week ending Mar 4

Fed's Jefferson: 'No Illusion' Inflation Fight Will Be Quick (Reuters) -Inflation for a broad array of services in the United States remains "stubbornly high," Federal Reserve Governor Philip Jefferson said Monday, though slower-growing wages might help slow prices in those parts of the economy as well. Though the Fed has seen some progress in slowing price increases for goods and expects the same to happen in housing, inflation continues for services ranging from restaurants to medical care -- and will likely need to slow for the central bank to make clear progress back towards its 2% inflation target. "Core goods inflation has started to come down. Several indicators suggest that housing services inflation is likely to come down in the coming months. There is more uncertainty surrounding inflation in core services excluding housing," Jefferson said in remarks to a Harvard University economics class. "The inflation outlook for this nonhousing category of core services partly depends on whether growth in nominal labor costs comes back down, and recent data suggest that labor compensation has indeed started to decelerate somewhat over the past year." In later comments in response to questions, Jefferson said he was under "no illusion" that inflation would return quickly to the Fed's target, and noted that the Personal Consumption Expenditures price index remained "elevated," jumping unexpectedly last month to a 5.4% annual rate versus a 5.3% rate as of December. The Fed uses the PCE index to sets its inflation target. "I'm under no illusion that it's going to be easy to get the inflation rate back down to 2%," Jefferson said. "There's a lot of resolve on the part of the (Federal Open Market) Committee. I know that I am committed to doing what it takes." Jefferson did not detail his views on the Fed's upcoming policy decision, or how much higher he thinks the target federal funds rate might have to move beyond the 4.5% to 4.75% range set at the Fed's last meeting. The central bank meets on March 21-22 and is expected to approve a quarter point rate increase, while also providing new projections about policy for the rest of the year.

Fed Officials Warn They May Need To Lift Rates To Higher Peak - Two Federal Reserve policymakers cautioned that recent stronger-than-expected readings on the US economy could push them to raise interest rates by more than previously expected. In remarks Thursday, Governor Christopher Waller said that if payroll and inflation data cool after hot prints in January, “then I would endorse raising the target range for the federal funds rate a couple more times, to a projected terminal rate between 5.1% and 5.4%.” “On the other hand, if those data reports continue to come in too hot, the policy target range will have to be raised this year even more to ensure that we do not lose the momentum that was in place before the data for January were released,” Waller said in remarks prepared for delivery at an event hosted by the Mid-Size Bank Coalition of America. His virtual event, including the question and answer session following delivery of his prepared remarks, was canceled after a participant displayed pornographic content that was visible to viewers. The organizers said they had been the victim of “teleconferencing or Zoom hijacking.” Waller’s speech followed comments by Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic, who told reporters that he still favored raising rates by 25 basis points in March but was open to lifting borrowing costs higher than he had envisioned if the economy remained so robust. “I want to be completely clear: There is a case to be made that we need to go higher,” Bostic said. “Jobs have come in stronger than we expected. Inflation is remaining stubborn at elevated levels. Consumer spending is strong. Labor markets remain quite tight.” Market reaction to Bostic was mixed. US stocks climbed on Thursday, with investors focusing on a comment that the central bank could be in a position to pause rate hikes sometime this summer. Still, yields across the Treasury market closed higher after rising earlier in the day on another batch of strong labor-market data. The focus now shifts to a report on the US services sector due Friday. US central bankers have raised rates rapidly from near zero a year ago to a target range of 4.5% to 4.75%, including a series of four jumbo 0.75 percentage-point increases. In February, they stepped down to a 25 basis-point increase after a half-point move in December. Officials next meet March 21-22, and by then they will have seen fresh reports on employment and inflation. Recent incoming data has been surprisingly strong: Employers added 517,000 new workers in January while inflation remains well above the central bank’s 2% target.

Federal Reserve virtual event canceled after porn Zoom bomb - An event that was set to take place with Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller on Thursday was canceled following a pornographic Zoom-bombing incident. Waller was set to speak at the virtual event with the Mid-Size Bank Coalition of America, an organization that advocates and serves as a resource for mid-size banks, about the economic outlook going forward. But Brent Tjarks, the executive director of the coalition, told Reuters that the group was the “victim of a teleconference or Zoom hijacking.” Tjarks said the group regrets the incident and is working to ensure it does not happen again. “We have had various programs, and this is something that we have never had happen to us,” he said. A Reuters reporter who was on the call for the event told the outlet that a participant with their name listed as “Dan” began showing graphic, pornographic images on the screen a few minutes before the event was to start. Reuters reported that as many as 220 people were on the call before it was ended, and the organizer did not automatically mute microphones and shut off video for participants when they joined. A Fed spokesperson told The Hill that “technical difficulties” with the event caused it to be canceled, but Waller’s prepared remarks were posted on the Fed’s website. Zoom became widely known and used at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020, but it has received some criticism over the past couple years for security concerns. Zoom has released updates to improve its security features on multiple occasions during the past few years.

Fed's Bowman: regulators should monitor Treasuries market function | -- The functioning of the U.S. government debt market remains a concern for the Federal Reserve. In brief remarks delivered at an event hosted by the University of Chicago's Booth School of Business, FedGov. Michelle Bowman said it was important for the central bank to continue working with other regulators to review Treasuries markets to make sure they are appropriately supervised and resilient. "Doing so can increase the ability of private markets and institutions to function during times of stress and reduce the likelihood of future market interventions by the central bank," she said. "In this regard, it is important for the Federal Reserve to engage along with the other agencies in a thoughtful consideration of possible regulatory adjustments and structural reforms to increase the resiliency of the Treasury markets and reduce the likelihood of future market dysfunction." Financial regulators in Washington have been studying the impacts of the COVID-19 era actions on Treasury markets. The Interagency Working Group for Treasury Market Surveillance, which consists of the Fed Board of Governors, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Treasury Department and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, has issued two reports on the matter during the past two years.Last fall, SEC Chair Gary Gensler and Treasury Under Secretary for Domestic Finance Nellie Liang called for more transparency, more competition and more regulation in the government bond space. During the Friday afternoon event, Bowman moderated a panel discussion on "Design Issues for Central Bank Facilities in the Future." In her opening remarks, she detailed how the Fed's various interventions helped support the U.S. economy in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, including creating lending facilities and buying assets.The Fed's actions, she said, were integral to preserving the flow of credit in the financial system. But, she noted, some of the various tools the central bank used saw differing levels of use by market participants.

2023 US recession now expected to start later than predicted - (AP) — A majority of the nation’s business economists expect a U.S. recession to begin later this year than they had previously forecast, after a series of reports have pointed to a surprisingly resilient economy despite steadily higher interest rates.Fifty-eight percent of 48 economists who responded to a survey by the National Association for Business Economics envision a recession sometime this year, the same proportion who said so in the NABE’s survey in December. But only a quarter think a recession will have begun by the end of March, only half the proportion who had thought so in December.The findings, reflecting a survey of economists from businesses, trade associations and academia, were released Monday.A third of the economists who responded to the survey now expect a recession to begin in the April-June quarter. One-fifth think it will start in the July-September quarter.The delay in the economists’ expectations of when a downturn will begin follows a series of government reports that have pointed to a still-robust economy even after the Federal Reserve has raised interest rates eight times in a strenuous effort to slow growth and curb high inflation.In January, employers added more than a half-million jobs, and the unemployment rate reached 3.4%, the lowest level since 1969. And sales at retail stores and restaurants jumped 3% in January, the sharpest monthly gain in nearly two years. That suggested that consumers as a whole, who drive most of the economy’s growth, still feel financially healthy and willing to spend. At the same time, several government releases also showed that inflation shot back up in January after weakening for several months, fanning fears that the Fed will raise its benchmark rate even higher than was previously expected. When the Fed lifts its key rate, it typically leads to more expensive mortgages, auto loans and credit card borrowing. Interest rates on business loans also rise. Tighter credit can then weaken the economy and even cause a recession. Economic research released Friday found that the Fed has never managed to reduce inflation from the high levels it has recently reached without causing a recession.

High Frequency Indicators: Airlines Back to Pre-Pandemic Levels, Movie Tickets Still Down --I stopped the weekly updates of high frequency indicators at the end of 2022. Here is a look at two indicators that were still below pre-recession levels as of last December. The TSA is providing daily travel numbers. This data is as of February 24th. This data shows the 7-day average of daily total traveler throughput from the TSA for 2019 (Light Blue), 2020 (Black), 2021 (Blue), 2022 (Orange) and 2023 (Red). The dashed line is the percent of 2019 for the seven-day average. The 7-day average is at the same level as the same week in 2019 (99.7% of 2019). (Dashed line) Air travel - as a percent of 2019 - is back to pre-pandemic levels.This data shows domestic box office for each week and the median for the years 2016 through 2019 (dashed light blue). Black is 2020, Blue is 2021, Orange is 2022 and Red is 2023. The data is from BoxOfficeMojo through February 23rd. Note that the data is usually noisy week-to-week and depends on when blockbusters are released. Movie ticket sales are running about 30% below the pre-pandemic levels.

Yellen says will talk deficit-reduction with Republicans, not debt limit (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Saturday she was willing to negotiate with Republicans in Congress over the Biden administration's budget proposal to be unveiled next month - but not as a condition of raising the debt ceiling. Yellen told Reuters in an interview that the Biden budget for fiscal 2024 would contain "substantial deficit reduction over the next decade. "And we're going to show how we're going to accomplish that," she said on the sidelines of a G20 finance leaders meeting. "Republicans need to put a plan on the table, and a negotiation or discussion about that is certainly possible, but it can't be a condition or precondition for raising the debt ceiling."Republicans who hold a slim majority in the House of Representatives, have demanded that President Joe Biden agree to spending cuts as in exchange for raising the debt ceiling.Yellen said the United States "can't bargain over whether or not we're going to pay our bills. It's simply a fundamental responsibility a government has."Yellen said that tax receipts collected around the April 15 filing deadline could allow for some adjustments in the department's estimate of when it would no longer be able to pay all of the government's bills without an increase in the $31.4 trillion debt limit.

Republican war on 'woke' policies creeps into U.S. debt-ceiling debate (Reuters) - U.S. House Republicans are eyeing $150 billion in spending cuts that reflect a hardline drive to target education, healthcare and housing - particularly efforts to address racial inequities that conservatives deride as "woke" - as they push forward in talks on the federal debt ceiling. House of Representatives Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington said Republicans are assembling a budget along the lines of a budget proposal developed by Russell Vought, who served as Republican President Donald Trump's budget chief. "It is consistent with what's in his budget," Arrington said in an interview. The congressman, whose party controls the House, did not provide specifics of what cuts he would suggest to his fellow Republicans, who return to Washington on Monday after a two-week break. Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has vowed not to allow an increase in the $31.4 trillion legal limit on federal borrowing without an agreement from President Joe Biden's Democrats in Congress to rein in federal spending. Failing to lift the debt ceiling could trigger a default on the federal government's debt that would take a heavy toll on the American and probably world economies. A prolonged 2011 debt-cap standoff led to a cut in the government's top-tier credit rating. During Biden's State of the Union speech early this month, Republicans loudly vowed not to pursue cuts to the Social Security retirement or Medicare healthcare programs. They also mostly oppose military cuts.

Blinken pledges $444M in additional US aid to Yemen - Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday pledged more than $444 million in additional aid to Yemen as it faces what the secretary called “the world’s worst humanitarian crisis” of conflict, economic instability, food insecurity and other issues. “As one of the largest donors, this brings our total to the humanitarian response in Yemen to over $5.4 billion since the conflict began. The United States’ commitment to alleviating the suffering of millions from the world’s worst humanitarian crisis in Yemen remains resolute,” Blinken said in a statement. The secretary said the new millions in aid are “exemplifying the continued generosity of the people of the United States for the people of Yemen.” The United Nations has estimated that $4.3 billion needs to be raised to “reverse a steady deterioration across the country,” and Blinken on Monday urged donors to “give generously” in order to meet that benchmark. “While today’s pledges are important, much more is needed,” Blinken said, noting the U.N. assessment that two out of every three Yemenis need humanitarian assistance. But the secretary stressed humanitarian assistance “must also be complemented by economic and development support” to Yemen’s destabilized economy. “More than eight years of conflict have pushed Yemen’s economy and institutions to the brink. Families have been left unable to buy basic goods, provide for their children, or access healthcare. The United States continues our efforts to help stabilize Yemen’s economy and restore basic services and livelihoods,” Blinken said. U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said Monday that “the international community has the power and the means to end the crisis in Yemen” and re-upped the international organization’s fundraising appeal.

Yellen In Ukraine Announces Another $1.25 Billion - Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen visted Kiev for about 12 hours on Monday, which was a highly symbolic trip which came a week after President Biden made his first visit there to meet with President Zelensky.What the 76-year old Yellen could have accomplished via a simple zoom call, or rather by a bank wire, was done in person. Yes another massive check at American taxpayers' expense was handed over. The New York Times reports that "The trip — during which Ms. Yellen announced the transfer of $1.25 billion in economic and budget assistance to Ukraine — is part of a concerted diplomatic push by the Biden administration to show support for Ukraine while maintaining pressure on Russia." This of course also means dissuading China from dealings with Moscow at a moment Beijing is bristling over accusations that it's preparing to send weapons to Kremlin forces. "The secretary of state, Antony J. Blinken, will visit two former Soviet republics this week and is expected to urge them to maintain their distance from Russia as well as China," the Times continues.Yellen pledged that the US would "stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes" upon arriving for her unannounced trip, which came via an early morning train which crossed over from Poland. The NYT also notes that "The demonstration of American solidarity with Ukraine came as the United States is preparing to disburse another $10 billion in aid following the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion."

Pence breaks with DeSantis over Ukraine position: Putin will not stop at Ukraine - Former Vice President Mike Pence on Friday warned that it would be “wrong” to think Russian President Vladimir Putin would stop at trying to take control of Ukraine, a direct break with comments made by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R). Pence delivered an address at the University of Texas at Austin in which he argued for the importance of U.S. support for Ukraine on the first anniversary of the war, cautioning that Russian victory in Ukraine could draw the U.S. into a broader conflict and threaten the sovereignty of NATO allies. In an interview with NBC News after the speech, Pence was asked about DeSantis’s views: Earlier this week, the Florida governor expressed opposition to open-ended support for Ukraine while casting doubt on the prospect that Russia would seek to invade other countries. “The fear of Russia going into NATO countries and all that and steamrolling, you know, that has not even come close to happening,” DeSantis said on Fox News. “I would say anyone that thinks that Vladimir Putin will stop at Ukraine is wrong,” Pence told NBC News, referring to DeSantis’s earlier remarks. “We need to understand the real long-term threat of renewed Russian aggression in Europe,” he continued. “And I hold the view that it will not stop there.” Pence in Friday’s speech said Putin bore responsibility for the war, and he cautioned that there can be “no room in the leadership of the Republican Party for apologists for Putin.” “Make no mistake: This is not America’s war. But if we falter in our commitment to providing the support to help people of Ukraine to defend their freedom, our sons and daughters may soon be called upon to defend ours,” Pence said. “If we surrender to the siren song of those in this country who argue that America has no interest in freedom’s cause, history teaches we may soon send our own into harm’s way.”

Pentagon tells Republicans 'no evidence' that weapons for Ukraine are being diverted - Top Pentagon officials on Tuesday told lawmakers they’re confident weapons being sent to Ukraine are being used for their desired purpose and aren’t being smuggled to the black market, a major concern among some Republicans. The testimony of the Pentagon’s policy chief and internal watchdog came in a House Armed Services hearing on U.S. support to Ukraine as Republicans make a push to ramp up open oversight of billions in aid to Kyiv. Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Colin Kahl told the panel that the Pentagon assesses that Ukrainian forces “are using properly what they’ve been given.” “What we’re not seeing is any evidence of significant diversion,” Kahl told lawmakers. “Our assessment is if some of these systems have been diverted it’s by Russians who have captured things on the battlefield, which always happens, but that there’s no evidence the Ukrainians are diverting it to the black market.” The Armed Services session is the first such public hearing devoted to U.S. military support to Ukraine. Armed Services Chair Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) wants to intensify high-level public oversight of aid to show that weapons and equipment are going where they’re intended. Top Democrats and Republicans are aiming to preserve the bipartisan bloc that’s successfully enacted more than $100 billion in emergency aid since Russia launched its full-tilt invasion in February 2022 in a freshly split Congress.

Greene criticizes Zelensky at CPAC: ‘Leave your hands off of our sons and daughters’ - Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) targeted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during her speech to the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), saying he should leave his “hands off of our sons and daughters” over the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Greene has been an outspoken critic of U.S. support for Ukraine, which has been supported by a majority of Democrats and Republicans. Her remarks appeared to reference comments Zelensky made late last month in which he said that if Ukraine lost its war with Russia, it could lead Moscow to invade other former Soviet states that are now members of NATO — such as the Baltic countries. Ukraine is not a NATO member. Zelensky said such a situation — Russian invading a NATO member — would lead the U.S. to send forces to those countries. Greene on Friday told the CPAC crowd that she was still “committed to saying no money to Ukraine, and that country needs to find peace, not war.” “And while I will look at a camera and directly tell Zelensky, you’d better leave your hands off of our sons and daughters because they’re not dying over there,” she continued. There are no U.S. troops in Ukraine, and the White House is opposed to sending U.S. troops to Ukraine, as are most members of both political parties.

The Empire Gives People The Illusion Of Fighting The Power Without Ever Endangering Real Power – Caitlin Johnstone - The one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has seen countless emotional news segments and heartstring-plucking articles, wall-to-wall social media posts, and public demonstrations decrying the evils of Vladimir Putin throughout the western world. For what’s probably the first “anti-war” protest of most of their lives, American liberals gathered at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC over the weekend to bravely condemn the leader of a foreign government thousands of miles away. There they were joined by empire managers like the virulent warmonger Samantha Power, who spoke at the rally opposing Russian warmongering at the capital of the most warlike nation on the planet.For the last year, mainstream westerners have been using this war to act out their fantasies of being courageous up-punching anti-imperialists, fighting powerful bloodthirsty tyrants in defense of the needful, all while living directly under the thumb of the most tyrannical regime in the world. They mindlessly regurgitate the propaganda of the most powerful empire that has ever existed, parrot the same lines that are already being said all day long by all the most powerful institutions in the western world, all in service of the hegemonic agendas of the largest and most murderous power structure on earth, while pretending to be standing in opposition to the powerful.The way the war in Ukraine allows mainstream liberals to play-act as rebellious anti-imperialists is a good illustration of how the empire gives people the illusion of fighting the power without their ever opposing the empire.We saw this same trend take place in the US throughout the Trump administration, where mainstream liberals branded themselves “The Resistance” like they were socialist revolutionaries or insurgents opposing Hitler in Nazi-occupied France. In reality Trump’s presidency had little actual impact on the comforts of their lives, because beneath all the narratives Trump was a fairly normal US president whose most heinous crimes were all of the customary variety we see in all US presidents — including his predecessor and his successor. Democrats just spent four years LARPing as brave revolutionaries, and then he left office and the game ended.In exactly the same way, Trump’s presidency allowed right wingers to pretend they were part of a movement against the establishment, despite Trump never actually challenging the establishment in any meaningful way. They believed he was fighting the Deep State even after he imprisoned Assange. They believed he was “ending the wars” even as he ramped up aggressions against Russia whichhelped bring us to where we are today, killed tens of thousands of Venezuelans with starvation sanctions, vetoed attempts to save Yemen from U.S.-backed genocide, worked to foment civil war in Iran using starvation sanctions and CIA ops with the stated goal of effecting regime change, occupied Syrian oil fields with the goal of preventing Syria’s reconstruction, greatly increased the number of troops in the Middle East and elsewhere, greatly increased the number of bombs dropped per day from the previous administration killing record numbers of civilians, and reduced military accountability for those airstrikes. They believed he was draining the swamp after packing his cabinet with establishment swamp monsters. Trump supporters are just George W Bush supporters LARPing as Ron Paul supporters. They role-play a fight against the empire that is never actually happening anywhere except in their imaginations.

There Has Never In History Been A Greater Need For A Large Anti-War Movement – Caitlin Johnstone - Things are escalating more and more rapidly between the US-centralized power structure and the few remaining nations with the will and the means to stand against its demands for total obedience, namely China, Russia, and Iran. The world is becoming increasingly split between two groups of governments who are becoming increasingly hostile toward each other, and you don’t have to be a historian to know it’s probably a bad sign when that happens. Especially in the age of nuclear weapons. The US State Department’s Victoria Nuland is now saying that the US is supporting Ukrainian strikes on Crimea, drawing sharp rebukes from Moscow with a stern reminder that the peninsula is a “red line” for the Kremlin which will result in escalations in the conflict if crossed. On Friday, Ukraine’s President Zelensky told the press that Kyiv is preparing a large offensive for the “de-occupation” of Crimea, which Moscow has considered a part of the Russian Federation since its annexation in 2014. As Anatol Lieven explained for Jacobin earlier this month, this exact scenario is currently the one most likely to lead to a sequence of escalations ending in nuclear war. In light of the aforementioned recent revelations, the opening paragraph of Lieven’s article is even more chilling to read now than it was when it came out a couple of weeks ago: The greatest threat of nuclear catastrophe that humanity has ever faced is now centered on the Crimean peninsula. In recent months, the Ukrainian government and army have repeatedly vowed to reconquer this territory, which Russia seized and annexed in 2014. The Russian establishment, and most ordinary Russians, for their part believe that holding Crimea is vital to Russian identity and Russia’s position as a great power. As a Russian liberal acquaintance (and no admirer of Putin) told me, “In the last resort, America would use nuclear weapons to save Hawaii and Pearl Harbor, and if we have to, we should use them to save Crimea.” And that’s just Russia. The war in Ukraine is being used to escalate against all powers not aligned with the US-centralized alliance, with recent developments including drone attacks on an Iranian weapons factory which reportedly arms Russian soldiers in Ukraine, and Chinese companies being sanctioned for “backfill activities in support of Russia’s defence sector” following US accusations that the Chinese government is preparing to arm Russia in the war.Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly been holding multiple meetings with top military officials regarding potential future attacks on Iran to neutralize the alleged threat of Iran developing a nuclear arsenal, a “threat” that Netanyahu has personally been lying about for years.If you’ve been reading Antiwar.com (and if you care about this stuff you probably should be), you’ve been seeing new articles about the latest imperial escalations against China on a near-daily basis now. Sometimes they come out multiple times per day; this past Thursday Dave DeCamp put out two completely separate news stories titled “US Plans to Expand Military Presence in Taiwan, a Move That Risks Provoking China” and “Philippines in Talks With US, Australia on Joint South China Sea Patrols“. Taiwan and the South China Sea are two powderkeg flashpoints where war could quickly erupt at any time in a number of different ways.If you know where to look for good updates on the behavior of the US-centralized empire and you follow them from day to day, it’s clear that things are accelerating toward a global conflict of unimaginable horror. As bad as things look right now, the future our current trajectory has us pointed toward is much, much, much worse.

It Is The Mass Media’s Job To Help Suppress Anti-War Movements – Caitlin Johnstone - In a new article titled “European antiwar protests gain strength as NATO’s Ukraine proxy war escalates,” The Grayzone’s Stavroula Pabst and Max Blumenthal document the many large demonstrations that have been occurring in France, the UK, Germany, Greece, Spain, the Czech Republic, Austria, Belgium and elsewhere opposing the western empire’s brinkmanship with Russia and proxy warfare in Ukraine.Pabst and Blumenthal conclude their report with a denouncement of the way the western media have either been ignoring or sneering at these protests while actively cheerleading smaller demonstrations in support of arming Ukraine.“When Western media has not ignored Europe’s antiwar protest wave altogether, its coverage has alternated between dismissive and contemptuous,” they write. “German state broadcaster Deutsche Welle sneeringly characterized the February 25 demonstration in Berlin as ‘naive’ while providing glowing coverage to smaller shows of support for the war by the Ukrainian diaspora. The New York Times, for its part, mentioned the European protests in just a single generic line buried in an article on minuscule anti-Putin protests held by Russian emigres.”This bias is of course blatantly propagandistic, which won’t surprise anyone who understands that the mainstream western media exist first and foremost to administer propaganda on behalf of the US-centralized empire. And chief among their propaganda duties is to suppress the emergence of a genuine peace movement.As we’ve discussed previously, it has never in human history been more urgent to have a massive, forceful protest movement in opposition to the empire’s rapidly accelerating trajectory toward a global conflict against Russia and China. Other peace movements have arisen in the past in response to horrific wars which would go on to claim millions of lives, but a world war in the Atomic Age could easily wind up killing billions, and must never be allowed to happen.And yet the public is not treating this unparalleled threat with the urgency it deserves. A few protests here and there is great, but it’s not nearly enough. And the reason the people have not answered the call is because the mass media have been successfully propagandizing them into accepting the continuous escalations toward world war that we’ve been seeing. People aren’t going to protest what their government is doing if they believe that what their government is doing is appropriate, and the only reason so many people believe what their government is doing with regard to Russia and China is appropriate is because they have been propagandized into thinking so.

Watchdog highlights US withdrawal blunders that led to collapse of Afghan government - The United States helped lay the groundwork for the quick fall of Afghanistan when U.S. troops left the country in August 2021 by failing to create “an independent and self-sustainable” security force there after 20 years and $90 billion spent, the government’s watchdog for Afghanistan reconstruction revealed Monday. In the days leading up to and during the U.S.-pullout, the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF) appeared to melt away, allowing the Taliban to quickly retake Kabul and the rest of Afghanistan. The swift disintegration was brought on by the United States having no “political will” or “dedicated resources to initiate the wholesale development of another nation’s army,” Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) John Sopko concluded in his final report. “Due to the ANDSF’s dependency on U.S. military forces, the decision to withdraw all U.S. military personnel and dramatically reduce U.S. support to the ANDSF destroyed the morale of Afghan soldiers and police,” Sopko wrote in the report’s summery. As the United States had created a force “that could not operate independently and set unrealistic milestones for ANDSF capability development,” the eventual collapse “was predictable,” he notes.

China Blasts US 'Disinformation, Absolute Hypocrisy' On Russia Ties, Vows Retaliation For Sanctions -China has delivered a blistering response to the US pressure campaign regarding Beijing's closer ties with Moscow. In Monday remarks Mao Ning, a spokesperson for the Chinese foreign ministry, told a press briefing that China is prepared to retaliate if "illegal" sanctions on Chinese companies involved with Russia are not revoked.She also rejected accusations from Washington that China is mulling sending weapons to Russia, calling the reports part of US "disinformation". Instead, she said "The U.S., however, has been fanning the flame and fueling the fight with more weaponry.""This is out-and-out hegemonism and double standard, and absolute hypocrisy," Mao said. "The Chinese side will continue to do what is necessary to firmly safeguard the lawful rights and interests of Chinese companies. We will take resolute countermeasures in response to the U.S. sanctions." She reiterated China's position as one which seeks a peaceful solution through negotiations when it comes to the Ukraine conflict. "On the Ukraine issue, China has been actively promoting peace talks and the political settlement of the crisis," she said.And from there she once again put the blame for escalation back on Washington: "In addition to pouring lethal weapons into the battlefield in Ukraine, the US has been selling sophisticated weapons to the Taiwan region in violation of the three China-US joint communiqués," Mao noted. "What exactly is the US up to? The world deserves to know the answer."She said that the US is ultimately busy "spreading disinformation that China would supply weapons to Russia and sanctioning Chinese companies under that pretext."

Anti-war outbursts disrupt House China panel’s first hearing - POLITICO video

China bills sail through House committee - A desire to restrain China united Republicans and Democrats on the House Financial Services Committee Tuesday, with lawmakers approving a series of bipartisan bills designed to rein in the country’s economic power.The committee approved 10 bills with broad support, including measures that would have the U.S. government scrutinize financial institutions that serve senior Chinese officials, target Chinese manufacturing of synthetic drugs, and commission a Treasury Department report on the global economic risks associated with China’s financial sector.The package also featured pro-Taiwan bills that would encourage Taiwan’s membership in the International Monetary Fund and exclude China from the G-20 and other global organizations in the event it threatens Taiwan’s security.The bills stopped short of major intervention into China’s economy, such as restrictions on U.S. investment.“Let me be clear, these are modest efforts to hold China accountable,” the panel’s ranking member, Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), said.But Financial Services Chair Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) said the bipartisan support was notable “in a divided Congress that many pundits have claimed will not accomplish much.”

Bipartisan China committee holds first hearing on 'existential struggle' with Beijing — House Republicans and Democrats on the new select China committee held their first hearing Tuesday night, vowing to investigate the numerous technological, economic and military threats from the Chinese Communist Party. Members used the prime-time hearing as a sort of introduction to the Chinese government for an American audience who may not follow the issue closely, highlighting the broad scope of Chinese influence and the avenues the committee may go down as it seeks ways to make the U.S. more competitive.The packed hearing came amid escalating tensions with Beijing. For days, the nation was captivated by a Chinese spy balloon that floated over Alaska and the contiguous U.S. before it was shot down off South Carolina.And this week, the Energy Department concluded in a classified report shared with lawmakers that the Covid-19 pandemic “likely” was spread through a laboratory leak in Wuhan, China. FBI Director Christopher Wray said much the same thing in a Fox News interview that aired moments before the hearing.“We may call this a ‘strategic competition,’ but this is not a polite tennis match,” committee Chairman Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., said in his opening remarks Tuesday. “This is an existential struggle over what life will look like in the 21st century — and the most fundamental freedoms are at stake.”Both Gallagher and the panel’s top Democrat, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, made it clear that the committee is targeting the Chinese communist government — not the people of China who have been victimized by the regime's oppressive tactics.“We must practice bipartisanship and avoid anti-Chinese or Asian stereotyping at all costs. We must recognize the CCP wants us to be fractious, partisan and prejudiced. In fact, the CCP hopes for it,” Krishnamoorthi said. “We have no quarrel with the Chinese people or people of Chinese origin,” he said later.The high-profile hearing, held in the cavernous room that housed the historic Jan. 6 committee hearings, began with a video presentation detailing numerous human rights abuses committed by Chinese government officials, from the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre to the alleged rape and torture of the Uyghurs.

For now, the one thing Congress seems to agree on is China - In 2023, just as in 2022, a select committee of the House of Representatives held its first hearing in primetime and discussed a topic that everyone in the room agreed on. On Tuesday, the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party undertook a similar effort. It laid out the sweep of challenges presented by the Chinese government and presented its basic theory of the case: that, as former national security adviser H.R. McMaster argued, President Xi Jinping’s China poses a greater threat than the Soviet Union during the Cold War but that the United States can still fend off China and preserve global stability with prompt bipartisan action.Yet while both hearings were Manichaean in how they addressed their respective topics, they could have taken place on different planets. The January 6 select committee was a polished, made-for-television presentation that was designed to persuade viewers at home not to believe everything that Fox News told them about Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election. It was as much an effort to make an argument to the public as it was to uncover new facts about the fall and winter of 2020.The CCP select committee was also making an argument, but not to the public — members of Congress were trying to sell each other. As Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-MA) told Vox, “I think the initial audience is Congress; we’ve got to build shared awareness within Congress and build shared conviction around priorities within Congress.”The format of the committee hearing seemed to emphasize that fact — it wasn’t made for primetime, it was made for C-SPAN. It was formatted like any other congressional hearing, with members each taking five minutes for questions of the witnesses. However, unlike most other congressional hearings, members actually used most of their time for questioning.Yet the threat the committee worried about wasn’t that many members are unconvinced about the challenges that the Chinese Communist Party presents — it was set up by an overwhelmingly bipartisan vote, and there is broad consensus on China policy in Washington, with a handful of exceptions. Instead, the threat was partisanship itself. The worry was that members would give up the unrewarding, if nourishing, work of legislation and instead embrace the sugar highs of cable news hits for partisan audiences. Members were self-aware of this risk and how much it could undermine their objective. As Rep. Darin LaHood (R-IL) argued during the hearing, “the CCP fears more than anything Republicans and Democrats working together to expose [its] malign activities.” The committee was set up to avoid such temptations, with members ranging from longtime Bernie Sanders ally Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) to Rep. Jim Banks (R-IN), the founder of thecongressional Anti-Woke Caucus, all of whom mostly stuck to the game plan. As Rep. Dusty Johnson (R-SD) marveled to Vox afterward, “It’s remarkable to me out of 24 questioners, I think for 90 percent of them, you couldn’t have told whether the questioner was a Democrat or Republican.”

What it looks like when Congress takes on China - The fractious U.S.-China relationship — and assertions of Beijing’s blame for those tensions — dominated legislative discussions on Capitol Hill this week. Hearings of seven congressional committees — including the Senate’s Space, Science and Technology Committee and the House Oversight Committee — aired concerns about the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s perceived threat to U.S. economic and national security on Tuesday.House Foreign Affairs Committee chair MICHAEL MCCAUL (R-Texas) set the tone by titling his hearing “Combatting the Generational Challenge of CCP Aggression” and declaring that U.S.-China competition had morphed into a “struggle for the global balance of power.” HFAC members responded by passing no fewer than 11 China-related bills and resolutions on Tuesday. Those ranged from ranking member GREGORY MEEKS’s (D-NY) bill to hold Beijing accountable for last month’s spy balloon incursion, Rep. CHRIS SMITH’S (R-N.J.) Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act of 2023 and Rep. MICHAEL CLOUD’s (R-Texas) resolution demanding China release jailed U.S. citizenMARK SWIDAN.Bipartisan antagonism toward Beijing bled into the House Financial Services Committee hearing with the approval of 10 bills on Tuesday aimed at reining in Beijing’s economic power. Those included measures targeting Chinese manufacturing of synthetic drugs, and commissioning a Treasury Department report on the global economic risks associated with China’s financial sector.That legislation distills congressional anger at Beijing following the discovery and subsequent destruction of a Chinese spy balloon over the continental U.S. in February. Biden administration warnings last week that the Chinese government is considering providing lethal weaponry to Russia in its war against Ukraine have only fanned those fears. And the conclusion of a Department of Energy report published on Sunday that concluded (albeit with low confidence) that a laboratory leak in Wuhan, China sparked the Covid pandemic has renewed congressional anger toward China’s role in a pandemic that has killed more than a million Americans.But the climax of this week’s congressional China-targeted slam-fest was the prime-time Tuesday evening debut hearing of the new House China Select Committee that revealed early partisan fault lines in the body’s legislative agenda, as I reported after the arguments wrapped around 10 p.m.In a three-hour event complete with multimedia presentations and hecklers from the activist peace group Code Pink, the committee’s 24 members heard from witnesses who painted a lurid portrait of an America at acute risk from malign Chinese government activities. Witnesses and committee members raised perennial bilateral tensions ranging from Taiwan, trade and TikTok to supply chain security and human rights. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson MAO NING accused the committee of “ideological bias and zero-sum Cold War mentality.”

US Ambassador To China: “We’re The Leader” Of The Indo-Pacific – Caitlin Johnstone -- A recent US Chamber of Commerce InSTEP program hosted three empire managers to talk about Washington’s top three enemies, with the US ambassador to China Nicholas Burns discussing the PRC, the odious Victoria Nuland discussing Russia, and the US ambassador to Israel Tom Nides talking about Iran.Toward the end of the hour-long discussion, Burns made the very interesting comment that Beijing must accept that the United States is “the leader” in the region and isn’t going anywhere.“From my perspective sitting here in China looking out at the Indo-Pacific, our American position is stronger than it was five or ten years ago,” Burns said, citing the strength of US alliances, its private sector and its research institutions and big tech companies.“And I do think that the Chinese now understand that the United States is staying in this region — we’re the leader in this region in many ways,” Burns added emphatically.The “Indo-Pacific” is a term which has gained a lot of traction in geopolitical discourse in recent years, typically describing the vast multi-continental region between Australia to the south, Asia to the north, Africa to the west, and the middle of the Pacific Ocean to the east. It contains half the Earth’s population, and it very much includes China.After making the rather audacious claim of being “the leader” of a region which China is a part of but the United States is not, Burns went on to claim the US does not want any kind of confrontation with the Chinese government.“We want a future of peace with China,” Burns said. “As President Biden makes clear every time he talks about this, we don’t want conflict, but we’re gonna hold our own out here. And I feel optimistic, just concluding my first year as ambassador, about the American position in this country and in this region.”Again, Burns is saying this from China, so by “in this country” he means in China.Burns supported the Iraq war and is on record saying that “China is the greatest threat to the security of our country and of the democratic world,” and he was appointed to his current position for a reason. Though especially hawkish and American supremacist, his comments are entirely in alignment with official US foreign policy; here’s an excerpt from a White House strategy published last year titled “Indo-Pacific Strategy of the United States“:

A Lab Leak in China Most Likely Origin of Covid Pandemic, Energy Department Says – WSJ —The U.S. Energy Department has concluded that the Covid pandemic most likely arose from a laboratory leak, according to a classified intelligence report recently provided to the White House and key members of Congress.The shift by the Energy Department, which previously was undecided on how the virus emerged, is noted in an update to a 2021 document by Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines’s office.The new report highlights how different parts of the intelligence community have arrived at disparate judgments about the pandemic’s origin. The Energy Department now joins the Federal Bureau of Investigation in saying the virus likely spread via a mishap at a Chinese laboratory. Four other agencies, along with a national intelligence panel, still judge that it was likely the result of a natural transmission, and two are undecided.The Energy Department’s conclusion is the result of new intelligence and is significant because the agency has considerable scientific expertise and oversees a network of U.S. national laboratories, some of which conduct advanced biological research.The Energy Department made its judgment with “low confidence,” according to people who have read the classified report.The FBI previously came to the conclusion that the pandemic was likely the result of a lab leak in 2021 with “moderate confidence” and still holds to this view.The FBI employs a cadre of microbiologists, immunologists and other scientists and is supported by the National Bioforensic Analysis Center, which was established at Fort Detrick, Md., in 2004 to analyze anthrax and other possible biological threats.U.S. officials declined to give details on the fresh intelligence and analysis that led the Energy Department to change its position. They added that while the Energy Department and the FBI each say an unintended lab leak is most likely, they arrived at those conclusions for different reasons.The updated document underscores how intelligence officials are still putting together the pieces on how Covid-19 emerged. More than one million Americans have died in the pandemic that began more than three years ago.The National Intelligence Council, which conducts long-term strategic analysis, and four agencies, which officials declined to identify, still assess with “low confidence” that the virus came about through natural transmission from an infected animal, according to the updated report.The Central Intelligence Agency and another agency that officials wouldn’t name remain undecided between the lab-leak and natural-transmission theories, the people who have read the classified report said.Despite the agencies’ differing analyses, the update reaffirmed an existing consensus between them that Covid-19 wasn’t the result of a Chinese biological-weapons program, the people who have read the classified report said.

China must be 'more honest' on COVID origins, envoy says (Reuters) - China must be more honest about the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. ambassador to China said on Monday, after reports that the U.S. Energy Department concluded the pandemic likely arose from a Chinese laboratory leak. Nicholas Burns, speaking by video link at a U.S. Chamber of Commerce event, said it was necessary to push China to take a more active role in the World Health Organization (WHO) if the U.N. health agency was to be strengthened. China also needed to "be more honest about what happened three years ago in Wuhan with the origin of the COVID-19 crisis," Burns said, referring to the central Chinese city where the first human cases were reported in December 2019. The Wall Street Journal first reported on Sunday that the U.S. Energy Department had concluded the pandemic likely arose from a Chinese laboratory leak, an assessment Beijing denies.

Republicans React To Energy Department’s Reported Finding That COVID 'Likely' Leaked From Wuhan Lab -- Republican lawmakers responded to a news report saying that the U.S. Energy Department had concluded the lab leak theory was “likely,” saying that the finding supports what many have long suspected. A Wall Street Journal article on Feb. 26 reported that a classified intelligence report by the Energy Department said that the virus likely leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. “So the government caught up to what Real America knew all along,” Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) wrote in a Twitter post on Sunday. The responses came as GOP lawmakers ramp up investigations into the origin of COVID-19 and allegations of government-big tech censorship of the debate. The Energy Department was previously undecided on the issue but now joins the FBI in corroborating the lab leak hypothesis, according to the report. Several people who have read the report said the Department’s judgment was made with “low confidence,” the Journal reported. Responding to the report on Sunday, White House national security advisor Jake Sullivan told CNN that the intelligence community does not have a “definitive answer” on the matter at this point. Republican lawmakers have been vocal about the theory that the virus leaked from the Wuhan laboratory soon after the onset of the pandemic in 2020. Initially, some health professionals and legacy media outlets dismissed the theory, labeling the theory’s proponents as racist and conspiracy theorists. Some lawmakers also accused Anthony Fauci, former head of the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), of colluding with big tech companies, such as Facebook and Twitter, and censoring stories about the lab leak theory via what these companies describe as a crackdown on “misinformation.”\ “Fauci knew this immediately but dismissed it because of funding for the Wuhan lab,” Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) wrote in another post. “We know what happened next — when Fauci spoke Big Tech censored. I exposed this collusion as AG and I’ll work to ensure this type of censorship never happens again.” “Americans knew this from Day One,” Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) wrote on Twitter on Sunday. “Unfortunately, Big Tech and Big Government silenced them.” Republicans and critics of Fauci have raised concerns about the NIAID’s funding of the Wuhan Institute of Virology via the non-governmental organization EcoHealth Alliance, including for research described by experts as gain-of-function. The NIAID issued about 3.4 million in grants to EcoHealth.

Paul calls for declassifying documents showing that COVID came from Chinese lab - Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), the ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, says the Biden administration should declassify classified documents showing that scientists at the Department of Energy believe COVID-19 leaked from a lab in Wuhan, China. “Classified documents leaked (they should be declassified!) showing scientists at DOE believe COVID leaked from Wuhan Lab,” Paul tweeted on Monday, circulating a Wall Street Journal story published over the weekend reporting the Energy Department has concluded the COVID-19 pandemic likely came from a lab leak. The Journal reported the Energy Department concluded the pandemic arouse from a mishap at a Chinese lab based on new intelligence. It matches the FBI’s conclusion from a 2021 analysis that the pandemic originated from a lab leak. The Energy Department study reportedly offered the conclusion with low confidence. The U.S. intelligence community is split on the conclusion that the deadly virus leaked from a Chinese lab. Four other federal agencies believe that it likely jumped to humans from an animal host outside a lab. Those findings are also reportedly made with low confidence. The CIA hasn’t made a judgment on whether the virus sprung from a lab or naturally from another animal host. Paul is not the only U.S. senator pushing to see the intelligence and make it public. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) said on Sunday that he will introduce legislation to declassify intelligence findings about the likely origin of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has resulted in more than 1 million deaths in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “The American people deserve the full truth about #COVID origins. No more whitewash. I will again introduce legislation to make the U.S. government’s intelligence reports on COVID more open to the public,” Hawley tweeted.

GOP divided on how to respond to ‘lab leak’ report - Congressional Republicans are anxious to use new Covid-19 lab leak reports to lash out at the ruling Chinese Communist Party and paint President Joe Biden’s administration as soft on Beijing. But they have reached little consensus on how exactly to do that. Some GOP lawmakers hope a reported new assessment from the Energy Department, concluding that the so-called lab leak theory is the most likely explanation for Covid’s origin will give new life to legislation that stalled last year — including bills to declassify intelligence about the pandemic, set up a 9/11-style nonpartisan commission to study the virus’ beginnings, and restrict data-sharing with Chinese scientists. Others are calling for the White House to hold classified briefings on what they knew about Covid-19’s origins, when they knew it, and what led to the latest agency assessment. And still more hope to use the lab leak assessment as momentum for sanctions and investment restrictions on the world’s second-largest economy. The spectrum of responses played out on Tuesday across nearly a dozen hearings and legislation markups aimed at deterring what GOP lawmakers say is increasingly aggressive behavior from China that the Biden administration has not effectively addressed. The Covid news “reinforces the vigilance we’re going to have to have vis a vis China on just about every front,” said Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.). “It takes a little time to get momentum, but you’re going to see a lot of fresh China-countering policies from this Congress.” The U.S. government has not reached a consensus on how the coronavirus pandemic started. But The Wall Street Journal’s weekend report that the Energy Department made a “low confidence” endorsement of the lab leak theory provided fresh ammunition for those who have long accused the federal government of misleading the public about Covid-19, potentially sowing more distrust about the threat the virus still poses. But even as some Republicans argued the Energy Department news vindicates the lab leak theory they’ve promoted for years, they warned against focusing on the past at the expense of current threats. “Most certainly, we can have additional hearings, but I think there are other priorities right now,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) told POLITICO. “We’ve got a war in Europe right now. We’ve got a new peer competitor in China right now that is growing faster than we are in terms of military capabilities. We’ve got challenges within our own country in terms of a huge debt that we really have to address. So, when we look at the pandemic and talk about assigning blame, I think most of us have already assigned it.”

COVID origin report reignites firestorm over ‘lab leak’ theory -- A new federal assessment saying a lab leak was the likely origin of COVID-19 is feeding new oxygen into Republican calls for further investigations, even as scientists and the intelligence community say the issue is still far from resolved. In the wake of a Wall Street Journal report published over the weekend on an Energy Department conclusion that COVID-19 most likely came from a lab leak in China, Republicans claimed vindication. “Senator Tom Cotton deserves an apology,” the Republican National Committee tweeted Monday. In February 2020, Cotton (R-Ark.) raised the possibility, without evidence, that the virus had originated in a Chinese biochemical lab, though he later walked back his assertion that the virus was a weapon. “Being proven right doesn’t matter. What matters is holding the Chinese Communist Party accountable so this doesn’t happen again,” Cotton tweeted. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) said on Sunday that he will introduce legislation to declassify intelligence findings about the likely origin of the COVID-19 pandemic, a call that was echoed by other Senate Republicans. The White House spent Monday downplaying the report, emphasizing that intelligence agencies have not yet found any conclusive evidence whether the virus came from a lab or nature. “There’s not been a definitive conclusion, so it’s difficult for me to say, nor should I feel like I should have to defend press reporting about a possible preliminary indication here,” White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said during a press briefing. “What the president wants is facts. He wants the whole government designed to go get those facts. And, that’s what we’re doing, and we’re just not there yet,” Kirby said. Yet House Republicans are revving up a probe into the virus’s origins that began while they were in the minority last year. They retooled the focus of the panel investigating the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, and have fired off letters demanding information and testimony from current and former Biden health officials, including Anthony Fauci, the former head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.On Monday, House Republicans expanded the probe to include the Department of Energy, the Department of State, and Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), which has also assessed that a lab leak likely sparked the pandemic.

The Wuhan Lab Leak slander being resurrected to bolster US war drive against China - On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that the US Department of Energy (DOE) had shifted its previous stand on how the COVID-19 pandemic emerged from previously being undecided to now concluding that SARS-CoV-2 “most likely arose from a laboratory leak.” However, not one shred of new evidence has been offered in support of this discredited right-wing conspiracy theory. The Journal can only note that the Energy Department’s conclusion, now coinciding with that of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, “is the result of new intelligence and is significant because the agency has considerable scientific expertise and oversees a network of US national laboratories, some of which conduct advanced biological research.” The essence of this statement is that the “intelligence” must be credible because the DOE says it is. One must ask why doesn’t the Journal, with all its resources and clout, not demand the federal government to make this evidence publicly available? One reason, of course, is the editorial alignment of the newspaper, part of the media empire of billionaire Rupert Murdoch, with the Republican Party. The House of Representatives, now under Republican control, has set up a new select committee to investigate (i.e., resurrect from the dead) the claim that China deliberately created the virus which causes COVID-19. But it is more than the Republicans, since the DOE is under the direction of the Democratic administration of President Joe Biden, which is now spearheading a campaign to prepare the American population for war with China. COVID could provide yet another casus belli against Beijing, even though Biden has declared that the pandemic is over, and he has stopped thinking about it. Biden’s lying declaration does not change the fact that it has been an unprecedented catastrophe for hundreds of millions in the US, and billions around the world, and left an indelible scar on global society and mass consciousness. In America alone, 1.12 million have died from a preventable pandemic and upwards of 16 to 20 million continue to suffer from Long COVID as a result of their infections. And even as hundreds of people continue to die from SARS-CoV-2 infections, the entire government has essentially turned out the lights on every conceivable metric that provided the population some inkling of the state of the pandemic. And soon, with the ending of the pandemic emergency measures, millions of people will lose their government-sponsored Medicaid health insurance. This will push many health systems that are already operating in the red into outright bankruptcy. The Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform is forecasting that more than 200 rural US hospitals may have to shutter their doors in the next couple of years, which will leave millions without access to immediate care and heighten the crisis of delivering healthcare to the remaining systems, which are seeing record numbers of emergency room visits, crippling their ability to safely triage patients.

The COVID Lab Leak Is A Scandal Of Media And Government Censorship - Jonathon Turley- The Wall Street Journal reports that the Energy Department has concluded that the COVID pandemic most likely arose from a laboratory leak.The conclusion is reportedly based on a classified intelligence report recently provided to the White House and key members of Congress. Many will be exploring why the scientific evidence of a lab leak was so slow to emerge from intelligence agencies. However, for my part, the most alarming aspect was the censorship, not the science.There will continue to be a debate over the origins of COVID-19, but now there will be a debate.For years, the media and government allied to treat anyone raising a lab theory as one of three possibilities: conspiracy theorist or racists or racist conspiracy theorists.Academics joined this chorus in marginalizing anyone raising the theory. One study cited the theory as an example of “anti-Chinese racism” and “toxic white masculinity.” As late as May 2021, the New York Times’ Science and Health reporter Apoorva Mandavilli was calling any mention of the lab theory as “racist.” She embodies the model of the new “advocacy journalism” at the Times. Reporters who remained wedded to the dated view of objective journalism were purged from the ranks of The Times long ago. Mandavilli and others made clear that reporters covering the theory were COVID’s little Bull Connors. She tweeted wistfully “someday we will stop talking about the lab leak theory and maybe even admit its racist roots. But alas, that day is not yet here.” However, one former New York Times science editor Nicholas Wade chastised his former colleagues for ignoring the obvious evidence supporting a lab theory as well as Chinese efforts to arrest scientists and destroy evidence that could establish the origin. Others in academia quickly joined the bandwagon to assure the public that there is no scientific basis for their theory, leaving only racist or politics as the motivation behind the theory. In early 2020, with little available evidence, two op-eds in The Lancet in February and Nature Medicine went all-in on the denial front. The Lancet op-ed stated, “We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that Covid-19 does not have a natural origin.” We were also supposed to forget about massive payments from the Chinese government to American universities and grants of some of these writers to both Chinese interests or even the specific Wuhan lab. No reference to the lab theory was to be tolerated. When Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) merely mentioned the possibility in 2020, he was set upon by the usual flash media mob. The Washington Post ridiculed him of repeating a “debunked” coronavirus “conspiracy theory.” In September 2020, Dr. Li-Meng Yan, a virologist and former postdoctoral fellow at the University of Hong Kong, dared to repeat the theory on Fox News, saying, “I can present solid scientific evidence . . . [that] it is a man-made virus created in the lab.” The left-leaning PolitiFact slammed her and gave her a “pants on fire rating.” President Joe Biden accused Trump of fanning racism in his criticism of the Chinese government over the pandemic and his Administration reportedly shut down the State Department investigation into the possible lab origins of the virus. When Biden later revived an investigation into the origins, he was denounced as “sugar-coating Trump’s racism.” The categorical rejection of the lab theory is only the latest media narrative proven to be false. The Russian collusion scandal, the Hunter Biden “Russian Disinformation,” the Lafayette Park “Photo Op” conspiracy, the Nick Sandmann controversy, the Jussie Smollett case, the Migrant Whipping scandal. On the lab theory, media like the Washington Post piled on senators like Cruz and Cotton for mentioning the lab theory only later to admit that it could be legitimate. All of those experts and writers who were called racists or suspended by social media were simply forgotten in media coverage. That is why this is really about censorship. The media guaranteed that we did not have a full debate over the origins of the virus and attacked those who had the temerity to state the obvious that there was a plausible basis for suspecting the Wuhan lab. None of this has diminished demands for more censorship. Even after Twitter admitted that it wrongly blocked The New York Post story before the 2020 election, Democratic senators responded by warning the company not to cut back on censorship and even demanded more censorship.

