its largest thermoelectric power plant offline due to a multi-day blaze at a fuel depot in the northern part of the country. Bloomberg reported the Ministry of Energy and Mines said the 200 MW Antonio Guiteras thermo plant was disconnected from the grid because of a water shortage. A local media outlet said the fire at the nearby Matanzas industrial storage complex had used up the water delivery to the power plant as firefighters battled the blaze, affecting four of the facility's eight storage tanks. We noted Monday that the communist country's worst fear about the 2.4-million-barrel Matanzas terminal would be realized if the thermo power plant was shuttered. That's because its generators, fed by heavy crude oil from the Matanzas complex, provide a fifth of the country's power needs. It remains to be seen if crude flows from the damaged storage facility to the power plant have been affected. This disaster comes as power grid failures have been rampant due to fuel shortages, forcing grid operators to impose widespread energy blackouts in some areas of the country for up to 12 hours since May. The Union of Electrical Workers said the new power failure indicates only half the island's 3,000 MW peak energy demand can be met on Monday. About 1,223 MW of generation is offline. Cuba struggled to keep the lights on even before the fuel depot fire amid power plant breakdowns and fuel shortages. Rolling blackouts have sparked protests. Compound the risk of more power blackouts with annual inflation soaring to 29% in June, and it's a perfect recipe for more social unrest. Reuters said Cuban officials could expand floating storage capacity to handle imports that would normally be offloaded at the Matanzas complex. The fire at the fuel depot has exposed a critical bottleneck. Matanzas is Cuba's only terminal that can handle fuel shipments from large crude tankers piped to power plants across the country.
Fire at Cuba oil facility spreads as 3rd tank ignites — A deadly fire that began at a large oil storage facility in western Cuba spread Monday after flames enveloped a third tank that firefighters had tried to cool as they struggle to fight the massive blaze.At least one person has died and 125 are injured, with dozens of firefighters reported missing ever since lighting struck one of the facility’s eight tanks on Friday night. A second tank caught fire on Saturday, triggering several explosions.“The risk we had announced happened, and the blaze of the second tank compromised the third one,” said Mario Sabines, governor of the western province of Matanzas where the facility is located.Firefighters had sprayed water on the remaining tanks over the weekend to cool them and try to stop the fire from spreading.The governments of Mexico and Venezuela have sent special teams to help extinguish the fire, with water cannons, planes and helicopters fighting the fire from several directions as military constructions specialists erected barriers to contain oil spills. Local officials warned residents to use face masks or stay indoors given the billowing smoke enveloping the region that can be seen from the capital of Havana, located more than 65 miles (100 kilometers) away. Officials have warned that the cloud contains sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, carbon monoxide and other poisonous substances.
Fire spreads at Cuba oil storage facility as fourth tank erupts - Flames have engulfed a fourth tank at an oil storage facility in western Cuba as a raging fire consumes critical fuel supplies on an island grappling with a growing energy crisis. Firefighters and specialists from Mexico and Venezuela helped fight the blaze in the province of Matanzas with boats, planes and helicopters as they sprayed foam on the containers, a first for crews since broiling temperatures had prevented them from doing so earlier.The fire at the Matanzas supertanker base has killed at least one person and injured 125 others, with another 14 firefighters still missing. It also forced officials to shut down a thermoelectric plant on Monday after it ran out of water, sparking concerns about additional blackouts.Those injured were treated mostly for burns and smoke inhalation. More than 20 remain hospitalized, with five of them in critical condition.The eight-tank facility plays a crucial role in Cuba’s electric system: it operates an extensive oil pipeline that receives Cuban crude oil that is then ferried to thermoelectric plants that produce electricity. It also serves as the unloading and transshipment center for imported crude oil, fuel oil and diesel.The facility caught on fire late on Friday after lightning struck one of its tanks,sparking several explosions as it spread over the weekend. The first tank was at 50% capacity and contained nearly 883,000 cubic feet (25,000 cubic meters) of fuel. The second tank was full.Officials have yet to provide an estimate of damages. The blaze comes just days after the government announced scheduled blackouts for the capital of Havana amid a sweltering summer.
A raging fire consumes a fourth tank at a Cuban oil storage facility : NPR— Flames engulfed a fourth tank at an oil storage facility in western Cuba on Tuesday as the raging fire consumes critical fuel supplies on an island grappling with a growing energy crisis.Firefighters and specialists from Mexico and Venezuela helped fight the blaze in the province of Matanzas with boats, planes and helicopters as they sprayed foam on the containers, a first for crews since broiling temperatures had prevented them from doing so earlier. 17 missing, 121 hurt, 1 dead in fire at Cuban oil facility Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said crews have taken control of the area where the fire is burning and are taking further steps to quell it."They are not easy tasks," he said. "It is an intense and complex incident."The fire at the Matanzas Supertanker Base has killed at least one person and injured 125 others, with another 14 firefighters still missing. It also forced officials to evacuate more than 4,900 people and shut down a key thermoelectric plant on Monday after it ran out of water, sparking concerns about additional blackouts.Those injured were treated mostly for burns and smoke inhalation. More than 20 remain hospitalized, with five of them in critical condition."This situation has us very worried at the moment because there are problems with electricity, with the environment, with the people who are still living here," said Adneris Díaz a 22-year-old cafe owner.The eight-tank facility plays a crucial role in Cuba's electric system: it operates an extensive oil pipeline that receives Cuban crude oil that is then ferried to thermoelectric plants that produce electricity. It also serves as the unloading and transshipment center for imported crude oil, fuel oil and diesel.The facility caught on fire late Friday after lightning struck one of its tanks, sparking several explosions as it spread over the weekend. The first tank was at 50% capacity and contained nearly 883,000 cubic feet (25,000 cubic meters) of fuel. The second tank was full.Officials have yet to provide an estimate of damages.The blaze comes just days after the government announced scheduled blackouts for the capital of Havana amid a sweltering summer."The economic effects are clear," said Tahimi Sánchez, a 48-year-old cafe owner. "They are there, we will notice them and we will see them, but we are confident, and we are going to come out of all this well."
Cuba Supertanker Blaze Under Control -The fire at the supertanker base of Matanzas has been controlled and work is being done to extinguish small outbreaks, Manuel Marrero Cruz, the prime minister of Cuba, announced in a Twitter statement late Wednesday. “There is total control and reduction of smoke emission, without danger to people,” Cruz said in the statement. In a follow up Twitter statement, Cruz outlined that damage assessment had started “to plan the recovery”. “The dumping of water, via land and air, continues, with the aim of cooling the surface and being able to start the search for the disappeared,” Cruz noted. In a separate Twitter statement made earlier in the day, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, the president of Cuba, said, “we made progress in confronting the terrible fire in the Industrial Zone of Matanzas”. “Yesterday was a day of victory, but we cannot trust ourselves. The danger is still latent. My hug and deep respect for those who are there in the fight,” he added in the statement. As of August 10, 128 people have been treated and one person has died as a result of the supertanker fire, the official Cuba Presidency Twitter page highlighted late Wednesday. On the same day, the Cuba Presidency Twitter page outlined that air force helicopters had flown more than 240 flights, with each carrying two tons of water, in response to the supertanker blaze. The Cuba Presidency Twitter page also noted the work of the builders and hydraulic resources in the creation of dikes that prevented the spread of flames. On August 6, Susely Morfa González, the first secretariat of CPPCC in the provincial committee of Matanzas, announced in a Tweet that a fire had been caused by an electrical discharge at the base of the Matanzas supertanker.
Pollution teams continue work to reduce oil slick off east Kent coast – The Isle Of Thanet News --- Pollution response teams continue work to reduce an oil slick first reported 12 nautical miles off the east Kent coast at the end of July. Aerial surveillance flights continue to report reduced areas of sheen and vessels continue to work to collect and capture any visible surface oil. The Maritime Coastguard Agency, which is the lead organisation on the clean up operation says reports and surveillance work demonstrates that the slick is reducing and the risk to the shoreline diminishing. Reports have been received of minor spots of oil on the beaches at Deal and both HM Coastguard and pollution response contractors are undertaking regular patrols of the beaches. Oil found so far – which is confirmed to be from the same source as the slick – is of minor amounts and sparsely spread. The remotely operated underwater vehicle is continuing to survey the potential source but investigations are ongoing. Any oil found is being cleaned up by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency’s pollution response teams. A spokesperson for the Maritime and Coastguard Agency said: “We continue our work to do all we can to prevent oil from reaching the shore.” Work continues off the east Kent coast to keep an oil spill contained and prevent it from reaching the shore. The first report of the oil slick was made to the Maritime and Coastguard Agency by a Royal Navy vessel. The Agency is working with local partners to ensure a coordinated response.
This map shows where Europe gets its natural gas - and why economic disaster is looming if Russia cuts off its fuel supply - Russia is choking off Europe's natural gas supply in a bid to hit back against western sanctions.It cut the capacity of the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany to just 20% last month, contributing to the continent's energy crisis.Key gas benchmarks have soared since the start of June, with TTF Dutch natural gas futures surging 129% to 194 euros ($198) per-megawatt-hour."European gas prices are soaring again, approaching record highs, as a result of Nord Stream 1 flows falling to just 20% of capacity due to ongoing maintenance," Rystad energy analyst Karolina Siemieniuk said in a recent research note. "If Russian flows halt entirely, which is not out of the question, prices will skyrocket further."But Nord Stream 1 isn't the only pipeline that provides Europe with its natural gas.Gas fields in Azerbaijan, the North Sea, and northern Africa are also key sources of energy for the continent.Many European countries also import liquefied natural gas by ship - and the US now sends more super-cooled gas by boat than Russia does by pipeline.Russia has the capacity to ship gas to Germany at a rate of 1.76 million GigaWatt hours a day, according to the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Gas. Key routes include the Gazela pipeline, which runs through the Czech Republic, and the Yamal-Europe pipeline that runs from Western Siberia to Germany.But the European Union has also worked on initiatives to reduce its dependency on Russian gas. The Trans-Anatolian and Trans Adriatic pipelines, finished in 2018 and 2020 respectively, supply gas from Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz gas field to Greece, Italy, and Turkey.The EU also imports gas from the North Sea gas fields, which are the territory of Norway and the UK. Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and Ireland all receive gas via networks including Europipe-II and the Forties pipeline system.Lastly, Italy and Spain both import gas from key northern African sites including the Algerian natural gas hub of Hassi R'Mel.
Deadlock with Russia over Nord Stream gas turbine is not our fault, Siemens Energy CEO says - Siemens Energy CEO Christian Bruch said Monday that there is no technical justification for Russia to refuse the delivery of a turbine for the key Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline. His comments come amid a standoff between Germany and Russia over a piece of equipment that the Kremlin claims is holding back gas supplies to Europe. Germany's Siemens Energy, which provides equipment to the power industry, says it is ready to return the turbine to Russia after carrying out maintenance work in Canada. Moscow, however, says economic sanctions imposed by Canada, the European Union and Britain following the Kremlin's onslaught in Ukraine have prevented the turbine from being shipped back. Russia says it needs documentation to confirm the turbine is not subject to Western sanctions. Germany has contested this reasoning, saying the equipment is not affected by sanctions and accused Russia of not honoring its contracts for political reasons. Russia recently cut gas supplies to Europe via the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, the EU's single largest piece of gas infrastructure, to just a fifth of its capacity. Moscow has repeatedly denied it is weaponizing fossil fuel supplies. It is not yet known when or if Nord Stream 1 gas flows will return to normal levels.
Egypt Curbs Electricity to Export More Natural Gas to Europe – Egypt’s prime minister has said the country is curbing electricity use so that it can export more natural gas and generate foreign currency. Egypt will reduce street lighting, lights in public squares and large sports facilities, and illuminations outside government buildings will be switched off after working hours. Cairo is struggling to cope with the fallout of the conflict in Ukraine which has pushed the price of wheat up dramatically. Russia and Ukraine are the largest exporters of wheat worldwide whilst Egypt is the world’s biggest importer, with 80 percent of its supply coming from the two countries. Earlier this week Egypt met with delegates from the World Bank to discuss a $500 million food security loan to help the struggling country. As well as wheat, electricity, petrol and the price of other basic commodities have soared, causing huge problems in a country where a third of the population already live below the poverty line. In June the European Union signed a memorandum of understanding with the Zionist regime and Egypt to boost natural gas imports to Europe, in an effort to replace imports from Russia. Last year Russia accounted for 40 percent of the EU’s natural gas imports but since the war, Europe has said it will cut imports by two thirds in one year. Russia has reduced and cut off supplies of gas to several European countries in what analysts say is a punitive measure against sanctions in response to the war on Ukraine. In 2020 Egypt and the occupying regime of Israel signed a deal under which the regime exports roughly 20 million cubic meters of gas per day to Egypt where it is liquefied and shipped to European countries.
Potential curb on Australian LNG exports is another blow to Asia-Pacific gas markets -The Asia-Pacific gas market has suffered another blow after major natural gas producer Australia signaled it could potentially cut down liquified natural gas exports as the region battles tight gas supplies, high prices and competition from gas-short European buyers. Australia is looking to trim its overseas sales in favor of domestic consumption ahead of a projected shortfall in local supplies next year As energy protectionism takes hold globally, last week, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission called on Canberra to protect domestic gas supplies and curb LNG — cooled natural gas — exports after projecting the east coast of the country could face a shortfall of 56 petajoules of gas next year. For months, Asia-Pacific region has faced competition for fuel from European buyers looking to replace restricted Russian gas. These European countries, in scrambling for LNG to mitigate a shortage of pipeline gas ahead of the northern winter, have outbidded some less developed Asian countries. "To protect energy security on the east coast we are recommending the Resources Minister initiate the first step of the Australian Domestic Gas Security Mechanism (ADGSM)," ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb said last week. "We are also strongly encouraging LNG exporters to immediately increase their supply into the [local] market." Most of the gas used on Australia's east coast is produced by companies that are also LNG exporters to Asia-Pacific and other countries. The ADGSM stops these producers from exporting LNG if there is a shortfall domestically. While most LNG sales to overseas buyers are made through long-term contracts, Australian LNG producers also sell ad-hoc and non-contracted LNG on the spot market. Countries without the ability to strike competitive long-term contracts are forced to buy them on the spot market. It is this LNG supply that the ACCC says producers should avoid selling to the overseas market — currently flushed with gas-starved buyers — and save it for local consumers.