US Senate clears bill to declassify all intel information on Covid-19 origin - The US Senate has voted unanimously to pass a bill that calls on the Biden administration to declassify the intelligence about the origin of COVID-19. Announcing the same, Republican Josh Hawley, the Senator from Missouri, tweeted, "Tonight, the Senate unanimously passed my bill to declassify all the intelligence the government has on COVID-19 origins. Let the people see the truth!" Republican congressmen had asked the Department of Energy (DoE), the Department of State and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for documents related to the probe into the origins of the coronavirus. Politico reported that the request for the papers arose after a Wall Street Journal report said that the DoE had concluded that the pandemic most likely arose from a Chinese laboratory leak. A WHO and China joint report published in 2021 noted that the virus travelled from bats to another animal, subsequently infecting humans. However, it wasn't made clear how the virus reached the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan. Lab leak was being cited as a reason, and earlier this week, FBI said that Wuhan lab leak was the most plausible reason for the emergence of the COVID-19 virus. Speaking on Fox News on Tuesday, FBI director Christopher Asher Wray said that the bureau believes COVID-19 "most likely" originated in a "Chinese government-controlled lab". According to the BBC, it is the first public confirmation of the FBI's classified judgment of how the pandemic virus emerged. China hit back at the claims, with spokeswoman for China's foreign ministry, Mao Ning, condemning Wray's allegations about the origin of the coronavirus and asserted that they only damage US credibility. There has been a divide in the US government over the origins of Covid-19. A 2021 report issued by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence revealed that the National Intelligence Council, along with four other unidentified agencies, in a low-confidence assessment believe that the initial Covid-19 infection “was most likely caused by natural exposure to an animal infected with it or a close progenitor virus.”

CIA Chief Says Iran Is Not Resuming Nuclear Weapons Program - In a weekend CBS interview, CIA Director William Burns offered a surprising and blunt assessment which contradicts much media reporting over Iran and its nuclear program. Days ago multiple international reports claimed that Iran is now enriching uranium to 84%, which would bring it very close to obtaining the level of purity needed for a bomb. Burns in the new interview also advanced this figure, but at the same time said his agency believed the Islamic Republic is "not resuming" its nuclear weapons program. But he did stress that should the Iranians decide to take final crucial steps toward nuclear weapons capability, it would merely be "a matter of weeks" before achieving a nuclear bomb."If they chose to cross that line," he explained, Tehran would only need a "matter of weeks" to enrich uranium necessary to reach nuclear weapons grade. Currently, talks to restore the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPA) are effectively dead, and the Biden administration is no longer actively pursuing a deal, blaming the Iranians for the collapse of the Vienna process.The "Face the Nation" interview aired Sunday, and while most headlines emphasized that Tehran's nuclear program is advancing at "worrisome pace", his words contained the following admission:"To the best of our knowledge, we don't believe that the Supreme Leader in Iran has yet made a decision to resume the weaponization program that we judge that they suspended or stopped at the end of 2003," Burns told show host Margaret Brennan. "But the other two legs of the stool, meaning enrichment programs, they've obviously advanced very far." But regardless, Iran's regional enemy #1 Israel does believe Tehran is pursuing nukes. For this reason the hardline Netanyahu government has stressed time and again that it reserves freedom of action to intervene militarily to stop Iran's threatening program. This also as Israel sees any potential Iranian acquirement of the bomb as an existential threat to the Jewish state. Recent years have seen Israeli drone attacks as well as suspected sabotage operations against Iran's nuclear facilities, and even the assassination of a top Iranian nuclear scientist in a high risk covert operation using a remote-controlled machine gun.But CIA director Burns has been fairly consistent in saying Iran is not actively pursuing nukes (which suggests the Iranian official explanation of a peaceful nuclear energy program could be accurate). For example in 2021 he made the exact same assessment, which was also controversial at the time.

Brazil Flouts Biden Pressure, Welcomes Iranian Warships To Rio Port - In defiance of US pressure, Brazilian authorities have allowed a pair of Iranian warships to dock in Rio de Janeiro this week. This ships were welcomed despite specific warnings from Biden administration officials. The IRIS Makran and IRIS Dena warships pulled into port on Sunday morning, Rio's port authority confirmed at the start of the week. Initially, just after his historic defeat of incumbent Blair Bolsonaro, far-Left President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had vowed to deny Tehran's request for the ships to stop in Brazil. But that decision which was meant to appease the Biden administration just after Lula's election win was clearly reversed, with Brazilian Navy Vice Admiral Carlos Eduardo Horta Arentz having given his approval for the ships to dock between February 26 and March 4. In mid-February US Ambassador Elizabeth Bagley ramped up the pressure on the Brazilian government in the following appeal: "In the past, those ships facilitated illegal trade and terrorist activities, and have also been sanctioned by the United States. Brazil is a sovereign nation, but we firmly believe those ships should not dock anywhere," she said.Additionally, Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian Nelson in a statement had earlier said "The United States will continue to aggressively target all elements of Iran’s UAV program."Photos confirmed the presence of the two Iranian ships at Rio's port...

US watchdog to audit Buttigieg government jet use | (Reuters) - A U.S. government watchdog will audit Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg's use of government airplanes for some trips, his office said on Monday. The Transportation Department Office of Inspector General will review 18 flights Buttigieg made on Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) planes over seven trips. The costs of the flights for Buttigieg and staff was $41,905.20 and in six of seven trips costs to fly on FAA planes were less expensive than flying commercial, the department confirmed to Reuters.

GOP uses East Palestine train derailment to ramp up Buttigieg attacks - Republicans are seizing on the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, to ramp up their attacks against Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, saying he is promoting his own agenda at the expense of families who are grappling with a toxic chemical accident in their backyard. The Transportation Department does not have primary responsibility for the cleanup, and Buttigieg and his supporters are firing back, suggesting the GOP has other motives for its focus on him. The secretary, who sought the presidency in 2020, has taken the unusual step of responding directly to some of his critics, including Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), former president Donald Trump and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). The result is an unusually personal and, on occasion, vitriolic back-and-forth involving a transportation secretary who is also a rising star in his party, potential candidate for higher office and prominent gay official — far from the usual technocratic and logistical debates that surround the Transportation Department. “I’ve never heard this level of criticism against another secretary, ever, and I’ve been following this a long time,” said Ray LaHood, a former Republican congressman who served as transportation secretary under President Barack Obama. “I’ve never seen it like this before. This is pure politics.” Buttigieg has faced GOP criticism before, notably during supply chain disruptions early in Biden’s presidency and the failure of a federal aviation safety system in January. But people close to the transportation secretary say the attacks on him since the derailment have risen to a new level, noting that the Environmental Protection Agency, which is in charge of the response to the derailment, has taken far less heat. Though part of a broader GOP criticism of the administration’s response to the derailment, the attacks on Buttigieg have in some cases been strikingly personal. Rubio tweeted that Buttigieg is “an incompetent who is focused solely on his fantasies about his political future & needs to be fired.” McConnell said on the Senate floor that Buttigieg is “more interested in pursuing press coverage for woke initiatives and climate nonsense than in attending to the basic elements of his day job.”

Rail unions tell Biden officials that workers have fallen ill at Norfolk Southern derailment site --The presidents of U.S. railroad unions told Biden administration officials that rail workers have fallen ill at the Norfolk Southern derailment site in East Palestine, Ohio, in a push for more train safety. Leaders from 12 unions met with Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Amit Bose, administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration, in Washington, D.C., Wednesday to discuss the derailment, aftermath and needed safety improvements."My hope is the stakeholders in this industry can work towards the same goals related to safety when transporting hazardous materials by rail," said Mike Baldwin, president of the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen. "Today's meeting is an opportunity for labor to share what our members are seeing and dealing with day to day. The railroaders labor represents are the employees who make it safe and they must have the tools to do so."Jeremy Ferguson, president of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers – Transportation Division, told CNBC that Buttigieg plans on more talks with the unions in the future."This was a good start," said Ferguson. "It's important these safety issues are addressed. No one wants another East Palestine. The safety discussion of employees must be addressed. The running of these long trains was a point of discussion as well."The meeting comes on the heels of letters sent to both the DOT and the FRA Wednesday in which union representations claimed rail workers had gotten sick at the derailment site. CNBC obtained the letters, addressed to Buttigieg, Bose, East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, from the general chairman of the American Rail System Federation of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.According to the letter, Norfolk Southern rail workers who have worked or continue to work the cleanup site have reported experiencing "migraines and nausea." One worker reportedly asked his supervisor to be transferred off the derailment site because of his symptoms, but never heard back from his supervisor and was left at the job site.The letter also claims workers are not being provided appropriate personal protective equipment such as respirators, eye protection or protective clothing. According to union representatives, 35 to 40 workers were on the track and were not supplied with proper breathing apparatuses — only paper and N95 masks — or rubber gloves, boots or coverups.

Playbook: A bipartisan response to East Palestine - — A bipartisan group of six senators today will introduce the Railway Safety Act of 2023, legislation aimed at preventing a repeat of the toxic firestorm in East Palestine, Ohio, that followed the Feb. 4 derailment of a chemical train. Introducing the bill are Ohio Sens. J.D. Vance (R) and Sherrod Brown, Bob Casey, D-Pa., John Fetterman, D-Pa., Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Josh Hawley, R-Mo.. According to a summary we saw last night, the legislation would: 1) require rail carriers to give advance notice to state emergency response officials before running trains carrying hazardous materials; 2) mandate trains run with at least two-person crews; 3) require better monitoring of railcar wheel bearings — which overheated in the Ohio train accident, according to the NTSB, and likely caused the train to jump the tracks — and 4) increase penalties for wrongdoing in the industry. AP’s Julie Carr Smyth with the scoop “Through this legislation, Congress has a real opportunity to ensure that what happened in East Palestine will never happen again,” Vance said in a draft statement reviewed by Playbook. “We owe every American the peace of mind that their community is protected from a catastrophe of this kind.” “Rail lobbyists have fought for years to protect their profits at the expense of communities like East Palestine and Steubenville and Sandusky,” Brown added. “These commonsense bipartisan safety measures will finally hold big railroad companies accountable.” The context: The bipartisan proposal stands in stark contrast to the partisan rancor that has surrounded the East Palestine disaster in recent weeks. Republicans have blasted President Joe Biden’s administration for what they’ve dubbed an inadequate response, roasted Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg for taking three weeks to visit the impacted area and vowed to launch an oversight investigation in the House. Democrats, meanwhile, have sought to highlight Donald Trump’s moves to roll back rail safety regulations, including withdrawing Obama-era rules requiring two-person crews and more advanced brake systems on trains carrying flammable materials. And Senate Majority Leader CHUCK SCHUMER has pointed a spotlight on Norfolk Southern, the railroad that ran the toxic train through East Palestine, calling for its CEO to testify. And yet this group of six unlikely bedfellows is putting the sniping aside, for now. The nature of the coalition — split evenly between the parties, with senators of both the state where the derailment occurred (Ohio) and the state where the toxic plume drifted (Pennsylvania) — gives the bill a good chance of advancing. But there are also reasons it could get bogged down: Only Vance sits on the Senate Commerce Committee, which has jurisdiction over rail transportation, and given the high profile of the disaster, many other lawmakers want a piece of the action. And, as Timothy Cama at POLITICO’s E&E News reported last week, rail industry lobbyists have “for years worked to block, delay or reverse safety regulations, usually under the argument that they would be cost prohibitive or would not improve safety.” And even if the bill advances in the Democrat-led Senate, it could face an even steeper hurdle in the GOP House. This morning our colleagues Tanya Snyder and Kayla Guo report that key House Republicans are warning colleagues against backing new regulations, arguing that the crash needs to be probed first. Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas), who chairs the Transportation and Infrastructure rail subcommittee, dismissed the need for stricter penalties on the industry: “The rail industry has a very high success rate of moving hazardous material — to the point of 99-percent-plus. Let’s not have more burdensome regulations and all this other stuff.”

Bringing Railroads Under Public Ownership - UE or the United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America union’s role in railroading is the transportation of train crews. It has a membership of approximately 2,000. Its Executive Board recently issued a statement concerning costs and the plight of labor.And the issues? Pricing issues within the transportation of goods across the US. Typically, these costs are passed along in the form of shortages and/or higher prices. The second issue is calling attention to the plight of railroad workers as caused byprecision scheduled railroading (PSR).PSR attempts to combine the best elements of two opposing operating plan strategies. Those issues being the holding of a train for tonnage and moving a train in a timely manner to adhere to a schedule. The conflict being freight being available to meet the train schedule.Instead of running single purpose trains like you might see in moving containers from the West Coast to Detroit. The industry has switched to include intermodal, merchandise, and bulk commodity trains, rather than a singular commodity trains. Doing so results in moving more freight cars in fewer and longer trains. It also contributes to maintaining a specific schedule which customers require on both ends.Where this plays out is with the crews (labor) manning the trains. Crews that are or were on (in one instance so far) call to man a train ready to go within a certain period of time. Crews must report if called in regardless of time off, etc. It gives the scheduling and departure timing of trains greater flexibility.Longer trains, mixed loads, and flexible Labor increases profitability. Railroads Must Be Brought Under Public Ownership, UE (ueunion.org):

White House says Biden’s words ‘mischaracterized’ by Rep. Majorie Taylor Greene - The White House on Thursday hit back at Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) when asked why President Biden chuckled during remarks he was making about being blamed for the death of a woman’s two sons to fentanyl. Biden addressed the House Democratic caucus during its issues retreat in Baltimore on Wednesday night when he sarcastically brought up Greene, who had previously blamed the Biden administration’s border policies for the deaths of the woman’s sons.White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden’s words were being mischaracterized when asked if the president regretted how his comments were delivered. “His words are being mischaracterized by someone who is regularly discredited for things that she says that are really conspiracy theories, and those lies are being parroted by a certain network and I’ll just leave it there,” Jean-Pierre said, referring to Greene.The mother, conservative activist Rebecca Kiessling of Michigan, has since asked for an apology from Biden for his remarks in Baltimore. “As President Biden was speaking about this mother who lost her two sons, he starts to laugh… This is how you speak about the death of my sons? Because a congresswoman misspoke? You mock the loss of my sons? How dare you. What is the matter with you?” Kiessling said in a statement, according to Fox News. In responding to Greene’s claims that the Biden administration was the cause due to fentanyl that she said came across the southern border, Biden noted that the death of the woman’s sons had actually occurred under the Trump administration. “She was very specific — I shouldn’t digress, probably — I read, she was very specific recently saying that a mom, a poor mother who lost two kids to fentanyl, that I killed her sons. Well, the interesting thing is, that fentanyl they took came during the last administration,” Biden said, letting out a chuckle.

To Tap Federal Funds, Chip Makers Will Need to Provide Child Care - — The Biden administration plans to leverage the federal government’s expansive investment in the semiconductor industry to make progress on another goal: affordable child care.On Tuesday, the Commerce Department will announce that any semiconductor manufacturer seeking a slice of nearly $40 billion in new federal subsidies will need to essentially guarantee affordable, high-quality child care for workers who build or operate a plant.Last year, a bipartisan group of lawmakers passed the CHIPS Act, which devoted $39 billion to directly boost U.S. semiconductor factories as part of $52 billion in subsidies for the industry, in hopes of making the nation less reliant on foreign suppliers for critical chips that power computers, video games, cars and more.Companies that receive the subsidies to build new plants will be able to use some of the government money to meet the new child care requirement. They could do that in a number of ways, in consultation with Commerce officials, who will set basic guidelines but not dictate how companies ensure workers have access to care they can afford.That could include building company child-care centers near construction sites or new plants, paying local child-care providers to add capacity at an affordable cost for workers, directly subsidizing workers’ care costs or other, similar steps that would ensure workers have access to care for their children.American employers, including manufacturers, are increasingly raising concerns that a lack of access to affordable child care is blocking millions of Americans from looking for work, particularly women. President Biden pushed Congress to address those concerns over the last two years, proposing hundreds of billions of dollars for new child care programs, but he was unable to corral support from even a majority of Senate Democrats.But Mr. Biden did convince lawmakers to approve a range of new spending programs seeking to boost American manufacturing. Now, Commerce is trying to utilize a centerpiece of those efforts, which aims to expand American semiconductor manufacturing, to make at least a small dent in his large goals for the so-called care economy.

Food stamp benefits could shrink for millions as pandemic federal aid ends - A federal pandemic program that provided extra money to Americans who receive food stamps ended on Wednesday, threatening to complicate the finances of an estimated 31 million low-income people while grocery prices remain high.For some households, the cuts are expected to reduce their monthly benefits by an average of $182, according to the Agriculture Department, which manages the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP. That means federal aid may only provide families an average of $6 per person each day for food starting Wednesday, less than what many anti-hunger experts say is necessary for a healthy diet.At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Congress allowed states to issue extra money to food stamp recipients, hoping to ease the financial burden on low-income families who unexpectedly lost their jobs — and suddenly faced a hunger crisis.Every state offered these emergency allotments until the spring of 2021, when a wave of largely GOP-led states began to cease their participation, arguing that the extra federal financial assistance was wasteful and unnecessary. More than a year later, Congress agreed to terminate the program nationally as part of a broad $1.7 trillion bipartisan dealenacted in December to stave off a government shutdown.The end to extra SNAP benefits threatens to bring new hardships for families in the 35 states and territories that had chosen to continue providing emergency aid until Wednesday, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, which estimates that roughly 31 million individuals — out of a total 41 million enrolled in SNAP nationwide — could be affected.For Chante Westfield, a mother of three in Halethorpe, Md., the cut is likely to be steep, cleaving deeply into a benefit that has provided her family a financial lifeline. Since the start of the pandemic, she has counted on an extra $200 in food stamps each month, enough to ease her anxiety and allow her to seek remote work so that she could stay home to tend to her newborn daughter. But Westfield on Monday — two days before the deadline — said she would now have to space out her purchases of meats, fresh produce and eggs and ration more of her meals, adding that she expects to make more trips to the local Laurel Advocacy and Referral Services food pantry.. The end of the emergency SNAP allotments comes at a precarious time for many low-income families, who have felt the strain of surging prices even as inflation begins to moderate nationally. The costs of housing, gasoline, groceries and other goods remained stubbornly high into January, according to federal indicators released last month, with eggs in particular up 8.5 percent compared with the same period a year prior.

Covid-era SNAP boosts kept millions out of poverty. Now they’re gone. - While food prices remain stubbornly high due to inflation, a program expansion that has served as a life raft since the early days of the pandemic has ended, leaving millions of people scrambling to fill the gap left behind. The program, which had increased benefits offered under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), helped millions avoid serious food insecurity despite pandemic-related job cuts, school closures, and other crises ended Wednesday, returning benefits close to levels seen near the start of the pandemic.Additional pandemic-era federal SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) ended on Wednesday as part of the government’s wind-down of Covid-19 federal assistance programs. The program, which helped millions of people avoid serious food insecurity despite pandemic-related job cuts, school closures, and other crises, ends while inflation is still high, and 6.4 percent, affecting the most basic necessities.On a federal level, many pandemic-era emergency assistance programs have already expired, like extended unemployment benefits. But other crucial programs like the SNAP extension and a Medicaid expansion to insure vulnerable people throughout the pandemic have continued.Some states had already closed the SNAP emergency allotment program, but until Wednesday it was still operational in 32 states, as well as Washington, DC, Guam, and the US Virgin Islands.The Biden administration agreed give two months’ notice regarding the end of federal pandemic-related programs; Congress ended the SNAP emergency allotments at the end of February as part of the budget bill passed in December. Though other programs, including a commitment to continue a summer meal subsidy program for school children, will continue, other vulnerable people including the elderly and disabled may not have that kind of additional support.Food prices remain high even as some costs like rent are coming down. Global inflation and other factors have pushed up the price of what were once low-cost, nutrient-dense basicslike eggs. So although other budgetary pressures will ease, food prices, even for nutritious staples, will consume a large part of SNAP recipients’ income.

Biden to warn of potential health care cuts - — President Joe Biden will speak in Virginia Beach today, where he plans to slam Republicans for what the White House insists are continuing threats to cut federal health programs. In a statement put out this morning before the speech, the White House called on Republicans to release their budget plan, including any cuts to the Affordable Care Act, Medicaid, Social Security and Medicare, so voters can compare it to Biden’s plan, set to be released March 9. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has said that cuts to Social Security and Medicare were “off the table,” and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has indicated the same. Everything else is up for negotiation, House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) said earlier this month. Biden’s line of attack that Republicans intend to cut health care spending programs in debt talks has been going strong since his State of the Union speech and is expected to continue through the campaign season, administration officials told our colleagues at West Wing Playbook earlier this mont. “Congressional Republicans have yet to disclose to the American people where these cuts will come from,” the White House said. “But past Republican legislation, budgets, and litigation, along with recent statements, proposals, and budget plans, provide clear evidence that health care will be on the chopping block for severe cuts.” The White House statement includes a long list of what the administration is worried about if the GOP plan includes repealing the ACA or cutting Medicaid, which could result in tens of millions of people at risk for losing their health insurance coverage, worsening conditions at nursing homes and millions losing access to mental health and substance use treatment.

Biden won’t veto GOP effort to repeal D.C. crime law - President Joe Biden told Senate Democrats on Thursday that he would not veto a GOP-backed bid to repeal changes to the D.C. criminal code, raising the stakes of an upcoming Senate vote on the proposal. Biden’s plans not to veto, relayed by three attendees at the party meeting, leave Republicans on track to roll back the new D.C. law when the Senate takes up the House-passed measure as soon as next week. Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) had already said he will support the disapproval bid, Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) backed it on Thursday and Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) is on an extended leave for health issues, eliminating the margin for error in the 51-49 Senate. And Biden’s lack of a veto threat might open the floodgates on the D.C. crime vote. Several Democrats predicted an overwhelming margin of support to roll back some of D.C.'s recent progressive crime measures. “I think that’s where most of the caucus is. Most of the caucus sees the mayor in a reasonable position as saying: 95 percent of this is really good, some of this is problematic. And we need to keep working on it,” Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) said after the meeting. Biden’s much-anticipated Thursday remarks end several weeks of mystery surrounding his handling of a politically perilous vote for his party. And it comes as the president moves to strengthen the ties with Hill Democrats that propelled him to the party’s nomination. The president also told Senate Democrats during their meeting that he wants to see immigration reform on the floor, according to Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) and left several Democratic senators with the distinct impression that he’s running for reelection. In addition, Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.) said that Biden addressed the debt ceiling by remarking that he’s waiting for Republicans to show him a budget. Following their meeting, Schumer also told reporters that the president would support Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and J.D. Vance’s (R-Ohio) bill on railroad protections following the East Palestine train derailment in their state, along with tackling insulin prices for people under 65. The debt limit and budget, along with an “online protection tech bill for kids,” were also discussed, Schumer said.

Biden's decision on DC crime bill puts him in a bind - President Biden on Thursday said he would not veto legislation Republicans have championed that would undo parts of a District of Columbia crime bill, reflecting how the White House is trying to navigate the politically charged issue of crime. And that decision has put Biden in a bind. If he were to veto it, he would have faced a barrage of GOP attacks that he was soft on crime. But instead, the decision to sign the resolution unleashed a barrage of vitriol from his own party, with some House Democrats accusing him of betrayal after they opposed it to align with what they thought the White House wanted. “And now we are being hung out to dry,” one House Democratic lawmaker told The Hill via text message. The bill, which passed the GOP-controlled House with 31 Democrats backing it, is likely to pass the Senate with bipartisan support in a vote as early as next week, despite the Democratic majority in the upper chamber. The Democratic Party’s usual support for D.C. home rule drove opposition in the House. Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre did not offer up many specifics within the D.C. bill that Biden opposed, but she said he was broadly concerned it would make District residents less safe. “One thing that the President believes in is making sure that the streets in America and communities across the country are safe, that includes in D.C. That does not change,” Jean-Pierre told reporters. “When it comes to what this proposal brings forth, which is really lowering penalties for car-jacking, he doesn’t believe that’s going to keep our communities safe,” she added. Ultimately, the president expressed concern about the ramifications of leaving the crime bill in place. The decision is in line with how the White House has tried to present Biden: as a Democrat who is supportive of law enforcement and interested in lowering crime and community violence. Jean-Pierre would not weigh in on any 2024 considerations that played into Biden’s decision. But the choice will be viewed through a political lens as the president prepares a reelection bid.

House Democrats blindsided as Biden changes tune on DC crime bill - House Democrats were infuriated and taken aback by President Biden’s announcement on Thursday that he will sign a resolution to nix the District of Columbia’s crime bill. The crime bill has come under heavy criticism from Republicans and centrist Democrats. But last month, 173 House Democrats voted along with what they thought was the White House’s stance that Biden would veto the resolution in an attempt to stand up for the District’s “home rule.” Instead, Biden made the revelation to Senate Democrats during lunch on Thursday and, in the process, angered their colleagues across the Capitol complex. “The White House f***** this up royally,” one House Democrat told The Hill via text message, noting the White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy opposing the resolution and backing D.C., and that House Democratic leadership told lawmakers that Biden was prepared to veto the measure. The declaration from the Office of Management and Budget called on Congress to “respect the District of Columbia’s autonomy to govern its own local affairs.” “So a lot of us who are allies voted no in order to support what the White House wanted. And now we are being hung out to dry,” the lawmaker continued. “F****** AMATEUR HOUR. HEADS SHOULD ROLL OVER AT THE WHITE HOUSE OVER THIS.” The House Democrat added multiple other lawmakers were “EXTREMELY pissed” about the situation. Rep. Pete Aguilar (Calif.), the No. 3 House Democrat, issued a rare rebuke of the White House during a Punchbowl News event at the caucus’s retreat in Baltimore, saying that Biden’s move was “disappointing.”

Democrats Praise Bush, Want More Small-Business War Profiteers – Caitlin Johnstone - Well it’s another big day for Democrats doing Democraty things. At a Friday event commemorating the 20th anniversary of the President’s Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) hosted by the George W Bush Institute, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi spoke glowingly of the president who instituted the program in 2003 at the same time he was preparing to launch an invasion which would inflict unfathomable horrors upon our world which continue to unfold to this day.“I’ll just say this honestly, that the Bush family, it’s because of their humanity, their faith, their generosity of spirit, their compassion,” said Pelosi. “Once again, it’s an honor to be associated with President Bush in this.”Pelosi then pointed to the former president, who was also joined by former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and oligarch Bill Gates, with video appearances by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Bono of U2 fame.Also on Friday we witnessed what Glenn Greenwald described as the “most Elizabeth Warren tweet ever,” in which the Massachusetts senator took a bold stand against Big War Profiteering to advocate on behalf of the little guy (by which I mean Small War Profiteering).“In the 1990s, America had 51 major contractors bidding for defense work,” tweeted Warren from her government account. “Today, there are only five massive companies remaining. Defense contracting should be reworked to break up the massive contracts awarded to the big guys and create opportunities for firms of all sizes.”Yeah that’s the real problem, Liz. It’s not that the war industry reaps huge profits from global militarism and nonstop warmongering, it’s that the war industry doesn’t include enough plucky small businesses. Won’t somebody please think of the mom and pop war profiteers? They’ve been forced to close their small community military-industrial complex shops by Walmartian “big guys” like Raytheon and Northrop Grumman! This is almost as embarrassing as Warren’s 2019 push to convert the US war machine to clean energy, saying “We don’t have to choose between a green military and an effective one” on the campaign trail during her run for president.

House Wants Companies To Tell Consumers About Cameras, Microphones In Devices - The House of Representatives on Feb. 27 overwhelmingly voted to make manufacturers tell consumers if an Internet-connected device comes with a camera or microphone, with enforcement left to the Federal Trade Commission.That requirement does not cover certain devices, such as “a telephone (including a mobile phone), a laptop, tablet, or any device that a consumer would reasonably expect to have a microphone or camera.”A motion to suspend the rules and pass H.R. 538 flew through the chamber with 406 yeas and 12 nays: 201 Democrats and 205 Republicans voted for it, while 12 Republicans voted against it. 15 representatives didn’t vote.The motion’s opponents include a number of well-known conservative and libertarian lawmakers.Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), Rep. Dan Bishop (R-N.C.), Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), and Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) all voted against it.

Democrats scoff at Republican permitting plan - Republicans looking for Democratic buy-in to overhaul federal permitting for energy projects will need to try harder — or resign themselves to a partisan project. At a House Natural Resources Committee hearing Tuesday, Democrats expressed skepticism of the GOP plan, which would make dramatic changes to the National Environmental Policy Act as a vehicle for permitting reform. But Democrats were somewhat divided on the matter, too. In one camp were those adamantly opposed to the prospect under any circumstances. Committee ranking member Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.) accused Republicans of selectively identifying projects delayed by NEPA to make it appear as though the problem is more widespread than it actually is. “So you can imagine my skepticism,” Grijalva said, “when I hear about the need to accelerate environmental reviews through the so-called permitting reform, and see bills that allow the fossil fuel industry to pollute when and where it wants without having to tell the public too much about it.” And in another camp were committee Democrats who said they’d like to improve energy permitting capabilities but not with the approach being endorsed by the GOP. “If we’ve learned one thing about permitting reform over the last year, there is bicameral, bipartisan interest in getting it done,” said Rep. Susie Lee (D-Nev.), but she called the current product “Not it.” “We understand that permitting is too important across the country — it’s too urgent for this Congress — to spend time on partisan bills and one-sided legislative packages that will go nowhere,” she added. The draft bill is called the “Building United States Infrastructure Through Limited Delays and Efficient Reviews (BUILDER) Act.” It would seek to speed up environmental reviews that can currently delay permits for energy projects, including wind and solar, by requiring regulators to rely on existing “reliable” data rather than conduct lengthy new research. It would also allow project sponsors to assist in conducting environmental reviews and limit lawsuits that could slow down processes. Representative Garrett Graves, standing, conversing with a seated Paul Gosar. Reps. Garret Graves (R-La.) and Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.). | Francis Chung/POLITICO The permitting overhaul effort from Republicans comes after Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chair Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) failed to advance his own permitting bills last year. While many Senate Democrats were on board, House progressives like Grijalva helped sink it. Now, members of both parties have said they are open to trying again, but remain divided on how to get there.

GOP, Manchin look to nullify ‘woke’ Biden rule - GOP lawmakers are escalating their war on “woke” capitalism this week, with House and Senate votes to repeal a Biden administration policy that enables investment managers to factor climate change and social goals into retirement savings decisions. Republicans, with help from at least one moderate Democrat, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, may succeed in passing the rollback and sending it to President Joe Biden’s desk, thanks to a law that allows Congress to nullify new regulations on an expedited basis without succumbing to a Senate filibuster. Other moderate Democrats like Sen. Jon Tester of Montana, who is facing a tough 2024 reelection bid, are also weighing whether to back the repeal. House Republicans passed a resolution to rescind the rule Tuesday afternoon with backing from one Democrat, Rep. Jared Golden of Maine. The Senate is expected to take it up Wednesday. Biden has threatened to veto the rollback, but the move is still providing fodder for GOP lawmakers who are making anti-woke criticism of socially minded big business a centerpiece of their political messaging. Rep. Andy Barr, the Kentucky Republican who sponsored the resolution, said on “Fox and Friends” Tuesday that the votes will put members of Congress on the record regarding “whether they are going to put their constituents’ retirement security first or their own progressive political agenda.” “Whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat, we think most Americans don’t want politics to be a factor in allocating their capital and determining whether or not they’re going to have a secure retirement,” he said.

How Environmentally Conscious Investing Became a Target of Conservatives - It’s been a widely accepted trend in financial circles for nearly two decades. But suddenly, Republicans have launched an assault on a philosophy that says that companies should be concerned with not just profits but also how their businesses affect the environment and society.More than $18 trillion is held in investment funds that follow the investing principle known as E.S.G. — shorthand for prioritizing environmental, social and governance factors — a strategy that has been adopted by major corporations around the globe.Now, Republicans around the country say Wall Street has taken a sharp left turn, attacking what they term “woke capitalism” and dragging businesses, their onetime allies, into the culture wars.The rancor escalated this week as Congress entered the fray. Republicans used their new majority in the House on Tuesday to vote, 216 to 204, to overturn a Department of Labor rule that allows retirement funds to consider climate change and other factors when choosing companies in which to invest. The Senate followed on Wednesday, as two Democrats, Senators Joe Manchin III of West Virginia and Jon Tester of Montana, joined Republicans in a 50-to-46 vote to send the resolution to President Biden’s desk.The White House has said Mr. Biden will block the resolution, in what could be the first veto of his presidency.As if to underscore the issue’s sudden visibility, former Vice President Mike Pence let loose on Twitter on Tuesday. “Disappointing that President Biden is putting E.S.G. and woke policies above hard-working Americans’ retirement accounts!” wrote Mr. Pence, a potential 2024 candidate for the White House. “We will keep fighting until we put a stop to E.S.G. once and for all!”E.S.G. investing has been routine on Wall Street for years. Most major companies issue extensive reports about their efforts to combat climate change and commitment to workplace diversity. But in recent months, conservatives have increasingly attacked the practice, arguing that it promotes liberal priorities ranging from renewable energy to the Black Lives Matter movement.And while E.S.G. applies to everything from diversity among corporate leaders to corruption controls, it’s the “E” in E.S.G. — the idea that the private sector needs to consider its impact on the environment — that has emerged as the top target of Republicans.Officials in Republican-led states argue that it would lead to disinvestment in fossil fuel companies that provide tax revenue and jobs in their states, making it a top target of right-wing commentators and politicians.

Joe Manchin and Jon Tester tee up Biden's first veto - President Joe Biden will soon be in a position to issue his first veto, after moderate Senate Democrats helped Republicans pass a measure that would undo an environmental and social investing rule.Sen. Jon Tester of Montana, a Democrat who is facing a tough 2024 election campaign, ensured passage of the rollback by announcing his support before the Wednesday afternoon vote. Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, another Democrat facing reelection next year, also backed the effort.The Senate passed the GOP-led resolution in a 50-46 vote. House Republicans passed it on Tuesday, with the backing of Rep. Jared Golden(D-Maine). It now heads to Biden’s desk.Tester and Manchin defied Biden’s threat to veto the rollback, which targets a new Labor Department rule that allows retirement plan managers to incorporate climate and social factors into investment decisions. Republicans have criticized the regulation — which itself reversed a Trump-era rule discouraging environmentally and socially focused investing — as a threat to retirement savers because it would allow political forces to take precedence over returns.“At a time when working families are dealing with higher costs, from health care to housing, we need to be focused on ensuring Montanans’ retirement savings are on the strongest footing possible,” Tester said in a statement. “I’m opposing this Biden Administration rule because I believe it undermines retirement accounts for working Montanans and is wrong for my state.”The fact that Republicans are poised to push the measure through a divided Congress underscores the growing political momentum behind their crusade against what they deride as “woke” business practices. Conservative officials at the state and federal level are increasingly attacking big corporations for embracing social and environmental causes. It’s a push that Democrats in red states and swing districts are finding they’re unable to ignore.Republicans took advantage of procedures under the Congressional Review Act that allow lawmakers to nullify recently issued rules with simple majority votes, avoiding the Senate filibuster.The Biden administration said in its veto threat this week that undoing the DOL rule would “unnecessarily limit the options available to retirement plan participants and investors.”Biden’s threat in a way gives moderate Democrats a free pass to distance themselves from the president because they don’t face the risk of the rollback actually being implemented.Asked whether Democratic leadership had pressured him to vote “no,” Tester told reporters that they gave a presentation to the broader caucus Tuesday. But “it wasn’t like, pestering.”The 2024 election “hasn’t been my focus, but that ought to be their focus,” Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.), who sponsored the measure, told reporters. “I just tried to make the merits of the case out there understandable to everyone listening.”Manchin took to the Senate floor to blast the Biden DOL rule as “just another example of how our administration prioritizes a liberal policy agenda over protecting and growing the retirement accounts of 150 million Americans.”The Labor Department rule at issue doesn’t require investment managers to focus on environmental, social and governance factors in retirement accounts, but instead clarifies that they’re free to do so.

Barrasso Pushes for Answers on Anti-car, Anti-mining Report by Officials of Department of Energy Partner - energy.senate.gov — U.S. Senator John Barrasso (R-WY), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources (ENR), sent a letter to Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Jennifer Granholm regarding a report produced in part by officials at UC Davis’s Energy and Efficiency Institute, a “partner” of DOE. The report highlights the alleged benefits of reducing “car dependency,” “densifying” low-density suburbs, and expanding “high-density urban spaces.” It notes that increasing use of “mass and active transit” may help create safer communities. In the letter, Barrasso requests details about DOE’s involvement in producing the report. Read the full letter here and below. Excerpt: The notion that the government should tell people where to live or how to get around is on its face ridiculous. In my home state of Wyoming, people rely on their cars to cross the vast stretches of highway between towns, over plains, and through the mountains. People live in Wyoming because they want to get away from federal overreach, not to have Washington bureaucrats dictate their lifestyles. The Department of Energy (DOE) is listed as a “Partner” of UC Davis’s Energy and Efficiency Institute. Additionally, Shalanda Baker, Director of the Office of Economic Impact and Diversity, is listed on the Climate and Community Project’s website as a member. This prompts several questions about DOE’s involvement in such areas of study. DOE should be promoting American industries and American energy, not stifling growth and constraining the choices of individual consumers. I have attached a series of questions to the end of this letter. In order to keep the American taxpayer appraised of how their money is being spent, please answer each question thoughtfully and respond by March 17, 2023.

'We can’t find people to work': The newest threat to Biden's climate policies – President Joe Biden has been traveling the country to tout the job creation boom his billions of dollars in clean energy spending will bring.But the cutting-edge companies he’s promoting face a struggle: hiring enough people to fill those jobs.The same booming labor market that has given Biden the lowest unemployment rate since the 1960s is also creating a hiring bottleneck for the same construction and manufacturing companies that are central to his climate agenda. Democrats’ policies rely on those companies to make batteries, build solar panels and accelerate next-generation technology that aims to remove planet-warming carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.“Having the technicians and the engineers and skilled mechanics, that is going to be a challenge in the United States,” Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, a prominent Democratic clean energy proponent whose own 2020 presidential platform helped shape some of Biden’s policies, said in an interview.Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act includes $369 billion in clean energy incentives that are meant to send a signal to U.S. businesses — encouraging them to build and deploy electric cars, carbon-free energy sources and less-wasteful appliances. And it appears to be working: More than 100,000 clean-energy job openings have sprung up across the U.S. since Biden signed the climate law six months ago, according to Climate Power, a coalition of environmental groups.The media could not be loaded, either because the server or network failed or because the format is not supported.But another report cast a more ominous outlook: The U.S. construction industry was short 413,000 workers as of December, while 764,000 manufacturing sector jobs remained open, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And the consulting firm McKinsey & Co, expects 550,000 new energy transition jobs will become available by 2030, about 10 percent of which may be filled by people leaving the oil and gas industry. “The first thing I heard from everyone was the same thing: We can’t find people to work,” said Rep. Bob Latta (R-Ohio), said of a recent visit to his manufacturing-heavy district in northern Ohio. “That’s inhibiting what they can do.”Companies in the clean energy sector have raised alarms about labor shortages, said Dawn Lippert, CEO of Honolulu-based Elemental Excelerator, a group that helps clean energy start-ups.“Our portfolio companies have two main concerns: capital and workforce. The need to grow the workforce is evident in all industries, from electricians to finance,” she said.

Blocking sun rays finds support in the Senate - Senators on both sides of the aisle are open to funding research on solar geoengineering, a little understood and potentially dangerous method of blocking the sun’s rays to quickly reduce global warming. Their receptiveness comes after years of Senate apprehension over such funding. While the House has passed bills to study the method — also known as solar radiation management — those efforts have struggled to gain traction on the other side of the Capitol. But more leaders in Washington, Beijing and other capitals are reviewing geoengineering technology while their economies continue to burn fossil fuels — the main cause of climate change. There is also a growing scientific debate about the viability of solar radiation management as an emergency measure to protect ice sheets, ecosystems and low-lying nations from the worst impacts of global warming. “Climate change is to a point where we should look at everything,” Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.) told E&E News. A former petroleum geologist, Hickenlooper won his seat in part by campaigning against the Green New Deal, a 2019 proposal that called for a federal jobs guarantee to help rapidly scale up climate mitigation and adaption efforts. “I think it’s sensible,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said of geoengineering research and small-scale testing. Her state is on the front lines of climate change, with the Arctic portions of Alaska warming more than twice as fast as the rest of the globe, according to NOAA. “I have had constituents come to me with proposals. I have been to Arctic conferences where we’ve been presented these,” she said. “I haven’t done anything legislatively to address any of it. But it is interesting.” Many academics have long considered solar radiation management too dangerous to research. That’s because the process — which can involve reflecting sunlight by shooting aerosols into the stratosphere or increasing marine cloud cover — could create new geopolitical tensions and distract from the urgent need to slash emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases. Those concerns were echoed by some senators. “Are you talking about the stuff that people are worried is going to start a war?” Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, the top Republican on the Select Committee on Intelligence, said when asked about supporting geoengineering research. He spoke with E&E News on Tuesday, shortly after The Washington Post reported that top national security officials gamed out how to avoid conflicts triggered by weather or precipitation changes blamed on geoengineering. “I’m not downplaying it or being negative about it,” Rubio added. “I just don’t know enough about it to give you an informed opinion about whether we should be spending more money on it.” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), a leading advocate of aggressive climate action, said “most of the geoengineering schemes that I’ve heard about create massive, massive unintended consequence risks.” Yet even he remains open to funding solar geoengineering research.

House Ethics Committee announces investigation into embattled Rep. George Santos | CNN Politicswww.cnn.com - The House Ethics Committee announced Thursday it is officially moving forward with a probe into embattled Rep. George Santos as the New York Republican faces mounting legal issues and calls to resign for extensively lying about his resume and biography.The Ethics Committee said in a news release that it voted to set up an investigative subcommittee with authority to look into a number issues, including whether Santos may have engaged in unlawful activity related to his 2022 congressional campaign.According to the release, the investigative panel will have jurisdiction to determine whether Santos “may have engaged in unlawful activity with respect to his 2022 congressional campaign; failed to properly disclose required information on statements filed with the House; violated federal conflict of interest laws in connection with his role in a firm providing fiduciary services; and/or engaged in sexual misconduct towards an individual seeking employment in his congressional office.”Santos responded to the announcement in a tweet.“The House Committee on Ethics has opened an investigation, and Congressman George Santos is fully cooperating,” his office’s Twitter account wrote. “There will be no further comment made at this time.”Santos told CNN in early February that he is “not concerned” about a House ethics probe or about New York constituents calling on him to resign.“You’re saying that the freedom of speech of my constituents is a distraction to my work?” Santos said. “Do you think people are a distraction to the work I’m doing here?” In a recent interview with Piers Morgan, Santos also suggested the local grassroots campaigns demanding his ouster were not representative of the district. But a poll released on Monday by Siena College found that 66% of New Yorkers wanted him out – including 58% of Republicans.

Michael Steele on Marjorie Taylor Greene: ‘Just shut the hell up’ | The Hill - Former Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Michael Steele unloaded on Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) on Thursday, saying that the controversial firebrand congresswoman needs to ‘“just shut the hell up.” In an interview on MSNBC’s “The 11th Hour,” Steele rebuked Greene for calling for a “national divorce” that would separate the country into red states and blue states. He said that Greene had become a humiliating weight on the GOP who needs to rethink her position. “She has no clue what the hell she’s talking about,” Steele said. “Why do we listen to this crazy fool? Marjorie Taylor Greene, please just shut the hell up. Do us all a favor. You are an embarrassment to the Republican Party and to the country as a congresswoman.” “We fought that war,” he added. “A Republican president lost his life over trying to save the union, and this fool wants to split it? So, here we go. This is the kind of crazy that requires a lot of heavy thinking, because she isn’t.” Steele, who helmed the RNC from 2009 until 2011, has been fiercely critical of former President Trump and like-minded politicians, like Greene, for years, and publicly supported President Biden in the 2020 presidential election. His remarks on Thursday came as Greene continues to push her proposal for a “national divorce,” which, according to Greene, would drastically reduce the size of the federal government, separate states by political ideology and allow them to pursue their own policy agendas free of federal interference. While she has insisted that she isn’t calling for “civil war,” her comments have drawn fierce criticism from both Democrats and many Republicans, who have accused Greene of seeking to further divide the country and encourage secessionism — a sore point for a country that fought a bloody civil war after 11 states sought to leave the union in 1860s.

Trump Unveils 'Universal Import Tariffs' As Part Of 2024 Campaign - Former President Donald Trump unveiled a key talking point for his 2024 campaign - an "America First" trade plan which would include universal tariffs on most goods imported into the US. Trump laid it out in a Feb. 27 statement, which called for a system of universal baseline tariffs on most foreign products, while rewarding American domestic production. The new policy will "tax China to build up America," according to Trump."Joe Biden claims to support American manufacturing, but in reality, he is pushing the same pro-China globalist agenda that ripped the industrial heart out of our country," Trump said in a video titled "Pro-American Trade to End our Reliance on China."Trump claims his plan is a matter of "both economic and national security," and would "implement a bold series of reforms to completely eliminate dependence on China in all critical areas."As Rabobank notes;In short, his proposed “America First” policy would phase in a system of universal, baseline tariffs on most foreign products, the revenue from which would reduce taxation on firms producing in the US. Moreover, tariffs “would increase incrementally depending on how much individual foreign countries devalue their currency."Honestly, I am not shocked. I am sure no other markets Daily uses the word “mercantilism” as freely as this one has for around a decade - I had to explain the word in 2015, and then how pre-WW2 US presidents were mercantilists; when Trump floated his first tariffs, I argued phasing them in to allow onshoring FDI before imported goods got more expensive would be logical; ‘Weaker currency = higher tariffs’ was factored into our report on ‘Balance of payments -and power- crises’; and clearly there is still US momentum to change things even if means breaking things, which we factored into our ‘The World in 2030’ report – which we may arrive at early; moreover, as argued last year, and this, ‘Bretton Woods 3 Won’t Work’.

Haley’s mental competency tests could rock Washington — but would be hard to implement - . Former Ambassador Nikki Haley’s presidential campaign proposal to impose mental competency tests for politicians aged 75 and older has reignited debates about how to decide who is fit to lead. It puts the spotlight on calls for generational change sure to be front and center during the 2024 campaign cycle and on battles over whether those calls constitute a form of ageism. The proposal was a dig at President Biden, who will be 82 by the time of the next presidential inauguration — though former President Trump would be 78 — but it would also have implications for the rest of Washington, where nearly 10 percent of Congress is at least 75 years old. That includes some of the top leaders and decision-makers in both parties. Psychiatric and aging experts warn that it would be difficult to create and implement a fair and effective test to measure politicians’ mental competency, and drawing a line in the sand at age 75 to require such a test doesn’t necessarily make sense. “I’ve encountered individuals in their 80s, 90s or hundreds, who are much more mentally flexible and aware of current world events and the interaction of such things than are some of the 20- and 30- and 40-year-olds that I’ve worked with,” said Dr. Bennett Blum, an expert in mental capacity and legal issues affecting the elderly. The proposal from Haley, 51, has been met with some sharp criticism from those who would be subject to it. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), 81, pushed back on the idea on CBS’s “Face the Nation” last week, calling it “absurd” and ageist. Haley fired back by tweeting that is “exactly what a career politician and socialist would say,” charging that the “Washington establishment is afraid of the people finding out some of our leaders aren’t fit to serve.”

House Democrat accuses GOP of ‘misplaced priorities’ on education - — Republicans have “misplaced priorities” when it comes to education, as the GOP seizes on what they see as a winning issue ahead of next year’s election, according to one House Democrat. Republicans for months have leaned into issues like parental rights and school curriculums, making strikes to brand the Democratic Party as one that does not believe parents should have control over what their children learn in the classroom. The GOP conversation has also included talk about how LGBTQ identity and Black history should be taught in schools. Democrats, however, are going on the offensive, arguing that Republicans have their priorities wrong when it comes to what Americans are most concerned about on the topic of education. “Fundamentally you get a sense, again, from the House Republican agenda that they put forward over the course of the last several months, that this misplaced priorities,” said Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Colo.), the chair of the House Democratic Policy and Communications Committee (DPCC), when asked about how Democrats plan to message against the GOP position on education. Neguse said the parents he’s spoken to in Colorado are concerned about affordable childcare, how to improve the pipeline into higher education, better supporting apprenticeship programs and making sure that schools are adequately funded to help reduce class sizes and increase engagement. “Unfortunately all of them, every single priority I just mentioned, is missing from the so-called agenda, education agenda that House Republicans put forward,” Neguse added. “So that again gives you a clear sense of the contrast.” Pressed on what the Democratic message will be in response to GOP arguments on education, Neguse responded “I think our response is rooted in common sense.”

Tensions rise as Supreme Court prepares for high-stakes student debt clash -- As the Supreme Court convenes on Tuesday to weigh whether the Biden administration can forgive billions of dollars in student debt, thousands of borrowers don’t plan to go quietly. Upwards of 100 people were already outside the courthouse on a cold and rainy Monday evening, and groups will bus in many more as President Biden’s student loan relief plan, a major campaign promise, goes before the justices. With sleeping bags and emergency blankets ready, Temple University sophomore Kayla McMonagle, a first-generation college student already $20,000 in debt, was set to be among the first in line for Tuesday’s oral arguments in two challenges to Biden’s plan. “A lot of people think about our generation that we are not motivated to do things, we are always on our phones, always in our heads,” said McMonagle, a political science major. “But this issue impacts our generation the most so far, and it will impact our children’s generation and generations to come.” As the arguments begin, organizers expect a crowd of 3,000 at a rally that will include members of Congress, borrowers and activists. Decisions in the case are likely still a few months away, but the demonstrations come as borrowers are already bracing to hear the fate of Biden’s plan. Coming from a low-income family, McMonagle said traveling to Washington, D.C., and missing midterms was well worth the trouble. “I want to go to grad school. I want to possibly get a PhD. I love learning. I love being at school. I want to make sure that I have the chance to further my education. It will be amazing for me, life-changing almost,” she said of Biden’s plan. She and several others plan to camp outside in the rain in the lead up to tomorrow morning’s “People’s Rally,” which was planned by more than 20 national organizations, including the NAACP, Debt Collective and New Georgia Project. “The People’s Rally for Student Debt Cancellation is a powerful expression of our collective will to create a more just and equitable future. By coming together we can ensure that the voices of those most affected by student debt are heard and that policymakers are able to take action,” said Natalia Abrams, president and founder of the Student Debt Crisis Center. The rally will kick off two hours before oral arguments begin at 10 a.m., when the federal government will attempt to fend off two groups of challengers to the debt relief plan: six Republican-led states and two individual borrowers who did not qualify for the full $20,000 in relief. Both groups contend the Biden administration overstepped its authority, but the case could also hinge on whether the justices believe the challengers have legal standing.