Europe Set to Start Winter Seriously Short of Diesel - Northwest Europe is forecast to begin a perilous winter with historically low amounts of diesel, a fuel that powers vast swaths of the economy. The region’s stockpiles of road diesel, heating oil and other diesel-type fuel are set to shrivel this November to the lowest level in data that goes back to the start of 2011, according to Wood Mackenzie Ltd. That means there’s a smaller-than-usual supply cushion as the continent braces for a potentially severe winter energy crisis. “We’re expecting stocks to draw at a seasonal rate, but we’re starting from this very low base,” said James Burleigh, the consultancy’s principal analyst of European oil markets, on why November inventories are expected to be so low. “On the demand side, we have the usual seasonal increase.” Diesel is vital for cars and trucks in Europe, where its use has historically been financially encouraged. Such fuels are also consumed by ships, and used by the construction and manufacturing sectors. Stockpiles in independent storage in the Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp oil-trading hub are at the lowest level for the time of year since at least 2008, according to data from Insights Global. Europe is structurally short of diesel-type fuel, regularly receiving cargoes from overseas. That natural shortage could become more of a problem early next year, when an EU ban on seaborne imports from Russia -- currently the continent’s single-biggest external supplier -- is set to take effect. It’s just one part of a broader energy crisis that’s engulfed the continent following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, sending the prices of natural gas and electricity soaring and fanning inflation. Even now, a time of year when Europe’s stockpiles typically build, there are signs of supply constraints. Oil refiner OMV Germany reported a “run” on heating oil and diesel. Austria, Switzerland and Hungary have also said they will release oil from reserves in recent months. Low water levels on the Rhine -- an important river for the shipment of fuels -- aren’t helping. When the water is shallow, barges are limited in how much they can load. That makes it harder to ship fuel into inland Europe from the continent’s oil trading hub, especially past the key waypoint of Kaub, which lies to the west of Frankfurt. Part of the problem in building stockpiles is that it’s not being incentivized by the market. Currently, fuel for delivery in the winter months is pricing at a discount to the August diesel futures contract. This structure, known as backwardation, signals a tight market and discourages traders from putting fuel into storage tanks. More recently, that structure has been fading, due to a combination of high refinery runs, healthy imports -- including Russian barrels still finding their way into Europe -- economic data and recessionary fears, according to industry analysts. Still, compared to historical norms, it remains strong.
Russia resumes oil supplies to Slovakia and Hungary but imports to Czechia remain halted - The Druzhba [Friendship] pipeline is resuming the transfer of oil to Slovakia and Hungary following MOL Group’s payment to Ukraine for the Russian oil transit. However, imports are still halted to Czechia, local media report, after Russian oil company Transneft cut the oil flow westwards, blaming sanctions for blocking transit payments. Slovnaft and its parent company Hungarian MOL Group announced on Tuesday they had initiated talks to make payments to Ukrainian operator Ukrtransnafta; news followed on Wednesday that Ukraine had received transit payments that Slovnaft and MOL Group had made on behalf of the Russian Transneft. Russian oil pipeline operator Transneft said it had restarted pumping oil through the southern branch of the Druzhba pipeline on August 10, after the pipeline was closed down a day earlier in a payment dispute, the spokesman for the company Igor Dyomin told PRIME. The oil flow was stopped because Transneft claimed that its Ukrainian counterpart Ukrtransnafta had been unable to receive transit fees due to Western sanctions. Transneft sent the fees, but Ukrtransnafta sent it back. Dyomin now confirms that Ukraine had confirmed having received the payment for Russian oil transit. Slovak Minister of Industry Richard Sulik described the situation as an administrative glitch unrelated to politics. “It is not a fault of Ukrainians or Russians”, said Sulik and cited a decision made in “a smaller office of a bank in Portugal or Belgium where they did not administer the payment” because this office considered administering the Transneft payment a breach of sanctions. Sulik said that this was the fourth time a disruption like that had occurred since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and that the current payments by Slovnaft to enable the transit are a temporary solution to maintain the flow during August. Flow further west to Czechia has not been resumed, however. “Disruption of the imports from the Druzhba pipeline does not limit the operations of Czech refineries”, said Czech Minister of Industry and Trade Josef Sikela on Twitter, adding that reserves contain oil for several days and that the country is working with Poland to begin imports into Czechia. In Czechia, Druzhba’s client is a Czech company Unipetrol controlled by Polish group PKN Orlen. Other alternative options of oil imports to Czechia include the use of the TAL pipeline from the Italian port city of Trieste, informed the Czech state pipeline operator Mero, a shareholder in TAL Group. Head of Mero Jaroslav Pantucek said the situation is not as serious as it looks. “Transneft confirmed supplies for the coming months. I think we are witnessing a negotiation game between individual parties”, he told Czech daily DenikN. The EU agreed to halt imports of Russian oil by December 5, 2022, but Czechia, Hungary and Slovakia were exempted from the embargo due to their limited options to find alternatives for Russian imports, effectively keeping Druzhba operations in place.
IEA: Russian oil production to fall by a fifth on EU import ban - Russian oil production is set to drop by 20% next year as the European Union’s import ban on Russian oil-product shipments kicks in, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). The Paris-based agency said on Thursday that gradual monthly declines in output will start as soon as this month as the Kremlin cuts back oil refining, and will quicken as the embargo comes into force. The IEA expects to see close to 2 million barrels a day shut in by the start of 2023, despite a healthy recovery in production in recent months. Read more: Oil prices sink as IEA warns worst of energy crisis 'yet to come' Brent crude was up 1.1% to $98.43 a barrel, while US West Texas Intermediate crude (CL=F) also rose 1.1% to $92.96. From 5 December, the EU is set to halt most crude purchases from Russia in a bid to cut off revenue streams that Russia uses to finance its war in Ukraine, before the restriction takes effect on 5 February 2023. In the past three months, Russia’s oil output has risen, reaching nearly 10.8 million barrels a day last month amid higher domestic oil-processing and robust exports as the country redirects crude flows away from the EU to Asia. It estimates some 1 million barrels per day of Russian products and 1.3 million barrels per day of crude would have to find new homes due to the planned EU bans. In July, Russian oil output was just 310,000 bpd below prewar levels, while total crude exports were down 580,000 bpd. That saw the country generate oil export revenues of $19bn, down from $21bn the month before, thanks to lower prices and slightly reduced volumes. The agency also raised its oil demand growth forecast for this year as surging gas prices were spurring "substantial" gas-to-oil switching among consumers. "Natural gas and electricity prices have soared to new records, incentivising gas-to-oil switching in some countries," the IEA said in its monthly oil report. Earlier this week, a European emergency gas plan to cut consumption came into force, asking EU member states to voluntarily cut gas use by 15% this winter to prepare for a potential Russian cut-off. The move will affect all households, power producers and industry. While the measures would initially be voluntary, the proposal includes a mandatory trigger should the supply situation deteriorate significantly.
Exxon in talks with unnamed party for Sakhalin--- US oil producer Exxon Mobil is in the process of transitioning its 30% stake in a Russian oil development "to another party," according to a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday. Hundreds of energy and consumer goods companies including BP, Equinor, Pepsico, Shell and Starbucks have left the country or transferred assets as a result of Russia's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine. Exxon did not name the other party in its filing. It was the operator of Sakhalin-1, a large oil and gas development in Russia's Far East, which produced 220,000 barrels of oil and gas per day as recently as 2021. Earlier this year, Exxon took a $4.6 billion impairment charge for exiting the development, its largest investment in Russia. A senior Russian lawmaker said on July 8 that Moscow would take control of the Sakhalin-1 oil and gas project that included Exxon Mobil, Japan's SODECO, India's ONGC Videsh as well as Russian energy giant Rosneft. Its output fell to just 10,000 bpd following Western sanctions on Russian commerce. Exxon declined to say what company or companies would take over its Russia assets. However, it has made significant progress exiting the Sakhalin-1 venture, spokesperson Casey Norton said. "As operator of Sakhalin-1, we have an obligation to ensure the safety of people, protection of the environment and integrity of operations," he added. "It's a complex process." A shift of assets to Rosneft would follow a path taken by others. France's TotalEnergies transferred a stake in Russia's Kharyaga oil field to Russian state producer Zarubezhneft.
Japan intends to keep stake in Sakhalin-1 oil project: industry minister -- Japan intends to keep a stake in the Sakhalin-1 oil and gas project in Russia, industry minister Koichi Hagiuda said on Monday, after Russia temporarily banned Western investors from selling shares in key energy projects. The project contributed to diversifying Japan's energy supply, Hagiuda told a news conference. "Sakhalin-1 is a valuable non-Middle East source for Japan, which depends on the Middle East for 90 per cent of its crude oil imports," said Haguida, the minister for economy, trade and industry. "There is no change in maintaining the interests of Japanese companies in it," he said. Russia has banned investors from so-called unfriendly countries from selling shares in banks and key energy projects, including Sakhalin-1, until the end of the year, stepping up pressure in a sanctions stand-off with the West. Sakhalin Oil and Gas Development, a Japanese consortium, owns 30 per cent of Sakhalin-1. Separately, an Aug. 2 Russian government decree gave foreign investors at the Sakhalin-2 liquefied natural gas (LNG) project a month to claim their stakes in a new entity that will replace the existing one. The foreign investors include Royal Dutch Shell and Japanese trading houses Mitsui & Co and Mitsubishi Corp. Hagiuda reiterated that Japan intended to have the Japanese trading houses maintaining stakes in Sakhalin-2. "We'll need to consider specific measures after confirming details of Russia's decision," he said. "The public and private sectors will work together to ensure a stable supply of LNG to Japan," Hagiuda said. They shared a basic policy on maintaining the stakes, and he hoped the trading houses would start the procedure for converting to the new entity if they could meet Russia's conditions. Mitsui & Co has a 12.5 per cent stake in Sakhalin-2. Mitsubishi Corp holds 10 per cent.
Eni South Coral FLNG Aims To Reboot Mozambique’s Rovuma --Eni has proposed that its partners in the Rovuma LNG project construct a second floating liquefied natural gas processing facility to circumvent political risks that have disrupted ExxonMobil from building an onshore megaplant. Italy’s Eni is aiming to construct a second floating liquefied natural gas (FLNG) processing facility offshore Mozambique to fast-track monetization of the ultradeepwater gas reserves it is developing with its partners ExxonMobil and China National Petroleum Co. (CNPC) in the Mozambique Rovuma Venture SpA (MRV). No final investment decision (FID) has been made, but Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi told analysts during a 2Q earnings call on 29 July that Eni’s partners “are positive” and view the option as a temporary fix to work around political risk that has stalled ExxonMobil’s movement on the $30-billion onshore LNG facility originally planned. In late 2020, an Islamic militant insurgency that had been building over 3 years intensified attacks along the Cabo Delgado coast, home to not only ExxonMobil’s Rovuma LNG facility but also TotalEnergies’ $20-billion Mozambique LNG development. The attacks prompted the French major to declare force majeure in late April 2021 and ExxonMobil to postpone its FID to 2022 or even 2023. Rovuma isn’t having to wait to produce LNG from its upstream operations in Mozambique’s Area 4 block, however, thanks to the decision in 2017 to construct the $7-billion Coral-Sul FLNG facility which arrived at its mooring site 50 km (31 miles) offshore of the north coast of Mozambique in January. In June it took on its first feedstock from the ultradeepwater Coral South reservoir from connections to six subsea production wells.
NOSDRA Confirms Fresh Oil Leakage In Rivers Community – National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA) has confirmed a fresh oil spillage in Bodo community, Rivers state. The Director-General of the agency, Idris Musa, said in a text to Channels Television that the leak took place on the Trans-Niger Pipeline, operated by Shell Petroleum Development Company joint venture in the riverine area. An eyewitness had told TheCable that the underground pipeline had been discharging crude oil into the environment and spreading to farmlands since Tuesday night. The community had in 2008 experienced two large-scale oil spills from SPDC’s facilities with the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) making efforts to tackle the problem of spillage in the oil-rich state.
Nigeria's oil production decreased to 1.08m b/d in July -Nigeria’s crude oil production decreased in July to an average of 1.08 million barrels per day (bpd) from 1.16 million the previous month.The Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) said this in its latest crude oil and condensate production data for July 2022.The report shows a 6.42 percent decrease from June’s production figures.With the addition of condensate, oil output in July grew to a total of 1.31 million bpd from 1.40 million posted last month. Condensate is a mixture of light liquid hydrocarbons, similar to a light (high API) crude oil — usually separated out of a natural gas stream at the point of production (field separation) when the temperature and pressure of the gas are dropped to atmospheric conditions.In January, February, March, April, and May, the country’s crude oil production averaged 1.39 million bpd, 1.25 million bpd, 1.24 million bpd, 1.22 million bpd, and 1.02 million bpd, respectively.Nigeria has consistently failed to meet the 1.8 million bpd production quota set by the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).In March, Timipre Sylva, minister of state for petroleum resources, had said poor investment and the exit of oil majors were affecting Nigeria’s ability to meet the oil production quota.He also mentioned security issues as another major factor contributing to the lack of significant growth of the sector, adding that the drive towards renewable energy by climate enthusiasts had discouraged funding for the industry.