Supreme Court appears skeptical of Biden’s student debt relief plan - President Joe Biden’s plan to forgive student loan debt for tens of millions of Americans seems to be in danger based on oral arguments at the Supreme Court on Tuesday. A majority of justices appeared dubious about the Biden administration’s pandemic-related legal justification for the sweeping debt relief program, which offered up to $20,000 of loan forgiveness per borrower. The initiative has been put on hold while the high court debates the case. During more than three hours of oral argument, conservative justices on the court repeatedly questioned whether the Education Department had the legal authority it claimed to discharge federal student loan debt to help borrowers recover economically from the national emergency spurred by Covid-19. Chief Justice John Roberts emerged as one of the most hostile voices on the court towards the debt relief plan, repeatedly invoking its overall cost and raising questions about its fairness. Gorsuch questions fairness of Biden's student debt relief plan “We’re talking about half a trillion dollars and 43 million Americans,” Roberts said early in the arguments, questioning why the court shouldn’t expect Congress to explicitly bless a program of such mammoth scope. Roberts also seemed to skewer the Biden administration’s claim that the debt cancellation plan was not much different from existing programs that forgive student debts in specific circumstances. “Because there’s a provision to allow [a] waiver when your school closes…because of that Congress shouldn’t have been surprised when half a trillion dollars is wiped off the books?” the chief said skeptically. Roberts also said the administration’s decision not to wait on specific debt-forgiveness legislation may have cut short debates Congress could have had about whether student loan recipients were getting special treatment that people who paid off their loans or chose not to attend college did not. “Nobody’s telling the person who was trying to set up the lawn service business that he doesn’t have to pay his loan,” the chief justice said. “He still does, even though his tax dollars are going to support the forgiveness of a loan for the college graduate who’s not going to make a lot more than him over the course of his lifetime.”

Gorsuch questions fairness of Biden's student debt relief plan – POLITICO video

Supreme Court student loan case: The arguments explained -(AP) — The Supreme Court is about to hear arguments over President Joe Biden’s student debt relief plan, which impacts millions of borrowers who could see their loans wiped away or reduced.So far, Republican-appointed judges have kept the Democratic president’s plan from going into effect, and it remains to be seen how the court, dominated 6-3 by conservatives, will respond. The justices have scheduled two hours of arguments in the case Tuesday, though it will probably go longer. The public can listen in on the court’s website beginning at 10 a.m. EST. The debt forgiveness plan announced in August would cancel $10,000 in federal student loan debt for those making less than $125,000 or households with less than $250,000 in income per year. Pell Grant recipients, who typically demonstrate more financial need, would get an additional $10,000 in debt forgiven.College students qualify if their loans were disbursed before July 1. The plan makes 43 million borrowers eligible for some debt forgiveness, with 20 million who could have their debt erased entirely, according to the Biden administration. The White House says 26 million people have applied for debt relief, and 16 million people had already had their relief approved. The Congressional Budget Office has said the program will cost about $400 billion over the next three decades.The Supreme Court is hearing two challenges to the plan. One involves six Republican-led states that sued. The other involves a lawsuit filed by two students.A lower court dismissed the lawsuit involving the following states: Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and South Carolina. The court said the states could not challenge the program because they weren’t harmed by it. But a panel of three federal appeals court judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit — all of them appointed by Republican presidents — put the program on hold during an appeal. The Supreme Court then agreed to weigh in. The students’ case involves Myra Brown, who is ineligible for debt relief because her loans are commercially held, and Alexander Taylor, who is eligible for just $10,000 and not the full $20,000 because he didn’t receive a Pell grant. They say that the Biden administration didn’t go through the proper process in enacting the plan, among other things.Texas-based U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman, an appointee of President Donald Trump, sided with the students and ruled to block the program. Pittman ruled that the Biden administration did not have clear authorization from Congress to implement the program. A federal appeals court left Pittman’s ruling in place, and the Supreme Court agreed to take up the case along with the states’ challenge.To cancel student loan debt, the Biden administration relied on the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act, commonly known as the HEROES Act. Originally enacted after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack, the law was initially intended to keep service members from being worse off financially while they fought in wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now extended, it allows the secretary of education to waive or modify the terms of federal student loans as necessary in connection with a national emergency.

5 key moments from the Supreme Court showdown over Biden’s student debt relief - The Biden administration squared off with legal challengers to its sweeping student debt relief plan at the Supreme Court on Tuesday as the justices held oral arguments on two cases. Most of the conservative justices aired serious doubts about the legal underpinnings of the program, but the arguments seemed to leave open the possibility of a reprieve for the debt relief plan based on flaws in the pair of legal challenges that reached the high court. After more than three hours of back-and-forth among the justices and lawyers, the best hope for the Biden administration and those covered by the program seemed to be that the court’s liberals and two or more conservatives might agree that both the coalition of GOP-led states who sued over the program and a pair of student-loan borrowers who object to the plan lack the sort of concrete injury needed to challenge the plan in court. The three liberal justices and Amy Coney Barrett all raised questions about whether the states had standing to bring the case. A big wild card is three other Republican appointees — Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, and Roberts — all of whom were silent on the standing question, even though they seemed sharply critical of the merits of the case. Here’s POLITICO’s look at five key aspects of Tuesday’s closely-watched arguments on one of the Biden administration’s highest-profile policy initiatives:

• One particular fact about the Biden administration’s education debt relief program really seemed to be galling to Chief Justice John Roberts: It’s so darn big. Roberts seemed fixated on the sheer amount of the debt cancellation the Education Department was planning to offer before the courts froze the effort: an estimated $400 billion. Not content with the B-word that made astronomer Carl Sagan famous, the chief justice turned to the even more gargantuan T-word at least four times to make the debt relief program sound simply enormous. “We’re talking about half a trillion dollars and 43 million Americans,” Roberts intoned just minutes into the arguments Tuesday. “Congress shouldn’t have been surprised when half a trillion dollars is wiped off the books?” That became the prevailing framing of the program for Roberts and many of his colleagues, even liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
• One of the most jarring comparisons at Tuesday’s arguments came when Justice Brett Kavanaugh suggested that the dangers posed by Biden’s debt relief plan could be akin to those from some of the worst excesses of presidential power. Kavanaugh mentioned the seizure of steel mills by President Harry Truman in 1952.
• The Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority, known as MOHELA, figured heavily in the justices’ debate over whether the GOP states had standing to bring their lawsuit in the first place. Missouri, one of the states, argues that it can advance its case based on harms to MOHELA, which is a state-created entity that will face a reduction in revenue under Biden’s student debt relief plan. Prelogar, representing the Biden administration, conceded that if MOHELA itself had brought the lawsuit, the government wouldn’t contest its standing to bring such a case. But she said that Missouri couldn’t adopt MOHELA’s injuries as its own. Several of the justices also seized on the fact that MOHELA wasn’t part of the case.
• In hours of debate on complicated legal questions of standing, statutory interpretation and separation of powers, one soliloquy by Justice Sonia Sotomayor stood out: She detailed what hangs in the balance for borrowers in personal terms. “There’s 50 million students who … will benefit from this who today will struggle,” Sotomayor said, somewhat inflating the number of federal student loan borrowers who would benefit. (The Education Department estimates the total is roughly 42 million).
• Former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, who invoked the HEROES Act in 2020 to extend the pandemic moratorium on student loan payments, was among those who watched the arguments from the court gallery. DeVos has been sharply critical of student debt relief and signed an amicus brief with other former Republican education secretaries that blasted the proposal as unconstitutional. Under her leadership, the Education Department developed a legal opinion concluding that the agency lacked the legal authority to cancel large amounts of student debt without new Congressional approval. The Biden administration last August rescinded the department’s legal opinion and issued its own memo concluding that the HEROES Act provides a basis for broad-based debt relief..

Biden’s student-loan forgiveness plan gets cold reception from conservative justices – SCOTUSblog -The Supreme Court on Tuesday appeared skeptical of the Biden administration’s student-loan debt-relief program. During nearly three and a half hours of oral arguments, a majority of the justices appeared unconvinced that Congress intended to give the secretary of education the power to adopt the program, which has an estimated price tag of $400 billion.A ruling in favor of the challengers would obviously be a major blow for President Joe Biden, who enacted the debt-relief program to fulfill a campaign pledge. But the court’s decision could also have a much broader legal impact, affecting when and how states can go to court to challenge federal policies and how courts should interpret other laws giving powers to federal agencies.Biden announced the debt-relief program, which would forgive up to $20,000 in loans for qualifying borrowers, last August. At that point, student-loan repayments had already been on hold for nearly two years: In March 2020, then-Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos suspended both repayments and the accrual of interest on federal student loans because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both DeVos and the Biden plan relied on the HEROES Act, a law passed after the Sept. 11 attacks that gives the secretary of education the power to respond to a “national emergency” by making changes to the student-loan programs so that borrowers are left not worse off because of the emergency.Two separate challenges were before the court on Tuesday, but the justices spent most of their time and energy on the first case, which is known as Biden v. Nebraska and was filed by six states with Republican attorneys general.The justices will reach the merits of the states’ claims only if they first agree with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit that the states have a legal right to sue, known as standing. The states’ primary argument is that Missouri has standing because it created and controls the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority, one of the largest holders and servicers of student loans in the United States. The loan-forgiveness program, Nebraska Solicitor General James Campbell told the justices, “threatens to cut MOHELA’s” funding by nearly 40%. Because all funds beyond operating revenues go to support student financial aid in Missouri, Campbell emphasized, a reduction in MOHELA’s revenues will mean less money for financial aid in Missouri. Representing the Biden administration, U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar told the justices that even if MOHELA might be harmed by the loan-forgiveness program, that would not be enough for Missouri to bring a lawsuit.

The Supreme Court is likely to kill student loan relief on a party-line vote, in Biden v. Nebraska - If you were hoping that your student loans would be forgiven under a program that President Joe Biden announced last summer, you should, unfortunately, make other plans.On Tuesday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in two cases, Biden v. Nebraska andDepartment of Education v. Brown, that ask the Court to strike down the student loan relief program. That program would provide $10,000 in relief to most borrowers who earned less than $125,000 a year during the pandemic, and $20,000 in relief to borrowers who received Pell Grants.The Brown case is laughably weak, and no justice appeared to believe that federal courts have jurisdiction to hear this case. But the Supreme Court only to needs to assert jurisdiction over one of these two cases to kill the loan relief program, and the Court appeared likely to split along party lines in the Nebraska case. Though there is an off chance that Justice Brett Kavanaugh or Amy Coney Barrett might break from their fellow Republican appointees, all six of the GOP-appointed justices appeared inclined to kill the program.And even if the Biden administration did convince Kavanaugh or Barrett to vote in their favor, that would not be enough. The administration would need both of their votes to prevail.The justices are likely to strike down the program, moreover, despite the fact that the federalHeroes Act explicitly gives Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona broad authority to “waive or modify” many student loan obligations “as the Secretary deems necessary in connection with a war or other military operation or national emergency,” such as the Covid-19 pandemic. As it turns out, the most important question in American law is not what the law actually says, it is whether the nine justices on the Supreme Court think the policy is a good idea.

Supreme Court: Lawyer helps Biden student loan forgiveness plan chances - The government's top Supreme Court lawyer may have saved President Joe Biden's $400 billion student loan forgiveness plan from what experts considered all but certain defeat. Experts lobbed praise on Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, the lawyer who represented the Biden administration in front of the nine justices Tuesday. "The Biden administration now seems more likely than not to win the cases," said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz. "Her preparation, poise and power were impressive," Kantrowitz said. In contrast, the attorneys for plaintiffs opposed to the program were less than stellar, Kantrowitz said. "It was like the difference between a star quarterback and two tiddlywinks players," he said. University of Illinois Chicago law professor Steven Schwinn agreed: "Prelogar knocked it out of the park." "I do think she could have influenced or even changed the thinking of two justices, maybe more," he added. On Wednesday, Fordham law professor Jed Shugerman tweeted that he remains "struck by SG Elizabeth Prelogar's brilliant performance." "She may have snatched victory from the jaws of defeat," Shugerman wrote. The nine justices considered two legal challenges to Biden's plan to cancel up to $20,000 in student debt for borrowers. Six GOP-led states — Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and South Carolina — had brought one of the lawsuits, and the other was backed by the Job Creators Network Foundation, a conservative advocacy organization. Prelogar argued that the president was acting squarely within the law to avoid borrower distress during national emergencies and that plaintiffs had not shown in any way that they'd be harmed by the policy, which is typically a requirement to establish so-called legal standing. When the Biden administration rolled out its student loan forgiveness plan in August, it cited the Heroes Act of 2003 as its legal justification. The Biden administration now seems more likely than not to win the cases. That law, which is a product of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, allows the U.S. secretary of education to "waive or modify" student loan programs to ensure borrowers aren't left worse off because of a national emergency. Opponents of the president's plan say canceling hundreds of billions in dollars in student debt for tens of millions of Americans goes far beyond the scope of the Heroes Act. Justice Clarence Thomas, who kicked off the justices' questioning of the Biden administration, seemed to echo that view. "We're talking about half a trillion dollars and 43 million Americans," Thomas said. "How does that fit under the normal understanding of 'modifying'"? Prelogar countered that the heart of the provision's purpose was to allow the secretary to make sure borrowers don't suffer financially because of their loans during a crisis and that's exactly what the Biden administration's policy does.

Student-Loan Borrowers Likely Won’t Know for Months if Debt Will Be Forgiven – WSJ —Tens of millions of borrowers face months of uncertainty as the Supreme Court decides the fate of President Biden’s student-loan forgiveness program. During oral arguments on Tuesday, the court’s conservative majority expressed skepticism that the Biden administration had the legal authority to wipe away debt for the majority of the 43 million Americans with federal student loans. The court will likely not deliver its decision in the case until late June, leaving borrowers to wonder whether their loan balances will be slashed by as much as $20,000.

McCarthy made a ‘promise’ with his Fox News gambit, but to whom? --It took some time, but House Speaker Kevin McCarthy finally shed some light this week on his decision to give Fox News’ Tucker Carlson exclusive access to sensitive Jan. 6 security footage. In fact, the Republican leader’s explanation focused heavily on a single word. “I promised I would give you the truth regarding January 6th, and now I am delivering,” the House speaker wrote in a fundraising appeal this week. He used similar rhetoric in comments to The New York Times, justifying his deal with the controversial television personality by saying, “I promised.”There’s no shortage of problems with McCarthy’s tactics and defense, but his choice of words led to a related question: To whom did he make this “promise”? CBS News had a good report along these lines: McCarthy — who has already been fundraising on the move — did indeed promise to release the footage as part of his bid to become speaker, and it was something Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz had specifically been demanding. In fact, it was on a lengthy list of demands that Gaetz walked into McCarthy’s office with on the Monday night before the speaker’s vote, according to a GOP source familiar with the list. As the CBS News report added, the Florida Republican’s list of demands did not explicitly dictate that the security footage would go to Fox News’ Carlson. That specific element was reportedly “decided later.” In other words, we’re talking about a two-step process. The first was McCarthy’s negotiations with Gaetz — who, up until recently, was a congressman facing a federal criminal investigation for alleged sex trafficking. As MSNBC’s Alex Wagner explained on last night’s show, the House speaker agreed to a series of concessions to his far-right members in order to secure the gavel, and we now know that the Jan. 6 footage was a part of these negotiations. The second step was McCarthy agreeing to give Carlson exclusive access — which wasn’t specifically part of the original agreement with Gaetz and his cohorts, but which the Californian ultimately agreed to anyway for reasons he has not yet elaborated on. Stepping back, it was seven weeks ago tomorrow when McCarthy managed to claim the speaker’s gavel, and ever since, we’ve learned incrementally about the many side deals the GOP leader struck in order to prevail. This week, yet another such deal came to public light, and this one, according to Democratic leaders and law enforcement officials, puts Capitol security at risk. How many more “promises” to extremists will McCarthy continue to fulfill in the coming weeks and months? The fact that we have no idea is unsettling

House GOP moving to let Jan. 6 defendants access Capitol security footage - House Republicans are moving to provide defendants in Jan. 6-related cases access to thousands of hours of internal Capitol security footage, a move that could influence many of the ongoing prosecutions stemming from 2021’s violent attack. Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.), who chairs the House Administration Committee’s oversight subpanel, said that the access for accused rioters and others — which Speaker Kevin McCarthy has greenlighted — would be granted on a “case-by-case basis.” “Everyone accused of a crime in this country deserves due process, which includes access to evidence which may be used to prove their guilt or innocence,” Loudermilk told POLITICO in a statement. “It is our intention to make available any relevant documents or videos, on a case-by-case basis, as requested by attorneys representing defendants.” Loudermilk will be leading the effort given his senior Administration panel post, according to a senior Republican congressional aide who addressed the evolving decision on condition of anonymity. The GOP aide added that the new House majority is working on a system that eventually will allow members of the media and the public to access some Jan. 6 records as well. The footage access plan, described by three people familiar with the discussions, follows McCarthy’s move to grant exclusive access to the 41,000 hours of internal Capitol film from the day of the riot to Fox News’ Tucker Carlson. McCarthy and his allies are also making clear that there will be limits on the extent of material permitted to leave the tightly controlled confines of the Capitol, where Carlson’s team has been reviewing the footage for days. “What gets released is obviously going to be scrutinized to make sure you’re not exposing any sensitive information that hasn’t already been exposed,” said Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.). McCarthy told reporters Tuesday that he ultimately envisions releasing nearly all of the Jan. 6 surveillance footage publicly, with exceptions for sensitive security information. “I think putting it out all to the American public, you can see the truth, see exactly what transpired that day and everybody can have the exact same” access, McCarthy said. “My intention is to release it to everyone.” McCarthy dismissed questions about his decision to share the footage with Carlson, who has downplayed the Jan. 6 attack, describing it as a typical media exclusive. He noted that he did not consult with Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell about his decision. Similar measures would be taken with any footage opened up to Jan. 6 defendants and their lawyers, two of the people familiar said, though details of those steps remain unclear for now. Among the big logistical questions Republicans are still discussing: whether any footage they open up to defendants can be used in court proceedings, which would effectively make it public. McCarthy’s decision to let Carlson view the footage from the violent riot by former President Donald Trump’s supporters has already been raised in two ongoing Jan. 6 criminal cases. In one instance, a lawyer for one of the Proud Boys charged with seditious conspiracy has asked prosecutors to determine whether they will access and share the footage; then on Tuesday morning, Joseph McBride, an attorney for Jan. 6 defendant Ryan Nichols, claimed he had already been given permission to review the footage. It’s unclear if the Justice Department has requested similar access. A DOJ spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Fox News lawsuit: Rupert Murdoch acknowledged several hosts backed Trump's fraud claims --- Rupert Murdoch, the billionaire conservative media mogul who owns Fox News Channel, acknowledged that top hosts at his network endorsed former President Trump’s false claims of a fraudulent election in 2020, court documents filed on Monday show. Lawyers for Dominion Voting Systems, which is suing Murdoch and Fox Corp. for defamation and seeking $1.6 billion in damages, pressed Murdoch directly as they deposed him about whether some of the network’s widely watched opinion hosts endorsed Trump’s unproved claims. “In fact, you are now aware that Fox endorsed at times this false notion of a stolen election?” one of Dominion’s lawyers asked Murdoch during his deposition, the court filing shows. “Not Fox, No. Not Fox. But maybe Lou Dobbs, maybe Maria, as commentators,” Murdoch replied. “Some of our commentators were endorsing it,” the media tycoon added, when pressed again if the hosts endorsed Trump’s claims of a fraudulent election. “Yes. They endorsed.” The filing made Monday by Dominion is the latest chapter in a blockbuster lawsuit, in which the voting systems company argues that top brass at Fox, including its top hosts and executives, defamed Dominion by airing false claims peddled by Trump and his associates in the weeks following the 2020 election. Fox has so far unsuccessfully moved to have the case dismissed on First Amendment grounds, and in a filing of its own on Monday argued it was simply airing newsworthy comments made by the president and his top associates. By Dominion’s standard for defamation, Fox’s lawyers argued in their filing, the company could sue virtually every media company in the country for reporting on Trump’s claims. “Dominion’s lawsuit has always been more about what will generate headlines than what can withstand legal and factual scrutiny, as illustrated by them now being forced to slash their fanciful damages demand by more than half a billion dollars after their own expert debunked its implausible claims,” the network said in a statement on Monday evening.

Trump targets Fox News for ‘promoting’ DeSantis ‘so hard and so much’ - Former President Trump renewed his attacks on Fox News this week, accusing the network of underplaying a new poll showing him with a double-digit lead on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in a potential 2024 Republican presidential primary match-up. Trump, in reference to the Fox News poll published Sunday that showed him leading DeSantis by 15 points in a hypothetical match-up, knocked the media giant for “promoting” DeSantis “so hard and so much that there’s not much time left for Real News.” “Reminds me of 2016 when they were pushing ‘JEB!’ The new Fox Poll, which have always been purposely terrible for me, has ‘TRUMP Crushing DeSanctimonious,’ but they barely show it,” Trump wrote. “Isn’t there a big, beautiful, Network which wants to do well, and make a fortune besides? FAKE NEWS!” The Hill has reached out to Fox News about Trump’s comments. Trump has in recent weeks stepped up his attacks on the network, which still features a number of hosts who are staunchly supportive of him, though some have signaled a growing interest in DeSantis. Last week, Trump labeled Fox a “RINO” network — a term that means “Republican In Name Only” — and blasted the New York Post, also owned by conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch, over their coverage of the Florida governor. The Fox poll released Sunday showed Trump and DeSantis well ahead of other GOP hopefuls in a hypothetical matchup, with Trump at 43 percent and DeSantis at 28 percent, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and former Vice President Mike Pence at 7 percent each. Trump and Haley have both formally announced their White House bids, while several other prominent Republicans are widely expected to jump into the primary.

Judiciary Democrats go after GOP ‘whistleblowers’ in FBI probes - House Judiciary Democrats claimed Friday that three witnesses who have spoken to Republicans as part of the GOP investigation into politicization at the FBI have offered no evidence of wrongdoing by the law enforcement agency. They also said the witnesses were connected to committee Republicans through people with deep ties to former President Trump. Republicans have asserted that they’ve spoken to “dozens and dozens” of whistleblowers as part of their probe, but the committee Democrats said the trio of witnesses it had identified had little firsthand knowledge about the FBI and were instead advancing conspiracy theories. “The three individuals we have met are not, in fact, ‘whistleblowers.’ These individuals, who put forward a wide range of conspiracy theories, did not present actual evidence of any wrongdoing at the Department of Justice or the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” the committee Democrats wrote in a more than 300-page report released Friday. Republicans say their committee members have spoken with more individuals, including those who reached out previously, but Democrats have access to the three formal interviews conducted since the GOP won power. “These interviews also reveal the active engagement and orchestration of disturbing outside influence on the witnesses and, potentially, the Republican members of the Select Subcommittee. A network of organizations, led by former Trump administration officials like Kash Patel and Russell Vought, appears to have identified these witnesses, provided them with financial compensation, and found them employment after they left the FBI,” they added. Patel, a former top Department of Defense official who is a surrogate for Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, has been a chief voice in asserting that Trump declassified the documents found at Mar-a-Lago. Trump’s attorneys, however, have not made this claim in court.

Trump asks for roughly six-month delay in New York fraud case - Former President Trump on Friday asked for a roughly six-month delay in New York Attorney General Letitia James’s (D) civil fraud suit against him. Trump’s motion, if granted, would likely push his trial back until the heat of the presidential primary season in the early months of 2024. Attorneys for the former president argued that the current schedule infringes on Trump’s “right to a reasonable time to conduct discovery.” “The requested extension allows Defendants a fair and reasonable opportunity to engage in meaningful discovery and to prepare and present an adequate legal defense,” they added. Newly filed court documents indicate that Judge Arthur Engoron, who is overseeing the case, told the parties during a recent proceeding that the trial would start as scheduled on Oct. 2 “come hell or high water.” James filed the lawsuit last September, accusing the former president and his businesses of manipulating property values for years to obtain investments and loan benefits. She named the former president and his three adult children — Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump — along with a number of the family’s business entities as defendants and asked for an estimated $250 million in financial penalties. The legal team for Trump, who has cast the suit as a political witch hunt, said the additional time is needed to review millions of pages of documents and conduct witness interviews.

US Marshals hit with ‘major’ hack, sensitive data compromised | - The United States Marshals Service says it was hit with a “major” security breach over a week ago, compromising systems that contained sensitive information. U.S. Marshals Service spokesperson Drew Wade said in a statement to The Hill on Monday evening that the agency discovered the “ransomware and data exfiltration event” on Feb. 17, adding that it affected a “stand-alone” system. He said that after the discovery, the Marshals Service “disconnected” the system and the Justice Department initiated a forensic investigation. “The affected system contains law enforcement sensitive information, including returns from legal process, administrative information, and personally identifiable information pertaining to subjects of USMS investigations, third parties, and certain USMS employees,” Wade said of the breach, which was first reported by NBC News. A senior law enforcement official told NBC News that the hack did not affect the Witness Security Program, and that no one in the program is at risk due to it. The official added that the breach affected law enforcement sensitive information about the subjects of the agency’s investigations. Wade said that the Marshals Service on Feb. 22 briefed senior Justice Department officials, who determined that the breach was a “major incident.” He added the Justice Department’s “remediation efforts and criminal and forensic investigations are ongoing” in relation to the incident. “We are working swiftly and effectively to mitigate any potential risks as a result of the incident,” he said. Data hacks have increasingly plagued federal and state governments, in addition to corporations and individuals, in recent years.

Censors Use AI To Target Podcasts - Reams of internal documents, known as the Twitter Files, show that social media censorship in recent years was far broader and more systematic than even we critics suspected. Worse, the files exposed deep cooperation – even operational integration – among Twitter and dozens of government agencies, including the FBI, Department of Homeland Security, DOD, CIA, Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), Department of Health and Human Services, CDC, and, of course, the White House. Government agencies also enlisted a host of academic and non-profit organizations to do their dirty work. The Global Engagement Center, housed in the State Department, for example, was originally launched to combat international terrorism but has now been repurposed to target Americans.The US State Department also funded a UK outfit called the Global Disinformation Index, which blacklists American individuals and groups and convinces advertisers and potential vendors to avoid them. Homeland Security created the Election Integrity Partnership (EIP) – including the Stanford Internet Observatory, the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public, and the Atlantic Council’s DFRLab – which flagged for social suppression tens of millions of messages posted by American citizens.Even former high government US officials got in on the act – appealing directly (and successfully) to Twitter to ban mischief-making truth-tellers. With the total credibility collapse of legacy media over the last 15 years, people around the world turned to social media for news and discussion. When social media then began censoring the most pressing topics, such as Covid-19, people increasingly turned to podcasts. Physicians and analysts who’d been suppressed on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube, and who were of course nowhere to be found in legacy media, delivered via podcasts much of the very best analysis on the broad array of pandemic science and policy. Which brings us to the new report from Brookings, which concludes that one of the most prolific sources of ‘misinformation’ is now – you guessed it – podcasts. And further, that the underregulation of podcasts is a grave danger.In “Audible reckoning: How top political podcasters spread unsubstantiated and false claims,” Valerie Wirtschafter writes:Due in large part to the say-whatever-you-want perceptions of the medium, podcasting offers a critical avenue through which unsubstantiated and false claims proliferate. As the terms are used in this report, the terms “false claims,” “misleading claims,” “unsubstantiated claims” or any combination thereof are evaluations by the research team of the underlying statements and assertions grounded in the methodology laid out below in the research design section and appendices. Such claims, evidence suggests, have played a vital role in shaping public opinion and political behavior. Despite these risks, the podcasting ecosystem and its role in political debates have received little attention for a variety of reasons, including the technical difficulties in analyzing multi-hour, audio-based content and misconceptions about the medium.To analyze the millions of hours of audio content, Brookings used natural language processing to search for key words and phrases. It then relied on self-styled fact-checking sites Politifact and Snopes – pause for uproarious laughter…exhale – to determine the truth or falsity of these statements. Next, it deployed a ‘cosine similarity’ function to detect similar false statements in other podcasts.

Ghislaine Maxwell to ask appeals court to throw out sex trafficking conviction(Reuters) - Ghislaine Maxwell is expected on Tuesday to ask a U.S. appeals court to throw out her conviction for helping Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse teenage girls, saying a slew of errors marred the case as prosecutors made her a scapegoat because the financier was dead. "The government prosecuted Ms. Maxwell as a proxy for Jeffrey Epstein" to satisfy "public outrage" over the case, and worked with his accusers "to develop new allegations out of faded, distorted, and motivated memories," Maxwell lawyer Arthur Aidala said in a statement obtained by Reuters. A spokesman for U.S. Attorney Damian Williams in Manhattan declined to comment. Maxwell, 61, is expected to present her legal arguments in a filing with the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan. She is serving a 20-year prison sentence after a Manhattan jury convicted her in December 2021 on five charges for recruiting and grooming four girls for abuse by Epstein between 1994 and 2004. The daughter of deceased British media mogul Robert Maxwell is imprisoned in Tallahassee, Florida, and could be freed in July 2037 with credit for good behavior and two years she previously spent in jail. Maxwell's lawyers had tried to discredit her accusers and claimed that prosecutors turned the socialite's case into a legal reckoning that Epstein, a registered sex offender, never had. Epstein killed himself at age 66 in a Manhattan jail cell in August 2019, one month after being charged with sex trafficking. Hundreds of women claimed to be victims of Epstein's abuse, and famous people, most notably Britain's Prince Andrew, who were friendly with him have seen their reputations tarred or destroyed. Many arguments in Maxwell's appeal are expected to mirror those she made unsuccessfully before, during and after the trial. She has claimed that Epstein's 2007 nonprosecution agreement with federal prosecutors in southern Florida, arising from alleged abuse at his Palm Beach mansion, also immunized her. Epstein, in exchange for immunity, pleaded guilty the next year to a Florida state prostitution charge and served 13 months in jail. That arrangement is now widely considered too lenient.

JPMorgan says CEO Dimon 'not relevant' to lawsuit over bank's Epstein's ties (Reuters) - JPMorgan Chase & Co on Tuesday rejected the U.S. Virgin Islands' demand that it turn over more documents concerning Chief Executive Jamie Dimon for a lawsuit accusing the bank of aiding in Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking. In a Tuesday filing in Manhattan federal court, JPMorgan accused the territory of pandering for media attention by demanding documents from Dimon from 2015 to 2019. The largest U.S. bank said Dimon was not involved in any decisions regarding Epstein's account, and that it had dropped the financier as a client in 2013. It also called the U.S. Virgin Islands' demand a "fishing expedition," after the territory had obtained a "massive trove" of information in litigation against Epstein's estate, where it recovered more than $105 million. "Dimon is not relevant to this action," JPMorgan said. "If there were evidence supporting discovery from JPMC from 2014-2019, USVI would have found it." Lawyers for the U.S. Virgin Islands did not immediately respond to requests for comment. In a Feb. 23 court filing, the territory had called Dimon "a likely source of relevant and unique information" about decisions to keep Epstein as a client, and discussions on Epstein's referrals of prominent and wealthy potential clients. The U.S. Virgin Islands is seeking damages from JPMorgan for missing red flags about Epstein's misconduct on Little St. James, a private island he owned there. JPMorgan on Tuesday also asked a judge to reject a demand by Epstein victims for more documents for their own lawsuit. Both cases focus in part on Epstein's relationship with Jes Staley, a former JPMorgan private banking chief who has acknowledged having a friendship with Epstein but denied knowing about his alleged crimes.

JPMorgan is scapegoating her with its fraud suit, Frank founder says -JPMorgan Chase Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon pushed to acquire college-loan-planning site Frank out of fear that another bank was eyeing the company, its founder said. Frank founder Charlie Javice made the allegation about Dimon on Monday in her formal response to JPMorgan's suit claiming that she defrauded the bank in the $175 million acquisition. According to JPMorgan, she created fake user data to vastly inflate the number of people supposedly using her site. Javice claimed in her filing in federal court in Delaware that she was being scapegoated for the bank's faulty due diligence and that it was JPMorgan that asked her to come up with "synthetic data" on Frank users. The bank has launched a "massive" smear campaign by unfairly painting Javice as a confidence woman who duped JPMorgan executives into greatly overpaying for Frank, Javice's lawyers said in the filing in Delaware federal court. "How could one of the most powerful and sophisticated companies in the world fall for such an alleged scam?" Javice's lawyers asked in the filing. "The answer: it couldn't have. And didn't. JPMC knew exactly what it was getting when it bought Frank." 'Shift the blame' Executives within the bank involved in the Frank deal now seek to "shift the blame for a failed and now-regretted acquisition to someone they view as an easy target: its young female founder," Javice's lawyers said in the filing in federal court in Delaware. "As we have stated from the beginning, our legal claims against Ms. Javice and Mr. Amar are set out in our complaint, along with the key facts," Pablo Rodriguez, a JPMorgan spokesman, said in an emailed statement. "We stand behind our allegations and this dispute will be resolved through the legal process." JPMorgan sued Javice and Olivier Amar, another Frank executive, claiming the pair vastly inflated the number of students that had accounts on the now-defunct site and provided phony customer lists. Javice and Amar were fired from the bank after an internal probe uncovered what JPMorgan claims was fraud during the deal negotiations. Javice said Monday that the deal came together quickly in August 2021 because JPMorgan suspected earlier in the summer "that one of its banking competitors" was eyeing a possible deal for the site. 'Directly from the top' "Interest in Frank came directly from the top: the Chief Executive Officer of JPMorgan, Jamie Dimon, and Co-Chief Executive Officer of JPMC, Jennifer Piepszak, were both very eager to get the deal done," Javice said. In its suit, JPMorgan said it launched its probe after only 28% of its emails to Frank's customer list were delivered. JPMorgan claims it discovered that Javice and Amar hired a college professor to fake data showing Frank had more than 4.2 million customers who'd created accounts seeking help completing the government's Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). In reality, Frank had fewer than 300,000 customers, the bank claims. Javice's lawyers on Monday denied that Javice and Amar deceived JPMorgan. They said that the 4.2 million number related to students who'd clicked on the site for help in applying for financial aid and reviewing "thousands of pages of free website content concerning access to education and financial literacy." The bank's executives were attracted to "access to this broader group of young, diverse users who trusted Frank as a content provider and frequented its site and offerings," the filing added. At the same time, Javice and Amar "touted that the company had helped over 350,000 people access financial aid" on Frank's web site, the lawyers argued.

Revived Lummis-Gillibrand crypto bill won't touch Fed master accounts --— Sen. Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo., said that she and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., aim to reintroduce their crypto regulation bill in mid-April, and a spokesperson with Lummis' office said the new version will exclude a controversial provision that would make it easier for state-chartered banks to get a master account with the Federal Reserve.Speaking Thursday at an event hosted by the Milken Institute on the future of digital assets, Gillibrand and Lummis said that they are continuing work on the bill and that it would be in some ways more thorough than their previous version. "We're also looking to address some of the concerns that we heard from regulators and the industry to clarify in certain areas," Gillibrand said. "It might be a more thorough bill than the first version because the first version was an introduction of what a baseline framework would look like." Banks had reservations about the prior iteration of the bill, which said that any state-chartered depository institution would be entitled to an account at a Federal Reserve bankregardless of whether it is federally insured or supervised. The bill also would haveauthorized states and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to charter special-purpose banks that issue stablecoins. The collapse of crypto exchange FTX late last year increased regulatory scrutiny of cryptocurrencies' infiltration of the banking system, Lummis said, and a spokesperson from her office clarified that the master account provision "will not be included." “The bill is going to be stronger," Lummis added. "It's also going to address some of the things that happened with FTX." The odds of the Lummis-Gillibrand bill making it through the Senate remain slim, especially as Senate Banking Committee Chair Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, continues to express skepticism about digital assets and how they interplay with the banking system. Brown has shown little interest in scheduling a committee vote on any legislation. "It would require, certainly, a change in approach for the Banking Committee to move forward with markup," Lummis said.Still, Lummis and Gillibrand's work on the bill has sent a powerful signal about attitudes on crypto, particularly among lawmakers who don't want to stymie the industry. Lummis said that in the aftermath of the FTX bankruptcy, other lawmakers have been less willing to engage on the bill or on a wholesale effort to regulate crypto.

The Same Day Sam Bankman-Fried Is Hit with a New Count of Bank Fraud, Three Regulators Warn About Crypto Bank Runs - By Pam and Russ Martens: ~ On December 13, the U.S. Department of Justice released an 8-count criminal indictment against the former crypto kingpin, Sam Bankman-Fried. He was charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and conspiracy to defraud the Federal Election Commission and commit campaign finance violations. Last Thursday, the Department of Justice added four additional criminal counts against Sam Bankman-Fried in a superseding indictment. These include: bank fraud; conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business; and two counts involving the purchase and sale of derivatives. Bankman-Fried’s jury trial is scheduled to start in October. The charge of bank fraud is something that jury members can get their minds around – particularly when the alleged bank fraud is shown to have taken place at federally-insured banks which are backstopped by U.S. taxpayers. And while the new indictment does not name any specific banks, it is well known that Bankman-Fried’s FTX crypto exchange and his hedge fund, Alameda Research, were involved with a number of federally-insured banks. (See, for example, Federally-Insured, Crypto-Focused Silvergate Bank Loses 43 Percent of Its Market Value Yesterday as Depositors Flee. Silvergate was a $160 stock in late April of last year. It closed on Friday at $14.33 following a massive bank run on deposits in the last quarter of 2022 as its ties to FTX became publicized.) Here’s a sampling of what’s in the new indictment regarding Sam Bankman-Fried’s alleged diabolical plan to engage in bank fraud: […]- Investigative reporter Gretchen Morgenson reported for NBC News in December that North Dimension went to the trouble of creating a fake company website that marketed itself like this: “Our vision is to become most popular website for purchasing mobile phones and electronics by offering complete product information and a transparent purchasing procedure.” It is more than a little noteworthy that the same day that the Justice Department released details on how easily Bankman-Fried was allegedly able to commit bank fraud, three federal bank regulators released new warnings to U.S. banks about getting involved in crypto. The federal regulators are the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Federal Reserve), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).One paragraph of the various warnings sounds like it is describing the negative impact to all crypto-related banks when a relationship like that between Silvergate and FTX/Alameda makes headlines. It reads:“Deposits placed by a crypto-asset-related entity that are for the benefit of the crypto-asset-related entity’s customers (end customers). The stability of such deposits may be driven by the behavior of the end customer or crypto-asset sector dynamics, and not solely by the crypto-asset-related entity itself, which is the banking organization’s direct counterparty. The stability of the deposits may be influenced by, for example, periods of stress, market volatility, and related vulnerabilities in the crypto-asset sector, which may or may not be specific to the crypto-asset-related entity. Such deposits can be susceptible to large and rapid inflows as well as outflows, when end customers react to crypto-asset-sector-related market events, media reports, and uncertainty. This uncertainty and resulting deposit volatility can be exacerbated by end customer confusion related to inaccurate or misleading representations of deposit insurance by a crypto-asset-related entity.”There is no such thing as federal deposit insurance for crypto assets.

Coinbase Suspends Binance Stablecoin Trading - The San Francisco-based cryptocurrency exchange referred to its "listing standards" in a tweet. Coinbase will suspend trading for Binance USD stablecoin on March 13, the exchange announced Feb. 27 on Twitter. The message mentioned “listing standards” as it announced its decision. The decision will apply to Coinbase.com (simple and advanced), Coinbase Pro, Coinbase Exchange, and Coinbase Prime, according to the tweet thread. The exchange added, "Your BUSD funds will remain accessible to you, and you will continue to have the ability to withdraw your funds at any time."A Coinbase spokesperson told Cointelegraph: “Our determination to suspend trading for BUSD is based on our own internal monitoring and review processes. When reviewing BUSD, we determined that it no longer met our listing standards and will be suspended.” According to the Coinbase website, its digital asset listings group votes on assets to be listed on the exchange, “informed by a rigorous vetting/review process that evaluates assets against legal, compliance, and technical security standards.” In addition, there are additional business assessments and ongoing monitoring to ensure an asset continues to meet standards.Coinbase's decision comes after The SEC’s enforcement action against BUSD, which, as CoinTelegraph's Prashsant Jha reports, raises questions about whether the regulatory body is focused on the stablecoin market or the crypto exchange Binance.

Curious Case Of Grayscale & The Big Bitcoin Discount - Anyone who watched television during 2022 saw the ubiquitous TV commercials for Grayscale, which manages the world biggest Bitcoin investment fund. Those ads touted Bitcoin as “the future” and should be part of a retiree’s portfolio. But investors in Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) are facing both a problem and an opportunity. The problem? GBTC trades at a 46 percent discount to its underlying holdings, as of Feb. 24. This means the per-share value of the fund is 46 percent less than the Bitcoins held in the fund’s portfolio. No doubt the ongoing legal issues facing Digital Currency Group (DCG), the parent company of Grayscale, is one factor in the large discount. The opportunity is that if the fund were to trade up to its net asset value—and that is one giant “if”—investors would realize an 84 percent gain. Non-traded funds such as real estate investment trusts (REITs) and business-development companies pricing below asset value isn’t a new phenomenon. There can be factors such as supply and demand and quality of the underlying asset that could drive this spread. But a discount of up to 50 percent? That’s almost unheard of, and it amounts to around $7 billion of trapped value. The simple explanation for such a wide spread is investors are concerned about challenges at DCG, a cryptocurrency conglomerate of sort. DCG is backed by none other than SoftBank, which seems to have its hand in a number of failed or failing startups. DCG owns Grayscale, crypto news media CoinDesk, Bitcoin miner Foundry, a small London-based crypto exchange named Luno, and crypto brokerage and lending giant Genesis Capital. The last company, Genesis Capital, is currently under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, after its lending arm blew up after last year’s crypto rout and FTX’s collapse. DCG has been selling its stakes in various investment vehicles run by Grayscale, according to regulatory filings. Despite GBTC and its Ether-focused fund trading below their asset values, DCG presumably has needed to raise cash by all means necessary to support Genesis during bankruptcy. The Financial Times also reported that DCG retained investment bank Lazard to explore a sale of CoinDesk. A competitor has also targeted Grayscale. Osprey Funds, which also runs several crypto-focused investment funds, sued Grayscale in January for putting out misleading marketing statements to gain market share. “Grayscale has made materially false and misleading statements in its advertising and promotion … that turning its Bitcoin asset management services into access to a Bitcoin ETF was a foregone conclusion, when it knew that access was never likely to happen,” the complaint, filed in the Connecticut Superior Court, alleges. Clearly, these financial and competitive difficulties at parent company DCG is not lost on GBTC investors which contribute to the giant discount.

FTX ex-engineering chief Nishad Singh pleads guilty to criminal charges - FTX ex-engineering head Nishad Singh pleaded guilty to criminal charges in New York on Tuesday, becoming the latest member of Sam Bankman-Fried's former leadership team to agree to a deal. The six charges against Singh include conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to violate campaign finance laws. FTX spiraled into bankruptcy in November after the crypto exchange, founded by Bankman-Fried, couldn't meet customers' withdrawal demands. "Today's guilty plea underscores once again that the crimes at FTX were vast in scope and consequence," Manhattan U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement. "They rocked our financial markets with a multibillion dollar fraud. And they corrupted our politics with tens of millions of dollars in illegal straw campaign contributions. These crimes demand swift and certain justice and that is exactly what we are seeking in the Southern District of New York." The Securities and Exchange Commission, as well as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission both filed related civil complaints against Singh on Tuesday. The SEC said in a release that Singh is cooperating with the agency's ongoing investigation, and he has separately agreed to settle with the CFTC. Two of the criminal charges against Singh are related to wire fraud and another is conspiracy to commit commodities fraud. "Nishad is deeply sorry for his role in this and has accepted responsibility for his actions," lawyers for Singh said in a statement. "He wants to do everything he can to make things right for victims, including by assisting the government to the best of his ability in this case." Prior to Singh's guilty plea, FTX co-founder Gary Wang and former Alameda Research co-CEO Caroline Ellison both pleaded guilty in December to federal charges in the Southern District of New York. Alameda was a hedge fund and trading firm also controlled by Bankman-Fried. Prosecutors allege that customer deposits at FTX were sent to sister company Alameda, which faced billions of dollars in investment losses. In December, Bankman-Fried was charged with eight criminal accounts, including securities fraud and money laundering. He was hit last week with four additional charges, including ones related to commodities fraud and making unlawful political contributions. He's released on a $250 million bond while awaiting trial.

SEC is not the right regulator for stablecoins, Circle CEO says -The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is not the right regulator for stablecoins, according to Jeremy Allaire,the chief executive and founder of Circle. The Boston-based firm is the issuer of the second-largest stablecoin, USD Coin, with over $42 billion in circulation. Stablecoins usually aim to maintain a one-to-one ratio with key assets such as the dollar by holding comparable reserves, and act as a crucial medium between the traditional financial system and digital assets. The tokens are used to facilitate trades, exchange assets between blockchains and serve as a haven from the volatile price swings that hit cryptocurrencies, hence the stablecoin name. "I don't think the SEC is the regulator for stablecoins," Allaire said in a Bloomberg interview. "There is a reason why everywhere in the world, including the U.S., the government is specifically saying payment stablecoins are a payment system and banking regulator activity." The main U.S. regulator for the securities industry has tightened rules over crypto firms from exchanges, custodians and stablecoins after a series of meltdowns in the industry last year, including the algorithmic stablecoin TerraUSD. Meanwhile, the New York State Department of Financial Services ordered Paxos last week to stop minting Binance USD, the third-largest stablecoin, because of its relationship with exchange giantBinance. Tether is the largest stablecoin issuer. SEC Chair Gary Gensler has turned up the spotlight on the stablecoin sector, even raising the specter that the tokens could be considered securities, making them subject to the agency's registration and discloser requirements, as well as its oversight.

'Backdoor ban' on crypto banking? Regulatory statements raise concerns. -Federal regulators say banks are free to serve crypto firms, but some in the industry question how feasible doing so will be in light of recent guidance. The Federal Reserve, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and Office of the Comptroller of the Currency have issued two joint statements this year flagging risks related to digital assets and setting standards for how to mitigate them. The agencies have noted that the guidelines are not binding requirements, nor are they meant to steer banks away from crypto firms. Rather, they bill the statements as providing transparency into their evolving assessment of a nascent industry. Still, some regulatory lawyers and industry participants worry the new statements could create a de facto supervisory framework that blocks crypto firms from the banking sector entirely. Caitlin Long, founder and CEO of the Cheyenne, Wyoming-based Custodia Bank, said the statements mean any attempt to engage with digital assets will be met with more scrutiny from bank examiners. Whether that makes it difficult — or impossible — for banks to take crypto-related deposits will come down to individual supervisory evaluations, all of which will be confidential. "That is the question, is this a backdoor ban on banking crypto, or are [regulators'] overt statements that they're not banning the banking of crypto or any other lawful industry accurate? We don't know the answer to that," Long said. "No one knows where the guardrails are right now." Policy statements do not amend any regulatory statutes, so agencies are not required to go through a formal outreach process to public comments — as is required for formal rulemakings. But, because of the sweeping nature of some of the suggestions, Long said, the agencies would have been better served by soliciting input from crypto industry participants more familiar with its underlying technology.

Silvergate, a Federally Insured Bank, Just Blew Up from Ties to Crypto -- By Pam and Russ Martens -- The one thing a depositor never wants to hear from a bank that is holding his or her life savings is that it has doubts about its “ability to continue as a going concern.” Unfortunately, those very words appeared in a filing made yesterday by Silvergate Capital with the Securities and Exchange Commission – which pretty much guarantees that the ongoing run on deposits at Silvergate will continue with an added sense of urgency.Silvergate Capital is the owner of the federally-insured and taxpayer-backstopped bank, Silvergate Bank, which decided several years back that it would be a cool idea to become the go-to depository bank for crypto companies. One of those outfits was Sam Bankman-Fried’s now collapsed house of fraud. Accounts at Silvergate Bank included Bankman-Fried’s crypto exchange, FTX; his hedge fund, Alameda Research, which prosecutors say looted his FTX crypto exchange customers; and North Dimension, a fake company promoting itself as an online seller of mobile phones, when it was actually laundering money for Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto enterprises, according to federal prosecutors.Once the word got out about Silvergate’s ties to FTX and Bankman-Fried, a bank run ensued. On November 11, when FTX announced it was filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, Silvergate CEO, Alan Lane, released this statement: “As of September 30, 2022, Silvergate’s total deposits from all digital asset customers totaled $11.9 billion, of which FTX represented less than 10%. Silvergate has no outstanding loans to nor investments in FTX, and FTX is not a custodian for Silvergate’s bitcoin-collateralized SEN Leverage loans. To be clear, our relationship with FTX is limited to deposits.” Apparently, having $1 billion exposure to FTX was not comforting to other depositors. On January 5, Silvergate reported that its “total deposits from digital asset customers declined to $3.8 billion” as of December 31, 2022 (down from the previously reported $11.9 billion on September 30, 2022.) That’s a 68 percent drop in one quarter – an astonishing figure for a federally-insured bank in the United States.On the same date, the company announced that it was firing 40 percent of its workforce and that it had met the demand for customer withdrawals during the quarter as follows:“Silvergate sold $5.2 billion of debt securities for cash proceeds during the fourth quarter of 2022. The sale resulted in a loss on the sale of securities and related derivatives of $718 million during the fourth quarter of 2022.” That unaudited loss figure was updated in yesterday’s statement to $948.7 million – and that may not be the last word on the matter.Another way that Silvergate apparently met the run on the bank was to obtain $4.3billion in advances from the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco – a program meant to support housing for the poor. (See Four Crypto-Friendly Banks Are Being Bailed Out with Billions from a Federal Housing Program.)There were more troubling phrases in Silvergate’s revelations to the SEC yesterday, such as the fact that Silvergate can’t file its annual report for the full year of 2022 (Form 10-K) on time; it needs more time to “record journal entries.” Equally troubling was the phrase that “its independent registered public accounting firm” needs more time “to complete certain audit procedures, including review of adjustments not yet recorded and the evaluation of the effectiveness of the Company’s internal control over financial reporting.” You can read Silvergate’s full statement to the SEC at this link.

Silvergate Capital’s Ratings Cut by Moody’s Amid Crypto Meltdown -- Moody’s Investors Service cut its ratings on Silvergate Capital Corp. and its bank subsidiary Silvergate Bank, citing concern about its viability amid the crypto market’s turmoil and a crackdown by federal regulators. Silvergate Capital’s long-term issuer rating fell to Ca from B3, with the potential for another cut, Moody’s said in a statement. It cited the March 1 announcement that Silvergate is evaluating its ability to continue as a going concern and that additional losses will hurt regulatory capital ratios, which may leave the company and the bank less than well-capitalized.

Silvergate Closes SEN Platform Institutions Used to Move Money to Crypto Exchanges --Silvergate Bank, which warned this week about its ability to remain in business, discontinued its SEN platform that institutions used to move money to crypto exchanges.“Effective immediately Silvergate Bank has made a risk-based decision to discontinue the Silvergate Exchange Network (SEN),” the company said on its website Friday. “All other eposit-related services remain operational.”A spokesperson for the bank sent a similar message to companies within the crypto sector."Unfortunately, we have no additional information to share at this time," the spokesperson said.SEN is a 24/7 instant settlement service that the bank's clients could use to conduct transactions between each other at any time, including nights and weekends. The bank counted a number of major crypto firms as its clients for the service, including Binance US, Kraken, Gemini and ErisX (prior to the latter's acquisition by Cboe).Silvergate has had a rough week, after disclosing on Wednesday that it would delay the filing of its annual report due to questions from its auditors. In the same notice, the bank admitted it was facing investigations from bank regulators and the U.S. Department of Justice, and said its ability to be a "going concern" over the next year may be in doubt.A number of prominent crypto clients bailed on the bank the next day, and its stock price fell nearly 60% before somewhat stabilizing on Friday.