Nigeria loses N891bn to gas flaring --Nigeria lost N891bn to gas flaring in 18 months, according to data from the Nigerian Oil Spill Monitor, an arm of the Nigerian Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency, NOSDRA, released on Sunday. The data revealed that the country lost a total of N707bn in 2021 and N184bn in the first half of 2022, totaling N891bn. According to the NOSDRA report, oil and gas companies operating in the country flared a total of 126 billion standard cubic feet, SCF, of gas in the first half of 2022, leading to a loss of $441.2 million, (about N183.54 bn) in the six-month period. On the other hand, in 2021, about 23,862.271 barrels of oil (3,770,238.864 litres/119 tanker trucks) were spilled. Brent International was sold for an average of $71 per barrel in 2021, bringing total revenue loss in that year to $1.7m. The estimation put the equivalent of the volume of gas flared in the first half of 2022 to carbon dioxide, CO2 emission of 6.7 million tonnes in the oil producing areas, 4.56 per cent higher than the 120.5 billion SCF of gas flared in the second half of 2021, and capable of generating 12,600 gigawatts hours of electricity. On the other hand, the quantity of gas flared in the first six months of 2021 was capable of generating 14,000 gigawatt-hour of electricity, and an equivalent of 7.4 million tonnes of CO2 emission.Giving a breakdown of the gas flared in the country in the first six months of 2022, the agency disclosed that while companies operating in the offshore oilfields flared 62.2 billion SCF of gas, companies operating onshore flared 63.9 billion SCF of gas, valued at $223.6 million. In 2021, there were around 382 publicly available oil spill records. Out of the 382 occurrences, a total of 33 of these oil spill sites were not visited by a joint investigation team, and 122 of these had no estimated quantity of oil spilled provided by the companies involved.
Petrobras wraps up sale of shallow-water fields off Brazil - In an update last week, the Brazilian giant informed that it has finalised the sale of all its stakes in the producing fields of Peroá and Cangoá and the Malombe discovery to the company 3R Petroleum Offshore, previously known as OP Energia. The company explained that this sale was concluded with a payment of $8.07 million with the adjustments provided for in the contract. The firm elaborated that this amount was received in addition to the $5 million paid when the purchase and sale contract was signed. Aside from this amount, Petrobras is expected to receive up to $42.5 million in contingent payments, depending on future Brent prices and asset development. Petrobras held 100 per cent interest in the Peroá and Cangoá fields, located in shallow waters, whose average production from January to June 2022 was about 572 thousand m3/day of non-associated gas. In addition, the firm had a 100 per cent stake in the BM-ES-21 exploratory block, situated in deep waters, where the Malombe discovery is located. Petrobras wraps up sale of shallow-water fields off Brazil PPER-1 platform; Source: Petrobras The fields’ production system is based on up to six wells connected to the unmanned offshore platform PPER-1, which sits at 67 meters of water depth. Among the wells connected to the platform, three are operational in Peorá and one is operational in Cangoá while another well is directly tied to the gas pipeline connecting the platform to the UTGC processing facility onshore. On the other hand, the Malombe discovery was made in 2011 with the drilling of the 1-ESS-206 exploration well in the BM-ES-21 concession, which was acquired during ANP’s 6th bidding round in 2004. Petrobras explained that the development concept for this discovery consisted of a subsea tie‐back to the PPER-1 platform. The Brazilian player pointed out that this transaction is in line with its portfolio management strategy and the improved allocation of its capital, aiming to maximise value and provide a greater return to society. In line with this, the company is increasingly concentrating its resources on assets in deep and ultradeep waters, where it has “shown a great competitive edge over the years.”
Refined Products: India's Russian refined product imports treble - Not only crude oil but also cheaper refined fuels from Russia are gaining ground in the Indian market since the outbreak of the Ukraine war in February. Imports of Russian refined products have tripled in recent months from the preceding three-year average, according to energy cargo tracker Vortexa. India's imports of Russian crude slowed a bit in July, dropping 5% to 917,000 barrels per day (bpd), according to Vortexa. With 1.06 million barrels per day (mbd), China remained the biggest importer of sea-borne Russian crude in July. Europe imported below 1.9 mbd of sea-borne Russian crude oil in July, marginally less than in the previous three months but took in 13% more diesel over the previous month. Russian oil made up 19% of India's total crude imports in July compared with 20% in June. Rising Russian imports have displaced supplies from the Mideast Gulf, US and West Africa, with imports from these regions falling by nearly 20% in May-July over the first quarter of 2022, according to Vortexa analyst Serena Huang. Indian imports of Russian refined products have risen close to 100,000 bpd over recent months, with fuel oil making up 70% of these, followed by biofuels and secondary refinery feedstocks. The average import was 30,000 bpd over the last three years. In comparison, the average Chinese imports of Russian products have been stable over time between 50,000 and 60,000 bpd. India is a net exporter of refined products. In April-June, it exported nearly 60% more products in volume terms than it imported, with the biggest export items being diesel, petrol, jet fuel and naphtha. LPG, fuel oil and pet coke are the biggest imports. Fuel oil makes up a fifth of the total products' imports. Its domestic consumption rose 14% year-on-year in April-June in part due to industries' shift from pricey natural gas to cheaper liquid fuel.
SPRC faces B39m suit over oil spill -- Restaurant and hotel entrepreneurs at Mae Ramphueng beach and Koh Samet yesterday filed a lawsuit against Star Petroleum Refining Public Co Ltd (SPRC) to demand 38.8 million baht in compensation for recent oil spills that have harmed the area. Representatives of 38 plaintiffs -- all entrepreneurs -- gathered at Rayong Provincial Court on Tuesday. They said they lodged the civil lawsuit because the spill in January affected their businesses. The entrepreneurs said that they had discussed compensation with SPRC for over seven months, however, no progress had been made. .
Chinese oil giant Sinopec likely to enter Lankan fuel market amid Beijing's debt-trap – As Sri Lanka continues to remain in the Chinese debt trap, the biggest petrochemical company in China, Sinopec, is likely to start retail operations in the Lankan fuel market, local media said citing sources. The sources said that Sinopec is likely to enter Sri Lankan market for importing, distributing and selling petroleum products, reported Daily Mirror. This comes as Sri Lankan Cabinet Ministers in the month of June approved a proposal to allow more companies from oil-producing nations to import oil and start retail operations in Sri Lanka. The proposal was tabled by Power and Energy Minister Kanchana Wijesekera. It is pertinent to note that the economic crisis which is the worst in Sri Lanka’s history has prompted an acute shortage of essential items like fuel. Long queues at fuel stations in Sri Lanka are the new normal and prices fluctuate subject to availability. The economy of the country is bracing for a sharp contraction due to the unavailability of basic inputs for production, an 80 percent depreciation of the currency since March 2022, coupled into a lack of foreign reserves, and the country’s failure to meet its international debt obligations. This recent decision to let the Chinese enter in Sri Lanka’s fuel retail operations is prompted by a severe foreign exchange shortage. At present, 90 percent of Sri Lanka’s fuel supply is through the State-owned Ceylon Petroleum Corporation, and the remaining 10 percent by Lanka Indian Oil Corporation (IOC). Sinopec is already present at the Port of Hambantota where it operates an oil depot.
Iran’s key gas pipeline near Azerbaijan near completion - The National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC) authorities say a major gas pipeline project that is being constructed along the Caspian Sea is near completion amid Iran’s plans to increase gas supply to Azerbaijan under a swap deal with Turkmenistan. NIGC’s head of dispatching operations Mohammad Reza Joulayi said on Sunday that the Rasht- Chelavand pipeline will be ready for gas transfer within the next few days. Joulayi told the Iranian Oil Ministry’s news service Shana that the 42-inch, 150-kilometer gas pipeline will play a major part in Iran’s gas supply arrangements with Azerbaijan. The NIGC started the construction of Rasht-Chelavand gas pipeline in 2019 with the aim of expanding its gas transfer network in colder regions in north of the country. However, the project accelerated in November after Iran signed a major deal for swap of gas with Turkmenistan for delivery to Azerbaijan. Iraq is negotiating with Iran to secure increased supply of natural gas for its power plants. The deal allows Iran to receive 5-6 million cubic meters per day of gas from Turkmenistan for use in its northeastern regions while it delivers the same amount of gas to Azerbaijan through its pipeline facilities near Astara. Iran’s Oil Minister Javad Owji said in June that he had reached agreements with Turkmen and Azerbaijani officials to double the amount of gas agreed for swap between the three neighbors. The new gas pipeline from Rasht to Chelavand, which is located near Astara and is home to a major pressure bosting station, will enable the NIGC to significantly increase its gas supply to Azerbaijan. The pipeline also boosts NIGC’s capacity to respond to the gas demand in the Ardabil province where gas consumption reaches record highs during cold winter months.
OPEC’s Oil Exports Are Rising In August - Crude oil exports from OPEC producers rose by 223,000 barrels per day (bpd) in the first week of August, compared to the average shipments for the full month of July, according to data from trade flow intelligence firm Petro-Logistics cited by commodity analyst Giovanni Staunovo on Wednesday. In the first seven days of August, OPEC’s crude oil exports averaged 21.325 million bpd, per Petro-Logistics data. Libyan crude oil exports rebounded, after the African producer, exempted from the OPEC+ deal, lifted a force majeure in the middle of July. Libyan crude oil shipments jumped by 333,000 bpd to 927,000 bpd, according to Petro-Logistics. Last week, Petro-Logistics said that Saudi Arabia, OPEC’s top producer and de facto leader, raised its crude oil exports in July to the highest level in 26 months. “The Kingdom is finally supplying volumes in line with its #OPEC quota after restraining supply in the first-half of 2022,” Petro-Logistics said. Despite raising its crude oil production in July by 500,000 barrels per day, the OPEC+ group was still well below its collective quota, pumping 2.75 million bpd below targeted output, an Argus survey found on Wednesday. OPEC+ saw its combined crude oil production at 38.70 million bpd last month, with Saudi Arabia, OPEC’s top producer and de facto leader, raising its supply to the market the most. Still, the 500,000-bpd July increase of the collective OPEC+ oil production was lower than the 648,000-bpd rise the alliance had set for each of the months of July and August, after which it will have rolled back all the cuts from May 2020. Last week, OPEC+ gave the go-ahead to raise the collective oil production target for September by 100,000 bpd. The increase for the entire group means less than a 30,000 bpd rise for Saudi Arabia, and less than a 10,000 bpd increase for the UAE. Those two countries are believed to be the only two producers in OPEC+ and in the world currently holding enough spare capacity to raise their oil production.
OPEC’s Oil Production Rises But Still Well Below OPEC+ Target -OPEC’s total crude oil production rose by 216,000 barrels per day (bpd) in July compared to June, but combined production from the 10 OPEC members part of the OPEC+ pact continued to lag the targets in the agreement, OPEC’s monthly report showed on Thursday.Total OPEC-13 crude oil production averaged 28.90 million bpd last month, according to secondary sources in OPEC’s Monthly Oil Market Report. The 10 members in the OPEC+ pact, with Libya, Iran, and Venezuela exempted, pumped just over 25 million bpd in July, figures from OPEC’s secondary sources showed.To compare, per the OPEC+ deal, the 10 OPEC members with quotas had acollective target crude oil production of 26.276 million bpd. As usual and as per the agreement, top OPEC producer Saudi Arabia raised its production the most, by 158,000 bpd to 10.714 million bpd in June. This compares with a Saudi target of 10.833 million bpd. The Kingdom self-reported to OPEC production that was 100,000 bpd higher than secondary sources’ estimates and in line with its quota, 10.815 million bpd.Elsewhere within OPEC, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Kuwait boosted their respective production by nearly 50,000 bpd each, according to secondary sources, and pumped in line with their quotas. Iraq also increased its output, but was below its target.African producers Nigeria and Angola continued to severely lag behind their quotas amid a lack of investment and capacity. Angola’s production even fell by 19,000 bpd to 1.165 million bpd, compared to a July target of 1.502 million bpd. Nigerian production was nearly flat month over month and averaged 1.183 million bpd in July, according to OPEC’s secondary sources. Nigeria’s target for July was much higher—at 1.799 million bpd.Earlier this week, an Argus survey found that despite raising its crude oil production in July by 500,000 barrels per day, the OPEC+ group was still well below its collective quota, pumping 2.75 million bpd below targeted output.
Opec+ added 500,000 b/d in July, remained below target =Opec+ deal participants raised collective crude output by 500,000 b/d in July, when the group began the final unwinding of its Covid-19 supply cuts. But Argus' survey finds the group's production of 38.70mn b/d was still 2.75mn b/d below its quotas in the month. Dwindling spare capacity, underinvestment and sabotage have crippled the coalition's ability to return the roughly 10mn b/d it removed from the oil markets in May 2020. Opec+ will nominally complete that process this month, when its collective ceiling will rise by 648,000 b/d as it did in July. It has agreed to lift production by a further 100,000 b/d, shared pro rata, in September. Among Opec members, Saudi Arabia saw the highest monthly output increase in July, made possible by firm export levels and a seasonal rise in domestic crude burn for air conditioning. Saudi seaborne exports surged by over 550,000 b/d on the month to around 7.37mn b/d in July, including its half of shipments from the Neutral Zone shared with Kuwait, according to preliminary Argus tracking. Analysts said that between 60,000 b/d and 120,000 b/d of these may have emerged from stocks. Saudi Arabia can take its production up to 11mn b/d this month — a level it has reached only twice, according to its self-reported submissions to the Joint Oil Data Initiative (Jodi) covering January 2002-May 2022. After months of prioritising refinery run increases, neighbouring Kuwait also sharply boosted exports to 1.86mn b/d, including the Neutral Zone. Libya, which is exempt from the Opec+ deal, raised output by 70,000 b/d after lifting force majeure restrictions at all oil field and terminals in mid-July. Output has been recovering since, with export shipments resuming from the Es Sider, Ras Lanuf, Mellitah and Zueitina terminals, although lingering fractures in the political landscape continue to cast a shadow over the long-term stability of Libya's oil sector. Underperforming in July was Nigeria, whose output stood 570,000 b/d under the month's quota. Oil minister Timipre Sylva in late June said Abuja hoped to meet its production target by the end of August, but made no headway in July when force majeure was in place at the Bonny Light export terminal and output reduced of the Forcados and Bonga crude streams. Venezuelan production declined by 60,000 b/d, after a fire knocked out a natural gas pipeline key to the Jose refining and petrochemical complex. Caracas has been struggling to process recent shipments of Iranian crude sent to state-owned PdV's 140,000 b/d El Palito refinery, which have had to be rerouted. Analysts said sanctioned Venezuelan and Iranian grades are starting to suffer from competition with heavily discounted Russian sour crude, which is making its way towards refiners in Asia-Pacific. Non-Opec output rose by 220,000 b/d in July. Kazakhstan restored production at the offshore Kashagan field in mid-July, pushing the country's output to near 1.4mn b/d, and the return of Azerbaijan's ACG field from maintenance in late June added 40,000 b/d. Kashagan's return was cut short when a gas leak was discovered on 3 August, reducing output by more than 200,000 b/d. The field resumed production on the night of 9-10 August. Kazakhstan, the non-Opec group's second-largest producer, has been falling sharply behind its quota since March.
IEA Sees Little Chance OPEC+ Will Supply More Oil -- OPEC+ is unlikely to increase output in the coming months because of limited spare capacity, according to the International Energy Agency. Furthermore, the “largely symbolic” 100,000 barrel-a-day hike promised for September may actually turn into a cut as Russian production declines, the IEA said. “Comparatively low levels of operational spare production capacity, held mainly by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, may thus all but rule out substantial further OPEC+ output increases in the coming months,” the IEA said in its monthly report on Thursday. The outlook from the Paris-based organization that advises major developed economies on energy policy suggests the burden of satisfying global oil demand growth in the latter part of the year will fall on countries outside the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies. Non-OPEC+ supply is projected to rise by 1.7 million barrels a day this year and 1.9 million next year, according to the IEA. That’s a significant acceleration compared with last year, but still falls short of 2.1 million barrels a day of demand growth expected in 2022 and 2023.
Dodgy Demand Data? The Oil Price Collapse Conspiracy - WTI crude oil prices fell to their lowest point since early February on Thursday, giving up virtually all gains since Russia invaded Ukraine. WTI crude has lost ~9.5% over the course of the week, marking the largest one-week percentage decline since Aprilamid growing fears that oil demand will collapse when western nations descend into a full-blown recession.While oil producers are certainly beginning to feel the heat, it’s refiners like Valero Energy (NYSE: VLO), Marathon Petroleum Corp.(NYSE: MPC), and Phillips 66 (NYSE: PSX) who have been hardest hit by the pullback thanks to a sharp decline in their refining margins aka crack spreads.For months, refiners have been enjoying historically high refining margins, with the profit from making a barrel of gasoil, the building block of diesel and jet kerosene, hitting a record $68.69 in June at a typical Singapore refinery. The margin later settled in the high 30s a few weeks later, a level still nearly four times higher than the $11.83 at the end of last year, and some 550% above the profit margin at the same time in 2021.But crack spreads have now gone into full reverse: according to Refinitv data, Asian gasoline margins plunged more than 102% in July to a discount of 14 cents a barrel to Brent crude, a far cry from a premium of $38.05 a barrel they reached in June. Asian refining margins have now crashed to just 88 cents a barrel over Dubai crude, from a record $30.49 in June.The effect: a sharp rise in inventories from the United States and Singapore to Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp.Refiners are being forced to cut gasoline output to minimize losses and switch to producing more profitable fuels.Indeed, Taiwan’s Formosa Petrochemical Corp. (6505.T), Asia’s top fuel exporter, is planning to reduce operating rates at its residue fluid catalytic cracking (RFCC) units by 5% in the coming weeks, with a Formosa spokesman telling Reuters that the company plans to sell more very low sulphur fuel oil (VLSFO) due to higher margins for those products.The collapse in oil prices has been so epic and unexpected that some oil pundits are now accusing the Biden administration of fabricating low gas demand data in a bid to hammer oil prices.To wit, in late June the EIA shut down reporting for several weeks, ostensibly due to a server malfunction. But as ForexLive has pointed out, gasoline demand data has been consistently bad ever since the EIA returned: “Maybe there’s an issue with reporting or maybe it’s a conspiracy“, ForexLive has declared.
Oil prices edge up as strong economic data feeds hopes for demand (Reuters) - Oil prices edged up on Monday, hovering near their lowest levels in months in volatile trading as positive economic data from China and the United States fed hopes for demand despite nagging fears of a recession. Brent crude futures were up 93 cents, or 0.9%, at $95.85 a barrel by 11:20 a.m. ET (1520 GMT). U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude was at $89.68 a barrel, up 67 cents, or 0.8%. Last week, fears that a recession could dent energy demand pushed front-month Brent prices down 13.7% to their lowest since February. It was Brent's biggest weekly drop since April 2020, and WTI lost 9.7%. Both contracts recouped some losses on Friday after jobs growth in the United States, the world's top oil consumer, unexpectedly accelerated in July. On Sunday, China also surprised markets with faster-than-expected growth in exports. China, the world's top crude importer, brought in 8.79 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude in July, up from a four-year low in June, but still 9.5% less than a year earlier, customs data showed. In Europe, Russian crude and oil products exports continued to flow ahead of an impending embargo from the European Union that will take effect on Dec. 5. Last week, the Bank of England warned of a protracted recession in Britain. In terms of U.S. production, energy firms last week cut the number of oil rigs by the most since September in the first drop in 10 weeks. Analysts at Goldman Sachs said they believe the case for higher oil prices remains strong, with the market remaining in a larger deficit than they expected in recent months.
Oil: U.S. Crude Back at $90 on China Buying; CPI Worries Restrain Rally -- The same China that drove oil prices to six-month lows last week helped shore them above the $90-per-barrel zone on Monday as commodity markets were mixed ahead of this week’s much anticipated Consumer Price Index report for July. China surprised markets with faster-than-expected growth in oil purchases for last month. The world's top crude importer took in 8.79 million barrels per day in July, up from a four-year low in June, but still 9.5% less than a year earlier, customs data released at the weekend showed. U.S. West Texas Intermediate oil, which serves as the benchmark for U.S. crude, settled up $1.75, or almost 2%, at $90.76 per barrel. WTI dropped about 10% last week after striking a six-month low of $87.03. Sunil Kumar Dixit, chief technical strategist at SKCharting.com, said a trade above $96.60 could change WTI’s short-term momentum and set it up for a rally towards $99 and $101. Otherwise, WTI could stumble again, resuming its journey south, toward the support cluster of $88-$85-$82, he said. Brent, the London-traded global benchmark for crude, settled up $1.73, or 1.8%, at $96.65. On Friday, Brent struck a six-month low of $92.79. Brent also lost 14% last week in its worst weekly loss since the COVID-19 outbreak of April 2020 that virtually destroyed energy demand. Whatever rebound oil sees over the next 48 hours could be capped by concerns over what the CPI report for July -- due on Wednesday -- could be. Pump prices of U.S. gasoline — one of the biggest components of CPI — have fallen from June record highs of $5 a gallon to under $4 now. That could certainly take some heat off the headline CPI number when the July update is released on Wednesday. Despite that, core CPI, stripped off volatile gasoline and food prices, is expected to increase by 0.5% month-over-month and 6.1% year-on-year. The FOMC has already hiked interest rates four times since March, bringing key lending rates from nearly zero in February to as high as 2.5% last month, in an attempt to curb inflation. The committee has another three rate revisions left before the year is over, with the first of that due on Sept. 21. As of Monday afternoon, Investing.com’s Fed Rate Monitor Tool showed a 67% chance that the September rate hike will be 75 basis points — the same as in June and July. The 75-basis point hike, incidentally, was the highest in 28 years when it was introduced two months back.
Crude oil prices rise as Russia suspends exports to Europe through pipeline - Russia announced it is suspending crude oil exports through its Druzhba pipeline, leading to price increases. The move cuts off the flow of oil to Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. Russian pipeline operator Transneft blamed the situation on its counterpart in Ukraine, telling Russian state-owned news agency RIA Novosti that the Ukrainian company stopped the oil transport because of a problem with Russia's ability to pay. Insider reported that Russia's failure to pay was a result of Western sanctions., and that a Transneft spokesperson said the pipeline's northern section will continue to function normally. That section of the pipeline provides oil to Poland and Germany via Belarus. Soon after the announcement that the Ukrainian part of the pipeline would be halted, crude oil prices jumped, with Brent crude increasing 1.36% to nearly $98 a barrel, Insider reported. WTI crude went up 1.22%, reaching almost $92 a barrel. The situation arose just two over weeks after Russian state-owned energy company Gazprom cut natural gas flow to Germany, reducing supplies through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to just 20%. The pipeline had reopened at 40% capacity a week earlier after being down for 10 days for scheduled maintenance. Gazprom blamed that situation on sanctions that held up the return of a turbine that had been sent to Canada for repairs in June. Europe is heavily reliant on Russian energy, importing about 40% of its gas and 30% of its oil from Russia.
Oil prices slip amid chance of Iran nuclear deal supply boost (Reuters) - Oil dropped over $1 a barrel on Tuesday, approaching a multi-month low hit last week, pressured by the latest progress in talks to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear accord, which would eventually allow Tehran to boost exports in a tight market. The European Union on Monday put forward a "final" text to revive the deal. A senior EU official said a final decision on the proposal, which needs U.S. and Iranian approval, was expected within "very, very few weeks". Brent crude 1fell $1.34, or 1.4%, to $95.31 a barrel at 0815 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude dropped $1.25, or 1.4%, to $89.51. Talks have dragged on for months without a deal. Still, Iran's crude exports, according to tanker trackers, are at least 1 million barrels per day below their rate in 2018 when then U.S. President Donald Trump exited the nuclear agreement, so an agreement could allow a sizeable boost in supply. Oil soared earlier in the year as Russia's invasion of Ukraine added to supply concerns, with Brent hitting $139 in March, close to its all-time high, in March. Concern of economic slowdown have since weighed. Brent fell as low as $92.78 on Friday, its lowest since February, as the Bank of England's warning on Thursday of a drawn-out downturn intensified fears of slowing fuel use. In another bearish sign, China's crude oil imports in July fell 9.5% from a year earlier, customs data showed. China is the world's largest crude importer.
Oil Softens after EIA Downgrades 2022, 2023 Demand Outlook -- West Texas Intermediate futures nearest delivery slipped in market-on-close trade Tuesday after U.S. Energy Information Administration revised lower its world oil demand forecast for the fourth consecutive month in August, citing protracted economic weakness and rising inflation across industrialized countries that are part of Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. In its Short-term Energy Outlook released this afternoon, Washington-based energy watchdog forecasted global oil demand would rise by 2.08 million barrels per day (bpd) this year, down from a 2.23 million bpd growth rate seen in its previous forecast, to 99.43 million bpd. The downward revision was mostly attributed to consumption weakness in OECD industrialized countries. "Although supply disruptions have kept crude oil prices around $100 a barrel, crude oil prices have come down slightly in July as concerns of slower economic growth or a recession become more prevalent," said EIA its monthly outlook. These concerns are reflected in the University of Michigan's survey of consumer sentiment, which recorded its lowest reading on record in June, with data going back to November 1952. Likewise, consumer sentiment in the Euro Area has decreased, reaching record lows in July. On the supply side, EIA downgraded its 2022 production forecast to 100.21 million bpd this year, down 210,000 bpd from July outlook, mostly driven by output losses within Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. U.S. crude oil production in seen growing to 11.9 million bpd this year and 12.7 million bpd in 2023, which would set a record for most U.S. crude oil production in a year. The current record is 12.3 million bpd set in 2019. Earlier in the session, both the U.S. and international crude benchmarks got a leg up on media reports suggesting Russia suspended oil shipments through the southern leg of the Druzhba pipeline, effectively cutting supplies to three Central European countries - Hungary, Czech Republic, and Slovakia. Transneft, a sanctioned energy giant that controls transit through much of the Druzhba network, claimed on Tuesday that a transit fee for August was returned to buyers after European sanctions blocked the company's access to the funds. Hungary's major refiner MOL said it had initiated talks for alternative payment schemes aimed at restarting crude flows. At settlement, nearby month delivery WTI slipped $0.26 to $90.50 bbl, and the ICE Brent contract for October delivery fell $0.34 to $96.31 bbl. NYMEX September RBOB gained 7.4 cents to $2.9602 gallon, while NYMEX September ULSD contract rallied 15.47 cents to $3.3338 gallon.
Brent-WTI Oil Price Spread at Highest Point Since 2014 - The price spread between Brent and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) oil increased to a high of $13.26 per barrel on July 29, the highest price spread since January 14, 2014, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) highlighted in its latest short term energy outlook (STEO). This wide Brent-WTI spread reflects supply and demand dynamics in Northwest Europe, according to the EIA, which outlined in the STEO that the difference had come down in the first few trading days of August but remained high. “Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has resulted in shifting trade patterns, leaving Europe to find substitutes for Russia’s oil,” the EIA noted in the STEO. “This change has driven up the price of Brent contracts to a level high enough to reduce Asia’s imports of Brent crude oil and to retain more oil in Europe. The Brent-WTI spread has also increased enough to attract more imports of crude oil from the United States into Europe,” the EIA added. In the STEO, the EIA highlighted that, from March through July, the Brent-WTI spread averaged $6.05 per barrel, which it said was an almost $2.50 per barrel increase from the first two months of the year. The organization forecasted in the STEO that the Brent-WTI spread will average $6 per barrel in 2023, up $2 per barrel from the EIA’s July STEO forecast. “This high spread will keep exports from Europe to Asia subdued and encourage higher imports from the United States, both of which will likely be necessary as the EU reduces crude oil imports from Russia by 90 percent by the end of the year,” the EIA stated in the August STEO. “Although supply disruptions have kept crude oil prices around $100 per barrel, crude oil prices have come down slightly in July as concerns of slower economic growth or a recession become more prevalent,” the EIA added. “These concerns are reflected in the University of Michigan’s survey of consumer sentiment, which recorded its lowest reading on record in June, with data going back to November 1952. Likewise, consumer sentiment in the Euro Area has decreased, reaching record lows in July,” the EIA continued. In its August STEO, the EIA raised its Brent crude oil price forecast for 2022 and 2023 but lowered its WTI forecasts for the same period. According to the August STEO, the EIA now sees Brent spot prices averaging $104.78 per barrel this year and $95.13 per barrel next year. The organization’s previous forecast saw Brent spot prices averaging $104.05 per barrel in 2022 and $93.75 per barrel in 2023. As for WTI, the EIA now sees WTI spot prices averaging $98.71 per barrel this year and $89.13 per barrel next year. In its July STEO, the EIA saw WTI spot prices averaging $98.79 per barrel in 2022 and $89.75 per barrel in 2023.