Bitcoin hits two week low, Silvergate unravels (Reuters) - Silvergate Capital Corp said on Friday it made a "risk-based decision" to discontinue the Silvergate Exchange Network, its crypto payments network, two days after the digital asset-focused bank raised doubts about its viability. "Effective immediately Silvergate Bank has made a risk-based decision to discontinue the Silvergate Exchange Network (SEN). All other deposit-related services remain operational," Silvergate said in a statement posted on its website.The Silvergate Exchange Network, one of the bank's most popular offerings, enabled round-the-clock transfers between investors and crypto exchanges, unlike traditional bank wires, which can often take days to settle.Silvergate shares on Friday slumped more than 2% in after-hours trading, after closing up 0.9% at $5.77 in regular trade. The shares on Thursday had fallen to a record low, ending the day down more than 97% from their all-time high in November 2021.Silvergate on Wednesdaarned in a filing that it was evaluating its ability to operate as a going concern, disclosing that it had sold additional debt securities this year at a loss and that further losses mean the bank could be “less than well capitalized.”After the warning, cryptocurrency heavyweights including Coinbase Global Inc and Galaxy Digital dropped Silvergate as their banking partner. Stablecoin issuers Paxos and Circle, Cboe’s digital asset exchange, and crypto exchanges Bitstamp and Gemini also suspended their partnerships with Silvergate.

Silvergate suspends crypto payments network; shares fall after-hours (Reuters) - Silvergate Capital Corp said on Friday it made a "risk-based decision" to discontinue the Silvergate Exchange Network, its crypto payments network, two days after the digital asset-focused bank raised doubts about its viability. "Effective immediately Silvergate Bank has made a risk-based decision to discontinue the Silvergate Exchange Network (SEN). All other deposit-related services remain operational," Silvergate said in a statement posted on its website. The Silvergate Exchange Network, one of the bank's most popular offerings, enabled round-the-clock transfers between investors and crypto exchanges, unlike traditional bank wires, which can often take days to settle. Silvergate shares on Friday slumped more than 2% in after-hours trading, after closing up 0.9% at $5.77 in regular trade. The shares on Thursday had fallen to a record low, ending the day down more than 97% from their all-time high in November 2021. Silvergate on Wednesday warned in a filing that it was evaluating its ability to operate as a going concern, disclosing that it had sold additional debt securities this year at a loss and that further losses mean the bank could be “less than well capitalized.” After the warning, cryptocurrency heavyweights including Coinbase Global Inc and Galaxy Digital dropped Silvergate as their banking partner. Stablecoin issuers Paxos and Circle, Cboe’s digital asset exchange, and crypto exchanges Bitstamp and Gemini also suspended their partnerships with Silvergate.

Senate Democrats ask regulators to more closely monitor Zelle — Senate Democrats led by Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., have asked banking regulators to more closely scrutinize Early Warning Services, the company that's owned by seven of the country's largest banks and operates Zelle. The lawmakers — including committee Chairman Sherrod Brown of Ohio as well as Sens. Bob Menendez of New Jersey, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Mark Warner of Virginia — in a letter Thursday urged the Federal Reserve Board, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the National Credit Union Administration and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to review the customer reimbursement and anti-money-laundering practices of banks that participate in the Zelle network. They also recommended the regulators coordinate their approach to doing so with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. "When banks or credit unions participating in Zelle evade responsibility for reimbursing their customers if they are fraudulently induced to send money to scammers through the app, those customers may lose confidence in their depository institution for offering a product that places their money at risk," the letter said"On a wide scale, such a loss of confidence could weaken a depository institution's financial condition," the letter continued. "Additionally, there is risk of unfair, deceptive, or abusive practices if bank or credit union communications lead customers to expectations of safety that are not met." The lawmakers also asked the Fed and the OCC to regularly examine Early Warning Services. "This examination should evaluate safety-and-soundness risks as well as the company's compliance with consumer protection and AML laws," the letter said. "If the agencies uncover any unsafe or unsound practices, or uncover any legal violations, those deficiencies must be addressed promptly."

Senate Banking Republicans warn Fed not to go too far in capital review -Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee are keeping a watchful eye on the Federal Reserve's ongoing review of bank capital requirements. Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., the ranking member on the committee, sent a letter to Fed Chair Jerome Powell on Friday afternoon, urging him to make sure any changes to capital requirements are tailored to each bank's specific activities, risks and complexities. Should the review fail to adequately tailor capital requirements, the letter warns, the Fed's actions could have a "chilling effect on market making activities and availability of financial services." The letter also noted that the committee expected to be kept fully informed with "robust analysis" from the Fed as it conducted its review and adjusted policies accordingly. A Federal Reserve spokesperson said Friday afternoon that the central bank has "received the letter and [plans] to respond." Sens. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, Mike Rounds, R-S.D., Thom Tillis, R-N.C., John Kennedy, R-La., Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo., Katie Britt, R-Ala., Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., and Steve Daines, R-Mont., co-signed the letter. The senators also argued that the banking sector's ability to withstand the shock of the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing liquidity crunch in spring of 2020 without widespread failures serves as evidence that they are already sufficiently capitalized.

House Financial Services Committee passes data privacy bill - The House Financial Services Committee has approved a financial data privacy bill spearheaded by Chairman Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., but lack of support from Democratic lawmakers means it's unlikely to have a bright future in the Senate. The bill passed in a 26-21 vote, with some notable critics on the Democratic side of the aisle expressing concerns that it would set a ceiling, rather than a floor, on data privacy legislation across different states. "The bill includes a broad preemption of state laws," said Rep. Maxine Waters of California, the ranking Democrat on the committee. "Republicans often like to tout the importance of empowering states to make decisions and to be the laboratory for innovation, but when Wall Street or payday lenders come knocking, Republicans are quick to preempt any state law that provides greater protections for their constituents." McHenry said that the bill would provide a consistent standard, lowering confusion for consumers and giving companies that hold consumer data a more straightforward set of rules to follow rather than a patchwork of state laws. "There should be consistency across the country," McHenry said. "If a family moves from, say, California to Texas, it doesn't make sense for the guardrails around their personal financial data to change. A national standard will provide certainty to both consumers and the entities that handle their data."

Weaker profits, loan growth may lie ahead for banks: FDIC chairman — The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said banks' net income fell nearly 6% in 2022 compared with a year earlier, and it warned of turbulence ahead. Chairman Martin Gruenberg said Tuesday the FDIC will continue to monitor a variety of risks facing the industry, including persistent inflation, the war in Ukraine and rising interest rates. "The banking industry continues to face significant downside risks from the effects of inflation, rising market interest rates and continued geopolitical uncertainty," Gruenberg said at a news conference to discuss the agency's latest Quarterly Banking Profile. "Credit quality and profitability may weaken due to these risks and may result in tighter loan underwriting, slower loan growth, higher provision expenses and liquidity constraints" he said. Bank net income totaled $263 billion in 2022, down $16.1 billion or 5.8% from the previous year. The FDIC says these reductions reflect higher provisions for loan losses — up $82.6 billion — and noninterest expenses— up $27.4 billion — from 2021. Those two costs more than offset the $105.5 billion increase in net interest income. The aggregate return on average assets ratio also dropped 11 basis points to 1.12% in 2022. Short-term interest rate growth coupled with longer asset maturities could hurt banks' results in the near future, according to Gruenberg. Though unrealized losses on held-to-maturity and available-for-sale securities fell 10% to $620 billion in the last three months of the year, Gruenberg said that figure is still high. "The combination of a high level of longer-term asset maturities and a moderate decline in total deposits underscores the risk that these unrealized losses could become actual losses, should banks need to sell securities to meet liquidity needs," Gruenberg said.

Businesses allege Bank of America pressured them to take out bigger PPP loans -A group of small businesses allege in a new lawsuit that Bank of America left them with unforeseen debt after overstating the amount of their pandemic aid that was eligible for loan forgiveness. In a suit that seeks class-action status, three small businesses accused BofA of marketing Paycheck Protection Program loans to firms that used independent contractors on the basis that the debt would be forgiven by the U.S. Small Business Administration. The PPP's guidelines excluded compensation paid to independent contractors — sometimes called 1099 workers, a reference to the tax form used to report payments they receive — in calculating loan amounts. Independent contractors had a separate way to apply for PPP support. "Bank of America knew, or should have known, that the SBA would only approve forgiveness of loans to business owners that used PPP loans to pay retained employees, not 1099 employees," the businesses allege in their complaint. In a statement responding to the lawsuit's allegations, a BofA spokesperson placed responsibility on PPP borrowers for the representations they made in loan applications. "We processed Paycheck Protection Program loans based on loan amount requests and representations made by businesses. It is the borrowers' responsibility to follow SBA rules regarding loan amount eligibility," the bank spokesperson said. "In the forgiveness process, we are required to follow SBA rules about what expenses qualify to be forgiven," the spokesperson continued. "Certain expenses, such as payments made to contractors, do not meet the requirements for loan forgiveness." The lawsuit stems from federal stimulus funding authorized by Congress in March 2020 to offset economic disruptions from the COVID-19 pandemic.

CFPB warns banks about high fees in prepaid benefits programs - Lousy customer service, excessive fees and massive fraud continue to plague state and federal programs that provide unemployment, Social Security and other public benefits, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The CFPB warned Wednesday that it will "take action" against financial institutions that charge excessive fees and violate consumer protection laws in distributing public benefits through prepaid card programs. Banks face enormous regulatory and reputational risks administering federal and state benefits programs.Many states were targeted by criminals during the pandemic. A core problem is that banks that distribute public benefits through prepaid card programs are paid primarily through fees — including ATM, maintenance, balance inquiry and customer service fees — which have all been the subject of complaints to the CFPB. In 2020, issuers of government-administered prepaid cards earned $1.3 billion of fees from that business, or 0.3% of the $409 billion in public benefits distributed through prepaid cards, the CFPB said, citing a study by the Federal Reserve. Still CFPB Director Rohit Chopra warned that excessive fees can chip away at the cash sent to the most vulnerable consumers who opt to receive benefits via prepaid cards including older adults, people with disabilities, the unemployed and low-income families with children. "When cash assistance programs are drained by unnecessary fees and poor customer service, it hurts individual recipients and taxpayers," Chopra said. "The CFPB will continue to ensure that companies delivering public benefits obey federal consumer financial laws and continue to work with federal and state officials to make public benefits delivery more effective."

U.S. Bancorp signals CFPB has turned up heat in prepaid cards probe The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is weighing an enforcement action against U.S. Bancorp after launching an investigation of its management of prepaid cards for unemployment benefits, according to a securities filing by the company. The Minneapolis company, which disclosed the CFPB's investigation late last year, said in a filing Monday that the agency is now "considering a potential enforcement action" and that U.S. Bancorp is cooperating fully with all pending examinations. The CFPB probe centers on unemployment benefits disbursed during the pandemic. A spokesperson for U.S. Bancorp, the parent company of U.S. Bank, declined to comment beyond the public filing. Banks that work with state governments to administer unemployment insurance programs have faced a series of problems since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Though details of the U.S. Bancorp probe are not publicly available, other banks have faced fraud-related concerns due in part to expanded benefits during the pandemic. Nearly 14% of funds in pandemic-related unemployment benefits in four states likely went to fraudsters, according to a U.S. Department of Labor inspector general audit issued last year. Several banks work with states to issue prepaid cards to unemployment insurance beneficiaries, but elevated fraud has contributed to some banks reevaluating those programs.

Climate Coalition Targets Big Banks and Insurance Giants With New Shareholder Campaign --A coalition of more than 240 advocacy groups on Wednesday launched a "Shareholder Showdown" campaign in support of shareholder resolutions urging climate action and respect for Indigenous rights at major U.S. and Canadian banks and insurance companies. According to campaign coordinator Stop the Money Pipeline, the resolutions—which were filed by investors including the New York City and state pension funds, Sierra Club Foundation, and others—would require banks and insurance companies to "phase out their financing of companies engaged in fossil fuel expansion, report on projects that could violate Indigenous rights, use absolute emissions rather than emissions intensity targets, disclose 2030 transition plans, and hold directors accountable at banks that are not aligned with 1.5°C pathways."The resolutions were timed to precede the companies' annual general meetings."This campaign is called Shareholder Showdown because we're in for a real fight—we're up against some globally powerful institutions," Arielle Swernoff, Stop the Money Pipeline's U.S. banks campaign manager, explained in an opinion piece published Wednesday byCommon Dreams. "But organized people can achieve anything, and together we will stop the flow of money to fossil fuels and climate destruction." Bill McKibben, co-founder of the climate group 350.org, said in a statement that "the planet is running out of time and the banks are running out of excuses—everyone from the pope to the secretary-general of the [United Nations] have called on them finally to act with clarity and conviction to help with the planet's greatest crisis, and shareholders should demand no less." Among the resolutions filed are:

• An Indigenous rights reporting requirement filed by Sisters of St. Joseph for Peace at Citigroup;
• An absolute emissions target disclosure mandate filed by New York City Comptroller Brad Lander and three city pension systems at Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, and Royal Bank of Canada; and
• Measures filed by As You Sow requiring JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley to publicly disclose their 2030 plans for transitioning lending and investment portfolios away from fossil fuels.

Banks need even bigger low-carbon pivot to avert climate crisis --Banks have a long, long way to go on climate change. That's the takeaway from a BloombergNEF report that looks at the level of financing that banks are pouring into the energy transition. According to BNEF researchers, the ratio of clean-energy lending and equity underwriting relative to fossil fuels needs to hit 4 to 1 by the end of the decade if the planet is to avoid the worst ravages of climate change as laid out in the Paris Agreement of 2015. That ratio was roughly 0.8 to 1 at the end of 2021, according to the report. "Like the real economy, and inextricably linked to it, bank financing is a tanker which needs to turn," said William Young, director of strategic partnerships at BNEF and one of the report's authors. JPMorgan Chase, the world's largest underwriter of energy deals, had an energy-supply banking ratio of 0.7 in 2021. That's slightly worse than Citigroup and Bank of America, but better than Wells Fargo's 0.4. BNP Paribas had the highest ESBR of the 10 largest banks, at 1.7. "By relating climate scenarios with capital investment in the real economy to the fundamental financial plumbing of our modern economy, we are able to examine bank financing as an indicator of progress," Young said. The BNEF report shows that the headway made to date isn't enough for the planet to reach the crucial goal of net-zero emissions by mid-century. Since the clinching of the Paris Agreement at the very end of 2015, about $4.6 trillion of bonds and loans have been committed to businesses focused on hydrocarbons, roughly double the $2.3 trillion arranged for renewable projects and other climate-friendly ventures, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Banks have faced considerable criticism for their support of the fossil-fuel industry, which is the primary source of planet-warming pollution. The industry has countered that it wants to assist the transition to a low-carbon economy by staying engaged with oil, gas and even coal clients. That transition is happening at a dangerously slow pace.

The rise of 'imitation banks' may lead to regulatory scrutiny — Compound, previously Compound Banc, offers high-yield digital accounts that earn 7% annual interest on deposits, which customers can withdraw without fees at any time.But Compound — despite its former name — is not a bank, or even a brokerage. According to its SEC filings, its consumers are actually buying high-risk savings bonds, which it pools and invests in real estate loans and mortgages. Funds customers place in Compound accounts are not insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., and are not even technically deposits."Imitation banks" like these use online bank-like platforms and language to entice retail investors with yields nearly 20 times the national average — all while exempt from regulatory oversight.And Compound isn't the only one. The FDIC recently issued a cease-and-desist letter to Zera Financial for improperly implying that its customer deposits are insured, and another imitation bank — Tellus — similarly compares its returns to that of FDIC-insured banks.Tellus' website touts customers' ability to "earn up to 17x more interest on your savings today while keeping your cash out of the markets," and boasts that they pay "4.50-5.90% APY."Compound said it provides full transparency to its customers."We are not a bank," the company said in a statement. "Our product does not look like a savings account and clearly expresses what users are purchasing: bonds."On March 3, a day after this story was originally published, Compound removed any mention of the term banc from its site, now calling itself "Compound Real Estate Bonds." They also redirect visitors from the old website to a new domain: compoundrealestatebonds.com.

Banks seek extension for comments on CFPB's credit card late-fee plan --Seven bank trade groups want more time to comment on a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau proposal to cut credit card late fees to as low as $8. The trade groups asked CFPB Director Rohit Chopra in a letter this week for a 60-day extension until June 3, or until 90 days after the proposed rule is published in the Federal Register, whichever is later. The groups cited the substantial amount of data about the amount and number of late fees paid by credit card users that the CFPB requested as one of the reasons they need more time to comment on the plan, which they oppose. "Industry intends to provide the CFPB with data in response to the agency's requests," the bank trade groups said. "Collecting data from large and small [credit card] issuers, as well as from consumers, and performing the requisite analysis, will require substantially more time than is being provided." Banks and credit card issuers oppose the CFPB's plan to slash credit card late fees to $8, from the current average of $30 for a first late fee. The CFPB's plan would potentially eliminate $9 billion a year in revenue at banks and credit card issuers. Hundreds of small community banks and credit unions claim they will suffer harm if the CFPB caps late payments on credit cards at 25% of the minimum payment. The trade groups have said the CFPB is running afoul of a requirement in the Dodd Frank Act to convene a small-business review panel before issuing major rules that would impact small entities. In February, the CFPB proposed amending Regulation Z, which implements the Truth in Lending Act, to ensure that credit card late fees are "reasonable and proportional." The CFPB's proposal would adjust the current "safe harbor" dollar amount for late fees to $8 and eliminate a higher "safe harbor" amount for subsequent violations. The proposal also would eliminate a current provision that allows financial institutions to raise late fees annually in line with inflation. Overall, the proposal would limit late fees to 25% of the required payment. Figuring out the impact of the proposed changes will require "considerable time," the groups said. The seven trade groups include the American Bankers Association, Bank Policy Institute, Consumer Bankers Association, Independent Community Bankers of America, National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions and National Bankers Association. Without more time, the groups said, the CFPB risks "an incomplete administrative record and arbitrary agency action, and likely will result in unintended consequences, adverse consumer and small-business impact, and ultimately create flawed public policy."

U.S. Supreme Court to hear fight over consumer watchdog agency's funding (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday agreed to decide whether the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's funding structure established by Congress violates the U.S. Constitution in a case that President Joe Biden's administration has said threatens the agency's ability to function and risks market disruption. The justices took up the CFPB's appeal of a lower court's ruling in a lawsuit brought by trade groups representing the payday loan industry that the agency's funding mechanism violated a constitutional provision giving lawmakers the power of the purse. The agency, which enforces consumer financial laws, draws money each year from U.S. Federal Reserve earnings rather than budgets passed by Congress. The case is the latest to come before the Supreme Court seeking to rein in the authority of federal agencies. The court's 6-3 conservative majority has signaled skepticism toward expansive regulatory power in rulings in recent years including one in 2022 that limited the Environmental Protection Agency's authority to issue sweeping regulations to reduce carbon emissions from power plants. A CFPB spokesperson, welcoming the court's decision to hear the appeal, said there is nothing "novel or unusual" about the agency's funding structure. The justices will hear the case during the court's next term, which begins in October. Biden's administration had asked that the case be heard in the court's current term.

Supreme Court agrees to take CFPB constitutionality case --The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case challenging whether the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is constitutionally funded. The high court on Monday agreed to take CFPB vs. Community Financial Services Association of America among the cases it intends to hear in its next term. Oral arguments are expected to begin in October with a decision possibly by year-end or early 2024, experts said. In granting a petition by the CFPB, the court is expected to deal only with constitutional questions about the agency's funding and is not expected to revisit the bureau's 2017 payday lending rule, which was the basis of the initial lawsuit. The association, a payday lending trade group that filed the lawsuit against the bureau in 2018, had sought to invalidate the rule that imposed restrictions on small-dollar loans. The closely watched case could have a huge impact on consumers, the agency and the many industries it oversees. The CFPB had petitioned the court in November to review a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. A three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit found that the CFPB's funding through the Federal Reserve Board — an executive agency — and not through annual congressional appropriations violates the Constitution's separation of powers doctrine. The Fifth Circuit panel had invalidated part of the CFPB's 2017 payday lending rule. The CFPB responded to the Fifth Circuit's decision by saying: "There is nothing novel or unusual about Congress's decision to fund the CFPB outside of annual spending bills." Legal experts think the Supreme Court will want to know all the different ways that federal agencies are funded before determining whether the CFPB's funding is unconstitutional. Few experts think the court will abolish the CFPB outright. But the Fifth Circuit's ruling opened the door for the bureau's 12-year history of rules and enforcement actions to be challenged. While the high court considers the case, the CFPB faces challenges to its regulatory and enforcement actions. The case is the second constitutional challenge to the CFPB in five years. "Despite years of desperate attacks from Republicans and corporate lobbyists, the constitutionality of the CFPB and its funding structure have been upheld time and time again," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who founded the agency. "If the Supreme Court follows more than a century of law and historical precedent, it will strike down the Fifth Circuit's decision before it throws our financial markets and economy into chaos."

CFPB is 'not holding back' despite cloud of uncertainty from Supreme Court — The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is plowing ahead with a busy enforcement agenda despite a cloud of uncertainty hanging over it from the Supreme Court's decision to take a case challenging the bureau's funding. The CFPB said it was "pleased" that the Supreme Court had decided on Monday to take a case about the constitutionality of its funding mechanism. CFPB Director Rohit Chopra weighed in on the case for the first time, saying a decision could have massive repercussions for financial institutions, the agency and others. "We don't want a situation where there are financial institutions all over the country getting sued because of a lack of clarity on the validity of actions," Chopra said at the Credit Union National Association's Governmental Affairs Conference in Washington, D.C., on Monday. "I'm hopeful that this is the next step to create that clarity, and we'll let the process go forward." The CFPB had petitioned the high court to review a decision in October by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit. The three judges, all appointees of former President Donald Trump, found that the bureau's funding through the Federal Reserve Board violates the Constitution's appropriations clause. Chopra made clear that the agency is continuing its enforcement. The bureau in 2010 faced a similar period of limbo when the Supreme Court accepted a constitutional challenge to the protections its single director had from being fired by the president; that case threatened to hamper the CFPB, but it went on with its work as before. "I will be very clear that we are not holding back when it comes to our enforcement program," Chopra said. "We do know that many repeat offenders [and] bad actors want to use this to escape liability and accountability, and we are not holding back on that front." But the CFPB also faces significant litigation risks if the high court finds that the bureau's funding is unconstitutional. Financial firms that have paid billions in settlements may ask the CFPB to return their money, lawyers said. Even some attorneys that have been highly critical of the CFPB said that situation would be chaotic.

The CRA has little impact on household credit. Can regulators change that? | For a law meant to undo the harms of discriminatory lending practices of the past, the Community Reinvestment Act has little impact on household credit.So says the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which published a study this week that found that the CRA did virtually nothing to increase credit access or change borrower outcomes in designated low and moderate income communities, where households live on less than 80% of the area median income. The study centered on mortgage lending, which accounts for more than 80% of household borrowing. While CRA-eligible areas tend to see higher volumes of mortgage originations — including both purchase loans and refinancings — than non-eligible communities, the report notes that this activity has not resulted in a corresponding uptick in borrowing levels, citing anonymized data from Equifax about household balance sheets.The report also found that banks subject to the CRA tend to build their exposures to eligible communities by purchasing loans originated by nonbank lenders, which do not have to meet CRA obligations. "Because banks receive credit for originating or purchasing loans in [low and moderate income] tracts, they can effectively increase their CRA lending without changing overall credit supply in the tract," the study states. "Our results confirm the importance of the 80% eligibility threshold for lender incentives, but suggest that substitution from nonbanks and loan purchases allow banks to meet their CRA obligations without impacting the overall level of household credit."

Silvergate has 'fully repaid' Home Loan Bank advances --The Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco confirmed Thursday that Silvergate Bank's "outstanding advances have been fully repaid," an effort that the firm had previously said in a regulatory filing could imperil the bank's capital adequacy. The La Jolla, Calif.-based Silvergate Capital Corp. took out $4.3 billion in advances from the Home Loan Bank of San Francisco in the fourth quarter of 2022 after facing a severe decline in deposits from its cryptocurrency clients. A spokesperson for the San Francisco Home Loan Bank confirmed to American Banker that Silvergate "had been been paying down the $4.3 billion over the last 2 months" and that the bank's "outstanding advances have been fully repaid." In a March 1 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the firm said that it was projecting additional losses from "a number of circumstances ... including the sale of additional investment securities beyond what was previously anticipated and disclosed in the Earnings Release primarily to repay in full the Company's outstanding advances from the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco." Silvergate added in its filing that it expects to record further losses from the sale of additional debt securities in January and February. The company said it is "currently in the process of reevaluating its businesses and strategies in light of the business and regulatory challenges it currently faces" and that the company "is evaluating the impact that these subsequent events have on its ability to continue as a going concern for the twelve months following the issuance of its financial statements." "These additional losses will negatively impact the regulatory capital ratios of the Company and the Company's wholly owned subsidiary, Silvergate Bank, and could result in the Company and the Bank being less than well-capitalized," Silvergate said.

Park National Bank to pay $9M in redlining settlement -- Newark, Ohio-based Park National Bank (PNB) will pay $9 million to settle allegations of using redlining practices in the Columbus metro area spanning from 2015 to 2021, the Department of Justice announced Tuesday. During this time period, Park National concentrated most of its lending branches in majority-white neighborhoods, in effect redlining minority neighborhoods. The bank also did not make any attempts to "compensate for its lack of physical presence" in these communities, the federal regulator said. Additionally, PNB "engaged in conduct" that would discourage mortgage applications from prospective applicants who are residents of or seeking credit in majority-Black and Hispanic census tracts within Columbus, the DOJ's consent order said. PNB, a $9.8 billion asset multi-state bank with a total of 92 full-service branches, did not "admit or deny any of the allegations" and has opted to settle the matter without contested litigation. Under the consent order, which is subject to court approval, Park National has agreed to dish out $7.75 million in a loan subsidy fund to increase credit access in minority neighborhoods, $750,000 for advertising and outreach and $500,000 for developing community partnerships. The bank must also open one new branch and one new mortgage loan production office in majority Black-and Hispanic neighborhoods in the Columbus area and maintain a full-time position of an executive who will be responsible for overseeing lending in minority areas.

Bill to expand remote online notarization passes in the House -- Federal legislation that would authorize recognition and acceptance of remote online notarizations for mortgage closings and other official documentation across state lines, passed the House of Representatives this week after its reintroduction. The SECURE Notarization Act of 2023 passed on a bipartisan basis by voice vote after Reps. Kelly Armstrong, R-N.D., and Madeleine Dean, D-Pa. reintroduced the bill mid February. An additional 29 co-sponsors from both Republican and Democratic parties signed onto the bill. Advocates for national RON adoption are hoping the third time is the charm for the Securing and Enabling Commerce Using Remote Electronic Notarization Act, which was initially introduced in the Senate in 2020, along with a companion bill in the House. After no action was taken, a second attempt to enact SECURE legislation into law occurred in the 2021-2022 Congressional session, but despite House approval, the upper chamber opted to not bring a RON bill up for vote. As in previous versions, the latest iteration of the SECURE Act would allow notaries public to perform notarizations remotely, thereby permitting parties unavailable to attend an in-person meeting, such as overseas military personnel, to securely sign official documents. Notary and signer would both be required to communicate by sight and sound using authorized means and devices. The proposed new law would also set minimum security standards for electronic notarizations, the bill's sponsors said. -

Freddie Mac Mortgage Serious Delinquency Rate unchanged in January; Fannie Mae Decreased Slightly --Freddie Mac reported that the Single-Family serious delinquency rate in January was 0.66%, unchanged from 0.66% December. Freddie's rate is down year-over-year from 1.06% in January 2022. Freddie's serious delinquency rate peaked in February 2010 at 4.20% following the housing bubble and peaked at 3.17% in August 2020 during the pandemic. Fannie Mae reported that the Single-Family Serious Delinquency decreased to 0.64% in January from 0.65% in December. The serious delinquency rate is down from 1.17% in January 2022. This is at the pre-pandemic lows.The Fannie Mae serious delinquency rate peaked in February 2010 at 5.59% following the housing bubble and peaked at 3.32% in August 2020 during the pandemic.These are mortgage loans that are "three monthly payments or more past due or in foreclosure". Mortgages in forbearance are being counted as delinquent in this monthly report but are not reported to the credit bureaus.For Freddie, note that multi-family delinquencies have been increased slightly and were at 0.12% in January, up from 0.07% in January 2022.For Fannie, by vintage, for loans made in 2004 or earlier (1% of portfolio), 2.11% are seriously delinquent (down from 2.16% in December). For loans made in 2005 through 2008 (1% of portfolio), 3.40% are seriously delinquent (down from 3.49%). For recent loans, originated in 2009 through 2021 (98% of portfolio), 0.52% are seriously delinquent (down from 0.53%). So, Fannie is still working through a handful of poor performing loans from the bubble years.

BankThink: There's no easy way out of the structural housing shortage - — Politics, like medicine, is a discipline that requires the practitioner to identify the most urgent needs and address those first — a practice known as triage. If a patient comes into the Emergency Room impaled with a crowbar and also has prostate cancer, a doctor will likely decide that, while the cancer is serious, they will need to deal with the crowbar in order to give the patient a chance to heal his prostate. One important difference, however, is that politicians are not bound by a solemn oath to first do no harm. The problems that are urgently addressed by politicians on behalf of "The American People" tend to also be the very problems that distinguish those politicians from their opponents — in other words, the main problem is getting elected or re-elected. The result is that truly urgent crowbars in the abdomens of The American People are left in place while the orderly dresses their hangnails and other boo-boos.The malignant crowbar to which I am alluding is the structural shortage of quality housing in the United States — it's getting harder and more expensive for people to find places to live, which is making it harder and more expensive to start a career, start a family and build wealth the way past generations have. Studies have shown that Millennials are more likely to delay the traditional milestones of "growing up" than previous generations, which has led to a generation of nervous would-be grandparents wondering who they're going to spoil ifJessica and Michael don't get their act together soon.The downstream generational macroeconomic effects of expensive housing are easily understood, and for my part I'd like to dispel the aspersion that the problem is with the kids themselves. One very good reason to address the housing shortage is because people of all ages and walks of life would like to be able to find a quality place to live that meets their needs and budget, and for many it just doesn't exist. The good news is that those in a position to do something about the housing shortage are going to get the memo sooner or later, especially as more and more voters start identifying housing as a chief political concern. There is also little reason to expect that the market will sort this out on its own; the National Association of Home Builders said in January that new construction has continued to slow and may only pick up again next year. Rising interest rates may lower home values, but those lower prices are more than offset by higher borrowing costs. What seems to be warranted is a dramatic increase in housing supply to counteract a decade-long decline in the number of homes per person. The bad news is that even if there were political demand for the government to wave a magic wand and create the untold millions of housing units the people want, that solution would bring with it still other problems. Housing, like all widgets, is valued based on supply and demand — supply not only for the widgets themselves but for substitute widgets. So if five or six million housing units come onto the market as quickly as we might want them to, the net effect might be that the housing units that were already there might be worth less today than they were worth when their occupants bought them.

"Mortgage Rates Now Back Above 7%" -- From Matthew Graham at Mortgage News Daily: Mortgage Rates Now Back Above 7% Mortgage rates have been hit hard on two fronts over the past month. The first front is the obvious one: the bond market has moved in a way that forces rates to go higher. To be fair, it's almost always the bond market that forces rates to go wherever they're going... There's a different problem in the "everything else" category right now. The regulator overseeing Fannie and Freddie recently changed some of the upfront fees required for all conforming mortgages (conforming = guaranteed by Fannie and Freddie). Depending on a borrower's credit score and the amount of a home's value they wish to borrow, their rate could instantly rise by 0.125% simply because a lender implemented the new fee requirements. Without the impact of those fees, rates could still be in the high 6% range, or close to it. As it stands, the average lender is now back up into the low 7's for a well-qualified 30yr fixed scenario. These aren't the highest levels we've seen during this cycle, but they are the highest in more than 4 months (and not too far away from the long-term highs just under 7.4%). [30 year fixed 7.10%]

Case-Shiller: National House Price Index "Decline Continued" to 5.8% year-over-year increase in December --S&P/Case-Shiller released the monthly Home Price Indices for December ("December" is a 3-month average of October, November and December closing prices). This release includes prices for 20 individual cities, two composite indices (for 10 cities and 20 cities) and the monthly National index. From S&P: S&P Corelogic Case-Shiller Index Decline Continued in December The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA Index, covering all nine U.S. census divisions, reported a 5.8% annual gain in December, down from 7.6% in the previous month. The 10- City Composite annual increase came in at 4.4%, down from 6.3% in the previous month. The 20-City Composite posted a 4.6% year-over-year gain, down from 6.8% in the previous month.Miami, Tampa, and Atlanta reported the highest year-over-year gains among the 20 cities in December. Miami led the way with a 15.9% year-over-year price increase, followed by Tampa in second with a 13.9% increase, and Atlanta in third with a 10.4% increase. All 20 cities reported lower prices in the year ending December 2022 versus the year ending November 2022....Before seasonal adjustment, the U.S. National Index posted a -0.8% month-over-month decrease in December, while the 10-City and 20-City Composites posted decreases of -0.8% and -0.9%, respectively.After seasonal adjustment, the U.S. National Index posted a month-over-month decrease of -0.3%, and the 10-City and 20-City Composites posted decreases of -0.4% and -0.5%, respectively.

Housing market lost $2.3T in value in second half of 2022: study - The U.S. housing market suffered the largest decline in home values since 2008 as buyer demand slowed partly in reaction to rising mortgage rates. A new report from real estate brokerage site Redfin shows the total value of U.S. homes fell from a record high of $47.7 trillion in June 2022 to $45.3 trillion at the end of the year — a 4.9 percent decrease in home values. California’s Bay Area saw the largest percentage decline in total home values, with a decline of 6.7 percent over the past year for San Francisco, a 4.5 percent decline for Oakland and a 3.2 percent decline for San Jose. Just three other metros across the country — New York, Seattle and Boise, Idaho — experienced year-over-year declines. Overall, nationwide home values still experienced a 6.5 percent annual increase.But experts note that while some homebuyers could still benefit from the hot pandemic-era market’s low mortgage rates others remain on the sidelines. “The housing market has shed some of its value, but most homeowners will still reap big rewards from the pandemic housing boom,” Redfin economics research lead Chen Zhao said in a statement. “The total value of U.S. homes remains roughly $13 trillion higher than it was in February 2020, the month before the coronavirus was declared a pandemic.” “Unfortunately, a lot of people were left behind. Many Americans couldn’t afford to buy homes even when mortgage rates hit rock bottom in 2021, which means they missed out on a significant wealth building opportunity.” Mortgage rates are ticking up again after falling below 6 percent earlier this month — the first time since September — amid the Federal Reserve’s ongoing battle with inflation.

Mortgage activity falls alongside declining inventory -- Mortgage application activity declined from an early 2023 surge, as a rapid rise in interest rates kept borrowers away last week, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported. The MBA's seasonally adjusted Market Composite Index, a measure of weekly application activity based on surveys of association members, dropped 5.7% from seven days earlier for the period ending Feb. 24. Compared to the same stretch a year ago, activity landed 59.3% lower. The data included an adjustment for the Presidents Day holiday. "After a brief revival in application activity in January when mortgage rates dropped down to 6.2%, there has now been three straight weeks of declines in applications as mortgage rates have jumped 50 basis points over the past month," said Joel Kan, MBA's vice president and deputy chief economist. "Both purchase and refinance applications declined last week, with purchase index at a 28-year low for a second consecutive week." The MBA's Refinance Index decreased 5.5% week over week and came in 73.7% lower on an annual basis, with a majority of homeowners already locked into more favorable rates, Kan said. Refinances made up only a 31.8% share relative to total loan volume, falling from 32.5% seven days earlier. Meanwhile, the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index similarly dropped 5.6% from the prior week and stood 43.6% below levels from a year ago, "as homebuyers again retreat to the sidelines as higher rates crimp affordability," Kan said. Adding to interest rate pressures, the housing market has faced a dearth of new listings early this year, according to new reports from online brokerages HouseCanary and Redfin. The trend effectively put a cap on both affordability relief for buyers and new purchases due to the lack of inventory. HouseCanary also determined home listing removals were higher in February compared to a year ago.

Housing February 27th Weekly Update: Inventory Decreased 1.6% Week-over-week - Altos reports that active single-family inventory was down 1.6% week-over-week. Usually inventory bottoms in early February, so we'd expect inventory to bottom seasonally soon.Here are the same week inventory changes for the last five years:This inventory graph is courtesy of Altos Research. As of February 24th, inventory was at 430 thousand (7-day average), compared to 437 thousand the prior week. The second graph shows the seasonal pattern for active single-family inventory since 2015.The red line is for 2023. The black line is for 2019. Note that inventory is up from the previous two years (the record low was in 2022), but still well below normal levels.Inventory was up 76.2% compared to the same week in 2022 (last week it was up 76.4%), and down 47.5% compared to the same week in 2019 (last week down 46.7%). A key will be when inventory starts increasing in 2023 - so far inventory has declined about 12.4% over the first eight weeks of 2023. Mike Simonsen discusses this data regularly on Youtube.

NAR: Pending Home Sales Increased 8.1% in January; Down 24.1% Year-over-year - From the NAR: Pending Home Sales Improved for Second Straight Month, Up 8.1% in January Pending home sales improved in January for the second consecutive month, according to the National Association of REALTORS®. All four U.S. regions posted monthly gains but saw year-over-year drops in transactions. The Pending Home Sales Index (PHSI) — a forward-looking indicator of home sales based on contract signings — improved 8.1% to 82.5 in January. Year-over-year, pending transactions dropped by 24.1%. An index of 100 is equal to the level of contract activity in 2001.“Buyers responded to better affordability from falling mortgage rates in December and January,” said NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun....The Northeast PHSI rose 6.0% from last month to 68.7, a decline of 19.8% from January 2022. The Midwest index grew 7.9% to 83.3 in January, a drop of 21.1% from one year ago.The South PHSI increased 8.3% to 99.2 in January, dipping 24.7% from the prior year. The West index elevated 10.1% in January to 66.2, diminishing 29.3% from January 2022. Expectations had been for a 1.0% increase for this index. Note: Contract signings usually lead sales by about 45 to 60 days, so this would usually be for closed sales in February and March.

Construction Spending Decreased 0.1% in January --From the Census Bureau reported that overall construction spending decreased: Construction spending during January 2023 was estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1,825.7 billion, 0.1 percent below the revised December estimate of $1,827.5 billion. The January figure is 5.7 percent above the January 2022 estimate of $1,726.6 billion. Private spending was "virtually unchanged" and public spending decreased:Spending on private construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1,442.6 billion, virtually unchanged from the revised December estimate of $1,442.0 billion. ...In January, the estimated seasonally adjusted annual rate of public construction spending was $383.1 billion, 0.6 percent below the revised December estimate of $385.5 billion.This graph shows private residential and nonresidential construction spending, and public spending, since 1993. Note: nominal dollars, not inflation adjusted. Residential (red) spending is 19.4% below the recent peak.Non-residential (blue) spending is at a new peak. Public construction spending is close to the recent peak. The second graph shows the year-over-year change in construction spending.On a year-over-year basis, private residential construction spending is down 3.9%. Non-residential spending is up 19.1% year-over-year. Public spending is up 11.1% year-over-year. This was below consensus expectations of a 0.2% increase in spending, however construction spending for the previous two months combined were revised up.

February Mfg. and January Const. Continue Negative, while Auto Sales Improve - We started out yet another month of data with bad news in two leading sectors. The ISM manufacturing index has been showing contraction since November, and its more leading new orders subindex since September. And did so again in February, with the total index increasing slightly to 47.7, and the new orders index rebounding from a horrible 42.5 to 47.0. But because both of these numbers are below 50, they still show contraction: In the past, the ISM has said that numbers below 48 have been most consistent with recession. Meanwhile, construction spending for January also declined by -0.1%, and the more leading private residential construction spending declined by -0.6%: Even after factoring in the prices for construction materials, which declined -0.1% in January, “real” residential construction spending declined -0.5%: Finally, in a bit of relatively good news, it appears that the crunch in motor vehicle production may have eased somewhat, as in January 15.7 million autos and light trucks were sold on an annualized basis, the highest number since June of 2021 (the below graph norms that to 0 to better show comparisons): A more typical expansionary reading before the pandemic would have been between 17.0-18.0 million units annualized, so this is still a shortfall, but is much closer to a normal range than we have seen in the past year. When February payrolls are reported a week from this Friday, the leading sectors of manufacturing and construction jobs, neither of which has turned down as of now, will be of special importance.

Las Vegas January 2023: Visitor Traffic Down 4.0% Compared to 2019; Convention Traffic Down 24.9% -Note: I like using Las Vegas as a measure of recovery for both leisure (visitors) and business (conventions).From the Las Vegas Visitor Authority: January 2023 Las Vegas Visitor Statistics With strong weekends and rebounding attendance for conventions including the citywide tradeshows of CES, World of Concrete, and the SHOT show, Las Vegas hosted an estimated 3,275,000 visitors in January, well ahead of the lingering pandemic-suppressed volumes of January 2022 and just -4% shy of January 2019.Overall hotel occupancy reached 79.1% for the month, +19.8 pts YoY and down -4.9 pts vs. 2019. Weekend occupancy reached 88.4%, nearly matching January 2019 levels (88.8%, -0.4 pts) while Midweek occupancy reached 75.2%, +23.2 pts vs. January 2022 but -6.9 pts vs. January 2019. The ongoing trend of strong room rates continued in January as ADR approached $192, +32% YoY and +22.4% ahead of January 2019 while RevPAR exceeded $151, +76% YoY and +15.3% over 2019.The first graph shows visitor traffic for 2019 (Black), 2020 (light blue), 2021 (purple), 2022 (orange), and 2023 (red). Visitor traffic was down 4.0% compared to the same month in 2019. Visitor traffic was up 32.3% compared to last January.The second graph shows convention traffic.

Least Geeky Explanation Ever of Differences Between CPI and PCE Price Index which the Fed Uses as Yardstick by Wolf Richter - OK, “least geeky ever,” I mean I don’t know that, but you get the idea. Fed governor Jefferson outlines the differences in a lecture at Harvard. The below are excerpts from Fed Governor Jefferson’s speech, and the charts are from his presentation: “Both indexes measure inflation using a specific basket of goods and services consumed by households. These baskets are similar but not identical across the two measures. “Both measures also weight each item in their basket roughly in accordance with its expenditure share. That is, the more households spend on an item, like rent, the higher the weight it receives in the overall index. The weights are broadly similar across the two indexes, but, again, there are some important differences. “First, the PCE price index has a broader scope than the CPI. The CPI is limited to expenditures that households pay out of pocket, while the PCE price index covers a broader set of goods and services as it seeks to cover prices for all consumer expenditures in the national income and product accounts (NIPA). For example, the PCE price index includes prices of the health services provided to households through Medicaid, while the CPI excludes these items. “Second, the PCE price index and the CPI use different weighting systems. The PCE price index, which is more comprehensive than the CPI, estimates expenditure shares using the national income and product accounts, while the CPI measures expenditure shares using a separate survey of households, the Consumer Expenditure Survey. This leads to some differences in expenditure weights that can at times be important. “For example, the share of medical services is notably higher in the PCE price index (partly because the PCE price index includes more kinds of medical expenditures), and the share of housing services is noticeably smaller (because overall expenditures are larger in the PCE price index). As a result, when health-care services or housing services inflation behave differently than other prices, this can lead to differences in PCE versus CPI inflation. “Another difference in the weights is that the PCE price index uses time-varying weights, while the official CPI keeps weights fixed for a year. The PCE price index weights change to reflect changes in the goods consumers buy. For instance, at the start of the pandemic, the CPI was still giving the same weights to cruise ship and airline fares, even though no one was traveling. “The time-varying weights in PCE also account for substitution behavior. Suppose the price of apples goes up and the price of oranges stays the same. Consumers are then likely to substitute apples with oranges. “In contrast, the CPI does not capture substitution behavior because the basket of goods consumers purchase is updated only once a year (instead of every month) and reflects expenditure patterns prevailing two years ago. “The substitution effects captured by the PCE price index is one reason why PCE inflation (black line) is, almost always, lower than CPI inflation (red line), as you can see in figure 1. [Chart via Federal Reserve].

AAR: February Rail Carloads and Intermodal Decreased Year-over-year - From the Association of American Railroads (AAR) Rail Time Indicators.. Coal, chemicals, and grain combined account for more than half of U.S. non-intermodal rail volume. When all three are down, it’s extremely likely total carloads are down too. That’s what happened in February 2023 compared with February 2022: total carloads fell by 15,101 carloads, or 1.6%....U.S. intermodal volume fell 8.4% in February, its 12th straight decline. This graph from the Rail Time Indicators report shows the six-week average of U.S. Carloads in 2021, 2022 and 2022:Total originated U.S. rail carloads in February 2023 were 905,744, down 1.6%, or 15,101 carloads, from February 2022. Carloads averaged 226,436 per week in February 2023. February 2021 was lower (an average of just 206,201 per week, thanks to severe weather that month), but otherwise February 2023 was the lowest volume February for total carloads in our records that go back to 1988.The second graph shows the six-week average (not monthly) of U.S. intermodal in 2021, 2022 and 2023: (using intermodal or shipping containers): Intermodal originations, which are not included in carloads, totaled 943,979 in February 2023, down 8.4%, or 86,351 containers and trailers, from February 2022. The weekly average in February 2023 was 235,995, the fewest for February since 2015 (when volumes were down due to labor strife as West Coast ports). The 8.4% year-over-year decline in February was the 12th straight decline and the largest percentage decline in those 12 months.

ISM® Manufacturing index Increased to 47.7% in February - The ISM manufacturing index indicated contraction. The PMI® was at 47.7% in February, up from 47.4% in January. The employment index was at 49.1%, down from 50.6% last month, and the new orders index was at 47.0%, up from 42.5%. From ISM: Manufacturing PMI® at 47.7% February 2023 Manufacturing ISM® Report On Business® Economic activity in the manufacturing sector contracted in February for the fourth consecutive month following a 28-month period of growth, say the nation's supply executives in the latest Manufacturing ISM® Report On Business®.“The February Manufacturing PMI® registered 47.7 percent, 0.3 percentage point higher than the 47.4 percent recorded in January. Regarding the overall economy, this figure indicates a third month of contraction after a 30-month period of expansion. In the last two months, the Manufacturing PMI® has been at its lowest levels since May 2020, when it registered 43.5 percent. The New Orders Index remained in contraction territory at 47 percent, 4.5 percentage points higher than the figure of 42.5 percent recorded in January. The Production Index reading of 47.3 percent is a 0.7-percentage point decrease compared to January’s figure of 48 percent. The Prices Index registered 51.3 percent, up 6.8 percentage points compared to the January figure of 44.5 percent. The Backlog of Orders Index registered 45.1 percent, 1.7 percentage points higher than the January reading of 43.4 percent. The Employment Index dropped into contraction territory, registering 49.1 percent, down 1.5 percentage points from January’s 50.6 percent. The Supplier Deliveries Index figure of 45.2 percent is 0.4 percentage point lower than the 45.6 percent recorded in January; readings from the last three months are the index’s lowest since March 2009 (43.2 percent). The Inventories Index registered 50.1 percent, 0.1 percentage point lower than the January reading of 50.2 percent. The New Export Orders Index reading of 49.9 percent is 0.5 percentage point higher than January’s figure of 49.4 percent. The Imports Index continued in contraction territory at 49.9 percent, 2.1 percentage points above the January reading of 47.8 percent.”

ISM® Services Index at 55.1% in February --The ISM® Services index was at 55.1%, down from 55.2% last month. The employment index increased to 54.0%, from 50.0%. Note: Above 50 indicates expansion, below 50 in contraction. From the Institute for Supply Management: Services PMI® at 55.1% February 2023 Services ISM® Report On Business® Economic activity in the services sector expanded in February for the second consecutive month as the Services PMI® registered 55.1 percent, say the nation's purchasing and supply executives in the latest Services ISM® Report On Business®. The sector has grown in 32 of the last 33 months, with the lone contraction in December. “In February,the Services PMI® registered 55.1 percent, 0.1 percentage point lower than January’s reading of 55.2 percent. The composite index indicated growth in February for the second consecutive month after a reading of 49.2 percent in December, the first contraction since May 2020 (45.4 percent). The Business Activity Index registered 56.3 percent, a 4.1-percentage point decrease compared to the reading of 60.4 percent in January. The New Orders Index expanded in February for the second consecutive month after contracting in December for the first time since May 2020; the figure of 62.6 percent is 2.2 percentage points higher than the January reading of 60.4 percent. The PMI was higher than expected and the employment index was above 50.

Subprime Auto Lender And Used Car Retailer Collapses As Distress Cycle Finally Arrives - One month ago, when discussing the "perfect storm" hitting the US auto market, we showed that according to Fitch "More Americans Can't Afford Their Car Payments Than During The Peak Of Financial Crisis"...... which was to be expected: after all the latest consumer credit report from the Fed revealed an exponential spike in the amount of new car loans, which increased by more than $2,000 in one quarter, from just over $38,000 (a record), to $40,155 (a new record). And yet something just didn't click: if so many subprime Americans were saddled with record amounts of auto loans - on average more than $40K - where were the defaults? After all, the average loan rate for new car loans just hit a 13 year high and will soon rise to the highest level this centiry. Well, after a lengthy period in which nothing seemed to happen, suddenly the dominoes are starting to fall, and as Bloomberg reports, used car retailer and subprime auto loan lender, American Car Center, told employees the business was closing its doors, just one day after the company had hoped to pull off a funding Hail Mary by selling a $222 million bond (it failed). According to Bloomberg, the used car retailer, which targets consumers regardless of their credit history (and thus targets almost entirely subprime borrowers who can't get a loan elsewhere), said in an email to employees on Friday the firm was ceasing all operations, closing its headquarters in Memphis, Tennessee, and that all employees would be terminated by the end of the business day, the people said. It employed about 288 people at its headquarters. The closure email came a day after the company sent another message to staff saying management and advisors had been working with lenders to improve liquidity and continue operations. American Car Center, which has more than 40 dealerships across 10 states, is owned by York Capital's private equity group. The long overdue collapse - the first of many - comes as more Americans are starting to fall behind on their car payments, and the distress cycle is rapidly accelerating.