WTI Dips After Bigger Than Expected Crude Build - --Crude prices were marginally lower today after early gains were erased on indications that Russian crude shipments via the southern leg of a major pipeline to Europe may resume in a few days after being suspended.“Energy traders faded the rally that stemmed from the halting of oil shipments because it wasn’t triggered by an escalation from the Russians,” said Ed Moya, senior market analyst at Oanda Corp. "Europe is going to figure out how to allow the payments that were behind that disruption," he added.Also weighing on trading is the potential return of Iranian oil to the market. The US and Iran have just weeks to decide whether they want to revive their nuclear deal, after European Union diplomats presented parties with a final draft accord.But for now, the inventory issues remain top of mind... API
- Crude +2.156mm (-400k exp)
- Cushing -627k
- Gasoline +910k
- Distillates 1.376mm
For the 2nd straight week, API reports a crude inventory build (despite expectations of a small draw)...WTI was hovering around $90.60 ahead of the API data and dipped on the crude draw...
Oil Slides Ahead of US Inflation Data, Inventory Report-- Oil futures nearest delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange and Brent crude traded on the Intercontinental Exchange moved lower early Wednesday after the American Petroleum Institute late Tuesday reported large builds in domestic crude and distillate inventories during the first week of August, fueling concerns over weak demand this summer. In addition, investors await the release of closely watched inflation data in the United States that is expected to show the first month-on-month decrease in the headline inflation since April, easing pressure on the Federal Reserve. Economists expect annualized rate of inflation in the U.S. to have decelerated from 9.1% in June to 8.7%, bringing monthly increase to 0.2%, which would be the smallest monthly gain since January 2021. Gasoline prices likely brought notable relief for headline inflation, with global supply chain pressures further easing from the spring lockdown across China. What's more, core inflation, excluding volatile food and energy prices, is seen to have fallen to 0.5% month-on-month, which should suggest inflation in the broader economy has peaked. A slight decline in headline inflation in July could fuel speculation that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates by only 50 basis points at its next meeting in September, less than the last two decisions that saw an increase of 75 basis points each. Heading into the data's release, U.S. equity futures edged higher and the U.S. Dollar Index lost some ground against its global peers to trade below 106 but failed to lend support for the oil complex in early trading. Nearby-month delivery West Texas Intermediate dropped $1.56 to $88.91 barrel (bbl), and the ICE Brent contract for October delivery declined $1.69 to $94.62 bbl. NYMEX September RBOB fell 2.93 cents to $2.9399 gallon, while NYMEX September ULSD contract pulled back 7.83 cents to $3.2539 gallon. Separately, API reported Tuesday afternoon that commercial crude oil stocks rose 2.156 million bbl last week, well above calls for a 200,000 bbl increase. If confirmed by U.S. Energy Information Administration data Wednesday morning, this would be the second consecutive weekly build in domestic crude oil inventories. Stocks at the Cushing, Oklahoma, tank farm, the New York Mercantile Exchange delivery point for WTI futures, also rose 910,000 bbl. Gasoline stocks fell 627,000 bbl in the week reviewed compared with estimates for a 500,000 bbl downturn. API data show distillate inventories rose 1.376 million bbl as of Aug. 5, missing calls for a draw of 500,000 bbl. Further weighing on the complex, EIA on Tuesday forecast global oil demand would rise by 2.08 million barrels per day (bpd) this year, down from a 2.23 million bpd growth rate seen in its previous forecast, to 99.43 million bpd.
WTI Rebounds Despite Big Crude Draw & Production Increase; Gasoline Demand Jumped- Oil prices extended losses this morning - amid some notable volatility around US CPI - after a bigger than expected crude build reported by API, the imminent reopening of crude flows to Europe from Russia through Ukraine, and continued weakness in real wages."Crude oil prices rose on Tuesday on news pipeline flows of crude oil from Russia via Ukraine to Europe had been halted over a payment dispute of transit fees. The line, however, is expected to reopen within days but it nevertheless highlights and supports the current price divergence between WTI futures stuck around $90, amid rising US stockpiles and slowing gasoline demand, and Brent," Saxo Bank said in a note on its website. For now, all eyes are the official data to confirm (or deny) the API report... DOE
- Crude +5.457mm (-400k exp)
- Cushing +723k
- Gasoline -4.978mm
- Distillates +2.166mm
After the prior week's surprise build, analysts expected a small draw this week (while API reported another sizable build). However, analysts were seriously wrong with crude inventories rising by 5.457mm. Cushing stocks are also up for the 6th straight week... (Graphics Source: Bloomberg) Total crude stockpiles were virtually unchanged for a second week, with a 5.5 million barrel build in the commercial crude inventory almost entirely offset by a draw of 5.3 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. US Crude production rose to a new cycle high while the rig count dipped last week...Gasoline demand picked up notably last week - back to normal...
Oil Above $90 as Soft CPI Takes Down Dollar; U.S. Crude and Gasoline Offset -- Crude advanced firmly into the $90-per-barrel territory as investors celebrated a weaker-than-expected U.S. consumer price reading that dragged rate hike expectations and the dollar lower. Oil prices initially tumbled as much as 2% on the day as the flow of oil reportedly resumed on the Russian-owned Druzhba pipeline, after a brief blockade. The market went deeper into the red after the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported a second straight weekly build of five million barrels in crude balances. But the agency also cited a drop of about five million barrels in gasoline inventories, and that helped offset the bearish sentiment hanging over the market. The weak dollar was the clincher for those seeking direction in crude. The Dollar Index, which pits the greenback against six majors led by the euro, hit a one-month low of 104.51. The dollar tumbled after the Labor Department reported that the Consumer Price Index rose by 8.5% during the year to July versus a 9.1% annual expansion in June that marked its most in 41 years. Economists polled by U.S. media had expected an 8.7% growth in the annual CPI reading for last month. For July itself, the index posted zero growth, versus an expansion of 1.3% in June. Money market traders immediately priced in a higher probability for a 50-basis point, or half percentage point, hike at the Federal Reserve’s next rate revision meeting on Sept. 21. Prior to this, bets had been heavy for a 75-basis point, or three quarter percentage point, increase. West Texas Intermediate, the benchmark for US crude, settled up $1.43, or 1.6%, at $91.33 per barrel. It rose just over $1.90 at the day’s peak for a session high of $92.42, and slid more than $2.80 later to reach an intraday bottom of $87.67. Brent, the London-traded global benchmark for crude, settled up $1.09, or 1.1%, at $97.40. It rose almost $2.10 for a session high of $98.40, and tumbled nearly $2.70 for an intraday bottom of $93.64. Both WTI and Brent were up about 3% on the week. That was after last week’s slump that wiped 10% off the U.S. benchmark and nearly 14% off the London-based crude gauge. WTI also hit a six-month low of $87.03 last week while Brent slumped to $92.79, its lowest since February. Crude oil inventories jumped by 5.458 million barrels during the week ended August 5 against a build of 73,000 barrels forecast by analysts tracked by Investing.com In the previous week to July 29, crude stockpiles had also risen nearly five million barrels, or by 4.467 million to be precise. The latest surge in crude stockpiles came as exports of crude fell almost 40% last week to 2.11 million barrels from a previous 3.51 million. Production of crude also ticked higher, to an estimated 12.2 million barrels per day from 12.1 million. In the case of gasoline, the top automobile fuel in America, inventories declined by 4.978 million barrels last week, against expectations for a drop of 633,000 barrels. In the previous week, gasoline balances rose by 163,000 barrels. The drop in gasoline stockpiles came as the United States exported 1.13 million barrels of the fuel last week, the most in a week since December 2018. Domestic demand for gasoline was also strong as per seasonal trends. Last week’s demand was 9.123 million barrels, just slightly lower than year-ago levels of 9.43 million. U.S. consumption of gasoline dipped last month as pump prices hit record highs of $5 per gallon, prompting Americans to conserve on fuel. Prices have fallen since to just above $4 per gallon, encouraging demand again. The EIA also reported an outflow of 5.3 million barrels from the US emergency oil reserve last week, bringing the balance in the so-called Strategic Petroleum Reserve to 464.6 million barrels — its lowest since April 1985. In the case of distillates, stocks surprisingly grew by 2.166 million barrels last week. The expectation had been for a decline of 667,000 barrels. In the previous week, distillates had fallen by 2.4 million barrels. Known as middle-of-the-barrel oil, distillates are refined into the diesel that runs trucks, buses, trains and ships, as well as the fuel needed to fly airplanes.
Crude Oil Higher; IEA, OPEC Disagree Over 2022 Demand Growth -- Oil prices rose Thursday, boosted by the International Energy Agency lifting its forecast for crude demand growth, adding to the week’s gains on the back of weaker-than-expected U.S. inflation data. By 09:05 ET (13:05 GMT), U.S. crude futures traded 1.8% higher at $93.55 a barrel, while the Brent contract rose 1.6% to $98.94. U.S. Gasoline RBOB Futures were up 0.9% at $3.0969 a gallon. The Paris-based intergovernmental organization raised its outlook for 2022 demand by 380,000 barrels per day, citing steep price rises in competing energy sources. "Natural gas and electricity prices have soared to new records, incentivising gas-to-oil switching in some countries," the agency said in its monthly oil report. This news has been received positively even though OPEC took a contrary view, cutting its forecast for growth in world oil demand in 2022 for a third time since April. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries said, in its monthly report Thursday, it expects oil demand to rise by 3.1 million barrels per day in 2022, down 260,000 barrels per day from the previous forecast. "Global oil market fundamentals continued their strong recovery to pre-COVID-19 levels for most of the first half of 2022, albeit signs of slowing growth in the world economy and oil demand have emerged," OPEC said in the report. On the supply side, the IEA said Russia’s oil output is set to fall roughly 20% by the start of next year as a European Union import ban comes into force, with close to two million barrels a day shut in by the start of 2023. Oil prices are up around 5% this week, rebounding from the largest weekly drop since April 2020 last week, helped by a reassessment of the Federal Reserve’s likely monetary tightening path in the wake of the softer-than-expected U.S. CPI release. Still, the rise in U.S. oil inventories last week and the resumption of crude flows on a pipeline supplying central Europe capped further price gains. U.S. crude oil stocks rose by 5.5 million barrels in the most recent week, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said Wednesday, more than the expected increase of 73,000 barrels. “Lower crude oil exports helped with the inventory build,” said analysts at ING, in a note. “U.S. crude oil exports fell by 1.4MMbbls/d to 2.11MMbbls/d over the week- the lowest weekly export number since January.”
OPEC Downgrades Crude Demand Outlook; IEA Says Gas-to-Oil Switching Impacts Forecast - Oil demand shows signs of waning as the global economy slows, bringing the world crude market close to balance, OPEC officials said Thursday in a new outlook. The Saudi Arabia-led cartel cut its world oil demand outlook by 260,000 b/d from an earlier forecast to about 100 million b/d for 2022. It held its expectation for next year to 102.7 million b/d.OPEC cited slowing economic conditions across the globe, notably including the United States. The U.S. government earlier this month reported that gross domestic product shrank in both the first and second quarters of 2022. OPEC last month had downgraded its global economic growth forecasts for 2022 to 3.1% from 3.5%. The growth outlook for the United States, the world’s largest economy, was slashed by OPEC in July to 1.8% this year from 3%, and to 1.7% in 2023 from 2.1%.China, the second-largest economy in the world, is expected to grow by 4.5% this year, according to OPEC, down 60 basis points. The 2023 forecast for China was unchanged at 5.0% A combination of the 40-year high inflation in the United States, war in Ukraine that fueled an energy crisis in Europe, and lingering pandemic woes in Asia intersected to fan recession fears and dimmish OPEC’s outlook.“Downside risks remain, stemming from the ongoing geopolitical tensions, the continued pandemic, ongoing supply chain issues, rising inflation, high sovereign debt levels in many regions, and expected monetary tightening by central banks in the U.S., the UK, Japan and the Euro-zone,” OPEC researchers wrote in the organization’s monthly oil market assessment.Still, the researchers emphasized, they continue to expect both economic and oil demand growth overall this year, with momentum continuing into 2023, albeit at a more moderate level than previously forecast. They said 2022 demand would average a “healthy” 3.1 million b/d above 2021 levels, putting consumption on par with pre-pandemic levels. OPEC noted “the recently observed trend of burning more crude in power generation.”Meanwhile, the International Energy Agency (IEA) on Thursday lifted its 2022 global oil demand forecast by 380,000 b/d, yet it only expects growth of 2.1 million b/d.The global energy watchdog pegged world oil demand at 99.7 million b/d in 2022 and 101.8 million b/d in 2023.“Natural gas and electricity prices have soared to new records, incentivizing gas-to-oil switching in some countries,” the Paris-based agency said in its monthly oil report. “These extraordinary gains, overwhelmingly concentrated in the Middle East and Europe, mask relative weakness in other sectors.” IEA’s researchers noted ebbing use of travel fuels in developed countries, “aligning with more negative economic sentiment.”IEA said world oil supply hit a post-pandemic high of 100.5 million b/d in July, following maintenance season and increases in output this year by both OPEC countries and the United States. If the world market can maintain the higher pace through the year – offsetting lower levels in the first half of 2022 — it could roughly align supply with expected demand yet this year.OPEC and an allied group of oil-producing nations this month agreed to lift output by 100,000 b/d in September. That would bring the OPEC-plus total production target back to pre-pandemic levels after a long recovery from the depths of virus outbreaks in 2020. The group has embarked on more sizable increases over the summer months.In the United States, production for the week ended Aug. 5 climbed by 100,000 b/d to 12.2 million b/d, marking a 2022 high, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said Wednesday in its Weekly Petroleum Status Report. U.S. demand over the last four-week period averaged 20.1 million b/d, down 2.4% from the same period last year, EIA reported. In the same span, gasoline consumption averaged 8.9 million b/d, down 6%.