DeSantis Signs Bill Killing Disney World's "Corporate Kingdom" - Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Monday signed a bill that takes control of a special tax district surrounding Walt Disney World that, as Reuters reports, for half a century allowed Walt Disney Co. to operate with an almost unprecedentedly high degree of autonomy. The legislation, titled HB 9-B, ends Disney’s self-governing status, establishes a new state-controlled district and imposes a five-member state control board, which is appointed by the governor.The board will also be confirmed by the state Senate.“Today is the day the corporate kingdom finally comes to an end,” DeSantis said.The Republican governor said during the announcement this morning that:"Allowing a corporation to control its own government is bad policy, especially when the corporation makes decisions that impact an entire region."The law also ends Disney's exemption from state regulatory reviews and codes and it ensures "that Disney will pay its fair share of taxes," DeSantis' office said.DeSantis' actions come after Disney's advocacy against Florida's Parental Rights in Education bill (the so-called "Don't say gay bill"). As The Epoch Times' Dan Berger reports, DeSantis and other speakers who joined him at the podium reviewed a wide range of issues tied into the tussle with the big entertainment company. “Disney has since doubled down and embraced all things woke increasingly making things like sex, gender, race and worse things the core mission of its storytelling. You know, we’ve gone from ‘Cinderella’ and ‘Snow White’ and ‘Pocahontas’ and all these great stories with morals and great characters, and have brought us stuff like ‘Little Demon’ who was the spawn, the child of Satan, as the lead character.”“We have recently seen the cartoon ‘Proud Family’ on Disney Plus. And that really doesn’t tell the whole truth of what happened in our country. They tried to build a narrative that everything in this country is built on the back of slaves and reparations. And what they’re doing is they’re taking vulnerable children, and they’re indoctrinating them into becoming activists and hating each other.”

Florida bill would require bloggers to register before writing about DeSantis | The Hill A bill proposed this week by a Republican state senator in Florida would require bloggers who write about Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.), his Cabinet officers and members of the Florida legislature to register with the state. Bloggers who receive compensation for a given online post about an elected state officer would have to register with the Florida Office of Legislative Services or the Commission on Ethics — though the requirement would not extend to the websites of newspapers or similar sites. “If a blogger posts to a blog about an elected state officer and receives, or will receive, compensation for that post, the blogger must register with the appropriate office … within 5 days after the first 164 by the blogger which mentions an elected state officer,” reads the bill, introduced by Republican state Sen. Jason Brodeur. If additional posts about elected state officers were to be posted, the blogger would have to file monthly reports detailing where, when and by whom the post was published, plus the amount of compensation received. Failure to file reports could lead to fines. The elected state officers covered by the proposed “Information Dissemination” bill are defined as “the Governor, the Lieutenant Governor, a Cabinet officer, or any member of the Legislature.” A blog is defined in the bill as “a website or webpage that hosts any blogger and is frequently updated with opinion, commentary, or business content” and a blog post as “an individual webpage on a blog which contains an article, a story, or a series of stories.”

American Woman Kidnapped by Family and Allegedly Forced to marry for A $500K Dowry – An American woman is being detained in Yemen after her family tricked and kidnapped her in an attempt to derail her wedding. The unnamed victim planned to celebrate her wedding in Guadalajara, Mexico last September and invited her family to the occasion. However, her disapproving father, mother and brothers conspired to kidnap her instead. According to the Department of Justice statement, the family wanted to force her to marry someone else in Yemen. Her father vowed that he would support of her marriage to her fiancé, who she knew for almost nine years. However, unbeknown to her, the victim’s family allegedly tried to force her fiancé to pay a $30,000 dowry. After the woman intervened, her father, Khaled Abughanem, threatened to throw her from the 12th floor of the hotel.The following day, her father allegedly changed his mind and came to a “gentleman’s agreement” with the groom. He agreed to support their union — if he could host a party and the ceremony in the United States. The victim agreed to those new terms. However, upon returning to the States, the victim’s family kidnapped her and locked in her family’s home under strict supervision. She wasn’t even able to use the restroom in privacy. Another family member impersonated her and withdrew her from all of her classes at the University of Buffalo. They also erased her presence on social media. The woman’s family forced her to fly to Egypt. There, they planned an arranged marriage to an undetermined man in Egypt or Yemen. In return, the family would have received $500,000, according to Insider.According to the DOJ statement, her family told her that she had to comply and agree to an arranged marriage. If she did not agree to those terms, they would lock her up in the home without contact. Her family told her that if she didn’t comply with what they wanted they would kill her fiancé.“You are no longer in the West,” Abughanem said to his daughter, according to the DOJ’s statement. “You are in the Middle East. Women, like you, are killed.” Now, Khaled and Waleed Abughanem, the woman’s father and brother, face pending kidnapping charges and are currently in custody.

A new deal will make Lunchables more powerful than ever - One of Kraft Heinz’s most profitable brands, Lunchables, is signing a deal with grades K-12 schools across the country — potentially launching Big Cheese, Ham and Crackers into unknown heights.Carlos Abrams-Rivera, Kraft Heinz executive vice president, announced the deal at the annual Consumer Analyst Group of New York (CAGNY) meeting on Feb. 21. Two types of Lunchables with “improved nutrition” will be served in grades K-12 schools as soon as this fall. A Kraft-Heinz spokesperson declined to provide more details. The company will release more information about this program in the next month. The effort is likely intriguing to any of the folks who have consumed the billions of Lunchables packages sold by Kraft Heinz since they were introduced in 1988. I — or more accurately, my parents — purchased untold units of Lunchables because I was for some reason obsessed with eating the pepperoni pizza variety through much of my childhood. My organs have come out mostly unscathed. For the uninitiated, here is what a Lunchables consists of:

• Some sort of main dish that you make yourself, like stacking rectangles of ham and cheese on a circular cracker or squeezing a red pizza sauce on a disc of bread and adding cheese and pepperoni.
• A drink, like bottled water, Capri-Sun, or a mysterious fizzy drink called “Cola.”
• Dessert, like a wee Crunch bar.

Here is my ode to Lunchables, the most MBA-friendly product to ever exist, with a significant footnote for the nutritionally suspicious element within. Ultimately, as schools become more strapped for cash, we will see more of these deals come about — and it’s a spooky indicator for our country’s health outlook.

US students need well-paid teachers to rebuild what’s been lost - Students continue to wrestle with the impact of disrupted learning time from the pandemic. Yet despite generations of research proving that teacher quality is the single most important school-based factor in student outcomes, our country continues to allow teacher shortages — which we know are most persistent and acute in schools and districts hit hardest by the pandemic.There’s not a moment to lose to recruit, support and retain more teachers. One simple action, which President Biden named during his State of the Union Address, could go a long way: Give public school teachers a long-overdue raise. It’s a reform that will benefit not just teachers but students as well.Members of Congress looking to boost student performance — and combat pandemic-inflicted learning loss — should support new proposals to make teaching a more economically viable profession. A bipartisan group of governors has done just that and now it’s time for federal policymakers to act. Inflation-adjusted wages for teachers have remained mostly flat since 1996, according to a 2022 Economic Policy Institute assessment. It’s no wonder the proportion of college graduates that go into teaching is at a 50-year low. Even accounting for teachers’ benefits packages, they make 14 percent less than other college graduates. Our analysis points to low pay among the top reasons why young people don’t consider a teaching career. Members of Gen Z want to make a meaningful difference, but they also prioritize financial stability and rightly don’t view teaching as a way to achieve it. For current teachers, low pay is a major barrier to job satisfaction and retention. In a recent survey by the Teacher Salary Project of more than 1,000 teachers — more than half of whom received formal recognition for their achievements in the classroom — just 1 in 5 teachers said their pay was high enough to keep them in the classroom for the medium to long term. More than 80 percent reported currently or previously working another job while teaching. That’s unacceptable.Our country can change this. Rep. Frederica Wilson’s (D-Fla.) American Teacher Act — and a similar bill expected from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) — would set a minimum teacher salary of $60,000 as a first step in moving toward livable, competitive wages for all teachers.As we explore these options, we should focus especially on recruiting and retaining teachers in under-resourced schools. There is promising legislation in Congress that does just that: Sen. Cory Booker’s (D-N.J.) RAISE Act would make teachers eligible for up to $15,000 in refundable tax credits. First-year teachers could access the credits right away, and a sliding scale would provide higher credits for those working in schools with the highest poverty levels.At Teach For America, we have provided $5,000 stipends for incoming corps members in 2022 and 2023, with an additional $5,000 for those who received a Pell Grant or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. This is on top of grants and loans we’ve been offering to incoming corps members for more than a decade to support them through emergencies, hardship or the transition to the first day of school. In 2022, all of this financial support for corps members totaled more than $14 million.Boosting teacher compensation helps students as well. Research dating back to the early 1980s shows a correlation between increasing teacher pay and improving student performance. As young people work to get back on track after years of inconsistent schooling, it’s critical we have the best educators in schools.

Florida bill targets gender-affirming health care for trans youth, adults - Transgender youths and adults may soon find their access to gender-affirming medical care heavily restricted and their identities erased from official documents under sweeping legislation introduced Friday in the Florida House. Under Florida’s newly proposed House Bill 1421, gender-affirming health care including puberty blockers, hormone therapy and surgeries will be outlawed for transgender minors. Transgender adults will be required to clear a number of additional regulatory hurdles to receive care in the state, including submitting a written consent form to their doctors each time they have an appointment.The informed consent form must detail the long-term and short-term effects of gender-affirming medical care as well as the potential impact such care may have on a person’s physical and mental health, according to the bill, which also makes it easier for patients to sue their doctors within a 30-year statute of limitations.Florida health care providers or hospital employees under the bill are protected from “any disciplinary or other recriminatory action” if they refuse to supply gender-affirming care to a consenting adult on “clinical, moral, or religious grounds.” The measure also bars state health insurance policies and health maintenance policies from covering gender-affirming care.Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration has already eliminated Medicaid coverage for gender-affirming health care for transgender individuals of all ages. The state’s medical boards in February voted to adopt a set of rules that bar transgender youth younger than 18 from receiving puberty blockers and hormone replacement therapy.The legislation filed Friday also aims to prevent people born in Florida from amending their birth certificate to reflect a sex that is different from their sex assigned at birth, although exceptions exist for individuals whose genitalia was “unresolvably ambiguous” when they were born or in the case of scrivener’s error.

Florida bill would ban gender studies majors, diversity programs at universities (Reuters) - Florida Governor Ron DeSantis would gain more influence in the state's public university system, and majors involving gender studies or critical race theory would be eliminated if a bill filed this week wins support from the Republican-controlled legislature. The new measure, which largely reflects a legislative agenda announced by DeSantis in January, also would ban consideration of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in hiring of faculty. It would require each institution's board of trustees to approve hires, giving DeSantis greater influence over those decisions because the governor appoints a significant number of board members. The wide-reaching legislation represents a new front in the Republican war against the "woke" agenda many conservatives believe liberals are trying to push on public education across the country. DeSantis, who is expected to launch a presidential bid after Florida's legislative session ends this spring, has positioned himself as a leader in that fight. "In Florida, we will build off of our higher education reforms by aligning core curriculum to the values of liberty and the Western tradition," DeSantis said in January. The legislature, which has a clear Republican majority, convenes for its regular session in March. Academics, free speech advocates and students condemned the measure. Jeremy C. Young, senior manager of free expression and education at the writers' organization PEN America, tweeted that it would be the "central battleground for the soul of higher education."

7.2 Percent Of US Adults Identify As LGBT --A total of 7.2 percent of U.S. adults identified as LGBT in 2022, a new record high.As Statista's Katharina Buchholz notes, Gen Z, newly added in the Gallup survey's 2020 edition, is the gayest generation in terms of self-identification.Almost 20 percent of those born between 1997 and 2004 identified as LGBT, compared with around 11 percent of Millennials.While scientists believe that the share of LGBT individuals has not actually changed over time, younger people in the U.S. are more likely to be openly gay, lesbian, bisexual or transsexual.Even within the generation of Millennials, defined as those born between 1981 and 1996, self-identification quotas rose in the past years. In 2014, only 6.3 percent of Millennials had said they identified as LGBT.For older generations, levels of self-identification did not change majorly in the past decade.The Gallup survey question did not ask respondents to identify as other sexes, sexual identities or sexual orientations like intersex, asexual or queer.

White student alleges racial discrimination in $2M suit against Howard University - An expelled white student is suing Howard University, a historically Black school, for $2 million over what he claims is racial discrimination, citing “pain, suffering, emotional anguish and damage to his reputation.” Michael Newman was expelled in September after attending Howard law school starting in 2020. Newman alleges in his suit that the school created a “hostile education environment,” and argues that he suffered “depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts” as a result of “public ostracism, vilification and humiliation.” Newman apparently became the target of criticism by other students when he made remarks about where he parts “from the Black community,” saying in a group chat with other students that Black people “believe government solves problems, I only see it causing problems,” according to the suit. Newman made further comments in class settings that other students took exception to, and the suit alleges that some “conspired to seek his expulsion.” The suit also claims that an administrator at the university told Newman that he had become “the most hated student” he had seen in his time at the school. The acrimony reached a peak when a classmate found Newman’s private Twitter account and reposted a tweet from him that included a photo of a slave with scars on his back, with the caption: “But we don’t know what he did before the picture was taken!” Newman argued that the comment was made ironically, “in response to Americans who attempt to explain away videos of police brutality by claiming that the victim must have committed wrongdoing before the video started that justified the violence.” Following a number of other infractions with school administrators, including using a university Listserv to send what was seen as administrators and students alike as disturbing emails to the community, Newman was expelled. He lost an appeal at the school that challenged the expulsion.

How private companies, IOUs help universities reach climate goals & save money -Universities increasingly outsource the management of their power/HVAC systems to private companies and investor-owned utilities (IOUs) to help meet their environmental/sustainability goals and to improve cost efficiencies.With an ambitious goal to become an international pioneer in sustainability, Ohio State University (OSU), for example, in 2017 entered into a 50-year integrated solutions agreement with Ohio State Energy Partners (OSEP) — a public-private partnership between gas and electricity supplier ENGIE North America and investment firm Axium Infrastructure — which is leasing the university’s energy assets.“Public-private partnerships allow for an alternative funding stream to achieve key initiatives like energy use reduction that can also contribute to a reduction of carbon emissions, while still allowing the university to focus on its core mission of teaching, research, and health care thanks to money going toward the overall endowment,” Brett Garrett, director of energy at OSU’s Facilities Operations and Development, told Daily Energy Insider.More broadly, Garrett said that such public-private partnerships offer institutions like Ohio State the ability to stay focused on their core business. And so far, it has been a very successful partnership.“To date, because of the agreement, more than $91 million has been invested in reducing energy consumption by approximately 11 percent,” Garrett said.The 50-year lease agreement — valued at almost $1.2 billion — is designed to help OSU meet its energy sustainability goals for its 485-building campus in Columbus, Ohio, one of the largest university campuses in the United States.OSU’s specific sustainability goals are to improve energy efficiency by a minimum of 25 percent within 10 years; achieve carbon neutrality by 2050; nurture the next generation of sustainable energy leaders; and serve as an incubator for sustainable energy innovations.Toward reaching such goals, the agreement tasks ENGIE (as part of OSEP) with operating the systems that power, heat, and cool OSU. And through its performance guarantees, ENGIE has responsibility for the resiliency and reliability of these systems, including uptime commitments from 99.9 percent for steam to up to 99.996 percent for electricity.

First-of-Its-Kind Report Details Hundreds of Millions Pumped Into Academia by Big Oil -- An analysis of more than two dozen U.S. universities' donor bases reveals the lengths fossil fuel companies have gone to in recent years to manipulate research into the climate emergency, pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into some of the country's schools as scientists struggle to convince policymakers that extractive industries must be reined in.The Fossil Free Research (FFR) campaign partnered with progressive think tank Data for Progress to conduct the first-of-its-kind study—released Wednesday—of donations from companies including BP, Chevron, and ExxonMobil, and found that between 2010 and 2020, fossil fuel giants donated more than $676 million to 27 universities that lead in the field of climate research.That figure likely represents "just a fraction of the true total" amount that the industry has contributed to universities, said Geoffrey Supran, associate professor of environmental science and policy at the University of Miami and a member of the FFR Advisory Board."It's no mistake that fossil fuel companies have continued to make major financial gains through the climate crisis; fossil fuel industry executives, knowingly, have long misled the public about their impact on it and used their profits tomanipulate climate research.""Estimating this massive lower bound figure is a crucial first step towards compelling university officials to reckon with the conflicts of interest inherent in accepting fossil fuel money, especially to fund climate-related research," said Supran.The schools that were found to be the top recipients of fossil fuel money include University of California, Berkeley, which took more than $154 million, and University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, which took more than $108 million. Both schools received the vast majority of their fossil fuel funding from BP.George Mason University and Stanford University both received more than $50 million and nine schools including Harvard University, Princeton University, Iowa State University, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) all took more than $10 million each."It's no mistake that fossil fuel companies have continued to make major financial gains through the climate crisis; fossil fuel industry executives, knowingly, have long misled the public about their impact on it and used their profits to manipulate climate research," said Data for Progress.The funding of climate research by the very companies worldwide researchers have called on to drastically reduce their carbon emissions presents "a serious conflict of interest," added the group.The study pointed to numerous examples of universities using fossil fuel money to complete climate research, including:

• Stanford's use of the funding to support the work of the Doerr School of Sustainability, allowing funders "to counter claims that they are destroying the planet";
• MIT's development of the MIT Energy Initiative, which released a report in 2011 claiming natural gas offers a path to a "low-carbon future" and "dismissing research that found natural gas is, in fact, more harmful due to methane leaks"; and
• George Washington University's use of roughly $4 million from ExxonMobil, Shell, and Koch Industries to support its Regulatory Studies Center, which "crafts economic arguments that downplay the negative economic impacts of fossil fuel emissions."

Fossil fuel companies donated $700m to US universities over 10 years -Six fossil fuel companies funneled more than $700m in research funding to 27 universities in the US from 2010 to 2020, according to a new study.Such funding at universities that conduct climate research can shift not just research agendas, but also policy in the direction of climate solutions the industry prefers, the report’s authors argue.Those solutions typically include biofuels, carbon capture, and hydrogen, according to the research by the thinktank Data for Progress and the nonprofit group Fossil-Free Research. Oil majors also invest in public policy and economics research that favors deregulation.“$700m is probably an absolute bare minimum,” Grace Adcox, polling analyst for Data for Progress, said. “There’s so little transparency around these gifts.”The top five schools on the list, include some that champion their climate research, like University of California at Berkeley ($154m), Stanford University ($56.6m) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology ($40.5m), as well as those with long-standing fossil fuel ties, like George Mason University ($64m), the largest recipient of funding from the Koch Foundation.These schools have also long been the targets of campus divestment campaigns, with students and faculty urging administrators to pull university funds from fossil fuel companies; Berkeley fully divested in 2020, Stanford and MIT’s resistance to the idea has resulted in a student-led lawsuit.Asked about the new research, several universities described measures they had taken to mitigate concerns, or pointed to more recent reductions in accepting donations.The report includes a poll indicating that a majority (67%) of both college-educated and non-college-educated voters agree with the statement: “Colleges and universities studying the impacts of climate change and sustainability should refuse donations from fossil fuel companies so they can remain unbiased in their research.”The study was created from publicly available data, including tax-form 990s from fossil fuel company foundations, annual reports from both universities and oil companies, and press releases or media coverage about big new donations. It’s an imperfect approach, but it is enough to give the public some hint of how much money fossil fuel companies are investing in research that has a real impact on policy.“These research projects have real-life implications – for example a lot of the fossil fuel-funded research has re-centered natural gas in the conversation about renewables,” Bella Kumar, lead author of the Data for Progress report, said.In response to the research, Dan Mogulof, assistant vice-chancellor at Berkeley, sent the Guardian a full accounting of the university’s fossil fuel donations, which he said represent less than 1% of its total research funding. Stanford spokesperson Mara Vandlik said: “It’s unclear how these numbers were calculated as we do not share this information publicly,” adding that the university has formed a committee to review the question of fossil fuel funding of research.

Rehab on hold: COVID devastated prison learning programs | AP News (AP) — Joseph Sena has spent nearly half his 27 years in prison for manslaughter. For almost as long, he’s been striving to make himself a better man than when he first arrived. He has taken courses in creative writing, addressed his addictions, and attended school in prison, hoping to be judged fit for parole and ready to return home to Los Angeles if he’s ever freed. But when the coronavirus pandemic hit, tearing through prisons and killing thousands, it severely disrupted or shut down the very programs prisoners most desperately need to prepare them for eventual release. Trauma counseling, training in carpentry, masonry and barbering, and college courses were slow to adjust to pandemic learning. Isolation and uncertainty replaced creative outlets and mental health therapies, for months on end. Sena grew depressed and anxious. He began to doubt that he’d be known for anything other than taking a life when he was 15. He remembered the words of a poem he wrote to the man he was convicted of killing. “I know you’re not here. I’ll remember your name. For you I will live. For us, I will change.” He was afraid he’d never get the chance. In a nation that incarcerates roughly 2 million people — a disproportionate number of them Black and Hispanic — the COVID pandemic was a nightmare for prisons. Overcrowding, subpar medical care, staffing shortages and the ebb and flow of prison populations left most places unprepared to manage the spread of the highly contagious virus. At least 3,181 prisoners and 311 correctional staff died of virus-related causes through mid-January of this year, according to a COVID tracking project by the law school at the University of California in Los Angeles. The 10 largest state prison systems suspended or severely curtailed in-person visitation for an average of 490 days before such restrictions were lifted, based on information and records obtained by The Associated Press. That meant no family visits, and no volunteers coming in to lead rehabilitation programs. At the worst of times, prisoners said they were locked in their cells for weeks on end, their otherwise normal activities like phone calls to loved ones left up to the whims of correctional officers. And when things seemed to return to normal, just one COVID-positive case in their living quarters would send them back into isolation for weeks.

'Brilliant PR Move': Advocates Skeptical as Eli Lilly Vows 70% Insulin Price Cut - Eli Lilly, a pharmaceutical giant that has become virtually synonymous with the sky-high cost of insulin in the United States, pledged Wednesday to cut the list prices for its most widely used insulin products by 70%, a move that advocates and experts met with deep skepticism even as they welcomed its potentially significant benefits for some people with diabetes."Eli Lilly's price cut will help people," said David Mitchell, the founder of Patients for Affordable Drugs. "But it's the result of years of relentless pressure by diabetes advocates in this country and around the world."In addition to cutting the list prices of commonly prescribed insulin products such as Humalog—which currently has a price tag of $274.70 per vial—Eli Lilly said it would impose a $35 cap on out-of-pocket insulin costs for people with private insurance who use participating retail pharmacies.Eli Lilly, one of the three companies that dominate the U.S. insulin market, directed those without health insurance to a company website offering a $35-per-month "insulin savings card."The company specifically pledged to slash the price of Lispro, Eli Lilly's generic insulin, to $25 a vial—years after lawmakers chastised the drugmaker for failing to make the lower-cost product widely accessible.The changes are set to take effect in the coming months."This decision for affordable insulin shows the power of grassroots advocacy and organizing," Elizabeth Pfiester, executive director of T1International and a person living with Type 1 diabetes, said in a statement. "The T1International community has been taking action and asking insulin manufacturers to put patients over profits for years. In October, T1International and people with diabetes demonstrated outside of Eli Lilly in Indianapolis, and shared a petition with thousands of signatures asking them to lower their list price of insulin."

Walgreens won’t distribute abortion pills in states where GOP AGs object - The nation’s second-largest pharmacy chain confirmed Thursday that it will not dispense abortion pills in several states where they remain legal — acting out of an abundance of caution amid a shifting policy landscape, threats from state officials and pressure from anti-abortion activists. Nearly two dozen Republican state attorneys general wrote to Walgreens in February, threatening legal action if the company began distributing the drugs, which have become the nation’s most popular method for ending a pregnancy.The company told POLITICO that it has since responded to all the officials, assuring them that they will not dispense abortion pills either by mail or at their brick-and-mortar locations in those states.The list includes several states where abortion in general, and the medications specifically, remain legal — including Alaska, Iowa, Kansas and Montana. For example, Kansas’ law that patients only obtain the pills directly from a physician is blocked in court.“There is currently complexity around this issue in Kansas and elsewhere,” said Fraser Engerman, Walgreens’ senior director of external relations. The company stressed that it is not yet distributing the pills anywhere in the country, but is working to obtain certification to do so in some states, though declined to say which.“In my letter to Walgreens, we made clear that Kansas will not hesitate to enforce the laws against mailing and dispensing abortion pills, including bringing a RICO action to enforce the federal law prohibiting the mailing of abortion pills,” Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach said in a statement. “Evidently, Walgreens understood that my office was serious about this. I’m grateful that Walgreens responded quickly and reasonably and intends to comply with the relevant laws.”

FDA Authorizes First At-Home Test To Detect Flu And COVID-19 - The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved the first over-the-counter or OTC at-home diagnostic test to detect both influenza and COVID-19 viruses. The decision is part of its efforts to increase the availability of home diagnostic tests. In a statement, the agency said it has issued an emergency use authorization or EUA for Lucira Health, Inc.'s Lucira COVID-19 & Flu Home Test that can differentiate and detect influenza A and B, commonly known as the flu, and SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The single-use at-home test kit provides results from self-collected nasal swab samples in around 30 minutes. The test is for individuals with signs and symptoms consistent with a respiratory tract infection, including COVID-19. They can purchase the kits without a prescription and can perform completely at-home. Nasal swab samples can be self-collected by individuals ages 14 years or older or collected by an adult for individuals 2 years of age or older. They then need to swirl the sample swab in a vial that is placed in the test unit. In 30 minutes or less, the test unit will display the results that show whether a person is positive or negative for each of the following: Influenza A, Influenza B and COVID-19. Individuals are asked to report all results obtained to their healthcare provider for public health reporting and to receive appropriate medical care. The agency noted that the Lucira COVID-19 & Flu Home Test correctly identified 99.3% of negative and 90.1% of positive Influenza A samples in individuals with symptoms. It also identified 100% of negative and 88.3% of positive COVID-19 samples and 99.9% of negative Influenza B samples. Meanwhile, there are currently not enough cases of Influenza B circulating to include in a clinical study. The validation has confirmed that the test can identify the virus in contrived specimens.

Bacterial co-infections linked to higher risk of death in US COVID patients - Although bacterial co-infections were identified infrequently in hospitalized US COVID-19 patients, they were associated with a more than two-fold higher risk of death, US researchers reported yesterday in Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses. Using data from the Coronavirus Disease 2019-Associated Hospitalization Surveillance Network (COVID-Net), which includes more than 250 acute care hospitals in 14 states, a team led by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) investigated the incidence of bacterial and viral co-infections among hospitalized adults with confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infections from March 2020 to April 2022. They then compared demographic and clinical features among those with and without bacterial co-infections. Among a representative sample 36,490 hospitalized adults with COVID-19, 53.3% had bacterial cultures taken within 7 days of admission, and 6.0% had a clinically relevant bacterial pathogen in sputum, blood, deep respiratory tissue, or another sterile site. Understanding risk factors for bacterial infections and associated outcomes can help guide clinicians in providing optimal care. The most frequently isolated organism from all sites was Staphylococcus aureus, followed by gram-negative rods, including Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Klebsiella pneumoniae, and Escherichia coli. In-hospital death occurred in 31.7% of those with bacterial co-infections, compared with 13.2% of those without bacterial co-infections in bivariate analysis. After controlling for demographic factors, underlying medical conditions, and time period, adults with COVID-19 who had bacterial co-infections within 7 days of admission had a relative risk [RR] of 2.28 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.87 to 2.79) for death compared with those who had negative bacterial cultures. Those with a clinically relevant pathogen identified were also associated with an increased need for intensive care (RR, 2.11; 95% CI, 1.95 to 2.23) and mechanical ventilation (RR, 3.04; 95% CI, 2.74 to 3.37). "As SARS-CoV-2 continues to circulate and individuals continue to be hospitalized for COVID-19, understanding risk factors for bacterial infections and associated outcomes can help guide clinicians in providing optimal care," the study authors conclude.

Cardiovascular risks of long COVID persist for at least 1 year, study suggests - One year after COVID-19 infection, US adults with lingering symptoms were at elevated risk for cardiovascular conditions such as ischemic stroke and blood clots in the lungs, according to a nationwide study published today in JAMA Health Forum. Scientists from Elevance Health, a large commercial health insurance provider in Indianapolis, analyzed claims data, lab results, and Social Security Administration death data to assess the cardiovascular outcomes of 13,435 US adults with long COVID and 26,870 matched uninfected controls. Long-COVID patients had tested positive from April 2020 to July 2021. Average participant age was 50.1 years, and 58.4% were women. In the year after infection, 2.8% of the long-COVID patients died, compared with 1.2% of controls, implying an excess death rate of 16.4 per 1,000 people. Long-COVID patients also used more healthcare services for the treatment of abnormal heart rhythms (29.4% vs 12.5%; relative risk [RR], 2.35), blood clots in the lungs (8.0% vs 2.2%; RR, 3.64), ischemic stroke (3.9% vs 1.8%; RR, 2.17), coronary artery disease (17.1% vs 9.6%; RR, 1.78), heart failure (11.8% vs 6.0%; RR, 1.97), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD; 32.0% vs 16.5%; RR, 1.94), and asthma (24.2% vs 12.4%; RR, 1.95). Among long-COVID patients, 27.5% were hospitalized in the first month after infection. This patient subgroup had more chronic conditions before infection than the larger long-COVID group, including high blood pressure (54.1%), type 2 diabetes (30.7%), COPD (22.2%), asthma (15.6%), and severe obesity (14.7%). Hospitalized long-COVID patients had higher healthcare use for abnormal heart rhythms (51.7% vs 17.4%; RR, 2.97), blood clots in the lungs (19.3% vs 3.1%; RR, 6.23), ischemic stroke (8.3% vs 2.7%; RR, 3.07), coronary artery disease (28.9% vs 14.5%; RR, 1.99), heart failure (25.6% vs 10.1%; RR, 2.53), COPD (43.1% vs 19.2%; RR, 2.24), and asthma (31.6% vs 14.7%; RR, 2.15). The most common persistent COVID-19 symptoms were shortness of breath (41%), anxiety (31%), muscle aches/weakness (30%), depression (25%), and fatigue (21%). "While these risks were heightened for individuals who experienced a more severe acute episode of COVID-19 (ie, requiring hospitalization), it is essential to note that most individuals (72.5%) in the cohort did not experience hospitalization during the acute phase," the researchers wrote. "Many of these conditions will have lasting effects on quality of life." The authors said their study was the largest national evaluation of commercially insured long-COVID-19 patients with a year of follow-up.

Long Covid is associated with significantly increased risk of death, heart and lung problems, study finds | CNN — As the nation anticipates the end of the Covid-19 public health emergency, new research is showing that some groups are still feeling the long-term impacts of the disease. In the year following infection, individuals who experience long Covid are at high risk for a range of adverse health outcomes, including a doubled risk of death, according to a new study published Friday in JAMA Health Forum.The study examined insurance claims data for 13,435 adults with long Covid and 26,870 without Covid-19 during a 12-month follow-up period. Accounting for factors present prior to infection, the long Covid group experienced increased mortality, with 2.8% individuals with long Covid dying compared to 1.2% of those without long Covid.Those with long Covid were also roughly two times more likely to experience cardiovascular events including arrhythmias, stroke, heart failure and coronary artery disease. Pulmonary conditions were also common. The risk of pulmonary embolism more than tripled while the risk of COPD and moderate or severe asthma nearly doubled for those with long Covid.The study found that risks were greatest among individuals hospitalized within a month of a Covid infection.“We know from published literature that long Covid can result in fatigue, headache and attention disorder,” said Dr. Andrea DeVries, Staff Vice President for Health Services Research at Elevance Health and the lead author of the study. “While those conditions are concerning, the results from this study point to even more worrisome outcomes that can severely impact quality and length of life for individuals with long Covid.”The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defines long Covid as having new, returning, or ongoing health issues more than four weeks after onset of initial infection. According to research by the CDC, one in five Covid-19 survivors ages 18 to 64 and one in four survivors 65 years or older experience an ongoing health issue that might be attributable to Covid-19 infection.Long Covid has been associated with more than 200 signs and symptoms and 50 health conditions. Experts say the health consequences can last from months to years. “We can only measure out as far as the pandemic has been happening, but early evidence suggests that a large portion of people who experienced post-Covid condition are doing so more than two years after their initial infection, which is basically as long as it could be,” said Dr. Mark Czeisler who wrote a related editorial also published in JAMA Health Forum. Research has shown that Covid reinfection substantially increases an individual’s risk of death, hospitalization, and health consequences from long Covid. For example, the risk of cardiovascular disorders increases from 1.6 with one infection, to 3.0 with two infections and 4.8 with three or more infections. “It’s demonstrating that it’s not like you have Covid once and then if you don’t get acutely ill or you don’t develop long Covid from that first infection that the coast is clear,” Other risk factors for long Covid include older age, being female, tobacco use, higher body mass index, and experiencing more symptoms during the acute Covid-19 illness. Being vaccinated prior to infection has been associated with a decreased risk of long Covid, according to previous research.

California to end mask, vaccine rules for healthcare workers - With the COVID-19 state of emergency a thing of the past, California health officials on Friday unveiled plans to relax guidance on masking in high-risk settings and to end vaccination requirements for healthcare workers.Among the changes announced by the California Department of Public Health is the end of statewide mask requirements in healthcare and other indoor high-risk settings — including correctional facilities and emergency and homeless shelters — beginning April 3.Effective the same day, California will no longer require COVID-19 vaccinations for healthcare workers, including those in adult and direct care settings, correctional facilities and detention centers.The monthlong delay is meant to allow local health departments and healthcare facilities time “to develop and implement plans customized to their needs and local conditions to continue to protect Californians through the end of the winter virus season,” according to the Department of Public Health.

4 residents dead in COVID-19 outbreak at Yarmouth nursing home - CBS Boston - Four people have died in a COVID outbreak at a Cape Cod nursing home. A state-supported Rapid Response Team has been sent to work at the Windsor Skilled Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in South Yarmouth. The Department of Public Health confirmed for WBZ that as of Friday there have been 74 recent resident COVID cases, 19 among staff members, and four residents who have died. Since the pandemic began three years ago, there had been only one prior resident death from COVID at the facility. The Rapid Response team is made up of nearly a dozen nurses and certified nursing assistants who will support clinical care such as administering medications and assisting with feeding and bathing patients. The team will also perform hand hygiene and personal protective equipment audits. The Department of Public Health issued an admissions freeze notice to this facility this past Tuesday, February 28 - a standard policy during outbreaks. update: COVID outbreak at South Yarmouth nursing home leaves five dead - The Boston Globe

More than 500 hospitalized in Massachusetts with COVID-19 this week – The latest COVID-19 data released Thursday according to the CDC, all counties in western Massachusetts counties are at low risk except for Franklin which is at medium risk. State public health officials reported 87 new confirmed deaths and 3,356 new confirmed COVID-19 cases in Massachusetts this week. Total COVID-19 Cases by Age Group:

• 0-4 years: 523
• 5-9 years: 244
• 10-14 years: 215
• 15-19 years: 293
• 20-29 years: 811
• 30-39 years: 864
• 40-49 years: 732
• 50-59 years: 814
• 60-69 years: 977
• 70-79 years: 835
• 80+ years: 742

According to the Department of Public Health, 60,695 new tests were performed with an overall of 49,585,363 molecular tests administered. The 7-day average of percent positivity is 5.88%. On February 28th, there were 137 patients hospitalized primarily for COVID-19 related illness.There were 544 total patients hospitalized with COVID-19 with 44 patients in intensive care units, 12 patients intubated, 368 (68%) patients that were reportedly fully vaccinated. Confirmed COVID-19 Cases:

• • New Cases: 3,356
  • Total Cases: 2,021,700
  • New Deaths: 87
  • Total Deaths: 22,304
• Probable COVID-19 Cases
• • New Cases: 736
  • New Deaths: 31
  • Total Deaths: 1,945

Ohio creeps toward 10,000 new weekly COVID-19 cases - Weekly COVID-19 cases for Ohio have stayed in the four-digit range for seven weeks straight. While cases fell under 8,000 in mid-January, they teetered back above 9,000 toward the end of February. The early 2023 numbers have defied trends from the past two years, when COVID-19 infections historically swelled during and after the holiday season.ODH began reporting COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, deaths and vaccinations weekly instead of daily in mid-March 2022 after new infections slowed to a low level after the omicron wave. Over the past seven days, the state averaged around 1,332 new coronavirus cases per day. The 395 hospitalizations reported by ODH in the past seven days -- about 56 per day -- decreased below the 435 reported last week, but stayed above the 349 hospitalizations in the week prior.COVID-19 deaths decreased alongside hospitalizations in Ohio. ODH said 63 people died from the virus, which fell below both the 71 deaths the week prior and the 80 reported two weeks before.Ohio saw a sizable decrease in people getting COVID-19 vaccinations. Ohioans starting the vaccine dropped to 1,688 compared to 2,827 in the week prior. Another 1,797 finished vaccination by getting their second dose, up from 2,804. Around six in 10 Ohioans are partially or fully vaccinated.

COVID in US ebbs further; WHO weighs in on virus-source controversy | CIDRAP - US COVID-19 indicators continue a gradual downward trend, with proportions of the Omicron XBB.1.5 variant steadily rising, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today in its latest updates.In international developments, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) today called on all countries with knowledge about the origin of SARS-CoV-2 to share details with the WHO and the international science community, while reiterating that the WHO continues to push for studies into the origins.It its biweekly data synopsis, the CDC said the 7-day average for new daily COVID-19 cases is 32,374, down 5.1% compared to the previous week. The daily average for new hospitalizations as of the last week of February was 3,318, a decrease of 7.9% compared to the week before.An average of 338 people die from COVID-19 each day, reflecting a drop of 3.3% compared to the week before, the CDC said.Meanwhile, in the latest Omicron variant proportion estimates, the CDC said XBB.1.5 makes up 89.6% of cases, up from 85.4% last week. No other variant showed increasing proportions. The subvariant has been dominant in all US regions over the past few weeks.At a media briefing today, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, addressed renewed interest in the origin of SARS-CoV-2 amid assessments, without details, from two US government agencies that the virus likely came from a lab accident.He said it's important to share what led to the findings, not to assign blame but to better understand how the pandemic began, a key part of preventing and preparing for the next one.Tedros said the WHO's Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens has spelled out the studies that need to be done, and he said he continues to press China to conduct the probes and share the results. "Until then, all hypotheses on the origins of the virus remain on the table," he said, adding that political wrangling has made the task of identifying the source more difficult. In other global developments, COVID-19 activity is rising in a number of European countries, with serious cases and deaths also increasing, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) said today in its weekly update. It said XBB.1.5 is now the most frequently detected subvariant, making up 33.8% of cases. Other subvariants still make up substantial proportions, including BQ.1 at 26.8% and BA.2.75 at 22.2%.

Lula government ends daily COVID-19 tracking in Brazil - Facing the clear threat of a worsening pandemic in Brazil, driven by the Omicron XBB.1.5 subvariant, the Workers Party (PT) government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has signaled its intention to declare the pandemic over and get the Brazilian population used to “living” with the coronavirus. On February 16, the Health Ministry announced that it will start releasing COVID-19 data of cases, deaths and vaccination rates weekly and no longer daily, starting March 3. Trying to justify what in practice means a further departure from monitoring the pandemic in the country, the Health Ministry’s director of immunization, Eder Gatti, stated that only nine of the 27 Brazilian states update the data daily, which supposedly does not “allow an epidemiological analysis.” Still, he claimed,“We are not restricting data. ... What we want here is to facilitate the work with the data and send weekly data that is more accurate.” This claim is patently false. If the Lula government had a genuine concern about the pandemic, the least it could do is coordinate a national effort and assist the states in implementing a system to monitor the pandemic on a daily basis, with a mass testing program, genetic sequencing of the variants in circulation, among other measures completely ignored by the “herd immunity” policy of the former fascistic President Jair Bolsonaro. However, almost two months after taking office, the Lula government has not reversed the Bolsonaro government’s measures to prioritize corporate interests over human lives, including its ending of the National Public Health Emergency due to COVID-19 as early as April 2022. The Lula government has also failed to implement awareness campaigns about the airborne transmission of SARS-CoV-2, the importance of wearing quality masks and distributing them for free, as well as other basic public health measures that would have an almost immediate impact and could prevent cases and deaths. The Brazilian bourgeois media has aided the Lula government in its effort to hide the pandemic. In a move that set the stage for the Lula government’s decision to begin limiting the release of COVID-19 data to a weekly basis, in late January, Brazil’s major dailies ended their joint daily pandemic tracking system, launched in June 2020 when the Bolsonaro government attempted to censor COVID-19 data in Brazil. Throughout February, the news about the pandemic in Brazil and around the world virtually disappeared from the Brazilian media, especially with the approach of Carnival, which became the focus of the news in recent weeks and was deliberately seized upon by the Lula government to announce the change in the release of pandemic data in Brazil. In fact, two of the most important. Brazilian newspapers, Estado de S. Paulo and Folha de S. Paulo, did not even report this change by the Health Ministry. Later, the Lula government took a step further in its attempt to cover up the pandemic in Brazil. On February 17, Health Minister Nísia Trindade released a video saying, as if the pandemic was over, that “finally, the time has come for us to celebrate the biggest popular party in our country.” This statement on the eve of Carnival, when the service and tourism sectors in Brazil reap billions in profits, also expressed the Lula government’s intention not to put any restrictions on the economy, even with the worsening of the pandemic. The Brazilian Carnival threatens to become a new superspreader event for the coronavirus and drive another wave in Brazil. This situation may be further aggravated by the spread of the Omicron XBB.1.5 subvariant, which is more transmissible and more vaccine-resistant. It was first detected in São Paulo in early January, and a month later XBB.1.5 was responsible for 80 percent of the cases in the state.

Russian scientist who developed Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine 'strangled' to death in his apartment - The Russian authorities have opened up a probe after a top scientist who worked on the development of Sputnik V coronavirus vaccines was strangled to death in his Moscow apartment on Friday. The virologist identified as 47-year-old Andrey Botikov was one of the 18 scientists who worked on the Sputnik V vaccine at the Gamaleya National Research Center which was released in 2020. He was found strangled by a belt at his Rogova Street home on March 2, according to local news reports. Earlier, it was suggested that he had survived the attack after an intruder broke into his home. However, the Investigative Committee of Russia (ICR) has now opened a probe into the matter and have zeroed in on a 29-year-old man who is alleged to have killed the scientist with the belt over a disagreement. ICR's Moscow division in a statement released informed that a criminal investigation was ongoing and that the assailant was nabbed "in the shortest possible time". "During the interrogation, he admitted his guilt, he was charged. Previously, the defendant was prosecuted for committing a serious crime," read the statement. According to Russian media, the suspect's name is Alexei Z and he has previously spent 10 years behind the bars for providing sex services. Botikov was a celebrated scientist in the country and was awarded the Order of Merit for the Fatherland for his work on the vaccine. Prior to his work on the Sputnik V vaccine, Botikov had worked at the Russian State Collection of Viruses D.I. Ivanovsky Institute of Virology as a senior scientist.

U.S. CDC issues advisory after confirmed measles case in Kentucky - (Reuters) - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Friday it was issuing a health alert advisory to notify clinics and public health officials to be watchful after a case of measles was confirmed at a large gathering in Kentucky. On Feb. 24, the Kentucky Department for Public Health identified a confirmed case of measles in an unvaccinated individual with a history of recent international travel, the CDC said. While infected, the individual attended a large religious gathering on Feb. 17–18, with an estimated 20,000 people there from other states and countries, the national agency said. Measles is one of the most contagious human viruses and is almost entirely preventable through vaccination. However, it requires 95% vaccine coverage to prevent outbreaks among populations. The CDC said doctors should consider measles as a diagnosis with anyone with clinically compatible symptoms. The agency also asked physicians to recommend measles, mumps and rubella shots for patients who are unvaccinated or not fully vaccinated.

CDC issues warning about rise in highly drug-resistant stomach bug - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is warning clinicians and public health departments about a sharp rise in serious gastrointestinal infections caused by bacteria that are resistant to common antibiotics.In a health advisory issued Friday, the CDC said the agency has been monitoring an increase in people infected with strains of Shigellabacteria that are highly resistant to available drugs. Shigella infections, known as shigellosis, usually cause diarrhea that can be prolonged and bloody, as well as fever and abdominal cramps.In the past, shigellosis has predominantly affected children under 4. But the CDC said it has seen a recent increase in drug-resistant infections in adults, especially men who have sex with men, international travelers, people living with HIV and people experiencing homelessness.Most people recover without treatment with antibiotics. But people who have weakened immune systems, including those with HIV or who are receiving chemotherapy, can get a more serious illness. Severe shigellosis can spread into the blood, which can be life-threatening.Drug-resistant Shigella infections “are challenging to treat and easily transmissible, especially among vulnerable populations,” said Naeemah Logan, a CDC medical officer, in an email. These “superbug” infections “are a serious public health threat, and we want to ensure that providers are aware of the increasing potential for antibiotics to fail.” Shigella cause an estimated 450,000 infections in the United States each year. In 2022, about 5 percent of Shigella infections reported to the CDC were caused by super-resistant strains, compared with none in 2015.

Severe form of mpox may be fatal in 15% of people with advanced HIV -Clinicians have identified a severe, flesh-eating form of mpox with a 15% death rate in HIV patients who have suppressed immune systems, according to a global case series published this week inThe Lancet.Starting on May 11, 2022, a network of clinicians from 19 countries evaluated 382 adult mpox patients who also had advanced HIV, including 27 of the 60 people globally who died by the end of the study on Jan 18, 2023.The current global mpox outbreak, which began in May 2022, has infected a total of 86,209 people in 110 countries. Ninety-six of them have died. The authors noted that HIV patients have accounted for 38% to 50% of mpox cases.Participants included 367 cisgender men, 4 cisgender women, and 10 transgender women. Median participant age was 35 years. At mpox diagnoses, 349 (91%) of 382 participants had HIV, 228 of 349 (65%) were adherent to antiretroviral therapy (ART), and 32 of 382 (8%) also had an additional infection related to their suppressed immune system.Only 26 of the study participants (7%) had received the Jynneos mpox vaccine. Sixteen (4%) had been vaccinated before 2022, presumably for smallpox.The median CD4 cell count (an indicator of immune function) was low, at 211 cells per millimeter cubed (cells/mm³), with 22% of patients having CD4 cell counts of less than 100 cells/mm³ and 25% with 100 to 200 cells/mm³. Just over half of patients had an undetectable HIV viral load.Severe complications were more common in patients with a CD4 count less than 100 cells/mm³ than in those with more than 300 cells/mm³ and included necrotizing (flesh-eating) skin lesions (54% vs 7%), lung dysfunction sometimes accompanied by nodules (29% vs 0%), and secondary infections and sepsis (44% vs 9%).A total of 107 patients (28%) were hospitalized, and 27 (25%) of them died. All deaths were among patients with CD4 counts of less than 200 cells/mm³, and most occurred in those with a high HIV viral load. The clinicians suspected an inflammatory immune reaction to mpox in 21 (25%) of 85 people started or restarted on ART, 12 (57%) of whom died. Sixty-two of 382 patients (16%) received the Tpoxx smallpox/mpox drug (tecovirimat), and 7 (2%) were given other antivirals (cidofovir or brincidofovir). Three cases of tecovirimat resistance were identified. "We describe a severe form of mpox affecting mostly young men who have sex with men and which results in death in 15% of people with advanced HIV," lead author Oriol Mitja, MD, PhD, of the University Hospital Germans Trias in Barcelona, Spain, said in a Queen Mary news release."Health authorities should prioritise the vaccination of people living with HIV, particularly in countries with low levels of diagnosis or without universal free access to antiretroviral treatment." In the study, the authors conclude, "A severe necrotising form of mpox in the context of advanced immunosuppression appears to behave like an AIDS-defining condition, with a high prevalence of fulminant dermatological and systemic manifestations and death."

Eight countries report more polio cases -- More countries in Africa and the Middle East reported new polio cases, all involving vaccine-derived strains, according to updates from the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) and Israel's health ministry.African countries reporting more circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 cases include Benin (1), Cameroon (1), the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC; 8 cases), Mali (1), and Somalia (1). Also, two countries in the region reported more circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 1 (cVDPV1) cases: the Republic of Congo (1), its first involving the strain, and the DRC (13).In the Middle East, Yemen reported one cVDPV2 case. Also, Israel's health ministry recently reported an illness in an unvaccinated 8-year-girl from Safed, a city in Israel's Northern District. On Twitter, the health ministry said the epidemiologic investigation into the girl's illness has turned up three positive cases in asymptomatic children who were listed as contacts. The health ministry said sewage sampling continues to find positive samples from many of the country's settlements and that 150,000 children are unvaccinated.Last year, Israel reported its first polio infection in more than 30 years, in a child who was infected with circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 3 (cVDPV3). Also, vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 was detected last year in wastewater samples from Jerusalem.

CDC warns of risk to travelers from chikungunya outbreak in Paraguay -- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) yesterday issued a Health Alert Network (HAN)Health Advisory to clinicians and public health officials warning that US travelers could be affected by a growing chikungunya outbreak in Paraguay.Since the chikungunya outbreak began in October 2022, the Ministry of Health in Paraguay has reported 71,748 suspected cases of the mosquito-borne alphavirus, with 29,362 of those cases being probable or confirmed. Most cases have been reported in the capital district of Asuncion and the neighboring Central department. Further increases in case counts are expected.Paraguay is among several countries in the region of the Americas seeing an increase in chikungunya activity. In February, the Pan American Health Organization reported that cases in the region were up sharply in 2022, with 271,000 illnesses reported, up from 137,000 in 2021.The virus is transmitted primarily by infected Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus mosquitoes. The incubation period in infected people is typically 3 to 7 days, and the most common symptoms are acute onset of fever and joint pain. No specific antivirals or vaccines are available.The CDC says travelers returning from Paraguay with signs and symptoms consistent with chikungunya infection should be tested and evaluated. The health advisory also notes that clinicians should rule out infection with dengue virus, which is also transmitted by mosquitoes, has similar symptoms, and circulates in Paraguay and surrounding countries.The health advisory advises state and local health departments to report confirmed chikungunya cases to the CDC.

Baby's death tied to contaminated breast pump, CDC says - Federal health officials are warning parents of newborns to sterilize equipment used for both bottle- and breast-feeding after a baby died last year from a rare infection tied to a contaminated breast pump. The infant, a premature boy, was infected with the bacteria Cronobacter sakazakii, the same germ that sparked a recall and nationwide shortage of powdered infant formula last year, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report released Thursday. But this baby’s infection was not caused by contaminated formula. The child, who was hospitalized, had been fed a mix of breastmilk and liquid human milk fortifier through a tube. Genetic sequencing linked the infection to bacteria isolated from a breast pump used at home. Samples from expressed milk, a breast pump used in the hospital and the liquid human milk fortifier were all negative for the bacteria. An investigation found that the home breast pump was cleaned in a household sink, sanitized and sometimes assembled while still moist. Dr. Julia Haston, a CDC expert in pediatric infectious diseases, said the case underscores that cronobacter bacteria are found widely in the environment and can lead to severe and deadly infections.

Officials: Person dies after brain-eating amoeba infection (AP) — A person in southwest Florida has died after being infected with an extremely rare brain-eating amoeba, health officials said. The Florida Department of Health in Charlotte County confirmed the death Thursday. The agency had previously issued an alert last month, warning residents about the Naegleria fowleri infection. “I can confirm the infection unfortunately resulted in a death, and any additional information on this case is confidential to protect patient privacy,” Florida Department of Health spokesman Jae Williams said in an email. Health officials said last month that the infection might have been caused by sinus rinse practices using tap water, but an investigation is ongoing. Sinus solutions should be made using only distilled or sterile water. Tap water should be boiled for at least one minute and cooled before sinus rinsing. “Infection with Naegleria fowleri is rare and can only happen when water contaminated with amoebae enters the body through the nose,” Williams said. “You cannot be infected by drinking tap water.” Naegleria fowleri is a single-celled organism that lives in soil and warm fresh water, such as lakes, rivers and hot springs, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It can cause a brain infection when water containing the amoeba goes up the nose. Only about three people in the United States get infected each year, but these infections are usually fatal.