OPEC, in Contrast to IEA, Sees Lower 2022 Oil Demand Growth (Reuters) -OPEC on Thursday cut its 2022 forecast for growth in world oil demand for a third time since April, citing the economic impact of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, high inflation and efforts to contain the coronavirus pandemic. The view from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries contrasts with that of the International Energy Agency, the adviser to industrialised countries, which earlier on Thursday raised its 2022 demand growth outlook. [IEA/M] OPEC in a monthly report said it expects 2022 oil demand to rise by 3.1 million barrels per day (bpd), or 3.2%, down 260,000 bpd from the previous forecast. The IEA raised its forecast by 380,000 bpd to 2.1 million bpd. Oil use has rebounded from the worst of the pandemic and is set to exceed 2019 levels this year even after prices hit record highs. However, high prices and Chinese coronavirus outbreaks have eaten into OPEC's 2022 growth projections. "Global oil market fundamentals continued their strong recovery to pre-COVID-19 levels for most of the first half of 2022, albeit signs of slowing growth in the world economy and oil demand have emerged," OPEC said in its report. OPEC cut its 2022 global economic growth forecast to 3.1% from 3.5% and trimmed next year to 3.1%, saying that the prospect of further weakness remained. "This is, however, still solid growth, when compared with pre-pandemic growth levels," OPEC said. "Therefore, it is obvious that significant downside risk prevails." Oil prices held on to an earlier gain after the OPEC report was released, finding support from the IEA's view on demand and trading above $98 a barrel [O/R] OPEC and allies, including Russia, known collectively as OPEC+, are ramping up oil output after record cuts put in place as the pandemic took hold in 2020. In recent months OPEC+ has failed to fully achieve its planned production increases owing to underinvestment in oilfields by some OPEC members and by losses in Russian output. The report showed OPEC output in July rose by 162,000 bpd to 28.84 million bpd, a smaller increase than pledged. OPEC's take on the outlook for 2023 suggests that the market could remain tight. OPEC left its 2023 world demand growth projection unchanged at 2.7 million bpd and expects supply from non-member countries to rise by 1.71 million bpd, meaning OPEC will need to pump around 900,000 bpd more to balance the market. While the 2023 outlook for overall non-OPEC supply was left steady, OPEC sees a slight acceleration in U.S. shale growth.
ICE Brent briefly Tops $100 on Global Oil Demand Optimism -- Oil futures settled Thursday's session higher after International Energy Agency lifted its global demand projections for this year and next by 500,000 bpd to 99.7 million bpd and 101.8 million bpd, respectively, citing growing oil consumption in European Union as high natural gas prices force power generators to switch to oil for electricity production. "Natural gas and electricity prices have soared to new record highs, incentivizing gas-to-oil switching in some countries," said Paris-based energy watchdog in its August Oil Market Report released this morning. Gas-to-oil switching in power generation is likely to offset weakness in other sectors triggered by economic slowdown and a partial shutdown of industrial capacities across the EU. Similar sentiment was echoed in the Monthly Oil Market Report released this morning by OPEC economists that pointed to a trend of burning more crude in European power generation as one of the reasons for demand to remain strong this year. Despite this expectation, OPEC revised its demand projections downward from the previous month's assessment but still shows healthy growth of 3.1 million bpd this year and 2.7 million bpd in 2023. OPEC expects total oil demand to average around 100 million bpd in 2022. For 2023, the forecast for world oil demand growth remains unchanged at 2.7 million bpd, with total oil demand averaging 102.7 million bpd. On the supply side, OPEC estimates the 13-member cartel increased crude production by 162,000 bpd last month to 28.84 million bpd, with Saudi Arabia leading production gains with 136,000 bpd. Kingdom's direct communication indicated a July production gain of 169,000 bpd and output at 10.815 million bpd. The Saudi's quota for July was 10.833 million bpd. Kuwait and United Arab Emirates crude oil production increased 48,000 bpd for both countries to 2.773 million bpd and 3.13 million bpd, respectively. Both countries produced at their July production quotas. Iraq crude production increased 24,000 bpd to 4.49 million bpd in July according to secondary sources, while the country reported a 69,000-bpd monthly increase and output at 4.584 million bpd, which was their quota for last month. Only three of the 10 OPEC countries met their July production quotas, with the biggest laggard Nigeria, where July crude output at 1.17 million bpd was little changed on the month while 629,000 bpd or 35% below a 1.799 million bpd quota. Angola, with output slipping 23,000 bpd in July to 1.161 million bpd, was 341,000 bpd or 23% less than quota. The three countries that are not part of the OPEC+ accord -- Iran, Libya, and Venezuela, all saw production declines in July. Iranian crude production slipped 16,000 bpd to 2.553 million bpd, Libyan output declined 23,000 bpd to 621,000 bpd, and Venezuelan production was down 45,000 bpd to 665,000 bpd. In financial markets, the U.S. dollar index suffered steep losses for a second straight session Thursday after a key measure of U.S. producer prices unexpectedly fell in July for the first ti
Oil settles up as IEA hikes 2022 demand growth forecast – Oil prices settled up more than $2 on Thursday after the International Energy Agency raised its oil demand growth forecast for this year as soaring natural gas prices have some consumers switching to oil. Brent crude futures gained $2.20, or 2.3%, to settle at $99.60 a barrel. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures settled up $2.41, or 2.6%, to $94.34. “Natural gas and electricity prices have soared to new records, incentivising gas-to-oil switching in some countries,” the Paris-based agency said in its monthly oil report. It raised its outlook for 2022 demand by 380,000 barrels per day (bpd). By contrast, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) cut its 2022 forecast for growth in world oil demand, citing the impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, high inflation and efforts to contain the pandemic. [OPEC/M] OPEC expects 2022 oil demand to rise by 3.1 million bpd, down 260,000 bpd from the previous forecast. It still sees a higher overall global oil demand figure than the IEA for 2022. Prices were also boosted as the U.S. dollar extended losses against other major currencies after a report showed U.S. inflation was not as hot as anticipated in July, prompting traders to dial back expectations for rate hikes by the Federal Reserve. A rise in U.S. oil inventories last week and resumption of crude flows on a pipeline supplying central Europe capped price gains. U.S. crude oil stocks rose by 5.5 million barrels in the latest week, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said, more than the expected increase of 73,000 barrels. Gasoline product supplied rose to 9.1 million barrels per day, though that figure shows demand down 6% over the last four weeks from a year earlier. The premium for front-month WTI futures over barrels loading in six months was pegged at $4.38 a barrel, the lowest in four months, indicating easing tightness in prompt supplies. Top U.S. Gulf of Mexico oil producer Shell said a pipeline leak prompted it to halt production at three U.S. Gulf of Mexico deepwater platforms designed to produce up to 410,000 barrels of oil per day combined. Resumption of flows on the southern leg of the Russia-to-Europe Druzhba pipeline further calmed global supply worries. On Tuesday, Russian state oil pipeline monopoly Transneft said Ukraine had suspended flows to parts of central Europe since early this month because Western sanctions prevented it from receiving transit fees from Moscow. Meanwhile, physical oil prices around the world have begun to sag, reflecting easing concerns over Russian-led supply disruptions and heightened worries about a possible global economic slowdown.
Oil Falls 2% on Expectations That U.S. Gulf Supply Disruption Will Ease - (Reuters) -Oil prices plunged around 2% on Friday, on expectations that supply disruptions in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico would be short-term, while recession fears clouded the demand outlook. Futures, however, were still on track for a weekly gain. Brent crude futures fell $1.45, or 1.5%, to settle at $98.15 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude fell $2.25, or 2.4%, to settle at $92.09 a barrel. Both contracts gained more than 2% on Thursday. Brent gained 3.4% this week after last week's 14% tumble on fears that rising inflation and interest rates will hit economic growth and demand for fuel. WTI rose 3.5%. Crews were expected to replace a damaged oil pipeline piece nL1N2ZO154 by the end of the day on Friday, a Louisiana port official said, allowing for the resumption of production at seven offshore U.S. Gulf of Mexico oil platforms. [nL1N2ZO154] On Thursday, top U.S. Gulf of Mexico oil producer Shell said it halted production at three deepwater platforms in the region. The three platforms are designed to produce up to 410,000 barrels of oil per day combined. The Amberjack pipeline, one of two stopped by the leak, has restarted at reduced capacity, Shell spokesperson Cindy Babski said. The Mars pipeline remained offline but is expected to resume operation later on Friday, she said. The market also absorbed contrasting demand views from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and the International Energy Agency (IEA). "We are seeing an economic slowdown, but its unclear if it's as big a slowdown as some of the recent outlooks have been predicting," European sanctions on Russian oil are due to tighten later this year while a six-month coordinated energy release agreed by the United States and other developed economies is due to run its course by the end of the year. On Thursday OPEC cut its forecast for growth in world oil demand in 2022 by 260,000 barrels per day (bpd). It now expects demand to rise by 3.1 million bpd this year. The IEA, meanwhile, raised its demand growth forecast to 2.1 million bpd, citing gas-to-oil switching in power generation The IEA also raised its outlook for Russian oil supply by 500,000 bpd for the second half of 2022 but said OPEC would struggle to boost production. In the United States, import prices fell for the first time in seven months in July, helped by a strong dollar and lower fuel and nonfuel costs, while consumers' one-year inflation outlook ebbed in August, the latest signs that price pressures may have peaked. U.S. oil rigs rose three to 601 this week, energy services firm Baker Hughes Co said. The rig count, an indicator of future output, has been slow to grow with oil production only seen recovering to pre-pandemic levels next year.
Crudes Fall 2% as Russian Oil Supply Resumes, USD Rebounds -- While the front month ULSD contract advanced for a fourth session, West Texas Intermediate and RBOB futures settled Friday's session with losses between 1% and 2.5% triggered by a sharp rebound in the U.S. dollar index and a resumption of Russian oil exports to several Central European countries after a problem over transit payments with Ukraine was resolved. Slovakia's economy minister Richard Sulik said on Friday oil shipments through a critical pipeline that delivers Russian crude and refined products have resumed at about 50% of capacity, with additional volumes expected to come back online in coming days. Earlier this week, Russian state pipeline operator Transneft halted shipments through the southern branch of the Druzhba pipeline, which runs through Ukraine to the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary, citing European Union sanctions and issues with processing payment. Slovakia, Hungary, and Czech Republic receive practically all their oil imports through the Druzhba pipeline. EU leaders agreed in May to embargo most Russian oil imports shipped by sea but allowed for Druzhba flows to landlocked countries in Central Europe. Earlier this month, Russian state-owned energy giant Gazprom limited natural gas flow through the Nord Stream pipeline to just 20% of capacity, also citing issues with sanctions, delivering only 33 million cubic meters a day. Protracted disruption to European energy supplies have already pushed several large EU economies to the brink of recession, with Germany reporting no growth in nominal gross domestic product for the second quarter. The economic slowdown is likely to intensify as winter approaches and energy prices rise further in Europe, with several countries on the continent vulnerable to Russia completely cutting off gas flow. Underpinned by uncertainty over Russian supplies and elevated demand in the EU from scorching hot summer weather, spiking natural gas prices are prompting more gas-to-oil switching in power generation. This dynamic is underpinning support for ULSD futures. In its monthly oil market report, International Energy Agency revised higher its global oil demand projections for the remainder of the year, citing accelerated gas-to-oil switching for power generation in the EU, Middle East, and parts of Asia amid inadequate supplies and sky-high gas prices. "With several regions experiencing blazing heatwaves, the latest data confirm increased oil burn in power generation, especially in Europe and the Middle East but also across Asia. Fuel switching is also taking place in European industry, including refining," said IEA. At settlement, nearby-month delivery WTI fell $2.25 to $92.09 bbl, and the ICE Brent contract for October delivery dropped $1.45 to $98.15 bbl. NYMEX September RBOB settled 2.55 cents lower at $3.0460 gallon, while the NYMEX September ULSD contract advanced 3.38 cents to $3.5178 gallon.
Israeli airstrikes massacre Palestinian children in Gaza . - For three days, Israel has bombarded the densely populated and impoverished coastal enclave of Gaza, targeting leaders of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), civilians and their property in the worst flare-up since May 2021. As of Sunday evening, Israel’s “surgical” air strikes have killed at least 43 Palestinians, including Taysir al-Jabari and Khalid Mansour, senior PIJ military leaders in northern and southern Gaza. Fifteen children and four women have been killed since Friday. At least 300, more than half of them women and children, have been injured and at least 31 families made homeless. One Israeli civilian and two soldiers have been lightly wounded by shrapnel. The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said its aerial bombardment was a preemptive operation aimed at preventing rocket attacks planned by Palestinian Islamic Jihad against Israel. It warned that its operation could last up to a week. The continuous outbreaks of violence—Israel has launched at least eight murderous assaults on the besieged enclave since 2005 when it “withdrew” from Gaza—flows inexorably from the 15-year-long Israeli siege of Gaza that has been aided by the butcher of Cairo, General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt, and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. The blockade, an act of collective punishment banned under international law, has turned the enclave into an open-air prison for its two million inhabitants. Most lack even the most basic essentials of life, clean water, sanitation and electricity, while more than half the population is unemployed and the vast majority live in appalling poverty. At the same time as waging war on Gaza, the caretaker government under Yair Lapid, who heads an eight-party coalition that includes one of Israel’s Arab parties and several Jewish parties ostensibly committed to a Palestinian state alongside Israel, gave free rein to the far right to incite violence against the Palestinians in Jerusalem. Under the protection of armed Israeli security forces, 1,000 religious bigots, far right nationalists and settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in East Jerusalem on Sunday morning. They waved Israeli flags, prayed and chanted anti-Muslim and anti-Arab slogans, breaching long-standing agreements with Jordan, the official custodian of the site, whereby non-Muslims are not allowed to pray within the compound or display Israeli symbols. Israeli police have allowed settlers and far right activists entry to the site on a near-daily basis. The authorities allowed this latest provocation to go ahead as Israel’s military onslaught on Gaza entered its third day, amid concerns that this would incite Palestinian protests and clashes. In May 2021, similar provocations at the al-Aqsa Mosque compound coinciding with Ramadan led to Israel’s 11-day assault on Gaza that killed 256 Palestinians and extensive riots in Israel’s mixed cities of Haifa, Acre, Lod and Ramla. The latest conflict started on Monday with the storming by Israeli special forces of the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank. They fired live and rubber-coated bullets as well as tear gas at Palestinians and arrested senior Islamic Jihad leader Bassam al-Saadi, and his son-in-law, Ashraf al-Jada, at his home in Jenin. Pictures of al-Saadi being dragged across the ground accompanied by an attack dog provoked a storm of protest, amid fears for his life, from PIJ supporters. Islamic Jihad vowed revenge.
Israel kills second Islamic Jihad leader, Gaza death toll mounts -An Israeli airstrike killed a second senior commander in the Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad, the fighters said Sunday as the death toll from violence in Gaza rose to 31, including six children, according to Palestinian health officials. As Israel pressed on with its assault, Palestinian militants retaliated with barrages of rockets fired at Israel. The killing late Saturday of Khaled Mansour, who led the Iran-backedIslamic Jihad's operations in the southern Gaza Strip, came a day after another Israeli strike killed the militant's commander in the north.Egypt's President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has said officials were talking with both sides "around the clock" to ease the violence. A security source in Cairo said that Israel "has accepted" a ceasefire, adding that Cairo was waiting for the Palestinian response.A source from Islamic Jihad said that "discussions are under way at the highest levels towards calm", but warned that "the resistance will not stop if the occupation's (Israel) aggression and crimes do not stop".The death toll from violence in Gaza since Israel launched its latest strikes Friday rose to 41, including 15 children, the health ministry in the Palestinian enclave said on Sunday. More than 311 others were wounded in the attacks. Meanwhile in the West Bank, Israel pressed on with its operation against the Islamic Jihad group, arresting 20 suspects in overnight raids, the army announced on Sunday. Palestinian militants retaliated with rockets fired toward Israel, triggering air raid sirens in Jerusalem, the Israel army said Sunday. The Islamic Jihad later confirmed the group had fired rockets at Jerusalem. The hundreds of rockets fired by Islamic Jihad in response is why the operation continues, said Israeli Justice Minister Gideon Saar, a member of the decision-making security cabinet. Another potential flashpoint loomed on Sunday as Jews commemorating two ancient temples visited a major Jerusalem mosque compound that they revere as vestige of those shrines. Palestinians deem such visits a religious and political affront. The fighting began with Israel’s killing of a senior Islamic Jihad commander in a wave of strikes Friday that Israel said were meant to prevent an imminent attack.The militants said the strike also killed five civilians, including a child and three women, as it flattened several homes. Hamas, the larger militant group that rules Gaza, appeared to remain on the sidelines of the conflict for now, keeping its response limited. Israel and Hamas fought a war barely a year ago, one of four major conflicts and several smaller battles over the last 15 years that exacted a staggering toll on the impoverished territory’s 2 million Palestinian residents.Daily life in the strip has come to a standstill, while the electricity distributor said the sole power station shut down due to a lack of fuel after Israel closed its border crossings.
The names and faces of the 15 children killed in Gaza | Israel-Palestine conflict News By Al Jazeera Staff -Israel and the Palestinian armed group Islamic Jihad declared a truce late Sunday after three days of heavy Israeli bombardment on the besieged Gaza Strip.According to the latest official information from the Palestinian health ministry, 44 Palestinians, including 15 children, were killed and at least 350 civilians wounded.Since 2008, Israel has waged four wars on the Palestinian territory, killing nearly 4,000 people – one-quarter of them children.According to data compiled by Defense for Children International, at least 2,200 children have been killed by the Israeli military and Israeli settlers across the Occupied Palestinian Territory since 2000 – the beginning of the second intifada.Here are the names and faces of the 15 children aged 18 and under killed by Israeli air strikes over the past three days:
Ceasefire Holds In Gaza After 44 Killed In 3-Day Israeli Bombardment -- Following the major flare-up in fighting between Israel and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), which saw Israel launch days of airstrikes on Gaza starting Friday, a delicate ceasefire appears to be holding Monday. "An Egypt-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian factions came into effect at 11:30pm local time (8:30pm GMT) on Sunday," Middle East Eye reports. "Israel’s assault on Gaza, which began on Friday, has left 44 Palestinians dead, including 15 children, and injured hundreds more."On the Israeli side, three civilians have been reported injured by shrapnel from rockets fired from the Gaza Strip, after hundreds were launched by PIJ and Hamas through the weekend."Twelve hours in, the ceasefire appeared to holding, as residents of the besieged Palestinian enclave began to clear rubble and continued to mourn the dead," Middle East Eye continues.The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that over 350 rockets were launched from the strip within merely the first two days of the conflict. Israel's response, dubbed 'Operation Breaking Dawn', reportedly took out at least two top Islamic Jihad commanders. By the time Sunday's ceasefire took effect, the IDF updated its tally to a whopping 1,100+ rockets fired by PIJ over the prior three days. Many of these fell short, landing in Gaza itself, but others were intercepted by the Iron Dome defense system. Central Israel came under threat along with southern towns, causing emergency alarms to blare in Tel Aviv through much of the weekend.Like with past Israeli air assaults on the densely populated Gaza Strip, the past 48 hours have seen widespread reports of the deaths of small children as well as women. Additionally some 300 Gazans have been reported wounded, while the IDF is stressing that it takes great care to avoid civilian casualties as it attacks the small strip of land that includes some 2.3 million Palestinians living there.
Israel cheers its wins, Gaza mourns its dead as cease-fire holds - — — A cease-fire between Israel and Islamic Jihad militants in Gaza brought a tense calm to both territories Monday, ending a three-day conflict that killed 44 Palestinians and showcased the precision of Israel’s U.S.-backed antimissile defense system, known as Iron Dome, which kept the Israeli casualty count at zero. “The United States is proud of our support for Israel’s Iron-Dome, which intercepted hundreds of rockets and saved countless lives,” President Biden said in a statement Sunday. Biden welcomed the Egyptian- and Qatari-brokered cease-fire, which began Sunday at 11:30 p.m. local time, and commended Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid for his “government’s steady leadership throughout the crisis.” Though both sides claimed victory, the cease-fire promised no long-term fix for the 15-year-long standoff between the militant-controlled Gaza Strip and Israel — which, along with Egypt, has blockaded the coastal enclave since 2007, effectively trapping more than 2 million people in an area roughly twice the size of the District of Columbia. Besides a handful of cross-border firings in the minutes after the cease-fire’s start, the agreement held into Monday and enabled humanitarian aid to reach Gaza for the first time since Israel cut off outside supplies early last week. Dwindling electricity threatened to shutter hospitals as staff continued to treat the more than 350 people wounded in the fighting. Although the first fuel trucks crossed into Gaza at 7:30 a.m. Monday, officials said it would take time to restart the 75-megawatt generator that provides much of the strip’s eight hours of electricity a day. Gazans filled the streets Monday, many coming out of their houses for the first time since Friday afternoon, when surprise airstrikes shattered what had been a day of prayers and beach trips. Retail blocks were bustling, but pockets of despair were not hard to find. Just off Mansoura Street, Riyad Qaddoum, 65, relived the moment Friday when he heard a loud explosion around the corner from his house. Running to investigate, he found the bodies of three people killed when two missiles struck a motorcycle ridden by a suspected Islamic Jihad militant. Among the dead was his 5-year-old granddaughter, Alaa Qaddoum. She had been standing outside her aunt’s house waiting for a walk to the park. Blood spots and shrapnel marks still speckled the wall. “Why couldn’t they have waited until [the motorcycle] was away from the kids?” Riyad Qaddoum said above the music from two crowded funeral tents on his street, one for Aala, another for a 60-year-old man who had been sitting on the stoop of a mosque when the strike killed him. “She was excited to start kindergarten.” Fifteen of the 44 killed in Gaza were children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. Palestinian officials in Gaza said Israel was responsible for all the deaths..
China sending fighter jets to Thailand for joint military exercises -- The Chinese air force is sending fighter jets and bombers to Thailand for a joint exercise with the Thai military on Sunday. The training will include air support, strikes on ground targets and small and large-scale troop deployment, the Chinese Defense Ministry said in a statement posted on its website. China's expanding military activities in the Asia-Pacific region have alarmed the United States and its allies and form part of a growing competition between the world's two largest economies. US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin visited Thailand in June as part of an effort to strengthen what he called America's unparalleled network of alliances and partnerships in the region. The Falcon Strike exercise will be held at the Udorn Royal Thai Air Force Base in northern Thailand near the border with Laos. Thai fighter jets and airborne early warning aircraft from both countries will also take part. The training comes as the U.S. holds combat drills in Indonesia with Indonesia, Australia, Japan and Singapore in the largest iteration of the Super Garuda Shield exercises since they began in 2009. It also follows China's sending warships, missiles and aircraft into the waters and air around Taiwan in a threatening response to a visit by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to the self-ruled island, which China claims as its territory.
China Extends Taiwan Drills Past Sunday Deadline, Says Training Under "Real War Conditions" - China's military drills in six zones surrounding Taiwan were scheduled to wind down and end on Sunday, but on Monday Beijing announced it is extending the threatening military drills which Taipei officials have slammed as a "blockade" and simulation for future invasion. The drills were originally set for four days, but have now been extended into this new week.Not only have the drills launched in the wake of the last Tuesday into Wednesday visit to the self-ruled island of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi disrupted surrounding air traffic and shipping lanes key to global trade, but they've upped tensions with Washington, given the USS Ronald Reagan carrier strike group was ordered to stay in waters near Taiwan for longer than planned.The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Eastern Theatre Command confirmed Monday that it is "continuing joint training under real war conditions, focused on organizing joint anti-submarine warfare and naval strikes."This follows, as we detailed Sunday, on the heels of a "close quarters" standoff wherein ten warships each from the Chinese and Taiwan sides closely shadowed each other the Taiwan Strait. A total of 66 PLA aircraft and 14 warships were observed conducting exercises aimed at Taiwan into Sunday evening, with the aircraft repeatedly violating Taiwan's Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ).In announcing its military on a high state of alert and confirming it sent additional ships through the strait, Taiwan's defense ministry again said China is "simulating attacks on the island of Taiwan and our ships at sea."Further, according to the AP on Monday, "The exercises would include anti-submarine drills, apparently targeting U.S. support for Taiwan in the event of a potential Chinese invasion, according to social media posts from the eastern leadership of China’s ruling Communist Party’s military arm, the People’s Liberation Army.""The military has said the exercises involving missile strikes, warplanes and ship movements crossing the midline of the Taiwan Strait dividing the sides were a response to U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to the self-ruled island last week," the report details. Meanwhile, at a moment it appears that China's ongoing military squeeze is set to (at least for the foreseeable future) hold the democratic-run island 'hostage' - also threatening vital trade - the pressure on Washington to act more firmly in support of Taipei is growing.
China’s Economy Slumps Further, Raising Fears Of Layoffs - Both official and independent data show that China’s economy has slumped further in the second quarter of the year, with manufacturing slowing down unexpectedly and a downturn in the real estate sector intensifying. This has raised fears of a wave of layoffs in the second half of the year adding to already severe unemployment issues in China. China’s economy deteriorated further in July, said a China Beige Book International (CBBI) report in early August, which provides independent economic data. Factory outputs and new production orders in China reached their slowest since mid-2020, and retail employment was at its worst in more than two years, according to the latest CBBI survey. Deterioration in revenue growth for manufacturers and retailers curtailed profits, the report said. On Aug. 1, official data revealed even worse numbers in manufacturing and real estate. Data released by the Chinese regime’s statistics bureau showed that the purchasing managers index (PMI) of China’s manufacturing industry for July was 49.0 compared with 50.2 in the previous month, a decrease of 1.2 percentage, which is below the critical level of 50. In July, with more cases of COVID-19 emerging in parts of China, the communist regime continued its strict “zero-COVID” measures, putting many cities in lockdown, including industrial centers and economic hubs. Manufacturing activity had rebounded in June after the lockdowns were lifted in parts of mainland China but have now slumped again. The China Real Estate Index Research Institute publicized that in July, the average price of new residential buildings month-on-month in 100 cities in mainland China dropped instead of increasing, and the average price of homes further plummeted. Price drops for new houses were greater in cities, especially in the Yangtze River and Pearl River deltas, where housing prices had been increasing in previous years.