Zero-calorie sweetener popular in keto diets linked to strokes, heart attacks - A new study has found that a zero-calorie sweetener that is popular in ketogenic diets has been linked to strokes, heart attacks, blood clots and death. The artificial sweetener called erythritol is often found in diet foods, such as Truvia, as a sugar replacement because it does not affect blood glucose levels and does not have any calories. The new study, published in the journal Nature Medicine on Monday, found that higher levels of erythritol are correlated with a higher chance of heart attack, stroke or death in three years when analyzing blood samples from three different populations. Researchers first found the correlation between increased erythritol levels and major adverse cardiac events when analyzing chemicals and compounds in 1,157 blood samples of those who were at risk for heart disease that were collected between 2004 and 2011. After discovering the link between the high levels and increased risk, the researchers confirmed their results by testing a larger sample of 2,100 people in the United States and 833 samples in Europe through 2018. “Following exposure to dietary erythritol, a prolonged period of potentially heightened thrombotic risk may occur. This is a concern given that the very patients for whom artificial sweeteners are marketed (patients with diabetes, obesity, history of [cardiovascular diseases] and impaired kidney function) are those typically at higher risk for future [cardiovascular diseases] events,” the study reads. The study also found that when a group of eight healthy volunteers drank a beverage with 30 grams of erythritol in it, there was “heightened” blood clotting risks. Stanley Hazen, the director of the Center for Cardiovascular Diagnostics and Prevention at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner Research Institute and lead researcher on the study, told CNN that “the degree of risk was not modest.” “If your blood level of erythritol was in the top 25 percent compared to the bottom 25 percent, there was about a two-fold higher risk for heart attack and stroke. It’s on par with the strongest of cardiac risk factors, like diabetes,” Hazen said.

Toxic 'forever chemicals’ about to get their first US limits - The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to propose restrictions on harmful “forever chemicals” in drinking water after finding they are dangerous in amounts so small as to be undetectable. But experts say removing them will cost billions, a burden that will fall hardest on small communities with few resources. Concerned about the chemicals’ ability to weaken children’s immune systems, the EPA said last year that PFAS could cause harm at levels “much lower than previously understood.” “We as a community of scientists and policymakers and regulators really missed the boat early on,” said Susan Pinney, director of the Center for Environmental Genetics at the University of Cincinnati. There is also evidence the compounds are linked to low birthweight, kidney cancer and a slew of other health issues. It’s unclear what the EPA will now propose and how well it will protect people from these recently-understood harms. The compounds PFOA and PFOS are part of a larger family of chemicals called PFAS, for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, that are widespread, don’t degrade in the environment and have been around for decades. They’ve been used in nonstick pans, food packaging and firefighting foam. Their use is now mostly phased out in the U.S., but some still remain.

All fish tested from Michigan rivers contain ‘forever chemicals’, study finds --All fish caught in Michigan rivers and tested for toxic PFAS contained the chemicals – and at levels that present a health risk for anyone eating them, according to a new study.Researchers checked 100 fish samples that represented 12 species in the Huron and Rouge rivers.PFAS are a class of about 12,000 compounds used to make products resistant to water, stains and heat. They are known as “forever chemicals” because they do not naturally break down, and they have been linked to cancer, high cholesterol, liver and kidney disease, fetal complications and other serious health problems in humans.The chemicals are thought to be polluting drinking water for more than 200 million people, and the study is the second this year to suggest widespread contamination of freshwater US fish.The independent studies and research from state and federal regulators have shed light on a potential health threat in Michigan and nationally that public health advocates say needs urgent attention.The findings are “sad”, said Erica Bloom, one of the study’s co-authors with the Ecology Center, an environmental non-profit that tracks PFAS contamination in the state.“It just demonstrates how ubiquitous these chemicals are in the environment,” she said.The levels found in fish sampled from those rivers ranged from about 11,000 parts per trillion (ppt) to 180,000 ppt, and tests revealed 14 different kinds of PFAS compounds.While no state or federal limits on the amount of PFAS in fish or other food exist, Michigan’s health department issues “do not eat” advisories for fish fillets with levels over 300,000 ppt of PFOS, just one kind of PFAS compound. Fillets typically have lower levels of PFAS than the organs, which were included in Ecology Center’s testing. However, recent research showed how the nation’s freshwater fish can represent a dangerous exposure route even at levels below the state’s threshold. Eating a fish fillet with 11,800 ppt of PFOS is equivalent to drinking water contaminated with PFOS at 48 ppt every day for a month. The situation presents not just an environmental safety issue to those who fish in rivers as a hobby but an environmental justice issue as it is lower income residents who most frequently rely on eating fish they catch from freshwater rivers, as well as groups that fish as a cultural practice. “Fishing in these rivers is an important way of life, and we’re not out here to tell people to stop fishing – but if you’re fishing, here are some things to look out for,” Bloom said.

'Forever chemicals' found in animals around the world -- More than 330 species of wildlife around the world are contaminated with widely used chemicals known as PFAS, according to a new analysis that identified traces of the synthetic chemicals in animals on every continent except Antarctica.The report, released Wednesday by a nonprofit advocacy group called the Environmental Working Group, is the result of a review of more than 100 recent peer-reviewed studies of PFAS contamination in animals.The analysis adds to robust research of the negative impact of PFAS pollution on human health and hints at how pervasive these chemicals are across the globe and their far-reaching effects on ecosystems.“Likely anywhere you test for these compounds, you will find them,” said David Andrews, a senior scientist at the Environmental Working Group who contributed to the report. “I think that was what is so shocking.”Synthetic PFAS compounds (short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are commonly known as “forever chemicals” because they do not break down over time and thus can remain permanently in the air, soil, water and in the body. These chemicals have been used extensively since the 1940s in industrial manufacturing and to make products ranging from nonstick cookware and cleaning products to foams and stain- and water-resistant fabrics.In humans, exposure to PFAS chemicals has been associated with thyroid disease, high cholesterol, infertility, low birth weight, suppression of the immune system and an increased risk of certain cancers, including kidney cancer and liver cancer.People can come into contact with PFAS compounds by drinking contaminated water, eating food grown or caught near where the chemicals are produced, or through direct contact with materials that contain them, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Biomonitoring studies conducted by the CDC starting in 1999 have found traces of PFAS chemicals in the bloodstream of most of the general U.S. population, though higher concentrations were detected in people who work in manufacturing and communities in and around military bases.

FDA says no indication contaminated cough syrups have entered U.S. supply chain (Reuters) - The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said on Friday there was no indication that contaminated cough and paracetamol syrups that caused deaths of children in Gambia last year have entered the U.S. drug supply chain.This comes after an investigation led by the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention and Gambian scientists reported on Thursday that these medicines contaminated with toxic levels of diethylene and ethylene glycol led to acute kidney injury among 78 children in Gambia."We will continue to monitor the situation and keep the public and health care professionals updated of any changes in status to the U.S. market," Patrizia Cavazzoni, director for FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said in a tweet.In October, the World Health Organization sent out an alert saying four cough syrups containing toxic levels of diethylene and ethylene glycol made by India's Maiden Pharmaceuticals Ltd should be withdrawn.

Don’t take water for granted - This lyric, although a bit paradoxical, has always resonated with me, and I’ve applied it in many “taking-for-granted” situations.One of them concerns clean water, which most of us have certainly taken for granted, and in a way that is naive (to people who do not have access to affordable, clean water) as well as dangerous (the value of water in our lives is so high — relative to its price — that we do not think of the disastrous consequences of losing access to that water).Well, it’s worth thinking about, as the end of abundance starts to bite into our water consuming habits.We have less and less clean water because our actions — direct in terms of mining ground water or polluting surface water and indirect in terms of climate change and water embedded in animal products — are making it so.And those actions rarely consider what would happen if we had no clean water — let alone no water at all.“You’ve taken me for granted because I please you, flowing this water” My one-handed conclusion is that a lot of people are going to be surprised and upset as “their” water disappears in volume, decays in quality and increases in cost, until we no longer take it for granted. Beware.

Climate change is causing droughts everywhere - Much of the Northern Hemisphere is struggling with drought or the threat of drought, as Europe experiences an unusually warm, precipitation-free winter and swaths of the American West remain mired in an epic megadrought. But it’s not just those pockets feeling the pain in the U.S. Most of the Western United States is in some form of drought, with areas of extreme drought concentrated in the Great Plains and Texas. A 23-year megadrought has left the Southwest at the driest it is estimated to have ever been in 1,200 years, based on tree-ring data. That’s very bad news for Texas cotton farmers. The New York Times recently reported that “2022 was a disaster for upland cotton in Texas,” leading to short supplies and high prices of tampons and cloth diapers, among other products. “In the biggest loss on record, Texas farmers abandoned 74 percent of their planted crops — nearly six million acres — because of heat and parched soil, hallmarks of a megadrought made worse by climate change,” the Times noted. Even recent heavy storms in California haven’t brought the state out of drought, because the precipitation deficit is so big. “I want to be clear that these storms — and the likely rain and snow we may get over the next few weeks — did not, nor will they fully, end the drought, at least not yet,” Yana Garcia, secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency, said last Wednesday. “We’re in better shape than we were two months ago, but we’re not out of the woods.” Just days earlier, Lake Powell, the second-largest U.S. reservoir, dropped to a new record low. Powell is created by a Colorado River dam along the Arizona-Utah border, and if the reservoir goes much lower, experts warn, water won’t be able to pass through it. Millions of people who rely on the Colorado would then lose access to their water supply.“If you can’t get water out of the dam, it means everyone downstream doesn’t get water,” Brad Udall, a water and climate scientist at Colorado State University, told USA Today. "That includes agriculture, cities like Los Angeles, San Diego and Phoenix." The hydroelectric power plant for which the dam was constructed would also cease to function.

Big Ag Exploiting Carbon Markets to Intensify Grip on Food System: Report - Climate and agricultural policies aimed at bolstering carbon markets will fail to curb planet-heating emissions while enabling powerful agribusiness corporations to greenwash their polluting operations and augment their control over the food system.That's according to Agricultural Carbon Markets, Payments, and Data: Big Ag's Latest Power Grab, a report published Wednesday by Friends of the Earth, an environmental advocacy group, and the Open Markets Institute, an anti-monopoly think tank.While farmers could play a key role in mitigating the climate crisis by adopting agroecological practices capable of sequestering more carbon in the soil, the report warns that U.S. lawmakers from both major parties have embraced a "market-based" approach—centered around the buying and selling of so-called "carbon offset" credits generated through minor tweaks to industrial monoculture production—that is likely to tighten Big Ag's chemical-intensive stranglehold on the food system and disenfranchise small-scale farmers, all while failing to reduce greenhouse gas pollution."Carbon markets have become a top strategy for agriculture and climate, despite a history of fraud, failure to reduce emissions, and corporate greenwashing," report co-author Jason Davidson, senior food and agriculture campaigner at Friends of the Earth, said in astatement. "Such corporate schemes will strengthen the power of the largest agribusinesses, hand over private farm data, and fail to address the climate crisis.""Instead of another handout to Big Ag, the Biden administration and Congress must support farmers in pursuing proven climate solutions."As the report explains: "The idea begins with granting credits to farmers who adopt certain practices, such as planting more trees and cover crops, that are supposed to remove carbon from the atmosphere. Farmers then receive compensation for their efforts by selling these credits to other entities, typically large corporations. These corporations, in turn, use their purchases of such credits to justify claims of environmental responsibility."Though these corporations "may still be emitting carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, they claim to have 'offset' these emissions by paying others to pollute less or actively sequester carbon, often to the point of asserting that they now have a 'net-zero' climate impact," states the report.A recent investigation revealed that 94% of the rainforest carbon offsets sold by a leading market player provided no measurable climate benefits, casting further doubt on the very notions of 'net-zero' and 'carbon neutrality' that corporations promote in a bid to maintain or expand their own polluting activities while portraying themselves as green.Despite mounting evidence of the ineffective or counterproductive nature of 'net-zero' commitments, one-fifth of the world's biggest corporations have made them, meaning that demand for carbon offsets is growing, the report notes. Meanwhile, the federal government is providing key support to such programs, including indirectly through the Inflation Reduction Act and directly through a pair of bills embedded in the Fiscal Year 2023 Omnibus Appropriations Bill.

"We're Dying Slowly": East Palestine Residents Report Bizarre Health Issues After Toxic Train Derailment Residents of East Palestine, Ohio have been reporting bizarre symptoms following the Feb. 3 Norfolk Southern train derailment and subsequent toxic explosion, the NY Post reports. "Doctors say I definitely have the chemicals in me but there’s no one in town who can run the toxicological tests to find out which ones they are," said 40-year-old Wade Lovett, whose high-pitched voice now sounds as if he's been inhaling helium. "My voice sounds like Mickey Mouse. My normal voice is low. It’s hard to breathe, especially at night. My chest hurts so much at night I feel like I’m drowning. I cough up phlegm a lot. I lost my job because the doctor won’t release me to go to work." Leading the charge to fight for the community is 46-year-old Jami Cozza, a lifelong East Palestinian who counts 47 close relatives here. Many of them are facing health issues from the chemical fire as well as the psychic toll of their town becoming, in the words of a scientist visiting the area Thursday, the new “Love Canal” — a reference to the Niagara Falls, NY, neighborhood that became a hotbed issue in 1978 because people were getting sick from living above a contaminated waste dump. -NY Post Many residents are also complaining of mystery rashes and sore throats after returning home following the lifting of evacuation orders on February 8. "Yesterday was the first day in probably three or four days that I could smell anything. I lost my smell and my sense of taste. I had an eye infection in both eyes. I was having respiratory issues like I was just out of breath. Other members of my family have had eye infections and strep throat," said Shelby Walker, who lives a few yards from the epicenter from the crash and explosion. "The cleanup crew drives past us at night and won’t even look at us. It’s like we don’t exist. No one has reached out to us or told us anything." According to an independent analysis of EPA data by Texas A&M University released on Friday, nine air pollutants were found around East Palestine at levels that could raise long-term health concerns. "My fiancé was so sick that I almost took him to the hospital," Jami Cozza told the Post. "Not only am I fighting for my family’s life, but I feel like I’m fighting for the whole town’s life. When I’m walking around hearing these stories, they’re not from people. They’re from my family. They’re from my friends that I’ve have grown up with," she said. "People are desperate right now. We’re dying slowly. They’re poisoning us slowly."According to Harvard-trained toxicologist, Stephen Lester, the hot zone at East Palestine is one of the 'most concerning' he's ever seen - and warned that the chemical dioxin that was released during the controlled burn will be embedded in the soil and water. "Until the government takes this seriously there are going to be real problems," said Lester. "It’s criminal that the EPA didn’t come forward with information about dioxin and start testing for it."

“They have upended people’s lives”: East Palestine residents speak out at Erin Brockovich town hall meeting = Residents of East Palestine and surrounding areas packed a town hall meeting hosted by environmental advocate Erin Brockovich Friday evening to hear presentations on the dangers posed by the train derailment and subsequent release and burn of toxic chemicals. Brockovich’s group, East Palestine Justice, is a team of lawyers and health experts preparing a class action suit against Norfolk Southern. The meeting attracted hundreds of residents both from East Palestine as well as the surrounding communities. Many people also traveled from neighboring regions to learn about this environmental disaster, its causes and what can be done about it.At the meeting, residents heard stark reports from panelists. “You’re in a situation where you’re going to be dealing with this for the rest of your lives if you stay here,” hydrology expert Bob Bowcock told the meeting. Vinyl chloride, the main contaminant released in the disaster, moves very easily through the ground and is not easy to remove from the soil. Vinyl chloride is highly toxic and a Category 1A carcinogen. It causes liver, brain and lung cancer along with lymphoma and leukemia. It also has the potential to damage the nervous and immune systems and can lead to a decrease in bone strength. To make matters worse, the water supply in East Palestine is uniquely vulnerable to contamination.Prior to the start of the meeting, the National Transportation Safety Board issued its preliminary report on the derailment which, even in its abbreviated form, made clear that the “accident” which has devastated the town was completely preventable and that through its actions Norfolk Southern ignored warning for nearly an hour that one of the axles was overheating and would fail.On Friday, the EPA stopped Norfolk Southern from shipping contaminated water and mud for disposal. Previously, the railroad had been shipping waste to three sites, one in suburban Houston, one in southeast Michigan and one in Ohio. This was apparently done without even notifying local officials. In Texas, the local government first learned that waste materials were being shipped to sites in their areas after truckloads had already been brought in.Laurie Mattern and Janice Evans both live outside East Palestine and worry that those in surrounding communities are being forgotten. Laurie’s mother lives in Beavercreek. “If they don’t clean this up, it [the pollution] is going to run right by her,” she worried.She says that she has seen people testing the water three times and so far nothing has been found. But she also believes the water is not being properly cleaned, noting that “all they are doing are things like pumping the water out, running it through the system and pumping it back in.”“What are they going to do about the mud and everything?” she asked. “It is already settled down in there and that will leach back into the water. We don’t know the long-term effects. All they care about is their money, their profits, the bottom line.”Abby and Marty Hostetler said that Leslie Run, a highly contaminated creek which has received significant attention, passes through their backyard. “It is contaminated, all the fish are dead, everything is dead and our well is about 30 feet from the stream.“When it happened, we had all kinds [of] headaches, sore throats, we evacuated, but when we came home, it must’ve come through our chimney ‘cause the whole house smelled of the chemicals. You couldn’t breathe.”They worry that the creek will remain polluted and what that will do to people’s lives. “There are no signs to stay away from the water. No caution tape. On Sunday, I saw three kids playing in the creek. It is still contaminated.”

EPA Orders Temporary Halt To Shipping Of Ohio Toxic Train Crash Contaminated Waste - Amid objections from Michigan authorities who said they weren’t aware that hazardous materials were headed into their state, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has ordered a temporary pause on shipments of contaminated waste from the site of Norfolk Southern Railway’s Feb. 3 train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. “Everyone wants this contamination gone from the community,” EPA Region 5 Administrator Debra Shore said. “They don’t want the worry, and they don’t want the smell, and we owe it to the people of East Palestine to move it out of the community as quickly as possible.”On Feb. 3, a Norfolk Southern train carrying 151 cars derailed in East Palestine, a village of 4000. To avoid an uncontrolled explosion that officials claimed would send shrapnel into the air, toxic vinyl chloride was intentionally released and burned from five cars on Feb. 6, sending up a massive cloud of black smoke that could be seen for miles around and was likened to a mushroom cloud caused by a nuclear weapon.The burn triggered questions about the health effects on the residents of East Palestine. Norfolk Southern had been responsible for waste disposal until Feb. 24, Shore said. The railroad provided Ohio environmental officials with a list of disposal sites.Shore said disposal plans, including locations and transportation routes for contaminated waste, will be subject to EPA review and approval.“EPA will ensure that all waste is disposed of in a safe and lawful manner at EPA-certified facilities to prevent further release of hazardous substances and impacts to communities,” she said.On Feb. 21, the EPA ordered Norfolk Southern to pay for cleanup costs in East Palestine.Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said in a Feb. 23 statement, “[Under EPA guidance,] Norfolk Southern brought in large dump trucks to move contaminated soil to U.S. Ecology Wayne Disposal, a licensed hazardous waste disposal facility in Michigan. This will be a continuous effort to properly manage and safely dispose of the waste.“So far, 4,832 cubic yards of soil have been excavated from the ground and more may be removed as cleanup proceeds. When the process begins to dig up the tracks and remove the soil underneath, that soil will be hauled away immediately and taken to a proper disposal facility.”More than 1.7 million gallons of contaminated liquid have been removed from the derailment site, according to DeWine’s office. Most of the 1.1 million gallons hauled off-site were sent to a Texas-based hazardous waste disposal facility, which has stated that it will no longer accept shipments.

‘Nobody has answers’: Ohio residents fearful of health risks near train site - When crews conducted a controlled burn of giant quantities of toxic vinyl chloride in the wake of the train wreck in East Palestine, Ohio, they nullified the risk of a potentially deadly explosion.But the preventative burn created new potential risks over the horizon. Compounds such as dioxins, chlorinated PAHs and other chemical byproducts of vinyl chloride combustion, some of which are highly toxic, can accumulate in the environment, and could pose a long-term health threat in the East Palestine area and downwind.Though a growing chorus of calls from independent environmental researchers and senators is pressuring the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to test for dioxins and other dangerous chemicals, the agency has resisted taking those steps, and, some critics say, is needlessly putting residents’ health at risk with its decisions.“We don’t have any information on the presence of dioxins and we don’t have information on whether [the EPA] is testing for them because the messaging has been focused on ‘We’re not seeing vinyl chloride’, and that’s problematic,” said Pete DeCarlo, an environmental health researcher with Johns Hopkins University who characterized dioxins as a “particularly nasty chemical”. A Norfolk Southern train carrying vinyl chloride used to produce PVC plastic derailed on 3 February in the small industrial town of 4,700 people located at the edge of the Appalachian hills, close to the Pennsylvania border. The EPA on Tuesday released data that showed no major concerns for a range of chemicals for which it had tested, but independent scientists who reviewed the data say a number of gaps remain, even beyond dioxins.Earlier this week, the Ohio health department opened a free health clinic at a church in the middle of town amid mounting fear and frustration among residents who continue to suffer acute symptoms including headache, nausea, cough, a burning sensation in the throat and nose, and panic attacks.Retirees Ron Caratelli, 63, and his wife Peggy, 64, live less than a mile from the toxic spill site, and came in for a check-up as they have been unable to return home due to adverse health impacts.“Every time we try to come back to the house, I get burning eyes and throat, and a chemical taste in the back of my mouth, it’s not good … yesterday I had a weird sensation in my lungs,” said Ron Caratelli. “What is this doing to me and others long-term, nobody really has answers. Is it even safe to plant a garden this year?”“We’re older, by the time you see the attorney ads on TV for people who lived in East Palestine during the train derailment we’ll be dead. But what about the little kids around this town, what kind of effects will they have?” he added.

Local farmers downplay impacts of Ohio train derailment, but anxieties remain -Weeks after a train derailment of toxic chemicals in East Palestine, OH, local farmers say they've not seen any negative health impacts in their animals. But they, and many in the local community, remain anxious about the long-term health impacts of the spill. "What are we going to do? We don't have anywhere else to go. So we get on with our lives, use bottled water, and hope we don't get cancer in five years," said Rachel Wagoner, an Ohio farmer and On Feb. 3, a 141 car train derailed and caught fire near East Palestine. A total of 20 of the cars were carrying hazardous materials, so a controlled vent and burn was done to prevent the cars from exploding. According to the National Cancer Institute, exposure to vinyl chloride, one of the chemicals found on the trains, can increase the risk of developing liver, brain and lung cancers, as well as lymphoma and leukemia. Short-term symptoms of vinyl chloride toxicity include headaches, dizziness and unclear vision. Shortly after the derailment, there were reports of animals falling sick and dying as far as 15km away from the site. One farmer said several of the foxes he keeps on his property have became mortally ill, while another said all her chickens passed away suddenly. But Wagner, who also works as a journalist for the local publication Farm and Dairy, said the sheep and cattle on her farm are "all perfectly fine." "I let them out just the day before they did that controlled release. So I was a little worried about them, but everyone's fine, as far as I can see," she told the Western Standard. However, Wagner said many local rural residents are concerned about their private water wells. There is a severe backlog for well testing due to the train derailment, so residents have been using bottled water instead. Wagner pointed out that the area is known for fracking to extract oil and natural gas, a process known to have negative health impacts on humans. "So is the air bad because of this [derailment], or was it already bad because of other things have been going around here?" she asked. "They're working on studies showing the associations between fracking and cancer. So how can you know someone's strange ailment was because of the derailment, and not because they lived next to a steel mill all their lives? There are environmental concerns, but I worry that people are sort of being whipped into a frenzy about it more than they need to be."

Shadowbanning An Inconvenient Truth - When The Lever’s rail safety reporting suddenly dominated the national news cycle, I thought we had found an elusive glitch in the matrix — a story so powerful, so rooted in indisputable evidence, and so widely amplified that its most important facts could not be manipulated or suppressed.This, I imagined, could be a rare moment in which politicians, corporate media, and people of all political persuasions would have to fess up to all the truths that we reported — the inconvenient truths exposing bothpolitical parties’ complicity in the deregulation of America’s railroads.Two weeks later, I’m gratified that our reporting has successfully shamed and forced regulators into finally promising to improve policy. It will take more pressure to compel them to follow through, but this is a huge achievement — and proof that our subscribers’ support of our work is making a real impact.However, even after our team landed a full-page New York Times op-edand our work was featured on major media platforms, my dream of an inflection point of honesty has proven to be wishful thinking.The partisan ghost still haunts the media machine, compelling it to tell only liberals’ preferred Donald Trump s tory, and avoid the Barack Obama cautionary tale — one that is just as significant, but might offend liberal audiences conditioned to reward only pro-Democrat, anti-Republican content.Obama ignored NTSB, sided with lobbyists & exempted the Ohio train from safety rules. Trump then repealed a remaining weakened rule. @SecretaryPete then refused to fix it. The White House & DC media are lying by only telling the anti-Trump story.

Lever News Silences Workers’ Voices and Gets the Story Wrong in East Palestine Derailment Coverage - On February 3, 2023, 38 cars of Norfolk Southern train 32N derailed in East Palestine, OH. 20 cars were carrying hazardous materials; several burned for more than two days, after which emergency crews conducted a “controlled burn” of the remaining chemicals: The effects of the derailment and subsequent events on health, the air, the water, and the soilare still being sorted. On February 23, 2023, the National Transportation Safety Board released its preliminary report on the derailment: “Norfolk Southern Railway Train Derailment with Subsequent Hazardous Material Release and Fires.” From that report: While on scene, National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators examined railroad equipment and track conditions; reviewed data from the signal system, wayside defect detectors, local surveillance cameras, and the lead locomotive’s event recorder and forward-facing and inward-facing image recorders; and completed interviews. NTSB investigators identified and examined the first railcar to derail, the 23rd railcar in the consist. Surveillance video from a local residence showed what appeared to be a wheel bearing in the final stage of overheat failure moments before the derailment. The wheel bearing and affected wheelset have been collected as evidence and will be examined by the NTSB…. Train 32N was operating with a dynamic brake application as the train passed a wayside defect detector on the east side of Palestine, Ohio, at milepost (MP) 49.81. The wayside defect detector, or hot bearing detector (HBD), transmitted a critical audible alarm message instructing the crew to slow and stop the train to inspect a hot axle. The train engineer increased the dynamic brake application to further slow and stop the train. During this deceleration, an automatic emergency brake application initiated, and train 32N came to a stop.On the Fort Wayne Line of the Keystone Division, NS has equipped their rail network with HBD systems to assess the temperature conditions of wheel bearings while en route. The function of the HBD is to detect overheated bearings and provide audible real-time warnings to train crews. Train 32N passed three HBD systems on its trip before the derailment. At MP 79.9, the suspect bearing from the 23rd car had a recorded temperature of 38°F above ambient temperature. When train 32N passed the next HBD, at MP 69.01, the bearing’s recorded temperature was 103°F above ambient. The third HBD, at MP 49.81, recorded the suspect bearing’s temperature at 253°F above ambient. NS has established the following HBD alarm thresholds (above ambient temperature) and criteria for bearings:

• • Between 170°F and 200°F, warm bearing (non-critical); stop and inspect
• • A difference between bearings on the same axle greater than or equal to 115°F (non-critical); stop and inspect
• • Greater than 200°F (critical); set out railcar After the train stopped, the crew observed fire and smoke and notified the Cleveland East dispatcher of a possible derailment.

Or as Railfan and Railroad summarizes: “NTSB: Hot Bearing Caused East Palestine Wreck.” On February 12, 2022, we wrote, in “How Precision Scheduled Railroading at Norfolk Southern Caused a Toxic Vinyl Chloride Mushroom Cloud Over East Palestine, Ohio“: If a bearing overheats, it’s called a “hot box.” The heat is intense, and can damage the truck or even the car. The result will be a derailment. And the train that derailed at East Palestine had a hot box.And we concluded: No doubt [Norfolk Southern’s owners] are very happy with the Operating Ratio that [Norfolk Southern] achieved through [Precision Scheduled Railroading]. The chain of causality that begins with the hot box ends at their desks.

Rail unions tell Biden officials that workers have fallen ill at Norfolk Southern derailment site --The presidents of U.S. railroad unions told Biden administration officials that rail workers have fallen ill at the Norfolk Southern derailment site in East Palestine, Ohio, in a push for more train safety. Leaders from 12 unions met with Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Amit Bose, administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration, in Washington, D.C., Wednesday to discuss the derailment, aftermath and needed safety improvements."My hope is the stakeholders in this industry can work towards the same goals related to safety when transporting hazardous materials by rail," said Mike Baldwin, president of the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen. "Today's meeting is an opportunity for labor to share what our members are seeing and dealing with day to day. The railroaders labor represents are the employees who make it safe and they must have the tools to do so."Jeremy Ferguson, president of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers – Transportation Division, told CNBC that Buttigieg plans on more talks with the unions in the future."This was a good start," said Ferguson. "It's important these safety issues are addressed. No one wants another East Palestine. The safety discussion of employees must be addressed. The running of these long trains was a point of discussion as well."The meeting comes on the heels of letters sent to both the DOT and the FRA Wednesday in which union representations claimed rail workers had gotten sick at the derailment site. CNBC obtained the letters, addressed to Buttigieg, Bose, East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, from the general chairman of the American Rail System Federation of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.According to the letter, Norfolk Southern rail workers who have worked or continue to work the cleanup site have reported experiencing "migraines and nausea." One worker reportedly asked his supervisor to be transferred off the derailment site because of his symptoms, but never heard back from his supervisor and was left at the job site.The letter also claims workers are not being provided appropriate personal protective equipment such as respirators, eye protection or protective clothing. According to union representatives, 35 to 40 workers were on the track and were not supplied with proper breathing apparatuses — only paper and N95 masks — or rubber gloves, boots or coverups.

EPA to require Norfolk Southern to test directly for dioxins in East Palestine -The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said on Thursday that it will require Norfolk Southern to test for dioxins in East Palestine, Ohio, in the wake of last month’s train derailment.The railroad company will also be required to conduct a background study comparing dioxin levels in the eastern Ohio town to those in other areas, and the EPA will continue sampling for “indicator chemicals,” the agency noted.Dioxins are persistent environmental pollutants with “highly toxic potential,” according to the World Health Organization. While the EPA said on Thursday that its testing continues to suggest a “low probability” that dioxins were released from the incident, the burning of vinyl chloride — a toxic substance used in the manufacture of plastics — can create the pollutants, experts told The Associated Press. After the East Palestine derailment, officials conducted a controlled release and burn-off of vinyl chloride from several cars, amid concerns about a potential explosion.Ohio Sens. Sherrod Brown (D) and J.D. Vance (R) have previously expressed concerns to the state government and the federal EPA about dioxins. “Over the last few weeks, I’ve sat with East Palestine residents and community leaders in their homes, businesses, churches, and schools,” EPA Administrator Michael Regan said Thursday in a statement. “I’ve heard their fears and concerns directly, and I’ve pledged that these experiences would inform EPA’s ongoing response efforts.”Regan previously vowed that the agency would not “second-guess anyone’s experience” as it responded to the derailment.In the face of heavy criticism over his administration’s response to the incident, President Biden said on Thursday that he will visit East Palestine “at some point.”“I’ve spoken with every official in Ohio, Democrat and Republican, on a continuing basis, as in Pennsylvania,” Biden told reporters at the Capitol, adding, “We will be implementing an awful lot through the legislation here, and I will be out there at some point.”Biden also threw his support behind a bipartisan bill that would tighten federal oversight of trains carrying hazardous materials.“I applaud the bipartisan group of senators for proposing rail safety legislation that provides many of the solutions that my administration has been calling for,” he said Thursday in a statement.

Angry Ohio residents confront railroad over health fears - Residents who say they’re still suffering from illnesses nearly a month after a train carrying toxic chemicals derailed in Ohio confronted the railroad’s operator Thursday at a town forum, demanding to know whether they’d be relocated from homes they’re afraid to live in. “It’s not safe here,” said one man, staring straight at representatives of Norfolk Southern. “I’m begging you, by the grace of God, please get our people out of here.” While the railroad announced it was ready to begin moving more contaminated soil from underneath the tracks, buying homes and moving people out of East Palestine hasn’t been discussed, said Darrell Wilson, the railroad’s assistant vice president of government relations. “Why?” someone shouted. Few seemed to come away satisfied with answers they heard about air and water testing from state and federal officials — even after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said it was ordering Norfolk Southern to begin testing for dioxins, toxic chemical compounds that can stay in the environment for long periods of time. Many people remain scared about whether the area will be safe for their children years from now, saying they fear that dioxins not yet detected will cause long-term damage. Testing so far by the EPA for “indicator chemicals” has suggested there’s a low chance that dioxins were released from the derailment, the agency said.

Ohio hazmat, emergency crews respond to train derailment near Springfield | Fox News - A train derailed in Clark County, Ohio, Saturday evening, Fox News Digital has confirmed. According to the Clark County Sheriff’s Office, emergency personnel and hazmat crews responded to the train derailment on State Route 41 and Gateway Boulevard near the Clark County Fairgrounds at about 5 p.m.It is not known if the train was carrying any freight at the time of the derailment. The Clark County Sheriff's Office confirmed the train was not a passenger train.At 7 p.m. Saturday, the Clark County Emergency Management Agency asked residents within a 1,000 feet of the train derailment to shelter in place "out of an abundance of caution," according to a post on the Clark County government Facebook page.The State Highway Patrol said roads are closed surrounding the derailment site. Officials are urging residents to seek alternative routes.Saturday's derailment comes just over one month after a Norfolk Southern train with 50 rail cars, 10 of which were carrying vinyl chloride, derailed in East Palestine, Ohio,Feb. 3. That derailment caused hazardous chemicals to spill onto the ground and sent a plume of smoke into the air.

UPDATE: Clark County officials order residents to shelter in place after train derailment - The Clark County Emergency Management Agency is asking residents within a 1,000 feet of the train derailment in Clark County to shelter in place, according to a post on the Clark County’s Government Facebook page. People living in the area of State Route 41 near the Prime Ohio Business Park to shelter-in-place out of abundance of caution. They are asking residents to avoid the area of State Route 41 and find alternate routes. We will continue to provide updates. -INITIAL STORY- The Clark County Sheriff’s Office have confirmed deputes are on scene of a train derailment late Saturday afternoon. Deputies and medics responded to the area of State Route 41 and Gateway Boulevard near the Clark County Fairgrounds around 5 p.m. Dispatchers confirm to News Center 7 they are on scene but no other information was available at this time. Video sent from a News Center 7 viewer shows a couple of box cars derailed. A hazmat crew is confirmed to be on scene, according to News Center 7′s Taylor Robertson. The State Highway Patrol and Clark County Sheriff’s Office are also on scene. We have a news crew on scene and will continue provide updates.

More than 300,000 in Michigan with no power five days after ice storm - More than 300,000 homes and businesses in southern Michigan were still without power as of Sunday, a fifth day without electricity, after a nationwide winter storm brought snow, freezing rain and wind gusts of 30 to 40 miles per hour to the Great Lakes State on Wednesday. Based on data maintained by PowerOutage.us, more than 175,000 customers of DTE Energy and more than 65,000 customers of Consumers Energy, the two largest utilities in the state, and 60,000 more customers had no power from another five smaller regional and county-based electric companies in Michigan. With winter temperatures fluctuating between the low 20s and upper 30s, families scrambled to find a way to stay warm and keep their water pipes from freezing. Some were forced to move in with relatives and friends who had power or make the expensive decision to book a hotel room to keep from freezing to death. Others relocated to warming centers set up by local governments and the American Red Cross. In the city of Ann Arbor, for example, 40 percent of residents were without power and four warming centers were set up to provide cots, warm meals and water. Many residents have lost all their food at a time when the inflationary spiral has increased the cost of groceries to record levels. Teresa, an auto parts worker from Ypsilanti, Michigan, has been without power since Thursday. She told the WSWS, “When I got home from work at 2:30, it was off. At first, they did not have any information as to when it would be on. Yesterday they started giving estimates as to when it would be on. One had said Sunday. Then another one said Monday. Then the text I got today said Tuesday.” Teresa said the electric company is not offering residents any compensation for the disastrous outage, saying, “It felt like it was below zero in the house, freezing. I didn’t have lights. When the power goes off, everything goes. Somebody told me that DTE is going to give you a $25 voucher. She continued, “I’m going to laugh in their face if they try to give me $25. They could at least give you $100 to replace some kind of food. They are probably going to refer people to FIA (Family Independence Agency). FIA surely is not going to give me anything. If you make over $1,000 a month you can’t get any help from them.” While the energy companies have maintained that the ice storm was historic and impossible to prepare for, mass power outages in Michigan have become routine and the public is fed up with them. This widespread anger over the increasing deadly conditions is not being reported by local news media, which, instead, are giving energy company officials a platform to blame climate change for the crisis.

Winter storm updates: Heavy winds and reported tornadoes (AP) — Parts of the Southern Plains counted the injured and surveyed the damage Monday after tornadoes and other powerful winds swept through, while some Michigan residents faced a fifth consecutive day without power following last week’s ice storm. In California, the National Weather Service said winter storms will continue moving into the state through Wednesday after residents got a brief break from severe weather Sunday. Parts of the Northeast that have seen little snow this winter were under a winter storm warning. And forecasters warned of continued high winds in parts of the Plains and of thunderstorms and possible tornadoes in the Ohio Valley, Officials in Norman, Oklahoma, confirmed 12 weather-related injuries after tornadoes and wind gusts as high as 90 mph were reported in the state Sunday night. The winds toppled trees and power lines, closed roads and damaged homes and businesses around Norman, Shawnee and Cheyenne.Classes were canceled Monday at two damaged elementary schools, said Norman Police Chief Kevin Foster.Frances Tabler, of Norman, told KOCO-TV that she suffered a small cut on her head when a storm hit her home, tearing off much of its roof and sending debris flying. She said it was a miracle her children weren’t hurt, although her daughter was trapped for awhile in a bedroom. “It was just like a blizzard in the house with all the debris flying,” Tabler told KOCO. “I was screaming for my kids.”The line of quick-moving thunderstorms that produced a swath of damaging wind gusts across likely qualified as a derecho, although that’s not an official designation, said Nolan Meister, a National Weather Service meteorologist. Meister said a wind gust of 114 mph was recorded in Texas, with gusts between 70 and 90 mph in central Oklahoma.

Tornadoes leave a trail of destruction in southern Plains, U.S. - (7 videos) - Several destructive tornadoes touched down in southern Plains on February 26, 2023, resulting in severe damage and power outages. The National Weather Service reported multiple tornadoes throughout the day, with winds of over 177 km/h (110 mph) causing significant damage in Texas. The Storm Prediction Center reported 9 tornadoes on February 26 — 7 in Oklahoma and 2 in Kansas. Severe damage was reported in Norman, Oklahoma, as destructive winds and tornadoes swept through the area. Gas leaks, fallen power lines, and uprooted trees were reported in the city. Photos of the damage showed a car flipped upside down and homes with roofs shredded, and part of a garage collapsed. The highest wind gust report came from Memphis, Texas, where a 183 km/h (114 mph) gust was observed. Wind-driven hail also damaged windows in the town. In McLean, Texas, a garage door was blown in at a local business. While more than 88 000 customers in Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas were without power on Sunday night (LT), Oklahoma led the region in power outages, with over 55 000 customers still without power as of early Monday morning. Multiple tornado warnings were issued by the National Weather Service in Oklahoma, including confirmed tornadoes near Vinson, Hobart, and Angora. To the west of Sweetwater, Oklahoma, a house and barn were significantly damaged and destroyed after a tornadic cell rolled through the area. Agricultural barns and equipment were scattered across roads. Severe storms are forecast to continue to push northeastward into parts of southern and eastern Kansas, northwestern Arkansas, and Missouri into early Monday. AccuWeather forecasters warn that travelers across parts of northern Texas, Oklahoma, southeastern Kansas, and Missouri could face travel disruptions, including flight delays or cancellations due to area thunderstorms, low visibility on roadways in heavy downpours, and damaging wind gusts.

Yosemite National Park closed after winter storm dumps 15 feet of snow- A powerful winter storm led to significant snowfall across Yosemite National Park in California, forcing officials to shut it down until further notice.Storms have been pummeling the West Coast, leading to epic snowfall totals high up in the Sierra Nevada, where the national park is located. The National Park Service said Wednesday that some areas of the park have so far received about 15 feet of snow during the onslaught of storms, and those totals could creep higher through the day. Officials said that crews have been working to restore critical services to the park, but with so much snow, an estimated reopening date could not be determined. A powerful winter storm led to significant snowfall across Yosemite National Park in California, forcing officials to shut it down until further notice.The storm currently bringing heavy snow to the mountains in California will eventually make its way across the country, putting millions at risk of severe weather and snow. A multiday severe weather event is putting nearly 40 million people at risk of seeing tornadoes, hail and strong winds.In the Midwest and Northeast, heavy snow and ice are expected to significantly impact daily life across at least 10 states starting Thursday.

Tornadoes slam into Texas leaving 206,000 without power with Louisiana, Arkansas and Oklahoma under severe weather warnings - as California battles food shortage after winter storm dumped seven feet of snow -- Texas has been wracked by horrifying tornadoes while California is buried under a rare dose of heavy snow. Eight million people in the South are under a moderate to severe storm threat as Texas and Louisiana are devastated by gigantic tornadoes. A monstrous tornado swept through a residential neighborhood in Northlake and Winnsboro, Texas, leaving residents shocked as the big twister rolled through. Tornado warnings were also issued for Dallas-Fort Worth area, trapping travelers at the Dallas Love Field Airport in a storm bunker, including pro tennis player Toby Kodat, who was traveling back from a tournament in Waco, Texas. 'Not sure what is worse….that I am flying home early from the tournament or that I am in the tornado shelter at Dallas Love Field airport,' he wrote on Twitter. Dallas Love Field canceled around 400 flights on Thursday and has already started canceling flights as of early Friday morning. A temporary ground stop was issued at the airport during the storms. A monstrous tornado swept through a residential neighborhood in Northlake (pictured) and Winnsboro, Texas, leaving residents shocked as the big twister rolled through. Eight million people in the South are under a moderate to severe storm threat as Texas and Louisiana are devastated by gigantic tornadoes.. Another tornado was seen in Shreveport, Texas (pictured). Parts of Texas and Louisiana experienced hurricane-force winds, leaving more than 206,000 Texans without power, according to poweroutrage.us. All the schools in the Weatherford School District - near Fort Worth - will be closed on Friday due to power outage, debris, and damages to school grounds, according to CBS 11 Producer Giles Hudson. Roads in Greenville, Texas, have been blocked by bricks from multiple brick building were damaged in the storm. In Louisiana, a tornado touched down near Louisiana State University. The storm is forecast to move across the Ohio Valley on Friday and into the Northwest by evening, The New York Times reported.

Meteorologist: West Coast snowfall is 'once in a generation' - Portland, Oregon received nearly a foot of snow in a single day in what proved to be its second-snowiest day in history. Mountainous areas of California experienced nearly unprecedented snowfall accumulations - more than 40 feet since the start of the season. At the airport in Flagstaff, Arizona, 11.6 feet have fallen this season, second only to the winter of 1948-49. Even Phoenix suburbs woke up on Thursday to a dusting of snow that covered cactuses and lush golf courses.What is going on with all the snow?“This rain and snow bucked the trend and it’s highly unexpected,” said Ryan Maue, a meteorologist and former NOAA chief scientist. “It’s like once-in-a-generation.” Meteorologists say the explanation for the robust winter season is not so simple, nor is it a direct result of the current La Niña climate pattern, with the cooling of central Pacific ocean surface waters affecting weather.“The short answer is no, La Niña alone is not the main cause of this weather,” said Daniel McEvoy, a researcher with the Western Regional Climate Center. Bianca Feldkircher, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service, said a persistent blocking pattern over the Pacific Ocean plus cold air migrating south from the Arctic have created the conditions for widespread snowfall along the West Coast. “Not only were you getting significant snowfall in areas that already see snow, you were also seeing snowfall on lower elevations in Southern California, which is super rare,” said Feldkircher. For example, the forecast on March 1 warned of snowfall for parts of Phoenix, which Feldkircher said is “super unusual” for this time of year. And last week, Portland saw abnormally high snowfall rates and recorded nearly 11 inches (28 centimeters) — the second snowiest day in the city’s history. With respect to human-induced climate change, meteorologists say it’s challenging to nail down what part it is playing in the West Coast’s peculiar winter season. But increasingly extreme weather is expected as global temperatures rise. “Heat produces moisture, moisture produces storms, and heat and moisture bind to produce even more severe storms,” Feldkircher said.

California's snow-stranded residents need food, plows, help | AP News— Olivia Duke said she’s been trapped in her home in the snow-plastered mountains east of Los Angeles for so long that by Thursday the only food she had left was oatmeal. Snow plows have created a wall of ice between her driveway and the road in the San Bernardino Mountains, and there are at least 5 feet (1.5 meters) of snow weighing on her roof. While her power has been restored, she only has half a gallon of gas left for her generator in case it goes out again. “California is not used to this. We don’t have this kind of snow,” said Duke, a corporate recruiter who lives in the community of Cedarpines Park. “I thought I was prepared. But not for this kind of Godzilla bomb of snow. This is something you couldn’t possibly really have prepared for.” With Southern California’s mountain communities under a snow emergency, residents are grappling with power outages, roof collapses and lack of baby formula and medicine. Many have been trapped in their homes for a week, their cars buried in snow. County workers fielded more than 500 calls for assistance Wednesday while firefighters tackled possible storm-related explosions and evacuated the most vulnerable with snowcats. Californians are usually elated to see snow-covered mountains from Los Angeles and drive a couple of hours up to sled, ski and snowboard. But what started out as a beautiful sight has become a hazardous nightmare for those renting vacation homes in the scenic, tree-lined communities or who live there year-round. Back-to-back-snowstorms have blanketed the region repeatedly, giving people no time to even shovel out.

At least 12 dead after winter storm slams South, Midwest - CBS News -The winter-weary Northeast and upper Midwest were digging out Saturday from heavy snowfall while cleanup began in battered parts of the South and Midwest after a sprawling storm system produced ferocious winds that left widespread damage and caused at least 12 deaths. Three people were killed by falling trees in Alabama as severe weather swept through the state. In Mississippi, a woman died inside her SUV after a rotted tree branch struck her vehicle, and in Arkansas, a man drowned after he drove into high floodwaters. Two deaths were also reported in Tennessee. Five weather-related deaths also were reported in Kentucky in four different counties as storms with straight-line winds moved through the state. Gov. Andy Beshear had declared a state of emergency before the storm and on Friday evening the mayor of Louisville, Craig Greenberg, followed suit because of the severe storms, high winds, widespread damage and danger to lives and property. Snow fell across a large swath of the Northeast, from western New York to New England, with some areas expecting more than a foot of snow on Saturday. The mix of snow, sleet and rain prompted the National Weather Service to warn of possible coastal flooding in Massachusetts and Rhode Island. The storm could bring as much as 18 inches (45 centimeters) of snow to parts of New Hampshire and Maine. It also could deliver strong winds that could cause power outages. Hundreds of businesses were closed, many flights were canceled and some bus service was suspended. The heavy, wet snow was accompanied by winds gusting to 40 to 50 mph (64 to 80 kph), raising concerns about toppled trees and power outages, said meteorologist Jon Palmer with the National Weather Service in Maine. A vehicle passenger died near the western Tennessee town of Waverly, the Humphreys County Sheriff's Office reports. The death was deemed to be weather-related, the sheriff's office said. Thousands of utility customers in Kentucky, Tennessee and Michigan were still without power as of Saturday afternoon, according to the utility tracker PowerOutage.us. In the upper Midwest, residents dug out Saturday from heavy snowfall that caused widespread power outages and forced Detroit's Metropolitan Wayne County Airport to briefly close late Friday. Passengers were advised to check with airlines for flight delays on Saturday. The storm barreled Friday afternoon into the Detroit area, quickly covering streets and roads beneath a layer of snow. The weather service said some areas could see blizzard conditions with snowfall approaching 3 inches per hour.

Metro Detroit winter storm leaves thousands without power - Heavy, wet snow created treacherous travel conditions and knocked out power to thousands in metro Detroit on Friday.More than 10 inches of snow fell in areas in the region, including Highland, Milford and Rochester Hills, according to the National Weather Service.Just over 6 inches of snow was reported in Romulus.DTE Energy reported 200,403 customers without power on its website as of 2 p.m. Saturday.Consumers Energy reported 12,041 customers without power on its website.Detroit Metropolitan Airport airport temporarily closed around 7:30 p.m. Friday and reopened just before midnight, according to the airport's Twitter account. Travelers are encouraged to check flight statuses with their airlines before driving to the airport.As of noon, the airport was experiencing departure delays of an average of 28 minutes, according to FlightAware, which showed 48 outgoing flights had been canceled and 71 delayed Saturday. In addition, 71 incoming flights had been canceled and 68 delayed.The weekend weather is expected to be more tranquil, according to the NWS. Saturday is predicted to be partly sunny with a high near 40 degrees and winds from 5 to 15 mph.

Large dust storm darkens skies across parts of Texas and New Mexico - A large storm system brought a rare snowfall to California and thunderstorms to the Southern Plains in late February 2023. The system also generated strong winds that caused a massive amount of dust to be lofted into the air, darkening skies across northwestern Texas, northern Mexico, and eastern New Mexico. According to news reports, numerous areas were affected by wind gusts exceeding 110 km/h (70 mph). Memphis, Texas, recorded a peak gust of 183 km/h (114 mph), which could rival the wind speeds of a major hurricane. The event caused significant health hazards and adverse effects on air quality in Lubbock, Texas, where the fine particulate matter (PM2.5) reached 158 on the air quality index, which is considered unhealthy for otherwise healthy individuals. This dust storm was so intense that it was visible from space, as captured by the Advanced Baseline Imager on the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite 16 (GOES-16) operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Featured image credit: NOAA/GOES-East. Acquired on February 26, 2023

Judge upholds acquittal in 9 hurricane nursing home deaths (AP) — A Florida judge rejected a prosecutor’s impassioned plea Monday, saying he would not reconsider his acquittal of a nursing home administrator in the overheating deaths of nine patients after Hurricane Irma knocked out the facility’s air conditioning in 2017.Circuit Judge John J. Murphy III listened impassively as prosecutor Charles Morton made his case Monday morning for reconsideration. But after about an hour of deliberation Murphy upheld his Friday decision to acquit Jorge Carballo of manslaughter — even before the three-week trial reached the jury. Murphy agreed with Carballo’s attorneys that it would be double jeopardy to reverse his decision and let the trial continue. In his earlier ruling, he agreed with the defense that prosecutors had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that their client had acted with reckless disregard for human life or had demonstrated conscious indifference to his patients’ safety, two necessary components for conviction.The judge found “undisputed evidence” that Carballo’s employees had tried to provide care to the patients and, in Monday’s ruling, said nothing presented in court would have changed his mind even if he could have. “The state has not presented sufficient evidence that the Defendant acted with culpable negligence,” Murphy wrote Monday. Prosecutors cannot appeal the ruling, which is final. . Carballo, 65, was operating the Rehabilitation Center at Hollywood Hills in September 2017 when Irma knocked out power to the 150-bed facility’s air conditioning. Temperatures rose inside the building over two-plus days before patients started dying on the second floor. That’s where improperly installed temporary air conditioners had actually increased the already sweltering temperatures. In Hollywood, four patients were found dead initially after emergency workers received a call about a person with a heart attack, and more died later at the hospital, authorities said. Altogether, more than 100 patients there were found to be suffering in the heat and were evacuated, many on stretchers or in wheelchairs.