Signs Of Ukraine Export Stability As 4 More Grain Ships Leave Ports - This weekend saw four more ships carrying grain and sunflower oil depart Ukraine ports through the UN-brokered safe maritime corridor in the Black Sea, overseen by a joint coordination center in Istanbul staffed by Ukrainian, Russian, Turkish and UN officials. This as the Razoni cargo ship which was the first to depart Odesa carrying 27,000 tonnes of corn last week, is making its way to the Lebanese port of Tripoli, though not on time. The latest series of ships departed the ports of Odesa and Chornomorsk on Sunday, and their sailing has given rise to greater hopes of export stability, BBC reports, as millions in Ukraine-grain dependent countries are facing famine conditions. Two of the vessels are reportedly bound for Italy, while the other pair are going to China, after they are expected to dock in Turkey for international inspections under the terms of the UN safety corridor deal. In total they've been estimated to be laden with 160,000 tons of corn and other foodstuffs.The BBC writes, "Ukrainian authorities say there are good signs that the grain exports are safe, and have urged companies to return to the country's ports." And further: "The hope is that the exports will help ease the global food crisis while bringing in much needed foreign currency."And according to further details in NBC, referring to the Joint Coordination Center in Istanbul, "The JCC said late on Saturday it had authorized the departure of a total of five new vessels through the Black Sea corridor: four vessels outbound from Chornomorsk and Odesa carrying 161,084 metric tons of produce, and one inbound."
Ukraine Claims Unprecedented Attack On Russian Airbase Deep Inside Crimea - Earlier Tuesday a large explosion at Russia's Saki air base deep within Crimea immediately set off speculation that Ukraine's military could have just launched its boldest attack yet of the six-month long war. Russia's defense ministry quickly tried to down play the incident, which it said resulted in a handful of injuries. The suggestion from the Kremlin was that it was an accidental ignition of munitions being stored on base, but Ukrainian government sources are meanwhile busy leaking that it was the result of its long-range rockets targeting the base.A number of Western pundits were suspicious over the quick Kremlin denial of a Ukrainian army attack, and alleged Russia desired to avoid escalation, and also sought to deny allowing Kiev forces a 'victory' by covering up the strike. But now The New York Times has said Ukraine is claiming the attack: A senior Ukrainian military official with knowledge of the situation said that Ukrainian forces were behind the attack. A spokesman for the Kremlin-installed leader of Crimea confirmed that there had been an explosion but asked residents to refrain from jumping to conclusions about its cause....Russian and occupation authorities did not speculate publicly about the possibility of a Ukrainian attack. The senior Ukrainian official, however, took credit for it."This was an air base from which planes regularly took off for attacks against our forces in the southern theater," the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military matters. The official would not disclose the type of weapon used in the attack, saying only that "a device exclusively of Ukrainian manufacture was used." The explosion was widely filmed, and video has since hit the internet which seems to show more than one near-simultaneous impact of ordinance, strongly suggesting that it was a indeed a Ukrainian military strike.
Zaporizhzhia: New rocket strike on Ukraine nuclear plant, as UN watchdog warns of 'disaster' – CNN --Ukraine accused Russian forces on Sunday of launching rockets at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, further ratcheting fears of an accident a day after the United Nation's watchdog warned that fighting at the occupied complex risked a "nuclear disaster."It was the second time in as many days that the plant, which is the largest of its kind in Europe, was hit. Ukraine and Russia have traded blame for both attacks.The rockets launched on Saturday night struck near a dry storage facility, where 174 casks with spent nuclear fuel are kept, according to Energoatom, Ukraine's state-run nuclear power company. Explosions blew out windows in parts of the plant and one worker was hospitalized with shrapnel wounds."Apparently, they aimed specifically at the containers with processed fuel, which are stored outside next to the site of shelling," the company said in a statement on Telegram.Three radiation monitoring detectors were also damaged on Saturday, making "timely detection and response in case of aggravation of the radiation situation or leakage of radiation from spent nuclear fuel casks are currently impossible," Energoatom said."This time a nuclear catastrophe was miraculously avoided, but miracles cannot last forever," it added.Kyiv has accused Russian forces of storing heavy weaponry in and launching attacks from the plant, which they took over in early March and still occupy. Moscow, meanwhile, has claimed Ukrainian troops are targeting the complex.The head of the pro-Russian regional administration in Zaporizhzhia, Yevgeny Balitsky, said in a statement on Telegram Sunday that Ukrainian forces had targeted the spent fuel storage area and damaged administrative buildings.Fears about the security of Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant have been growing since Russian forces seized the site, but reached an inflection point on Friday when shelling damaged a high-voltage power line and forced one of the plant's reactors to stop operating -- despite no radioactive leak being detected.After the attack, Energoatom said that Russian shellfire had damaged a nitrogen-oxygen station and the combined auxiliary building, and that there were "still risks of hydrogen leakage and sputtering of radioactive substances, and the fire hazard is also high."The director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Mariano Grossi, said he was alarmed by the reports of damage and demanded that an IAEA team of experts urgently be allowed to visit the plant, to assess and safeguard the complex."I'm extremely concerned by the shelling yesterday at Europe's largest nuclear power plant, which underlines the very real risk of a nuclear disaster that could threaten public health and the environment in Ukraine and beyond," Grossi said in a statement Saturday."Military action jeopardizing the safety and security of the Zaporizhzya nuclear power plant is completely unacceptable and must be avoided at all costs," he added.
Ukraine's Zelensky calls on West to ban all Russian travelers - The way to stop Russia from annexing any more of Ukraine’s territory, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Monday, is for Western countries to announce that they would ban all Russian citizens in response. In a wide-ranging interview with The Washington Post, Zelensky said that “the most important sanctions are to close the borders — because the Russians are taking away someone else’s land.” He said Russians should “live in their own world until they change their philosophy.” Russian leaders have signaled they could hold annexation votes in the occupied parts of Ukraine’s east and south — in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions — on Sept. 11, alongside regional elections already scheduled to take place. Russian officials say those votes would legitimize Russia’s claim to those areas, but critics say the votes would be a Russian-manipulated farce. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and senior White House officials have warned that any attempted land grab through “sham” referendums would bring “additional costs imposed upon Russia.” It is unclear what those consequences would be. Much as they did before Russia invaded on Feb. 24, Zelensky and other Ukrainian officials are pushing their Western partners to announce sanctions as a deterrent. Zelensky told The Post on Monday that the sanctions already imposed on Russia for its unprovoked war in Ukraine are “weak” compared with closing borders to Russian citizens for one year and a full embargo on the purchase of Russian energy. Russian airlines have been banned from flying over most of Europe and North America, which has made it more challenging for Russians to travel abroad. But there is no blanket ban in place such as Zelensky is suggesting; Russian citizens are still free to apply for a visa to visit the United States, for example.
Russian-Turkish talks raise concerns in Western capitals amid NATO war on Russia -Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin held talks in the Black Sea resort town of Sochi Friday. The summit, only 17 days after a trilateral meeting with Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in Tehran in July, was closely followed by the NATO powers, which are waging war on Russia in Ukraine and imposing sanctions in Moscow. The meeting lasted more than four hours and focused on the Ukraine war, related difficulties with grain exports from Ukraine and Russia, the deepening economic, energy and tourism ties between Russia and Turkey, and ongoing wars in Syria and Libya. Before the bilateral meeting, which was not followed by a press conference, Putin emphasized the growing trade between Turkey and Russia, despite US-European economic and financial sanctions targeting Russia. He said, “last year our trade grew 57 percent, and it doubled in the first few months of this year, from January to May.” Putin also pointed to ongoing Russia gas deliveries to Europe via Turkey: “TurkStream, the construction of which we completed some time ago, is today one of the most important routes for supplying Europe with Russian gas. TurkStream, unlike all other directions of our hydrocarbon supplies to Europe, is operating well, smoothly, and without failure.” He thanked Erdoğan for the “grain corridor” agreement reached in Istanbul late July. “The problem of Ukrainian grain exports through Black Sea ports has been settled thanks to your personal involvement and the UN Secretariat’s mediation,” he said. The first grain vessel under the agreement left Odessa last week and, after being checked in Istanbul, sailed to Lebanon. Three vessels loaded with about 60,000 tons of grain bound for Ireland and Britain are reportedly preparing to depart from Ukrainian ports. Erdoğan said: “We will open a new page in our bilateral relations. This concerns energy, and especially the ‘grain corridor’ via the Black Sea where we have taken steps… From Turkey’s point of view, I want to note that Russia plays a special role on the world stage.” Aware of NATO allies’ concern on Russia-Turkey ties and the possibility of sanctions being circumvented, Erdoğan said, “Today the world fixed all eyes on Sochi: What will they do in Sochi, what will they address in Sochi, what will they discuss? Perhaps the world is watching our meeting in Sochi closely. And, perhaps the best answers to these questions will be given after our meeting.” Supplying Kiev with Bayraktar drones, Ankara has condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. However, it did not participate in Western sanctions and has tried to mediate a ceasefire since the war in Ukraine began, as it has also close economic and military ties with Moscow. This is unacceptable for the United States and other NATO imperialist powers, which seek to prolong the war, imposed regime change in Kremlin and subordinate Russia to their dictates. Erdoğan said, “I reminded Putin that we could have his meeting with Zelensky” in Istanbul. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu also wrote on Twitter that Ankara hopes the grain agreements will serve as a basis “to ensure a cease-fire and stable peace” in Ukraine. However, the joint press statement issued after the meeting made no mention of these issues; nor did it mention Ankara’s potential assault on US-backed Kurdish nationalist forces in Syria.
Radical change is needed and mainstream economics will not be part of the solution - Bill Mitchell - I wrote about what I am terming a ‘poly crisis’ in this recent blog post – The global poly crisis is the culmination of the absurdity of neoliberalism (July 18, 2022). I am working on material for my next book to follow up – Reclaiming the State: A Progressive Vision of Sovereignty for a Post-Neoliberal World (Pluto Books, September 2017). The German word ‘Zeitenwende’ means turning point. A fork in the road. It carries with it, from one interpretation, a recognition that the path that has been traversed to date is not the path that should be followed in the future. Something has to give. Whether Albert Einstein actually said “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results” is an interesting literary issue but the essence of the quote (correctly attributed to him or not) is sound. The idea of a ‘poly crisis’ is that big shifts in thinking and behaviour are required. We simply cannot continue to act in the same way as before whether it be on an individual level (us making our own choices) or at a societal level. The organisation of economic activity, our patterns of consumption and conduct of economic policy must all change – radically – for the planet to survive. Tinkering around the edges will be insufficient. Identifying a ‘poly crisis’ is tantamount to declaring the neoliberal experiment has failed dramatically and taken us all to the brink. It cannot form a basis for the future. But there is massive resistance to change and in Australia in the last week we have seen that in spades.
Millions Will Freeze This Winter; Or Fall Into Debt To Avoid Doing So - Yes, today is finally inflation day! Not high unit labor cost inflation day – that was yesterday in the US, which is why markets sold off. Not house price inflation day – that’s every day. I mean actual headline and core US CPI day, where increases in the price of just about everything are likely to be offset by temporary declines in gasoline prices. Yet that still opens the door for a new pre-US mid-terms phase of “sic transitory gloria mundi” back-patting in markets and politics. We also get inflation in China (CPI and PPI), which will show it is firmly under control. That’s largely because they are pumping out coal and have over-supply and under-demand. However, also note this is an economy where Bloomberg notes that the huge headline trade data are NOT matched by the trade-related money flows recorded by SAFE. There are technical reasons why the two differ, but now the simple message is: “China “bought” lots of goods from abroad, but they have never arrived.” It could be supply-chain related, or it could be capital flight. Either way, don’t trust the simple headline numbers on your screen. Indeed, today’s marvelous magical ‘turn around’ in US inflation is because of base effects. The 0.0% m-o-m CPI headline print this July will line up against a far higher print from July 2021. The problem is that the 0.0% is then the base for whatever July 2023 will be - and it will be lucky to be another 0.0%, even this far out, when you look at how the deck is stacked in some regards.As a parallel, despite potential champagne corks today, UK household power bills are now likely to soar to as much as £4,200 from January, a staggering increase. Indeed, the government, which is not going to do anything about it until a new PM is chosen, holds a “reasonable worst case scenario” (that is “highly unlikely to materialise”) for losing a sixth of the electricity grid, meaning enforced blackouts that will close down rail networks and public buildings. What is highly likely is that millions will freeze this winter; or fall into debts to avoid doing so; and the result will be deflationary demand for everything else, along with cost-push price increases for everything; and yet government help will just mean the latter inflation and less of the former.
"Revolution Has Begun": 75,000 Brits To Stop Paying Power Bills Amid Inflation Storm -- The resistance is growing as more than 75,000 irritated people in the UK have pledged not to pay their electricity bill this fall when prices jump again. "75,000 people have pledged to strike on October 1st! If the government & energy companies refuse to act then ordinary people will! Together we can enforce a fair price and affordable energy for all," tweeted "Don't Pay UK," an anonymous group spearheading the effort to have more than one million Brits boycott paying their power bill by Oct. 1. Together we can enforce a fair price and affordable energy for all.https://t.co/RYOlAVoLqd #dontpayuk pic.twitter.com/HeF4RiOVVH The strike comes as an inflation storm of high energy prices has obliterated household incomes. Brits are the most miserable in three decades as inflation is expected to hit 13%. And while Bank of England (BoE) Governor Andrew Bailey hiked interest rates the most in 27 years to tame inflation, risks are mounting of a recession. On Oct. 1, the average household will pay almost £300 a month for power, the BoE warned. Couple surging power costs with negative real wage growth, and it becomes apparent households are being squeezed. This excludes soaring prices for shelter, food, and petrol at the pump -- this trend is unsustainable and could result in social instabilities. British news outlet Glasgow Live said the strike is similar to the "action in the late 1980s and '90s to fight against the poll tax brought in by PM Margaret Thatcher. In protest, 17 million people refused to pay." UK financial journalist and broadcaster Martin Lewis said this about the strike:"I think I can categorise it more accurately now, the big movement that I am seeing is an increase of growth in people calling for a non-payment of energy bills, mass non-payment. Effectively a consumer strike on energy bills and getting rid of the legitimacy of paying that."We are getting close to a Poll Tax moment on energy bills coming into October and we need the Government to get a handle on that, because once it starts becoming socially acceptable not to pay energy bills people will stop paying energy bills and you're not going to cut everyone off."
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