How NSF uses 'absurd' health reasons to block scientists from polar missions - Scientists are raising the alarm about what they say is an unfair medical clearance process required by the National Science Foundation for polar expeditions. Some researchers said they were disqualified from field work based on medical conditions that their own doctors did not consider large risks. Others said they were required to undergo medical procedures that their doctors said were not needed. Advertisement Still others were disqualified, or approved only with restrictions, because they made minor adjustments to psychiatric medications within a year of their deployment. And at least one person said she was banned from fieldwork on the basis of a mental health condition with which she had never been diagnosed. “I felt so gaslit,” she said. Now, some scientists are calling for a reevaluation of the whole system. Known as the polar Physical Qualification, or PQ, process, this comprehensive medical screening is required for scientists and support staff whose deployment to the Antarctic and Arctic regions is funded by the National Science Foundation, a federal agency. It requires participants to complete a number of physical examinations and to provide in-depth information about their medical history, conditions and prescribed medications — for physical and mental health. NSF contracts with the University of Texas Medical Branch, which assesses participants’ medical applications and declares them either physically qualified (“PQed”) or not physically qualified (“NPQed”). Participants who fail the testing can submit a waiver — essentially an appeal — and may be reassessed. The decision on the appeal is typically final. The process is intended to protect researchers and prevent medical emergencies in remote parts of the world. But many participants say the process unfairly disqualifies people on the basis of common, well-managed medical conditions that shouldn’t pose a risk in the field. Participants have also pointed to a lack of transparency in the process, noting that the medical criteria resulting in disqualifications are not clear. E&E News spoke with seven polar scientists who expressed frustration or anger with their PQ experiences, and several others who have become concerned after watching colleagues or students struggle with the process. (interviews follow)

Mud domes discovered on islands near Kabawa mud volcano after M7.5 earthquake, Indonesia - Following a powerful M7.5 earthquake that struck the Tanimbar Islands in Indonesia’s Maluku Province on January 10, 2023, researchers have discovered new dome-shaped mud eruption mounds on two small islands near the large Kabawa mud volcano. These mounds reach up to 3 m (9.8 feet) in height and cover areas of up to approximately 700 m2 (7 534 feet2). The islands are located near the island of Yamdena, around 1 km (0.6 miles) south of the Kabawa mud volcano. The first island is characterized by a stretch of coarse blackish-gray sandstone on top of which scattered gravel-sized rocks with angular to angular shapes are found. The mud outcrop is situated on the west side of the island and is still soft and not yet compact, with a height of about 3 m (9.8 feet) and a dome shape. Above the mud, there are boulders and cobbles that are the same as the material scattered around it. The dimensions of the mud from the results of drone shooting are 27.2 m (89 feet) long and 16.6 m (54.5 feet) wide. The mud is gray, very fine-grained, soft, and strongly cohesive, with no sulfur smell and no coarse material. On the second island, the characteristics of the mud are similar to the first island, with dimensions of 47.5 m (156 feet) in length and 17.8 m (58.4 feet) in width. The island is composed of coarse sandstones overlaid by gravel-sized rock fragments with angular to spherical shapes, and the dominant cobblestone is flat. When compared to the first island, the fragments scattered on this island are smaller, and the rock type is almost the same. Mud domes discovered on islands near Kabawa mud volcano after M7.5 earthquake, Indonesia - island 2 mud dimensions According to data from the Regional Disaster Management Agency (BPBD) of Maluku Province, the earthquake caused moderate to severe damage to 523 residents’ houses, and damage to 131 public facilities, including public facilities, facilities, and infrastructure. The USGS reported the quake as M7.6 at a depth of 105 km (65 miles).

Turkish Red Crescent’s sale of tents after the earthquake revealed as “government resign” chants rise from stadiums -- Three weeks after two devastating earthquakes caused massive destruction and mass deaths in Turkey and Syria, public anger and opposition to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s response is growing. Over the weekend, it emerged that the Turkish Red Crescent sold tents that should have been provided immediately and free of charge to earthquake victims after the quake. Thousands chanted “Government resign” at major soccer matches in Istanbul. Over 100 members and supporters of the Workers’ Party of Turkey (TİP) who wanted to protest the sale of tents by the Red Crescent in Istanbul last night were attacked by police and detained. Others, who tried to hold a protest titled, “They were killed not by the earthquake, but by your rent-seeking system,” called by“Labor, Peace and Democracy Forces” in Kadıköy, were detained. After a break in the soccer league games due to the earthquake, fans at Saturday’s match between Fenerbahçe and Konyaspor chanted “20 years with lies. [Government] Resign!” In the Beşiktaş-Antalyaspor match played last night, “Government resign” chants rose from the stands. Devlet Bahçeli, the leader of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), the fascistic ally of the Erdoğan government, called for the matches to be played without spectators in response to these protests, which reflect the widespread anger among the population. The earthquake directly affected over 25 million people in Turkey and Syria, killing more than 51,000 people—at least 44,374 in Turkey and 6,760 in Syria. One governor’s estimate, which has not been officially denied, puts the real death toll as high as 150,000. Millions of people in both countries have been left homeless and thousands are still without basic needs such as shelter and sanitation.

Silent no more: Criticism of the state's inadequate earthquake response reaches football stadiums in Turkey -- It was an unforgettable moment as fans of one of Turkey’s main football teams, Besiktas, started throwing thousands of plush bear toys onto the Vodafone arena — Besiktas’s home turf — at exactly the 4:17-minute mark, the time when Turkey’s southeastern provinces were hit by the devastating earthquake on February 6. The club organized the protest to commemorate all the children who died in the earthquake, with plans to donate the toys to displaced families who survived the disaster. Seconds prior, license plate numbers for each of the affected provinces were shown on the scoreboard of the game played on February 26. (video)

Long-duration M6.3 solar flare erupts from AR 3229, CME produced, S1 solar radiation storm - (video) A long-duration solar flare measuring M6.3 erupted from Active Region 3229 at 19:44 UTC on February 25, 2023. The event started at 18:40 and ended at 20:27 UTC.A Type II radio emission with an estimated velocity of 528 km/s was detected at 19:23 UTC, indicating a coronal mass ejection (CME) was associated with the flare event.In addition, a 10cm Radio Burst (tenflare), lasting 22 minutes and with a peak flux of 500 sfu, was associated with this event.This indicates that the electromagnetic burst associated with the solar flare at the 10cm wavelength was double or greater than the initial 10cm radio background. This can be indicative of significant radio noise. This noise is generally short-lived but can cause interference for sensitive receivers including radar, GPS, and satellite communications.Radio frequencies were forecast to be most degraded over the Pacific Ocean, SW United States, Central America, and parts of NW South America at the time of the flare. drap long-duration m6.3 solar flare february 25 2023 High-energy particles started sharply rising at 20:20 UTC and reached the 10MeV warning threshold by 21:10 UTC — S1 – Minor Solar Radiation Storm (Solar Proton Event). Such events happen approximately 50 times per solar cycle. Expected impacts: Radio – Minor impacts on polar HF (high frequency) radio propagation resulting in fades at lower frequencies. Solar Proton Events (SPE) result from fast coronal mass ejections. During an SPE, satellites experience dramatically increased bombardment by high-energy particles. Fluxes of particles with energies ≥ 10 MeV can reach 43 500 protons/cm2/sec/ster. Single Event Upset rates in spacecraft electronics increase with high fluxes since there is a higher likelihood of impact on a sensitive location. In addition, these high energy particles can access the polar ionosphere and create an enhanced region of ionization (called the ‘D-Region’) which interferes with HF radio communication in these areas. High-energy particles can reach Earth anywhere from 20 minutes to many hours following the initiating solar event. 5:39 AM

CME impacts Earth, sparking G3 - Strong geomagnetic storm - (videos) Coronal mass ejection (CME) produced by a long-duration M3.7 solar flare at 20:30 UTC on February 24, 2023, reached Earth at 19:25 UTC on February 26.

• The impact of this event is anticipated to be followed by a glancing blow from another CME generated by the M6.3 solar flare on February 25, expected to arrive during the afternoon hours on February 27.
• The resulting geomagnetic storm activity is expected to be significant due to both CMEs interacting with a negative-polarity coronal hole high-speed stream (CH HSS).
• This interaction has the potential to produce G3 – Strong or even higher levels of geomagnetic storm activity.

The partial-halo CME associated with the M3.7 flare from Region 3229 was determined to have an Earth-directed component and the Enlil model analysis correctly suggested an arrival time late on February 26.In addition, analysis of an asymmetric halo CME, associated with a long-duration M6.3 flare at 19:44 UTC on February 25, suggests a glancing blow impact on February 27.Both CMEs are expected to interact with a negative-polarity CH HSS, potentially producing significant geomagnetic storming.As a result, a couple of hours before the arrival of the first CME, SWPC issued a G3 – Strong geomagnetic storm watch for February 27 and G2 – Moderate for February 28. The area of impact is primarily poleward of 50 degrees Geomagnetic Latitude.

• Induced currents – Power system voltage irregularities are possible, and false alarms may be triggered on some protection devices.
• Spacecraft – Systems may experience surface charging; increased drag on low Earth-orbit satellites and orientation problems may occur.
• Navigation – Intermittent satellite navigation (GPS) problems, including loss-of-lock and increased range error, may occur.
• Radio – HF (high frequency) radio may be intermittent.
• Aurora – Aurora may be seen as low as Pennsylvania to Iowa to Oregon.

Our planet is still under the influence of the S1 – Minor Solar Radiation storm that started after the M6.3 flare on February 25, but the effects are now waning and expected to drop below the S1 threshold soon.

George Soros wants to block Arctic sunlight. Will he fund it? - One of the world’s top funders of progressive campaigns is promoting a controversial plan to shield the rapidly melting Arctic from the warmth of the sun.Billionaire George Soros announced his support for a proposal to increase cloud cover at the top of the world in a speech last week at the Munich Security Conference. His comments raised the prospect that the hedge fund manager — a frequent target of conservative criticism and conspiracy theories — might become more involved in climate-related politics, an issue that has not historically captured a large amount of his attention.Soros’ newfound interest in what’s known as solar geoengineering comes as the United States and other countries consider ramping up research into sunlight-blocking technologies that could rapidly reduce global warming (Climatewire, March 26, 2021). But deploying those potential climate fixes wouldn’t prevent ocean acidification and other harms associated with the growing surplus of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and could lead to a rapid spike in warming if they were scrapped, experts say. Various geoengineering approaches also come with potential side effects that are difficult to predict and could be hard to manage without international standards, which don’t currently exist.“Our civilization is in danger of collapsing because of the inexorable advance of climate change,” Soros said during a40-minute speech at the annual international forum in Germany. Slashing heat-trapping emissions and adapting to a hotter world “are necessary but not sufficient,” he said. “The climate system is broken, and it needs to be repaired.”The fix favored by Soros is a targeted form of solar geoengineering that’s being researched by the Center for Climate Repair at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. The center is proposing to use more than 500 ocean vessels powered by waves and wind to spray seawater into the atmosphere during the Arctic summer. The ships would imitate the natural process that occurs when waves break over the ocean, creating tiny droplets of water vapor that could become sunlight-reflecting clouds.“We need to refreeze the Arctic,” former U.K. climate envoy David King, who founded and now chairs the center, said in a video played during Soros’ speech. The solar geoengineering process, known as marine cloud brightening, “would reflect sunlight away from the ice layer formed over the Arctic sea during the polar winter, with year-on-year growth of the last ice layer,” King said.

Efforts to block sunlight get boost from prominent scientists - Former NASA director James Hansen, who first warned Congress about the dangers of global warming in 1988, is among more than 60 leading scientists who are calling for dramatic increases in research on ways to limit sunlight so it won’t overheat the planet. Their open letter published Monday expresses support for studies and field experiments that would spray reflective aerosols in the stratosphere and alter the density of certain clouds — an area of climate research described by advocates as “solar radiation modification.” Critics, which include hundreds of other academics, deride such atmospheric interventions as “geoengineering.” The letter comes as heat waves, wildfires, floods and other climate-related disasters grow increasingly common and severe. Average temperature increases are also inching dangerously close to levels that climate scientists fear could trigger catastrophic, irreversible changes to ice sheets, ecosystems and vulnerable communities.Those sobering realities have prompted some international governments, top universities and wealthy philanthropiststo begin considering a last-ditch means to cool the planet. The letter, which stops short of fully embracing solar radiation modification, or SRM, could provide new momentum for thoroughly researching a type of climate intervention some still consider too dangerous to study.“Since decisions on whether or not to implement SRM are likely to be considered in the next one to two decades, a robust international scientific assessment of SRM approaches is needed as rapidly as possible,” the letter says.It was mainly written and organized by Sarah Doherty, an atmospheric sciences professor at the University of Washington, with input from Philip Rasch, the chief climate scientist at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.The letter emphasizes the need to slash emissions “starting immediately” and argues that the jury is still out on the viability of SRM as a climate fix. “Uncertainties in how SRM implementation would play out in the climate system are presently too large to support implementation,” it says.It obliquely rebukes Make Sunsets, a venture capital-backed startup that aims to profit from selling “cooling credits.” Last year, Make Sunsets began releasing aerosol-dispersing weather balloons before the Mexican government effectively shut down the unauthorized venture (Climatewire, Jan. 19).“Since SRM does not address the cause of climate change, nor all of the effects of increased greenhouse gas concentrations, it likely will never be an appropriate candidate for an open market system of credits and independent actors,” the letter says.

Blocking sun rays finds support in the Senate - Senators on both sides of the aisle are open to funding research on solar geoengineering, a little understood and potentially dangerous method of blocking the sun’s rays to quickly reduce global warming. Their receptiveness comes after years of Senate apprehension over such funding. While the House has passed bills to study the method — also known as solar radiation management — those efforts have struggled to gain traction on the other side of the Capitol. But more leaders in Washington, Beijing and other capitals are reviewing geoengineering technology while their economies continue to burn fossil fuels — the main cause of climate change. There is also a growing scientific debate about the viability of solar radiation management as an emergency measure to protect ice sheets, ecosystems and low-lying nations from the worst impacts of global warming. “Climate change is to a point where we should look at everything,” Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.) told E&E News. A former petroleum geologist, Hickenlooper won his seat in part by campaigning against the Green New Deal, a 2019 proposal that called for a federal jobs guarantee to help rapidly scale up climate mitigation and adaption efforts. “I think it’s sensible,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said of geoengineering research and small-scale testing. Her state is on the front lines of climate change, with the Arctic portions of Alaska warming more than twice as fast as the rest of the globe, according to NOAA. “I have had constituents come to me with proposals. I have been to Arctic conferences where we’ve been presented these,” she said. “I haven’t done anything legislatively to address any of it. But it is interesting.” Many academics have long considered solar radiation management too dangerous to research. That’s because the process — which can involve reflecting sunlight by shooting aerosols into the stratosphere or increasing marine cloud cover — could create new geopolitical tensions and distract from the urgent need to slash emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases. Those concerns were echoed by some senators. “Are you talking about the stuff that people are worried is going to start a war?” Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, the top Republican on the Select Committee on Intelligence, said when asked about supporting geoengineering research. He spoke with E&E News on Tuesday, shortly after The Washington Post reported that top national security officials gamed out how to avoid conflicts triggered by weather or precipitation changes blamed on geoengineering. “I’m not downplaying it or being negative about it,” Rubio added. “I just don’t know enough about it to give you an informed opinion about whether we should be spending more money on it.” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), a leading advocate of aggressive climate action, said “most of the geoengineering schemes that I’ve heard about create massive, massive unintended consequence risks.” Yet even he remains open to funding solar geoengineering research.

Global CO2 emissions hit a record even as Europe's decline - Global CO2 emissions rose to a record last year as the combustion of fossil fuels continued to put the world on track for a dangerous level of global warming. Data from the International Energy Agency show the biggest increase came from Asia's emerging markets, in large part due to coal-fired power. Yet a decline in industrial production in China and Europe meant an even worse outcome was avoided.“The impacts of the energy crisis didn't result in the major increase in global emissions that was initially feared,” said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol. “However, we still see emissions growing from fossil fuels, hindering efforts to meet the world's climate targets.”Energy-related emissions rose 0.9 per cent to more than 36.8 billion metric tons in 2022, IEA data show. Emissions in the European Union fell 2.5 per cent as a mild winter cut demand for heating and soaring natural gas prices prompted industries to shutter production.China, the world's biggest emitter, saw a slight drop of 0.2 per cent as weaker economic growth, slowing construction and measures to contain the spread of COVID-19 inhibited energy use.In the U.S., emissions grew by 0.8 per cent as exceptionally cold weather at the beginning of the year boosted heating demand. Overall, extreme weather events contributed to about a fifth of last year's growth in emissions. Many countries saw increased demand for cooling, a trend that's likely to persist as climate change makes heat waves more intense and more frequent.

Humanity put out more C02 than Ever Before last Year, but Green Energy Kept the Annual Increase Small -- Cathy Bussewitz at the Associated Press reports that carbon dioxide emissions reached an all-time high in 2022, reaching 36.8 gigatons. That is more CO2 spewed into the atmosphere by humanity in just one year than ever before. CO2 emissions were up nearly 1% over 2021, spurred by the relaxing of COVID-era restrictions. Bussewitz notes that the climate emergency itself is getting in the way of our attempts to fight the climate emergency. The heating of the earth has intensified drought conditions in some parts of the world, such as the American Southwest, which caused water levels to fall in hydroelectric dams and reduced the amount of electricity that could be produced in this low-carbon manner. People turned to fossil gas instead. Likewise, the heat wavers that are made worse and longer by the greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere caused people to run their air conditioners more, which caused the production of more carbon dioxide, which causes it to get hotter. . . in a vicious circle.This finding is bad news because we need to be going in the opposite direction, reducing how much CO2 we put into the atmosphere by burning gasoline, fossil gas and coal by 7% a year. That is the only way to avoid our climate system going chaotic, as it will if earth gets too hot. What happened last year is like a person in danger of dying from obesity vowing to take off 14 pounds in a year and instead putting on two pounds.That’s the bad news. The good news is that emissions grew less than 1% last year, whereas in 2021 they had grown 6%. Moreover, 2022 challenged the energy industry as have few other years in recent memory, given the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the boycott of and sanctions against Russian oil and gas. Some analysts had predicted a big return to coal in Europe to deal with this crisis. On the whole, with a few exceptions, that did not happen. Coal use did tick up slightly in Asia, with a 1.6% increase, but that after all is not very much.So in a way it is good news, given the high prices for fossil gas caused by the war and the boycotts, and given the further post-COVID opening of major economies, that Europe and the U.S. avoided any significant revival of coal and that emissions were only up 0.9% globally for the year.

Carbon emissions from global SUV fleet outweighs that of most countries - The continued global rise in sales of SUVs pushed their climate-heating emissions to almost 1bn tonnes of carbon dioxide in 2022, according to the International Energy Agency. The 330m sport utility vehicles on the roads produced emissions equivalent to the combined national emissions of the UK and Germany last year. If SUVs were a country, they would rank as the sixth most polluting in the world. Climate campaigners are increasingly concerned about the impact of SUVs. The activist group Tyre Extinguishers said it had deflated the tyres of hundreds of SUVs in Europe on Monday night in the run-up to the first anniversary of its campaign. The vehicles are larger and heavier than regular cars and use on average 20% more fuel. The increased number of SUVs in 2022 were responsible for a third of the increase in global oil demand. Purchases of SUVs have soared in recent years, rising from 20% of new cars in 2012 to 46% of all cars last year, the IEA reports. The rise continued in 2022, includes significant growth in the US, India and Europe, despite the overall number of cars sold falling slightly. About one in six SUVs sold in 2022 were electric. But the IEA experts said: “Electric SUVs are growing in popularity, but not quickly enough to offset the increasing oil consumption and emissions of the wider fleet. “Electric SUVs also require larger batteries to power them, so a growing electric SUV market would impose additional pressure on battery supply chains and further increase demand for the critical minerals needed to make the batteries.” Cities targeted by Tyre Extinguisher groups on Monday included London, Paris, Berlin and Milan. The activists claim to have deflated more than 10,000 tyres in the past year in 17 countries, including the US and New Zealand, using lentils to jam open air valves. A spokesperson said: “Things were quiet over the winter but we are now emerging ready for another year of lentil-based action. We act because politicians will not take even baby steps to make our streets and climate safe. We won’t stop until these polluting vehicles are history.”

Walmart, Target, Home Depot lead pack of retailers emitting millions of pounds of CO2 through shipping - 2021 was a big year for the global shipping industry, as COVID-19 drove hordes of shoppers to the internet to buy new clothes, gadgets, furniture, and other goods. Booming e-commerce contributed to widely reported supply chain disruptions — but it also led to less-reported consequences for the climate and public health.A new report from the nonprofits Pacific Environment and Stand.earth finds that the ships that carried imports for 18 of the U.S.’s largest retail, fashion, tech, and furniture companies emitted about 3.5 million metric tons of greenhouse gases in 2021, about as much as the annual climate pollution from 750,000 passenger cars. The ships transporting these companies’ clothes, computers, knickknacks, and other goods also released thousands of metric tons of cancer- and asthma-inducing nitrous oxide and particulate matter into port communities.The report brings “awareness and accountability to the companies that were behind that onslaught of pollution in 2021,” said Madeline Rose, Pacific Environment’s climate campaign director. She called on retail companies to demand cleaner shipping fuels and practices from the freight companies they pay to transport their goods, with an eye toward net-zero emissions by 2030.Pacific Environment’s report shines a spotlight on 18 major maritime importers in four retail categories, chosen based on their shipping emissions and their recognizability. Walmart, Target, and Home Depot led the pack in maritime climate and air pollution, together causing more than 1.7 million metric tons of carbon dioxide and 33 metric tons of methane to be released into the atmosphere in 2021. The report attributes this pollution to the brands’ partnerships with shipping companies whose vessels rely on carbon-intensive heavy fuel oil. These vessels aren’t an anomaly; most of the planet’s maritime freight fleet is highly polluting, and the industry writ large accounts for about 3 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.Besides contributing to climate change, the ships that U.S. companies rely on also release hazardous air pollution in port communities, whose residents tend to be lower-income people of color. For example, ships carrying goods for Walmart emitted thousands of metric tons of nitrogen oxide, sulfur oxide, and particulate matter during voyages to the Port of Houston in 2021, potentially elevating the risk of cancer and respiratory problems for port residents. Ships carrying products for Target and Home Depot caused similar pollution in port communities of Los Angeles, Long Beach, Seattle, and Savannah, contributing to what Pacific Environment called “human rights and environmental racism crises.”Walmart and Home Depot told Grist they are working with freight partners to “encourage” sustainable shipping solutions. Costco declined to comment. Of the 15 other companies identified in the report — including Amazon, HP, Lowe’s, and Nike — only Dell and Ikea responded to Grist’s request for comment. Dell reiterated its previously announced emissions reduction targets, including the ambition to reach net-zero emissions across its supply chain by 2050. Ikea said ocean shipping an “important topic” that needs more focus, and that it aims to reduce its transport emissions 70 percent below 2013 values by 2030.

DOE to offer $2.5B for carbon capture projects at power plants, industrial sites - The Department of Energy will provide $2.52 billion in funding for two carbon capture programs, with additional funding possible later, the agency said Thursday.Through its Carbon Capture Demonstration Projects Program, DOE is offering $1.7 billion for about six commercial-scale carbon capture projects integrated with carbon transportation and geologic storage infrastructure.The program focuses on projects that can be replicated at power plants and major industrial sources of carbon emissions, such as cement, pulp and paper, iron and steel plants, the department said.DOE will offer up to 50% of a project’s cost. It is targeting projects at two coal-fired power plants, two gas-fired plants and two industrial facilities, with the precise locations to be determined.DOE is also offering $820 million for up to 10 projects focused on “de-risking transformational” carbon capture technologies.Funding for the Carbon Capture Large-Scale Pilots program will support testing of emerging technologies for the power and industrial sectors, according to DOE. DOE said it expects it will issue another carbon capture demonstration funding opportunity for projects that are still performing front-end engineering design studies.“This announcement is significant not just for the size of the investment, but for the impact it will have on further advancing the development and deployment of carbon management technologies in both heavy industry and power sectors,” Jessie Stolark, Carbon Capture Coalition executive director, said in a statement.Including the just-announced programs, the bipartisan Infrastructure Law has provided more than $10 billion to boost carbon capture technology, according to Stolark.

California Carbon Capture Pipelines - Pipeline debate at center of California carbon capture plans - Twenty years into climate change efforts, California is now relying heavily on a controversial technology — capturing climate pollution from industry and piping it underground, where it's supposed to remain permanently. But the idea of storing carbon dioxide underground was always controversial in the state because some argue it allows polluters to keep polluting. Now that controversy is peaking. Experts say there is no other way to comply with the law that requires no net addition of carbon pollution to the air by 2045. The pipelines to transport the gas have become the latest flashpoint at time when the federal government is offering unprecedented financial incentives for these projects.

CO2 pipeline developer says Illinois sites are just the beginning - After filing a new application for a multi-state carbon dioxide pipeline, Navigator CO2 Ventures says its two proposed sequestration sites in Illinois will not be the last word on the project.“We want to build out something that’s dynamic in nature, which means a variety of on-ramps [and] a variety of off-ramps,” said Elizabeth Burns-Thompson, Navigator’s vice president of government and public affairs. “The geology in Central Illinois is ripe for sequestration, and the ability to do this safely in a number of counties has great potential. We want to go out and map landowner interest and appetite with where the geology makes sense.”Navigator has refiled its petition with the Illinois Commerce Commission for an expanded carbon dioxide pipeline route, adding a 42-mile spur to a proposed carbon sequestration site that was not listed in an earlier proposal. That petition was withdrawn in January at the urging of regulatory staff, who said it lacked sufficient detail, and in the face of intense local opposition.The new application, filed Feb. 24, says the Heartland Greenway pipeline will still connect to a “permanent underground sequestration site” in Christian County plus a “termination and delivery point in Montgomery County for sequestration areas being developed” by the company. The 42-mile lateral pipeline added to the latest application would connect Sangamon and Montgomery counties to the main pipeline, which would collect carbon dioxide from ethanol and fertilizer plants across five states. Navigator’s Illinois application notes that carbon dioxide carried in the pipeline may be stored in “terminal facilities” that would make it available for industrial users as “an efficient source of carbon dioxide.” The application says these hubs would be located in Iowa, not Illinois, but Burns-Thompson said that carbon dioxide could also be sold to industrial users in Illinois in the future. “We have always looked at this as a dynamic piece of infrastructure that continues to grow and evolve based on the market demands of our shippers,” she said. “There are manufacturers that can take carbon dioxide and break that molecule down into something that’s a valuable product.”As of December, the company had only secured 6% of the easements it would need from Illinois landowners, according to filings with the Illinois Commerce Commission. And Christian County, where it proposed to sequester carbon, passed a moratorium on carbon dioxide pipelines.

EPA to award $250 million in IRA funds to reduce climate pollution - The Biden Administration will make $250 million in grants available to develop strategies to cut climate pollution, the Environmental Protection Agency announced Wednesday. The funds are the first in $5 billion in grant funding allocated by the Inflation Reduction Act’s (IRA) Climate Pollution Reduction Grants (CPRG) program, EPA officials said on a call with reporters Tuesday evening. States, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia will be eligible to receive $3 million in grants, while the CPRG program will make a further $1 million available to the nation’s 67 most populous metropolitan areas. Deputy EPA Administrator Janet McCabe said on the Tuesday call that another $25 million would be set aside for tribes. McCabe acknowledged states, cities and tribes are “at different starting points” on addressing pollution, adding that the funds could be used either to begin new initiatives or build on existing ones. McCabe said the grants will likely be awarded by summer of 2023. The agency has set a March 31 deadline for notices of intent to participate at the state level, with an April 28 deadline for the 67 most populous areas. Tribes and territories will have until June 15. The administration will make another $4.6 million available later in 2023 in competitive grant funding for implementation of plans. The initial $250 million is noncompetitive. The announcement comes the week after the agency also announced $550 million in funds to address environmental inequity through local nonprofits, following an initial round of $100 million.

'We can’t find people to work': The newest threat to Biden's climate policies – President Joe Biden has been traveling the country to tout the job creation boom his billions of dollars in clean energy spending will bring.But the cutting-edge companies he’s promoting face a struggle: hiring enough people to fill those jobs.The same booming labor market that has given Biden the lowest unemployment rate since the 1960s is also creating a hiring bottleneck for the same construction and manufacturing companies that are central to his climate agenda. Democrats’ policies rely on those companies to make batteries, build solar panels and accelerate next-generation technology that aims to remove planet-warming carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.“Having the technicians and the engineers and skilled mechanics, that is going to be a challenge in the United States,” Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, a prominent Democratic clean energy proponent whose own 2020 presidential platform helped shape some of Biden’s policies, said in an interview.Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act includes $369 billion in clean energy incentives that are meant to send a signal to U.S. businesses — encouraging them to build and deploy electric cars, carbon-free energy sources and less-wasteful appliances. And it appears to be working: More than 100,000 clean-energy job openings have sprung up across the U.S. since Biden signed the climate law six months ago, according to Climate Power, a coalition of environmental groups. But another report cast a more ominous outlook: The U.S. construction industry was short 413,000 workers as of December, while 764,000 manufacturing sector jobs remained open, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And the consulting firm McKinsey & Co, expects 550,000 new energy transition jobs will become available by 2030, about 10 percent of which may be filled by people leaving the oil and gas industry. “The first thing I heard from everyone was the same thing: We can’t find people to work,” said Rep. Bob Latta (R-Ohio), said of a recent visit to his manufacturing-heavy district in northern Ohio. “That’s inhibiting what they can do.”Companies in the clean energy sector have raised alarms about labor shortages, said Dawn Lippert, CEO of Honolulu-based Elemental Excelerator, a group that helps clean energy start-ups.“Our portfolio companies have two main concerns: capital and workforce. The need to grow the workforce is evident in all industries, from electricians to finance,” she said.

"Climate Change Cult At It Again": Apple Users Frustrated With 'Green Charging' - A silly feature introduced with iOS 16.1 called "Clean Energy Charging" has upset some iPhone users as their devices will only charge when lower carbon-emission electricity on the grid is available. Some iPhone users reported when iOS 16.1 was installed -- their devices were automatically selected for Clean Energy Charging. Charging when the grid is 'green' has its disadvantages for the user experience, who might incur slower charge times. Twitter is a buzz this morning with frustrated Apple users. Some complained about 'slower iPhone charging' and encouraged others to turn off the setting. While Apple is forcefully trying to reduce the carbon footprint of iPhone users to fight climate change, don't bring up the sobering reality about all the carbon emissions it takes to mine lithium and other rare Earth metals for Apple products. Also, don't bring up company execs, such as Tim Cook, who fly on private jets. What irks the average person is that corporate elites and governments impose life-altering climate change measures on the working poor while the rules don't apply to the rich. Recall the Biden administration is trying to ban gas stoves.

How broadcast TV networks covered climate change in 2022 | Media Matters for America - Breaking a decade-long trend of year-to-year fluctuation, corporate broadcast TV networks' climate coverage increased for the second consecutive year. However, climate coverage still accounted for just around 1% of all corporate broadcast programming in 2022, a figure that is woefully inadequate in the face of a worsening climate crisis. In our annual analysis of broadcast news climate coverage, Media Matters found that morning, evening, and Sunday morning political shows on ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox Broadcasting Co. spent approximately 1,374 minutes — nearly 23 hours — discussing climate change. This is roughly equivalent to the high-water mark of nearly 22 hours that networks achieved in 2021. The coverage was largely driven by another year of apocalyptic extreme weather events including brutal, record-shattering heat across Europe and Asia, famine exacerbated by both flooding and drought in East Africa, and historic flooding in Pakistan. In the U.S., extreme weather has exposed the vulnerability of our power system and its aging infrastructure and threatened water supplies for communities across the Southwest. The consistent volume of coverage from 2021 through 2022 — after years of advocacy by climate journalists, activists, and researchers pushing for more and better climate coverage by TV news shows — was supported by commitments from corporate broadcast networks to cover climate through collaborative initiatives like Covering Climate Now and dedicated reporting during key climate events. However, some problematic trends continued to materialize in the quality of corporate broadcast news coverage of climate change, including, for at least the sixth year in a row, an overwhelming proportion of non-Hispanic white men featured as guests in climate coverage, despite the disproportionate harm people of color suffer from climate change. Additionally, while broadcast networks are increasingly covering the impacts of, and potential solutions to, the climate crisis, they largely fail to explicitly name the primary drivers of global warming or the main impediments to climate action.

Lithium Industry Reeling After China Shutters 10% Of Global Supply -- That's a nice little EV industry you got over there in the US, it's be a shame if suddenly it found itself without the most important commodity. That's one way to interpret what just happened in China; another - a less cynical - is the way Bloomberg described it, namely that China’s lithium industry itself is reeling as its top production hub - responsible for around a 10th of the world’s supply - faces sweeping closures amid a government probe of environmental infringements. The crackdown in Yichun, Jiangxi province, also known as the country's "Lithium capital" follows a local lithium frenzy over the past year as miners raced to feed rampant demand for the battery material — and to benefit from record global prices. Now, they’re grappling with a close-up inspection by environment officials sent from Beijing. According to Yicai newspaper, ore-processing operations in Yichun have been ordered to stop as investigators probe alleged violations at lithium mines. That, Bloomberg notes, threatens somewhere between 8% and 13% of global supply, according to various analyst estimates, although it’s unclear for how long the immediate shutdowns will last. The sudden probe injects a big dose of uncertainty into a lithium market that has seen prices drop, bringing some relief to EV manufacturers, as more global output emerges. Jiangxi province was expected to be a big source of extra supply, from a lithium-bearing mineral known as lepidolite. “This supervision may mean that the inspection and control over lepidolite mining in China will be more stringent in the future,” Due to the ongoing probe, all lepidolite mining in Yichun aside from those by a state-owned company have been suspended, but refineries are still operational, Daiwa analysts Dennis Ip and Leo Ho said. Global lithium prices soared to a record high last year as demand from China’s booming electric-vehicle industry outstripped production. And, as so often happens in commodities, where the cure to high prices is more supply, leading to lower prices, this high-profit, high-demand environment has encouraged miners to skirt regulations.

Ford’s F-150 Electric Pickup’s Built From Metal Damaging the Amazon Rainforest -The new all-electric model of America’s best-selling pickup truck, the Ford F-150, relies on aluminum to keep it light and give it speed. With no delay from a piston-firing combustion engine, it can bolt like a high-performance sports car from zero to 60 in 4 seconds. It emits no exhaust, makes no sound.Yet its impact can be heard a world away — in the Amazon rainforest in Brazil. That’s where the Ford F-150’s troubled trail of aluminum begins.Aluminum used to frame the truck’s passenger compartment can be traced back from Ford Motor Co.’s historic Rouge assembly complex in Dearborn, Michigan, to a parts manufacturer in Pennsylvania, to a smelter in Canada and, ultimately, to Brazil. There, in the heart of the Amazon, rust-colored bauxite is being clawed from a mine that has long faced allegations of pollution and land appropriation. And, near where the Amazon River empties into the Atlantic, a refinery that processes the ore stands accused of sickening thousands of people.A class-action lawsuit on behalf of 11,000 residents of neighborhoods surrounding that refinery, Hydro Alunorte, names owner Norsk Hydro ASA of Norway as responsible for polluting their rivers and streams. The suit cites toxic mud containing elevated levels of aluminum and other heavy metals, which are byproducts of refining bauxite into alumina, the white powder that becomes aluminum. Alunorte’s actions, it alleges, have caused health problems such as cancer, hair loss, neurological dysfunction, birth defects and increased mortality.“Every single day we die a little bit,” says Maria do Socorro, 57, whose community group Cainquiama is the lead plaintiff and who lives in an open-air house not far from the refinery. Her grandson’s organs broke through his skin at birth, and eight people in her family have been stricken with cancer, she says, including herself and her husband, who she says died as a result. “We are victims of this company, Hydro. They come and make money and leave nothing for us.”

Stainless Steal - The decay in quality reveals that the collapse of the neoliberal-hyper-financialization-hyper-globalization model has already occurred. I've often addressed the dismaying decline of quality over the past 30+ years, for example, The "Crapification" of the U.S. Economy Is Now Complete (February 9, 2022). I have attributed this to:

• 1) hyper-globalization, which pushes manufacturers to buy the cheapest components to lower costs. The failure of any one poorly made component renders the entire device useless junk which is dumped in the landfill.
• 2) Planned obsolescence as the corporate strategy to boost profits in an economy where everyone already has everything. By reducing the quality, product failure is accelerated, and the hapless consumer is forced to replace a device every few years that 30 years ago would have provided decades of trouble-free service.
• 3) Consumers have been trained to consume, no matter how poor the quality. Tossing stuff in the landfill is wonderful because this gives us another excuse to go shopping.
• 4) Since global production and distribution is dominated by rapacious cartels and quasi-monopolies, they don't care about the terminal decay of the quality of their product/service. They know we're going to buy their low-quality rubbish anyway because we have no choice, and they know the quality of "competing" (hahaha) products is equally abysmal.

Longtime correspondent Bart D., who coined the term Landfill Economy, pointed out a fifth source of decaying quality: resource depletion. It's not just hyper-globalization / corporate profiteering driven cost reductions at the expense of durability; it's also the increasing cost and difficulty of obtaining quality materials and components at any price. Here are Bart's comments on "stainless steel": "I found, what was for me, the most profound evidence of the ascendancy of the Fraud Economy that underpins the Landfill Economy. I found it in the term and substance 'stainless steel.' I own some old and by the standards of the day in the 1970’s 'cheap' stainless steel knives and cutlery. I use a few of these pieces as garden tools. They lay around in the dirt and weather 24-7 and 365 days a year. They are used for purposes never intended by their manufacturers, uses that they would classify as abuse. And I can pick these items out of the dirt, rinse them under a tap and they come up looking like new. They are shiny, silver and have no sign of rust. And I also own some 'quality' stainless steel items that were manufactured in the last 5 years in China. They were not priced in the 'Cheap and Nasty' bracket. These items do nothing more than live in a kitchen or out under the pergola and get wet with clean water. With Plain water. And they rust. Prolifically. So it seems that since the 1970s, we have managed to figure out how to make Fraud Stainless at a price point above actual stainless (inflation adjusted). I have come to realise that we are now a VERY long way past 'Peak Quality' and Peak quality of life. And we seem to accept this degradation as normal. We are now living in a comprehensive illusion of what is quality. I'm starting to wonder if there are any products being produced today that are genuinely superior to those produced 30+ years ago. Advertising tells us that products are 'Premium,' but 40 years ago products with similar or superior specifications were produced as 'cheap.' Todays standard grade products would be regarded as Defective in the economy of pre-1990s. Why is this happening? Almost certainly it's a product of resource depletion and substitution of superior and fit-for-purpose materials with inferior and faulty materials. I have seen this also in copper pipe and road bitumen. The pre-90s versions of these products were durable and fit for purpose … whatever watered down substitutes we use now are defective grade products that degrade quickly even under normal working conditions. I wonder how far quality can degrade before our economic model fails? Maybe we're just arriving at the point of failure now?" Tossing all the low-quality goods in the landfill and replacing them with even lower quality goods is now the global model of "growth." But since very few of the discarded goods have recyclable materials that are actually recycled, this waste is growth model runs into limits of materials availability and cost: when even low quality becomes too costly, the bottom 80% of consumers can no longer afford to buy replacements. Stainless steal won't survive impact. Fraud and theft eventually catch up with economies which have made them the centerpieces of "prosperity."

Green colonialism is flooding the Pacific Northwest (A wave of green colonialism) — High Country News – Is it green energy if it’s impacting cultural traditional sites?” Yakama Nation Tribal Councilman Jeremy Takala sounded weary. For five years, tribal leaders and staff have been fighting a renewable energy development that could permanently destroy tribal cultural property. “This area, it’s irreplaceable.”The privately owned land, outside Goldendale, Washington, is called Pushpum, or “mother of roots,” a first foods seed bank. The Yakama people have treaty-protected gathering rights there. One wind turbine-studded ridge, Juniper Point, is the proposed site of a pumped hydro storage facility. But to build it, Boston-based Rye Development would have to carve up Pushpum — and the Yakama Nation lacks a realistic way to stop it.Back in October 2008, unbeknownst to Takala, Scott Tillman, CEO of Golden Northwest Aluminum Corporation, met with the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, a collection of governor-appointed representatives from Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana who maintain a 20-year regional energy plan prioritizing low economic and environmental tolls. Tillman, who owned a shuttered Lockheed Martin aluminum smelter near Goldendale, told the council about the contaminated site’s redevelopment potential, specifically for pumped hydro storage, which requires a steep incline like Juniper Point to move water through a turbine. Shortly thereafter, Klickitat County’s public utility department tried to implement Tillman’s plan, but hit a snag in the federal regulatory process. That’s when Rye Development stepped in.“We’re committed to at least a $10 million portion of the cleanup of the former aluminum smelter,” said Erik Steimle, Rye’s vice president of project development, “an area that is essentially sitting there now that wouldn’t be cleaned up in that capacity without this project.”Meanwhile, Tillman cleaned up and sold another smelting site, just across the Columbia River in The Dalles, Oregon, a Superfund site where Lockheed Martin had poisoned the groundwater with cyanide. He sold it to Google’s parent company, Alphabet, which operates water-guzzling data centers in The Dalles and plans to build more. For nine years, the county and Rye plotted the fate of Pushpum — without ever notifying the Yakama Nation.The tribal government only learned of the development in December 2017, when the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued a public notice of acceptance for Rye’s preliminary permit application. Tribal officials had just 60 days to catch up on nine years of development planning and issue their initial concerns and objections as public comments.

This ‘climate-friendly’ fuel comes with an astronomical cancer risk --The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently gave a Chevron refinery the green light to create fuel from discarded plastics as part of a climate-friendly initiative to boost alternatives to petroleum. But, according to agency records obtained by ProPublica and the Guardian, the production of one of the fuels could emit air pollution that is so toxic, one out of four people exposed to it over a lifetime could get cancer.“That kind of risk is obscene,” said Linda Birnbaum, former head of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. “You can’t let that get out.” That risk is 250,000 times greater than the level usually considered acceptable by the EPA division that approves new chemicals. Chevron hasn’t started making this fuel yet, the EPA said. When the company does, the cancer burden will disproportionately fall on people who have low incomes and are Black because of the population that lives within three miles of the refinery that will produce the fuel in Pascagoula, Mississippi.ProPublica and the Guardian asked Maria Doa, a scientist who worked at the EPA for 30 years, to review the document laying out the risk. Doa, who once ran the division that managed the risks posed by chemicals, was so alarmed by the cancer threat that she initially assumed it was a typographical error. “EPA should not allow these risks in Pascagoula or anywhere,” said Doa, who now is the senior director of chemical policy at Environmental Defense Fund. In response to questions from ProPublica and the Guardian, an EPA spokesperson wrote that the agency’s lifetime cancer risk calculation is “a very conservative estimate with ‘high uncertainty’”, meaning the government erred on the side of caution in calculating such a high risk. . In approving the fuel, the EPA didn’t require any lab tests, air monitoring or controls that would reduce the release of the cancer-causing pollutants or people’s exposure to them.In January 2022, the EPA announced the initiative to streamline the approval of petroleum alternatives in what a press release called “part of the Biden-Harris administration’s actions to confront the climate crisis”. While the program cleared new fuels made from plants, it also signed off on fuels made from plastics even though they are petroleum-based and contribute to the release of planet-warming greenhouse gases.Although there’s no mention of discarded plastics in the press release or on the EPA website’s description of the program, an agency spokesperson told ProPublica and the Guardian that it allows their production because the initiative also covers fuels made from waste. The spokesperson said that 16 of the 34 fuels the program approved so far are made from waste. She would not say how many of those are made from plastic and stated that such information was confidential. Aside from the chemical that carries a 25% lifetime risk of cancer from smokestack emissions, another of the Chevron fuels ushered in through the program is expected to cause cancer in 1.2 of 10,000 people – a rate also far higher than the agency allows for the general population. The EPA division that screens new chemicals typically limits cancer risk from a single air pollutant to one case of cancer per million people. The agency also calculated that air pollution from one of the fuels is expected to cause cancer in 7.1 of every 1,000 workers – more than 70 times the level the EPA’s new chemicals division usually considers acceptable for workers. In addition to the chemicals released through the creation of fuels from plastics, the people living near the Chevron refinery are exposed to an array of other cancer-causing pollutants, as ProPublica reported in 2021. In that series, which mapped excess cancer risk from lifetime exposure to air pollution across the US, the greatest risk was one cancer case per 53 people, in Port Arthur, Texas.

As Oil Companies Stay Lean, Workers Move to Renewable Energy - Oil and gas companies laid off roughly 160,000 workers in 2020, and they maintained tight budgets and hired cautiously over the last two years. But many renewable businesses expanded rapidly after the early shock of the pandemic faded, snapping up geologists, engineers and other workers from the likes of Exxon and Chevron. Half of Fervo’s 38 employees come from fossil fuel companies, including BP, Hess and Chesapeake Energy. Executives and workers in energy hubs in Houston, Dallas and other places say steady streams of people are moving from fossil fuel to renewable energy jobs. It’s hard to track such movements in employment statistics, but the overall numbers suggest such career moves are becoming more common. Oil, gas and coal employment has not recovered to its prepandemic levels. But the number of jobs in renewable energy, including solar, wind, geothermal and battery businesses, is rising.The oil and gas industry had roughly 700,000 fewer workers last year than six years earlier, a decline of over 20 percent. Much of that drop had to do with the slowing of the shale drilling boom and greater automation. By comparison, employment in wind energy grew nearly 20 percent from 2016 to 2021, to more than 113,000 workers.In more than a dozen interviews, energy workers and executives said they had switched to renewable energy because they felt that the oil and gas industry’s best days were behind it. Others said they were no longer willing to tolerate the extreme ups and downs of oil and gas prices, and the accompanying cycle of rapid hiring followed by crushing layoffs. Many said concerns about climate change, which is primarily caused by the burning of fossil fuels, were a factor in their decision.

Offshore wind turbines are growing larger. How big is too big? - Even though offshore wind is just getting going in the United States, the turbines that will be used are changing dramatically — growing bigger and bigger. Turbine towers as tall as skyscrapers make more electricity than their shorter predecessors. This will make offshore wind farms — a pricey form of green energy — cheaper for developers to build. “There’s a big motivation to going bigger, because the more power you can capture with the single turbine, the more you can reduce cost of electricity,” explained Todd Griffith, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Texas, Dallas. “That’s been the single most important goal of the entire industry, to reduce costs.” But the race by global manufacturers to go enormous comes with its own significant hitch: It keeps changing the standard size of offshore wind turbines, potentially with ripple effects all the way down the supply chain. “[The push for larger turbines] has a lot of ramifications throughout the industry,” said Sam Salustro, vice president of strategic communications at the Business Network for Offshore Wind, a trade organization that represents suppliers and manufacturers that serve offshore wind. “As long as you’re constantly changing design parameters and sizes, it’s much harder to really hit efficiencies of the entire supply chain.” The size debate highlights the still-evolving nature of the young offshore sector in the United States and a potential complication for the Biden administration as it tries to lock in offshore wind to help decarbonize the grid by midcentury. The trajectory of the turbine race could have serious implications for the White House’s wind goals, which include revitalizing ports and building a slew of manufacturing plants the White House hopes will create union jobs from the Carolinas to Maine. Turbine towers made of steel, with blades the length of several school buses, will have to be designed, manufactured and put together. That includes the nacelles, rotors and foundations of the giant structures, not to mention the jack-up vessels needed to sink turbines into the seabed. Building a supply chain to reach President Joe Biden’s 2030 target of enough offshore wind to power 10 million homes represents $22 billion of investment, according to a recent Department of Energy report. Industry observers say it could be difficult to reach that level of investment if goal posts keep moving. Others are concerned about the reliability of rapidly evolving turbines, as they are still untested in the real world. Griffith and others said the sheer size of these turbines isn’t currently a safety concern due to the rigorous testing ahead of putting new models on the market. While blades falling off turbines, towers crumpling or motors catching fire make headlines, engineers say these incidents represent just a small fraction of the thousands of turbines operating worldwide.

Over 2 million more electric vehicles estimated in New England over next decade | New Hampshire Public Radio - New England's grid operator says approximately 2.4 million more electric vehicles could be driving on the region's roads in the next decade. But clean energy advocates say without significant improvements to EV infrastructure and policy in New Hampshire, uptake here will lag behind.The new preliminary draft figures, released this month by ISO New England, take into account a mix of local policies and manufacturing timelines. It also cites several federal policies, such as tax incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act and the EPA’s Clean School Bus grants program, that are part of the White House’s efforts to dramaticallyreduce the country’s reliance on fossil fuels.The draft forecast shows the biggest percent increase for EV’s in new light-duty fleet vehicles, such as delivery trucks and passenger vans. Personal EV’s would still account for the vast majority of electric vehicles, with over 300,000 new personal EV’s to be added annually by 2031. More electric vehicles on the road will require big upgrades to the region’s charging infrastructure and power grid and to its automotive and energy workforce. The New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission approved a plan last year to allow Eversource to build EV charging stations in the state. But in infrastructure and incentives, New Hampshire is significantly behind neighboring states. According to ISO New England’s 2022 forecast, New Hampshire is expected to contribute to only 4% of the overall EV increase over the next decade, in part due to local policies and infrastructure.

EVs are billed as the future. But a potential skills gap is sparking concerns about cost and safety - From seatbelts to airbags and radios to parking sensors, today's cars are packed with innovations that have transformed the vehicles we drive.Thanks to growing concerns about emissions from road-based transportation, several big economies are gearing up for another huge change: the mass rollout of electric vehicles. The U.K., for instance, wants to stop the sale of new diesel and gasoline cars and vans by 2030 and will require, from 2035, all new cars and vans to have zero tailpipe emissions.The European Union, which the U.K. left on Jan. 31, 2020, is pursuing similar targets. And over in the U.S., California — America's most populous state — is banning the sale of new gasoline-powered vehicles by 2035.The above goals above are years away but, bit by bit, changes are already being seen on the ground. Take the U.K., for example. According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, 2022 saw factories there produce 234,066 battery electric, plug-in hybrid and hybrid electric vehicles, a record number that accounted for 30.2% of total car production."Total BEV production rose 4.8%, with hybrid volumes up 4.3%, and boosting output of these vehicles will be critical in the attainment of net zero, for both the UK and major overseas markets," the industry body said.As the number of EVs on our roads increases, a workforce with the knowledge to fix and properly maintain them will be needed.There are concerns, however, that a skills gap may emerge in the near future, creating a big headache for both the automotive sector and drivers.In January, the Institute of the Motor Industry — a professional association for those employed in the sector — said roughly 16% of technicians in the U.K. had the relevant qualifications to work on electrified vehicles."The IMI predicts that the number of IMI TechSafe qualified technicians required to work with electric vehicles by 2030 is 77,000, increasing to 89,000 by 2032," it said."Aligned to Auto Trader Insight predictions, this suggests the skills gap — when there won't be enough technicians to service the electrified vehicle parc — will appear in 2029," it added. "Parc" is a term the SMMT says represents the "total stock of cars on the roads."The size of this skills gap, according to the IMI's January 2023 forecast, will leap from 700 in 2029 to 13,100 in 2032.

DOE touts grid expansion plans as operators raise concerns - The Department of Energy calls its new draft report on transmission a vital step in confronting barriers to long-distance power lines, but not all U.S. grid operators are sold on the outlook.DOE’s draft “National Transmission Needs Study,” released Friday, is the department’s initial view of where and how interstate power networks need to expand by the 2030s to carry three to four times the flow of wind and solar power on the grid today.It also looks at how to prevent congested power lines from swelling consumers’ utility bills. And DOE has outlined another reason to support high-voltage towers and lines: keeping the lights on.By increasing power-sharing capacity between regions, new lines can help defend against extreme weather assaults that are expected to get worse in the future, the study argues.Yet grid organizations in two major regions — Texas and the Southeast — signaled they aren’t eager for closer ties. And PJM Interconnection LLC, which manages the grid in swaths of the mid-Atlantic and Midwest, said the analysis needs to be stronger if DOE hopes to use it to implement new transmission authority under the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law.PJM “stands ready to assist the DOE in that effort,” the grid operator said in public comments attached to the new report. “However, in reviewing the draft, it is hard to find the specific analysis that supports the study’s findings — an issue that could provide grist for later legal challenges to the [Energy] Secretary’s actions that are being taken in reliance upon the study.”Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said during a webinar last year that “we need more transmission, period, to deliver this cleaner and cheaper and more reliable and resilient energy.”According to the needs study, building larger interregional transmission lines would open channels for more power flows into stressed states in emergencies, preventing blackouts and enormous price spikes like those that wracked Texas and other central U.S. states during Winter Storm Uri in February 2021. Doubling or tripling the current transmission system could cost up to several trillion dollars by midcentury as electrification of transportation and heating grows and old lines are replaced, according to research cited in the DOE study. DOE said it is also preparing a National Transmission Planning Study with a detailed cost-benefit analysis of grid expansion.

Coal plant pollution can be deadly — even hundreds of miles downwind -Over the past 15 years, coal power has been on a precipitous decline across the United States, dropping in use by over 50 percent. The rise of cheaper natural gas and renewable energy combined with environmental regulations has led to the shuttering of hundreds of plants across the country. Between 2010 and 2021, 36 percent of the country’s coal plants went offline; since then another 25 percent shut down or committed to retiring by 2030.But even as coal declines, it is still keeping a deadly grasp on communities across the country, according to a new report from the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign. The coal sector is responsible for 3,800 premature deaths a year due to fine particle pollution, or PM2.5, from smokestacks. “We know that coal plants remain one of the biggest polluters in the United States,” said Holly Bender, senior director for energy campaigns with the Sierra Club. “What the [government] data didn’t show was who was most impacted by each of these plants.”Coal plants release heavier particles and localized pollution that can have acute impacts within a 30- to 50-mile radius, but they also release fine particulate matter that gets blown hundreds of miles away downwind from tall smokestacks. The report looked at these particles specifically, finding that they had widespread impacts, causing premature death in states that don’t even borderanother state with a plant. For the average coal plant, only 4 percent of premature deaths occurred in the facility’s same county and only 18 percent occurred in the same state, highlighting the cross-regional nature of the problem of coal soot. Particulate pollution has a well-documented and disproportionate impact on people of color and low-income communities. The report notes how these inequities are increasing over time. While as a whole coal is the only pollution source that affects white Americans more than average, Daniel Prull, the author of the report, noted that the impacts varied from plant to plant; many coal facilities examined in the study had disproportionate impacts on communities of color, depending on where they were located.Over 50 percent of the mortality caused by coal soot could be traced back to 17 plants, the report found. The parent company with the most deaths was Tennessee Valley Authority, which has four plants, and is owned by the U.S. government. Many of the other super-polluters, such as PPL, Berkshire Hathaway, and Ameren, were investor-owned utilities — which combined were responsible for 40 percent of these coal-driven premature deaths. “This is not just a problem that’s relegated to one part of the industry,” said Bender, adding that the parent companies causing the most harm were also the ones that have failed to make commitments to retire coal plants and transition to clean energy.

Coal ash settlement raises hopes for cleanup - A settlement between environmental groups and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency could for the first time impose regulations on hundreds of coal ash sites nationwide that are not covered by 2015 federal coal ash rules. The development stems from a 2022 lawsuit naming sites in Indiana and Illinois and accusing the EPA of failing to regularly review its rules for so-called “legacy” or “historic” coal ash sites — landfills and dumps that were inactive before federal coal ash rules took effect in 2015. The EPA is now enforcing those 2015 rules but still ignoring older sites not covered by the rules. A Feb. 3 consent decree has made environmentalists hopeful the legacy “loophole” may soon close, forcing utilities to reckon with countless tons of coal ash deposited at hundreds of sites before the 2015 rules took effect.“We’re not calling it a win, but they’re telling us they’ll consider closing the loophole,” said Susan Thomas, press, policy and legislation director for Transition Northwest Indiana. While federal coal ash rules demand groundwater monitoring and cleanup of coal ash in more than 500 ponds and pits nationwide, advocates have long pushed to address landfills that were exempted under those regulations. They argue that companies should also be forced to clean up countless tons of coal ash mixed with dirt and used to build berms and roads or fill in the land on and near coal plant sites. The August 2022 lawsuit filed on behalf of Indiana, Tennessee and Illinois civil rights and environmental groups argues that the federal law governing waste disposal mandates the coal ash rules should have been reviewed and revised to cover the coal ash thus far exempt from the rules. With the consent decree, the EPA appears to agree, with a promise to review the rules and reject or announce a draft revision by May 5. Following public comment, a final rule must be adopted by May 2024, according to the consent decree. “There have been hundreds of coal ash dumps between impoundments and landfills which have been completely exempt since the [coal ash] rule went into effect over 7 years ago,” said Mychal Ozaeta, an attorney for Earthjustice who represented the plaintiffs. “In the process of [the rules] being drafted and finalized and implemented, we advocated for these units to be included and regulated, but the EPA chose not to.”

Biden admin offers $1.2 bln for distressed, shut nuclear plants (Reuters) -The Biden administration said on Thursday it is offering a fresh round of $1.2 billion in aid to extend the life of distressed nuclear power plants which, for the first time, could offer funding to a plant that has recently closed. President Joe Biden's climate team believes nuclear power is a crucial source of virtually carbon-free electricity needed to be maintained and expanded to reach his pledge of what it calls 100% clean electricity by 2035. But faced with rising security costs and competition from wind and solar energy and power generated with cheap natural gas, about a dozen U.S. reactors have closed since 2013, leaving 92 across the country. The funding comes from the $6 billion Civil Nuclear Credit program, created by the 2021 infrastructure law, and will be distributed by the Department of Energy (DOE). In this second round, the money is available to plants at risk of closure within a few years, but also for the first time, plants that have stopped operating after Nov. 15, 2021. "Expanding the scope of this ... funding will allow even more nuclear facilities the opportunity to continue operating as economic drivers in local communities that benefit from cheap, clean, and reliable power," Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said. That apparently allows the Palisades plant in Michigan to apply. It closed in May 2022, nearly two weeks earlier than its planned date, after then-owner Entergy Corp discovered a coolant system leak. Holtec International, the current owner, had applied for the first round of funding, but the DOE rejected it. Holtec's application had surprised some officials because reviving plants after closure has never been done and had not been a major consideration of the bill's sponsors. Holtec's application was rejected despite it being supported by Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer in a letter last year to Granholm, a former governor of the state. The plant provided about 600 highly paid jobs. Last month, Holtec, which has said it will take more than $1 billion to reopen Palisades, had applied for a different source of funding, the DOE's Loan Programs Office, to reopen the plant. Last year, the DOE provided $1.1 billion in conditional CNC funding to Pacific Gas & Electric's Diablo Canyon nuclear plant that had been set to fully shut in 2025.

Contentious California nuclear plant can keep operating, federal regulators decide - California’s biggest utility will be able to keep a disputed nuclear plant running while seeking official permission to extend the facility’s operations, a federal regulatory decided on Thursday. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) granted an exemption on Thursday to Pacific Gas & Electricity that will allow the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant to continue operating under its current licenses while the agency considers its renewal application. While both Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) and state legislators have been advocating for the extension as a reliable source of energy to support California’s clean energy transition, environmental groups remain vocal in their opposition for the plans. Located about 25 miles southwest of San Luis Obispo along California’s Central Coast, the Diablo Canyon first began operating in 1985. PG&E announced plans in 2016 to retire the facility and decommission the reactors when the licenses expire. But after California enacted legislation this fall to continue operations, the utility moved to apply for a license renewal. The licenses for Diablo’s two reactors are set to expire in November of 2024 and August 2025, respectively. The NRC exemption enables those licenses to remain in effect while the regulator reviews the renewal application, assuming that PG&E submits its request by the end of the year, according to the regulator. “The exemption is authorized by law, will not present undue risk to the public health and safety, and is consistent with the common defense and security,” a statement from the NRC said. “Diablo Canyon’s continued operation is in the public interest because of serious challenges to the reliability of California’s electricity grid,” the regulator added.

Householder seeks to sow reasonable doubt in Ohio corruption trial – Eye on Ohio --In his testimony in Ohio’s House Bill 6 corruption trial, former House Speaker Larry Householder challenged details of the government’s story and leaned on the argument that he engaged in normal political conduct that didn’t cross the line into criminal behavior.“Absolutely you have to raise money” in order to become speaker of the House, Householder said. “You need lots of donors.” Yet he said there were no promises to pass any specific legislation in return for funds from FirstEnergy and its affiliates.Cross-examination by lawyers for lobbyist and former Ohio Republican Party chair Matt Borges has likewise been geared toward countering potentially damaging testimony by government witnesses while presenting his actions as aggressive but effective politics that didn’t rise to the level of a crime.Between an explicit quid pro quo and outsized campaign contributions, “there’s a whole lot of gray area,” said Catherine Turcer, executive director of Common Cause Ohio.Government lawyers rested their case on Feb. 27 after five weeks of testimony and exhibits supporting their claims that Householder, Borges, three other individuals and the nonprofit corporation Generation Now took part in an alleged racketeering conspiracy centered around HB 6, Ohio’s nuclear and coal bailout law.Evidence introduced during the prosecution’s case told a story of fraudulent conduct, bribery, money laundering, and abuse of public office. The government claims an enterprise, allegedly led by Householder and assisted by others, funneled roughly $60 million from FirstEnergy and its affiliates to Generation Now and other dark money groups. In return, the enterprise allegedly made sure Ohio enacted HB 6 and protected the bill from a voter referendum. Co-defendant and former Generation Now president Jeff Longstreth pled guilty and testified as part of the government’s case, as did co-defendant Juan Cespedes, who acted as a lobbyist for FirstEnergy Solutions.FirstEnergy also admitted in July 2021 that it used nonprofit entities known as 501(c)(4) corporations to conceal payments and secure favorable treatment from the former House speaker. The company also said it paid $4.3 million to a company linked to Sam Randazzo shortly before he became chair of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio. At the end of the government’s case, Judge Timothy Black denied Householder and Borges’ motions for acquittal. The evidence viewed most favorably to the prosecution could support a guilty verdict under relevant federal law, he said. That law is the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, also known as RICO. Under federal law, the jury can only render a guilty verdict if it finds proof beyond a reasonable doubt for all elements of the alleged crime. The judge will tell jurors what those elements are. Both sides filed proposed jury instructions with the court before the trial began.The government’s proposed jury instructions call for jurors to find four elements of the crime. First, the defendants must have engaged in an enterprise, or joint undertaking. Second, that enterprise must have engaged in or affected interstate or foreign commerce.Third, a defendant must have been employed by or otherwise associated with the enterprise. And fourth, evidence would have to prove that each defendant knowingly conspired to conduct or take part in the enterprise’s affairs through a pattern of racketeering activity.

Oil and gas commission looking to lawmakers for increased royalties, fees - The commission in charge of new rules for leasing Ohio’s state lands to oil and gas companies will seek legislative tweaks to award leases through bidding and to allow for more lucrative royalties. Meanwhile, the commission is pushing forward with a standard lease form over the objections of environmentalists.They worry that, despite repeated statements to the contrary, the proposal opens the door to surface uses like setting up drilling equipment within state parks.The Ohio Oil and Gas Land Management Commission introduced its standard lease form at a meeting in February. The public comment period for that draft has now closed.Environmentalists have zeroed in on a particular section which notes “without a separate written surface use agreement,” companies can’t build structures like well pads, pipelines or pump stations on public land. Cathy Cowan Becker argued that language creates a supposition that surface use is possible, but that directly contradicts what Gov. Mike DeWine has promised.“The administration has a policy of prohibiting any new surface use impacts,” she explained. “But if you go to their draft at least form, it says that they can have surface impacts with a separate written surface use agreement.”“And so that can be negotiated after a lease comes to this commission and is approved, then that’s all done out of sight, all behind closed doors,” she added.Public lands advocates voiced frustrations with the proposed nomination process whereby interested companies select and pursue a given parcel. Roxanne Groff wants to see more time for public comment.“We asked for a minimum 60 days,” she said, “and we cannot accept 45.”With the public comment period concluded, next steps include a determination from the state’s Common Sense Initiative which intervenes when rules could hamper business development. After that, the commission has to hold an additional public hearing and go before the Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review.

Gulfport Makes $495M in 2022, Drilled & Turned to Sales 28 Wells | Marcellus Drilling News - Gulfport Energy, the third-largest driller in the Ohio Utica Shale (by the number of wells drilled), emerged from bankruptcy in May 2021 with a new board and new top management. In January of this year, the company appointed a new CEO, John Reinhart, the former President and CEO of M-U driller Montage Resources Corporation before that company was gobbled up by Southwestern Energy (see Marcellus Veteran John Reinhart Joins Gulfport Energy as CEO). Yesterday Gulfport issued its 4Q and full 2022 update. The company made $749 million in net income during 4Q22, versus $558 million in 4Q21 (up 34%). Gulfport’s net income for the full year was $495 million in 2022, versus losing $113 million in 2021.

No — natural gas is not really green energy - – Randi Pokladnik - During the recent lame duck session, Ohio’s predominantly Republican Legislature and Gov. Mike DeWine rushed to pass HB 507. The amended bill prohibits communities from banning pesticides within city borders and allows state lands and parks to be leased for oil and gas development. The legislation also would “create a broad new legal definition of green energy that would include natural gas.”An anonymously funded, pro-natural gas, dark money group, the Empowerment Alliance, helped Ohio lawmakers spin the narrative that natural gas is green. Labeling gas as green energy does not change the scientific facts: The combustion of methane produces carbon dioxide, and methane itself is a potent greenhouse gas. The bio-geo-chemical processes that created the methane gas and coal deposits in the geographic area of Ohio took place millions of years ago, when carbon sources such as ancient plants and animals decayed in anaerobic conditions. Coal has a higher percentage of carbon than methane; therefore, it produces more carbon dioxide per BTU when burned. However, both substances are fossil fuels that contribute to climate change, and both have limited supplies. Methane produces lower carbon dioxide emissions when burned but that benefit is overshadowed by the fact that extracting methane using high-pressure hydraulic fracking releases enormous amounts of methane gas into the atmosphere. These emissions can be from leaks of storage tanks, compressor stations, blowdowns, pipelines and flaring. A report published in “Energy Science and Engineering” states “natural gas (both shale gas and conventional gas) is responsible for much of the recent increases in methane emissions, and because of this have a higher greenhouse gas footprint than coal or oil. Pound for pound, the comparative impact of methane is 25 times greater than carbon dioxide. Fracking requires extensive infrastructure and constant inputs of resources such as water, sand and chemicals used to extract the methane. When it comes to the energy costs of fossil fuels, consumers are at the mercy of an industry which consistently makes record profits while it receives $20 billion a year in subsidies. Ohio’s southeastern counties provide examples of how fracking has turned rural communities into sacrificial industrial sites. Pipelines mar wooded hillsides; well pads rise over the landscape; and thousands of trucks loaded with carcinogenic chemicals, frack sand and toxic water travel our roads every day. Local residents are exposed to air and water emissions from the process which releases hazardous air pollutants and contaminants water. In February 2018, a gas well in Belmont County experienced a blowout. The well released methane gas for 20 days before the leak could be contained. The total emissions from the 20-day event were estimated to be equivalent to the total annual emissions of several countries, or 120 metric tons per hour. Given the significant contribution of methane gas to climate change and the environmental destruction caused by fracking, it is hard to understand why any educated person would call this energy source green. The only time “green” can legitimately be used to describe methane gas is when pointing out it is a potent greenhouse gas.

29 New Shale Well Permits Issued for PA-OH-WV Feb 20-26 | Marcellus Drilling News - New shale permits issued for Feb. 20-26 in the Marcellus/Utica slide lower last week. There were 29 new permits issued in total last week (down from 35 the week before), including 24 new permits for Pennsylvania, no new permits for Ohio, and five new permits issued in West Virginia. Last week the top receiver of new permits by far was the largest natural gas driller in the country, EQT Corporation, with 20 new permits split between Greene and Washington counties in southwestern PA. Antero Resources, Armstrong County, Beaver County, CNX Resources, Doddridge County, Energy Companies, EQT Corp, Greene County (PA), Harrison County, HG Energy, Lewis County, Marshall County, PennEnergy Resources, Range Resources Corp, Snyder Brothers, Southwestern Energy, Washington County, Westmoreland County

ShaleTech: Marcellus-Utica Shales - Thawing prices from a fickle winter heating season and largely politically-induced takeaway restrictions have combined to rein in gas production from the premier Appalachian basin, situated on the doorstep of half of the nation's population cluster. Amid seesawing gas prices, operators across the basin's dry and wet gas Marcellus and Utica shales of Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio are expected to produce 35,372 MMcfd in February (Fig. 1), guesstimates the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), a number which would be some 4,625 MMcfd less, year-over-year. January to February Appalachian gas production is forecast to rise by 93 MMcfd, but remains below February 2022 production. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)Gas prices vacillated for much of last year and continued into 2023, where futures for February delivery dropped to $4.172/MMBtu on Jan. 4, as a deadly arctic blast in late December gave way to unseasonably warm weather to greet the new year. The EIA projects spot gas prices on the Henry Hub benchmark will average less than $5.00/MMBtu this year. Prices hit a 2022 high of $9.85/MMBtu on Aug. 22. "I remain bullish on the outlook for natural gas, but there's no doubt we see some volatility in the near-term," Chesapeake Energy Corp. EVP and COO Josh Viets told the Bank of America Securities Global Energy Conference last November. Chesapeake is returning to its gassy roots following the $1.425 billion sale of around 377,000 net acres and 27,000 boed of oil production in its Eagle Ford Brazos Valley asset on Jan. 18.Headwinds aside, Appalachian drilling activity remained relatively steady throughout 2022 and entered 2023 with a combined 52 rigs active in January (Fig.2), according to Baker Hughes. Of those, 38 active rigs targeted the Marcellus in January—two active rigs off from the 2022 high of 40 in October—mainly in the Pennsylvania fairway, where operators are increasing focus on the Upper Marcellus horizon. Fig. 2. Cumulative Appalachian drilling activity was relatively steady last summer, averaging around 48 active rigs. Image: Southwestern Energy Co.Leading gas producer EQT Corp. operated up to three of those rigs last year, along with one to two top hole rigs and two to three frac spreads. In September, EQT spent $5.2 billion to acquire privately held Tug Hill Operating and XCL Midstream, adding 800 MMcfed of production and around 90,000 net acres to their possession, which now comprises 1.1 million net acres across the tri-state operating area. Full-year 2022 net production was projected to reach roughly 6.1 Bcfed, with 64 to 79 net wells turned-in-line—some 30% fewer than previously guided. President and CEO Toby Rice said wells have pushed back to this year, largely in hopes that the 10% to 20% inflation rate the industry has faced will ease. "One of the benefits of moving wells back in 2023, I guess, is that we do hope service costs will abate a bit," he said. "But we'd like to have those volumes today with the current price backwardations." With operators reporting record cash flows, further production growth, they say, is being hampered by difficulties in moving more gas out of the basin. The lingering dearth of pipeline capacity, which shows no sign of easing anytime soon, is driven largely by backlash from non-producing states, particularly in the Upper Northeast.

EQT Sending Oil, Natural Gas Equipment to Support Ukraine's War Efforts - EQT Corp., the largest natural gas producer in the United States, has donated production equipment to Ukraine’s largest gas producer, JSC Ukrgasvydobuvannya, to restore facilities damaged in the war with Russia. Ukrgasvydobuvannya, a unit of Naftogaz, produces 70% of Ukraine’s gas, which totals around 12.5 Bcm.“Ensuring a reliable supply of energy is a challenge, not only for Ukraine, but for the entire world,” said EQT CEO Toby Z. Rice. “This equipment will play a major role in helping to stabilize Ukraine’s energy supply.”The year-long Russian invasion of Ukraine has upended global gas and oil supplies. LNG imports from the United States have been one way to help Europe in responding to the impacts of Russia’s waning pipeline gas. “The war has significantly complicated delivery of required gas production equipment and materials. Certain equipment is just not readily available on the Ukrainian market,” said Ukrgasvydobuvannya’s acting CEO Oleg Tolmachev.

Pioneer Natural Resources considers buying smaller shale rival in Marcellus basin – Pioneer Natural Resources Co. is considering an acquisition of Range Resources Corp., according to people familiar with the matter. oil derrick in Marcellus shale basin The Texas-based oil and gas explorer is weighing a deal for the smaller U.S. rival as it seeks further consolidation in the shale industry, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing confidential information. Deliberations are ongoing and there’s no certainty the companies will reach an agreement, the people said. A representative for Pioneer declined to comment while Range couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. Pioneer shares fell as much as 7% on the news while Range rose as much as 18%, giving the company a market value of $6.8 billion. Up until Friday, shares in Pioneer have fallen 11% in New York over the last 12 months, valuing it at about $47 billion. Range’s stock is up 12% over the period. Buying Range would bring Pioneer into the Marcellus Basin in southwest Appalachia, where the key resource is gas, not oil. Pioneer already produces gas in the Permian, but only as a byproduct from its oil wells. Pioneer’s CEO Scott Sheffield has a reputation for dealmaking, with acquisitions of Parsley Energy and DoublePoint Energy since 2020. Both deals expanded Pioneer’s acreage in its core Midland Basin asset. The U.S. shale sector is poised for a big return to dealmaking this year as some of the largest oil companies look for ways to deploy cash, according to a McKinsey & Co. report Friday. Shares of other Appalachian-focused gas producers also climbed. EQT Corp. rose as much as 5.6% while Coterra Energy Inc. gained 2.8% and Antero Resources Corp. advanced 8.5%.

Range Resources Shrugs Off Report of Potential Pioneer Natural Resources Acquisition --Range Resources Corp.’s management team on Tuesday brushed aside questions about whether they’ve discussed the possibility of Pioneer Natural Resources Co. acquiring the company after reports surfaced last week. CEO Jeff Ventura told analysts during a call to discuss year-end financial results Tuesday that a statement Pioneer issued downplaying the reports was “good news” for Range. He added that Range is “in a great position where we don’t need to pursue any sort of” merger or acquisition. Management said little more about whether conversations with Pioneer, one of the nation’s largest independent oil producers, had actually taken place. Bloomberg, citing anonymous sources, first reported that Pioneer was considering acquiring the Appalachian pure-play and heavyweight. Pioneer released a statement shortly after the report saying it “is not contemplating a significant business combination or other acquisition transaction.” Ventura said Tuesday that 2022 was one of the best in Range’s history as it was able to capitalize on a sharp spike in commodity prices. As natural gas prices have fallen off steeply since then, he noted the company is well positioned to weather the current environment. He said the company is well hedged with breakevens of well below $2/Mcf across a wide-ranging position that spans Pennsylvania. Efficiencies gained through the second half of 2022 are also expected to build the company’s in-process well inventory and give it more optionality in 2024 and 2025 if prices firm. COO Dennis Degner said this year’s activity would be weighted more toward the company’s liquids-rich acreage in Southwest Pennsylvania compared to last year. He said two-thirds of the lateral footage turned to sales in 2023 would be in wet and super-rich areas as dry gas prices have plummeted by double digits since the beginning of the year. Range once again plans to pursue a maintenance program and keep production levels flat this year. The company produced 2.1 Bcfe in 2022 and guided for the same level of production this year. Fourth quarter production was 2.2 Bcfe and flat from the year-ago period. Capital expenditures are forecast to increase, however, as the industry continues to grapple with inflation. Range said it expects to spend $570-615 million this year, up from $492 million in 2022, to achieve the same levels of production. While Degner said the natural gas outlook appears grim now with maintenance levels continuing, rigs falling off and prices dropping, “we think that bodes well for the go-forward outlook for natural gas.” He added that Freeport LNG’s return to commercial service and additional U.S. liquefied natural gas export projects slated to come online beginning in 2024 is also constructive. Propane is also still being exported at record levels, “which is really encouraging,” Degner said. “And of course, we’re all watching the reopening of China take place, and we know that that will turn into the further support of reducing stock levels and continuing to support a back-half-of-the-year constructive outlook for further” natural gas liquids price improvements.

EOG Resources Strikes Upbeat Tune on Natural Gas, Oil Volumes - EOG Resources Inc., a multi-basin exploration and production firm, said its strong fourth quarter and full-year 2022 results were powered by robust natural gas and oil demand, price spikes and steady production activity. For the year, EOG said, the natural gas prices it fetched jumped 49% from a year earlier, while crude prices increased 42%. Houston-based EOG said natural gas production increased 4% in 2022 to 1.5 Bcf/d. Total equivalent production, including oil and natural gas liquids, increased 10% to 331.5 million boe. Gas prices have since retreated because of a mild second half of winter across much of the Lower 48 and elevated production. Oil prices, too, have come down amid recession concerns. Even as rumblings mount about production activity scaling back — Chesapeake Energy Corp. and Comstock Resources Inc., for example, said on recent earnings calls they would drop rigs this year – EOG said it would forge ahead and expects output growth in 2023. EOG’s Lower 48 footprint includes operations in the Permian, Williston, Powder River, Denver-Julesburg (DJ) and Anadarko basins, along with the Eagle Ford and Barnett shale formations, among other areas. The company estimated at the midpoint of its guidance that oil and condensate production would be 473,800 boe/d, above the 2022 actual of 461,300 boe/d. The company expects to maintain steady drilling operations in the Permian’s Delaware sub-basin and the Eagle Ford. It sees steady activity or growth in the Powder River Basin, Utica Shale, and DJ, among others. President Lloyd Helms estimated the average EOG rig count for this year would increase by two, with one additional fracturing fleet.

Despite Gas Price Slump, EOG Full Steam Ahead in Emerging Plays - EOG Resources Inc.’s drilling plans — particularly in emerging plays in South Texas and the Utica Shale — are not being significantly impacted by the recent slump in natural gas prices, the company recently told investors.Houston-based EOG has kept an eye on volatility in the natural gas space since late last year, Chairman and CEO Ezra Yacob said in the company’s fourth-quarter 2022 earnings call on Feb. 24. But the company plans to continue development and infrastructure build-out in emerging plays and expand its drilling program in 2023.Henry Hub gas prices averaged $3.27/million Btu MM(MMBtu) in January, down more than $2/MMBtu from December 2022, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s most recent Short-Term Energy Outlook.After previously forecasting Henry Hub prices to average nearly $5/MMBtu this year, the EIA now anticipates gas prices to average around $3.40/MMBtu in 2023 and to stay below $4 until December.But recent volatility in gas prices won’t deter EOG from its long-term strategy, Yacob said. The E&P company anticipates “a pretty dramatic increase in the offtake and the demand coming on along the Gulf Coast” as more liquefied natural gas export projects start up in the next few years.“The U.S., just this year, will have about 2 Bcf/d of LNG export back online after the disruption's clear,” Yacob said. “We've got an additional 5 Bcf/d a day coming online in kind of the [2024, 2025] time frame and then potentially another 8 Bcf/d still working through financing.”EOG plans to produce between 1.67 Bcf/d and 1.81 Bcf/d of natural gas this year, up approximately 245 MMcf/d at the midpoint compared to 2022 volumes.Around half of EOG’s gas volume growth will come from associated gas from EOG’s sizable footprint in the Delaware Basin, where returns are being predominately driven by oil and NGL production.EOG completed 358 net wells in the Delaware Basin in 2022, up from 288 net wells completed during 2021. The company plans to complete around 365 net wells in the Delaware this year, the company said in its latest annual report.The other half of EOG’s gas production growth will come from the company’s emerging Dorado gas play in South Texas. EOG completed 22 net wells in the Dorado play last year and anticipates completing 30 net wells in there in 2023.“Our strategy at Dorado hasn’t significantly changed yet – and at this point, we don’t really see that it would, barring anything dramatic,” Yacob said. “The reason for that is that Dorado always has been kind of a longer-term strategy for us.”Late last year, EOG began construction on a new 36-inch pipeline that will transport gas from the Dorado field to the Agua Dulce sales hub outside of Corpus Christi, Texas.Overall, EOG’s average rig count for 2023 is expected to grow by about two rigs and one additional frac fleet.

US Natural Gas Production Surges to Record in 2022, up 33% from 2017. LNG Exports Hit Record despite Freeport Terminal Shutdown - By Wolf Richter -US natural gas production rose to a record 39 trillion cubic feet in 2022, according to EIA data, having soared by 33% since 2017 and having doubled since 2006, amid the massive US fracking boom that reshaped the energy landscape in the US globally. By 2008, with limited demand in the US and not enough export possibilities, the price of natural gas in the US collapsed ( for a neck-breaker rollercoaster, see the long-term price chart at the bottom). In 2011, the US became the largest natural gas producer in the world.The US has exported natural gas via pipelines to Mexico since the late 1990s, and to a lesser extent to Canada (from which is also imports natural gas). And the US has long had a small Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) export terminal in Alaska.But large-scale exports of LNG to the rest of the world was impossible until the first large-scale LNG export terminal on the Gulf Coast began operating in 2016. And as the LNG export boom took off, providing more demand for US production, US production skyrocketed:Total exports of natural gas via LNG to the rest of the world, and via pipelines to Mexico and Canada rose to a new record of 6.89 trillion cubic feet, or roughly 18% of US production.Exports via LNG rose by 3.6% in 2022 to 3.87 trillion cubic feet, up from near-0 in 2015. Exports were handicapped by the shutdown of the Freeport natural gas liquefaction plant in Texas last June, after a major fire, which cut LNG export capacity by 17% for the second half of the year. Exports did not resume until this year. Exports via pipeline to Mexico took off over 20 years ago and in 2021 reached a record of 2.15 trillion cubic feet, but dipped to 2.07 trillion cubic feet in 2022 (the US imports no natural gas from Mexico).Exports to Canada via pipeline have remained relatively stable over the years, and in 2022 rose to 952 billion cubic feet, but that was below the 2019 volume (the US imports more natural gas from Canada than it exports to Canada).In the chart, you can see the slower growth in LNG exports (purple line) in 2022 due the shutdown of the Freeport LNG export terminal. The green line represents exports via pipeline to Mexico and Canada. The red line is total natural gas exports:Asia had been the dominant buyers of US LNG, at first Japan and South Korea. China and India also became big buyers starting in 2020. In 2021, exports of LNG to Asia reached a record 1.68 trillion cubic feet, nearly half of total LNG exports, according to EIA data. But in 2022, sales to Asia plunged by 46% (green line), as US LNG was diverted to Europe.European countries with LNG import terminals became large buyers of US LNG. Combined, they bought 2.47 trillion cubic feet in 2022, about 64% of total US LNG exports (red).Even though Germany ended up with some of the gas through the European gas distribution network, it didn’t have LNG import terminals until the very end of the year, and so it doesn’t show up as a major buyer. The buyers in Europe were coastal countries with LNG import terminals and with chartered Floating Storage and Regasification Units (FSRU). The largest buyers in Europe were, in billion cubic feet (Bcf)Exports to Latin America plunged by 60% in 2022, to 245 billion cubic feet (gray). Exports to the Middle East and Africa rose to 249 billion cubic feet (blue).

New Jersey utility wants to overhaul gas pipelines - New Jersey’s largest utility is seeking state approval to continue a major overhaul of its gas infrastructure, replacing aging cast-iron and steel pipelines prone to leaking methane, a potent greenhouse gas. The three-year $2.54 billion proposed project, filed with the state Board of Public Utilities Wednesday, also would allow PSE&G for the first time to use renewable natural gas and hydrogen in its gas distribution system, which serves nearly 2 million customers.If approved by the regulatory agency, the project would offer insight into how gas utilities are adapting to a state intent on transitioning from fossil fuels, a goal the Murphy administration now aims to achieve with a 100% clean-energy economy by 2035, 15 years sooner than its previous target.This third phase of PSE&G’s gas modernization program aligns with recent executive orders by Gov. Phil Murphy and the state’s Energy Master Plan, as well as a state law mandating reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, according to Wade Miller, senior director of gas transmission, distribution and engineering for PSE&G.PSE&G has more than 3,000 miles of cast-iron gas mains, with an average age of 91 years — more than any other utility in the nation. In its proposal, the company would replace about 860 miles of cast-iron pipes and approximately 200 miles of unprotected steel pipes, with much of the replacement targeted for overburdened communities.By PSE&G’s estimate, the utility’s ongoing replacement program has reduced methane emissions by 250,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions. The new program is expected to reduce emissions by another 145,000 metric tons, the utility said.If implemented as proposed, the latest program is forecast to increase the typical residential customer bill by about 3%, or $3 per month for each year of the three-year program. Lower natural gas prices have led to rate decreases in the past two months.

Is LNG by rail safe? - The train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, is renewing concerns about the safety of moving natural gas by rail and whether existing federal rules governing the industry should be changed. Seven Democratic House lawmakers from Pennsylvania, for example, sent a letter to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Friday, asking that he work to suspend a Trump administration rule that would allow the transportation of liquefied natural gas by rail. During the Biden administration, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration proposed to halt that authorization until it could finalize a rule or until June 20, 2024, whichever comes first (Energywire, Nov. 9, 2021). Advertisement But calls to change the rule more quickly have swelled since the Norfolk Southern derailment in Ohio, which forced the evacuation of thousands in the town near the Pennsylvania border, caused the deaths of tens of thousands of aquatic animals and left residents questioning whether the air and water in their town is safe. “We believe this derailment further demonstrates that any regulation governing hazardous transport must be developed in a manner that carefully analyzes safety risks and creates protections for communities through which trains travel and the workers who operate the railroad and respond to accidents on it,” said the letter, which was led by Rep. Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.). There are currently no large-scale shipments of LNG by rail in the United States, but that could change pending what happens with the Trump rule, according to industry groups, researchers and environmental advocates. Under a separate pilot program, a route in southern Florida in 2017 and one in Alaska in 2015 were given blessings by the Federal Railroad Administration to ship LNG by rail using the United Nations’ approved train cars for gas. The southern Florida project is shipping LNG by rail now. The Trump rule would allow the bulk transport of LNG in specialized rail tank cars and was created in response to a 2019 executive order (Energywire, June 23, 2020). Environmental groups, followed by 12 Democratic-leaning states, filed petitions to review the plan in the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit months later (Energywire, Aug. 19, 2020). Bradley Marshall, a senior attorney for Earthjustice and the lead of the environmental groups’ petition, said parts of the rule mostly followed recommendations by the Association of American Railroads and other rail-industry groups pushing for the approval — including a speed limit of 50 miles per hour on cars transporting LNG and the use of the specialized tank car that can hold more liquid than the United Nations’ approved train cars for the fuel. “Even a small amount of LNG in the right circumstances can prove pretty catastrophic should it reach a confined system and ignition source,” he said. “It could get into a storm water sewer and still have enough concentration to ignite and destroy good chunk of area with it.” The Association of American Railroads, which first petitioned for the allowance of LNG by rail in 2017, did not respond to a request for comment. On their website, the group says railroads have transported cryogenic liquids similar to LNG for 80 years, and more than 99.9 percent of rail hazmat shipments reach their destinations without releases caused by train accidents. The association also says that crude by rail has a strong safety record, pointing to numerous regulations and actions by Congress on safety. However, some incidents of train derailments containing fossil fuels have been devastating. An unattended parked train in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, rolled to the town’s core and derailed, and its payload of 2 million gallons of crude oil caught fire and exploded, leveling much of the town and killing 47 people. After PHMSA proposed rolling back the Trump LNG rule, 20 Republican members of the House’s Transportation and Infrastructure Committee in December 2021 urged against the decision. They said tank cars required under the Trump plan would require a thicker layer of outer steel to prevent damage in the event of a derailment and that those same types of train cars have transported other forms of flammable cryogenic material for years.

The Race to Debottleneck U.S. LNG Feedgas Routes | RBN Energy - LNG exports will be the biggest driver of demand growth for the Lower 48 natural gas market over the next five years. After a year of oversupply in 2023, export capacity additions will help to balance the market and support gas prices in 2024 as the glut spills over into next year. Beyond 2024, higher export volumes will lead to tighter balances and price spikes. As supply struggles to keep up with new export capacity, the timing of pipeline expansions will be critical for balancing the market. The bulk of new LNG export projects are sited along a small stretch of the Texas-Louisiana coastline and more pipeline capacity will be needed to move incremental feedgas into this area and across the “last mile” to the facilities. In today’s RBN blog, we begin a series delving into the planned pipeline expansions lining up to serve LNG demand along the Gulf Coast. Before we dive into our discussion about recently completed and planned pipeline projects along the Gulf Coast, let’s quickly review the LNG export projects that are driving their development. Figure 1 summarizes the LNG export facilities already operating (green diamonds) in the region, including ones with planned expansions, along with greenfield projects that fall into one of three categories: projects that are already greenlighted and under construction, or in the case of Calcasieu Pass, commissioning (blue diamonds); projects that are likely to reach final investment decisions (FID) within a year (dark orange diamonds); and projects that are probable for reaching FID in the next 1-3 years (lighter orange diamonds). Note that these are just a subset of the nearly 30 LNG export projects we track in our LNG Voyager report that are jockeying for a piece of the global gas market. For the purposes of this blog series, however, we’ll focus on the projects that are well on their way or have significant momentum toward moving ahead. As Figure 1 illustrates, there are two facilities that are under construction: QatarEnergy and ExxonMobil’s Golden Pass LNG on the west bank of the Sabine River near the Texas-Louisiana border that will add three liquefaction trains totaling 18 MMtpa (~2.4 Bcf/d) of export capacity, with the first train targeting in-service in early 2024; and the first phase of Venture Global’s Plaquemines LNG terminal, a greenfield project in southeastern Louisiana’s Plaquemines Parish that is aiming to add 13.33 MMtpa (1.75 Bcf/d) by late 2024. Another two are likely to reach FID within a year: the second phase of Plaquemines LNG and the first phase of Port Arthur LNG. (Port Arthur announced last month that its Phase 1 is fully subscribed, meeting the requirement to take FID.) Still others have gained momentum and are in the running to take FID in the next 1-3 years, including one in southwestern Louisiana: the Train 4 expansion at Sempra Energy’s existing Cameron LNG just outside Hackberry along the Calcasieu Ship Channel. In addition, there are the export projects on the Texas side that will compete for feedgas supply. Cheniere Energy sanctioned its Corpus Christi Stage III expansion last summer with plans to add seven trains totaling 10 MMtpa (~1.3 Bcf/d). The developer is also considering adding two mid-scale trains (the 8^th and 9^th), with FID on the 2.9-MMtpa (0.4 Bcf/d) expansion likely in the next year. FIDs for NextDecade’s Rio Grande LNG in Brownsville, TX, and Freeport’s Train 4 expansion are also possible in the near- to mid-term. As we said in Final Countdown, these projects would amount to ~3 Bcf/d of incremental feedgas demand each year in the 2024-26 timeframe and make up the lion’s share of demand growth for the Lower 48 gas market in the next five years. As such, the industry will be closely watching the progress and timing of these export capacity additions, from regulatory approvals to construction schedules and potential weather-related disruptions, such as hurricanes and damaging rains, that could derail project timelines.

Natural Gas Futures, Cash Prices Rise Amid Series of Winter Blasts - Natural gas futures extended their gains on Monday as weather models continued to show cold over much of the Lower 48 for early to mid-March and Freeport LNG stayed on its path toward full operations. With some nascent technical momentum also in play, the newly prompt April Nymex natural gas contract settled at $2.731/MMBtu, up 18.3 cents from Friday. May futures climbed 15.2 cents to $2.853. Spot natural gas prices strengthened across most of the country, but the West Coast and Northeast plunged dramatically after the latest winter storm exited those regions. NGI’s Spot Gas National Avg. ultimately fell 91.5 cents to $3.445. Despite the steep sell-off in some cash markets on Monday, additional storms ushering in bitter cold and snow on the West and East coasts should keep demand elevated this week – and possibly longer. Weather models continue to fluctuate with the March pattern, but the first half of the month is expected to see a “fair amount of cold,” particularly in the northern two-thirds of the country, according to NatGasWeather. Where the weather data is not yet clear is in the 11- to 15-day time frame. NatGasWeather said there are indications that colder momentum might be more difficult to sustain as some models show blocking waning late in the period. If that happens, a warmer pattern would likely evolve later in March over most of the country. “To be sure, the longer-range weekly models do not agree with such a scenario, keeping cold in play for longer,” the forecaster said. “But given what we see at the end of recent ensemble runs, it will be interesting to see how this week’s longer-range outlooks evolve.” After a record warm January, and overall mild winter thus far, any significant – and sustained – cold late in the season would bode well for prices. Last week, March futures briefly dipped below $2.00 as the market faced an ever-expanded storage surplus amid near-record production. There are indications that producers may tap the brakes on output this year, given the precipitous decline in gas prices along with inflation. However, the winter season is quickly drawing to a close, demand is waning and gas inventories are unseasonably high.

Natural gas rebound snaps on 6th day as stock draw unimpressive - Natural gas prices fell Thursday for the first time in six sessions after the U.S. government’s report of a larger-than-expected weekly draw of the fuel from storage failed to impress a market more concerned about an overall supply glut. The EIA, or Energy Information Administration, reported a draw of 81 bcf, or billion cubic feet, from gas storage during the week ended Feb. 24, higher than the 75 bcf forecast by industry analysts as well as the 71 bcf reported by the agency during the previous week to Feb. 17. Natural gas futures initially responded well to the draw, with the front-month April contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange’s Henry Hub rising to a five-week high of $2.861 per mmBtu, or metric million British thermal units. But the gains faded as trading progressed, resulting in a settlement at $2.765. That was down 4.6 cents, or 1.6%, on the day, marking its first decline since Feb. 23. From a fundamental perspective, the rebound in gas prices from the 2-½ year low of $1.967 on Feb. 23 was supported by a production dip to 97.5 bcf per day from earlier highs of above over 100 bcf daily. An anticipated rise in U.S. heating demand over the next two weeks due to colder-than-normal weather conditions in early March has been a supportive factor as well. Another upside for gas bulls has been the improving feed demand for liquefied natural gas with a steady pickup in volumes going into the Freeport LNG terminal in Texas, which has been slowly getting back to normal operations after a fire in June. Freeport had been a rock-solid base of 2 bcf of gas demand a day until it was knocked out. But intraday price swings will continue occurring due to the distinctly weaker demand for heating during much of the 2022/23 winter, analysts said. “Forecasts have been trending colder for March but it's too late to save the heating season.” “It's looking to me like there's too much natural gas in North America and a mess in the pipeline system. In the second half of the decade, it could balance out with more LNG online but given how rapidly gas names upped production, I don't think we're going to be back above $5 sustainably for a while.” Storage of natural gas stood at a total 2.114 tcf, or trillion cubic feet, as of Feb. 24 — up 27% from the year-ago level of 1.66 tcf and 19% higher than the five-year average of 1.77 tcf.

US natgas jumps 9% to 5-week high on record LNG feedgas, colder weather forecasts (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas futures jumped about 9% on Friday to a five-week high, as the amount of gas flowing to U.S. liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plants soared to a record high and on new two-week forecasts for colder weather and higher heating demand. Cold weather could crimp supply too. Gas producers "may face growing freeze-off risks in the Bakken (North Dakota) and Rockies," analysts at energy consulting firm EBW Analytics said in a note. The amount of gas flowing to LNG export plants was on track to hit a daily record high on Friday as Freeport LNG's facility in Texas keeps using more fuel after exiting an eight-month outage in February. The plant shut after a fire in June 2022. Front-month gas futures for April delivery rose 24.4 cents, or 8.8%, to settle at $3.009 per million British thermal units, their highest close since Jan. 27. For the week, the front-month was up about 23%, its biggest weekly gain since August 2020. Last week, the contract rose about 8%. Freeport LNG's export plant was on track to pull in about 1.4 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) of gas on Friday, up from 1.2 bcfd on Thursday, according to data provider Refinitiv, a sign the company likely had started the second of three liquefaction trains to turn gas into LNG. When operating at full power, Freeport LNG, the second-biggest U.S. LNG export plant, can turn about 2.1 bcfd of gas into LNG for export. Freeport LNG said on Feb. 21 that it could consume about 2.0 bcfd of feedgas "over the next several weeks." Some analysts have said Freeport LNG will likely not return to full capacity until the end of April. Federal regulators have approved the restart of two of Freeport LNG's liquefaction trains (Trains 2 and 3). On Monday, Freeport LNG sought permission to restart the third (Train 1). Total gas flowing to U.S. LNG export plants has risen to 13.4 bcfd so far in March from 12.8 bcfd in February. That compares with a monthly record of 12.9 bcfd in March 2022 before the Freeport LNG facility shut. Refinitiv said average gas output in the U.S. Lower 48 states has risen to 98.4 bcfd so far in March from 98.2 bcfd in February. The monthly record was 99.9 bcfd in November 2022. Analysts said production declined earlier this year due in part to drops in gas prices of 40% in January and 35% in December that caused several energy firms to reduce the number of rigs drilling for gas. In addition, extreme cold in early February and late December cut gas output by freezing oil and gas wells in several producing basins. Meteorologists forecast the weather in the Lower 48 states would remain mostly colder than normal through March 18 after some warmer-than-normal days from March 3-6. Refinitiv forecast U.S. gas demand, including exports, would ease from 120.9 bcfd this week to 119.1 bcfd next week, then jump to 127.4 bcfd in two weeks. Gas stockpiles were about 19% above their five-year average (2018-2022) in the week ended Feb. 24, expected to end up about 22% above normal during the week ended March 3, according to federal data and analysts' estimates.

BP Gets Disappointing Results For Gulf Of Mexico Deepwater Appraisal Well - BP, Chevron, and Talos Energy received disappointing results this week from its Puma West-2 appraisal well, Talos said. The Puma West-2 appraisal well was drilled to a depth of 25,995 feet followed by a sidetrack, which was drilled geologically down-dip to a total depth of 27,650 feet. While the appraisal wells did encounter hydrocarbons in multiple sands, additional hydrocarbons from a subsequent well or sidetrack are necessary before they consider moving forward with the project. The Puma West 2 wellbore was suspended temporarily with utility to allow for future potential sidetrack opportunities. Drilling data will now be reviewed and analyzed to determine the best path forward. BP owns a 50% stake in the project and is operator, with Chevron and Talos each holding a 25% stake. Spudded in October of last year, the well was highly anticipated and followed in the footsteps of the 2021 exploration discovery well on Green Canyon Block 821 just west of BP’s Mad Dog field. BP has plans to increase its GoM production to 400,000 bpd by the middle of this decade. The U.S. Gulf of Mexico is possibly one of the world’s most mature deepwater basins with significant room left to expand. It boasts some of the lowest emissions per barrel estimates in the world and contributes roughly 15% of all U.S. crude oil, a report from McKinsey & Company said late last year, with the potential to add up to another 2 million bpd by 2040. For oil companies that have pledged net zero emissions targets, the U.S. Gulf is an attractive play. The Bureau of Ocean Management issued last week a notice for an oil and gas lease sale in the Gulf of Mexico that will take place this month. The BOEM is offering up 13,600 blocks across 73.3 million acres..

American E&Ps Maintain Pandemic-Era Peak Oil Production; Inventories Mount U.S. crude output last week held at robust levels as American exploration and production (E&P) companies remained active to bolster domestic supplies and help meet global demand. E&Ps generated 12.3 million b/d for the week ended Feb. 24. That was on par with the highest level since March 2020, when the pandemic was declared. U.S. production also had held at this level through January and the first half of February, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) Weekly Petroleum Status Report on Wednesday. The EIA print eclipsed the year-earlier level of 11.6 million b/d. It kept inventories around the highest level since the onset of coronavirus outbreaks. U.S. commercial crude stocks for the Feb. 24 period, excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, increased by 1.2 million bbl from the previous week. At 480.2 million bbl, inventories were 9% above the five-year average. The continued strength in output among U.S. E&Ps comes as OPEC and its allies scale back in the near term and Russian production is vulnerable now and over the long term. The Saudi Arabia-led OPEC-plus launched an effort in late 2022 to cut production by up to 2.0 million b/d from the highs of last year. Russia in February threatened to trim its 10 million b/d oil production by 5% to retaliate against European Union sanctions imposed to protest the Kremlin’s war. At the same time, the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) February Oil Market Report highlighted a forecast for global oil demand to rise about 2 million b/d this year to nearly 102 million b/d, reaching a record level on the back of an anticipated surge in Chinese demand. China’s government early this year lifted a litany of pandemic-related economic restrictions, a move expected to unleash pent up demand for travel and, by extension, crude consumption. IEA estimates show supply and demand roughly balanced through this year but vulnerable to geopolitical tumult, including Russia’s war in Ukraine, as well as aging infrastructure in smaller oil producing countries. Analysts at ClearView Energy Partners LLC said that, while American E&Ps are holding output at solid levels, shortfalls elsewhere could leave the global market with “a material oil supply shortfall” in the second half of 2023. Additionally, as RBN Energy LLC analyst Jason Lindquist noted in a report this week, sanctions against Russia extend well beyond its energy complex, infiltrating other sectors vital to its economy such as agriculture and banking.

EPA's risky methane gambit: Let outsiders look for leaks - EPA has proposed something new, and oil and gas advocates are sounding the alarm. The agency’s draft methane rules released last fall would, for the first time, give citizens and communities a formal role in policing petroleum operations for spikes in pollution from equipment malfunctions or other mishaps. There’s nothing new about cities or citizen organizations keeping a watchful eye on emissions from local energy developers to safeguard their air quality. But when a sudden leak is found, the state regulators and the company have largely had the discretion to respond as they see fit. That would no longer be the case under EPA’s proposed program, called the Super‐Emitter Response Program, or SERP. If it survives in the final rule later this year, the program would compel operators to inspect their operations within five days of being notified of a potential leak by third-party monitors, and to make any fixes within 10 days. Data on the event would be made public. The proposal has earned kudos from environmentalists, who say it will safeguard public health in oil and gas fields — including the tribes and environmental justice communities that the Biden administration has promised to prioritize. But it has also catapulted to the top of the industry’s list of concerns about the standards, which otherwise enjoy qualified support from a sector that has largely dropped its former opposition to federal methane regulation. Frank Macchiarola, senior vice president of policy, economics and regulatory affairs at the American Petroleum Institute, told reporters on a call last month that the fenceline monitoring program is “the single most discussed problem within the rule across the industry.” “It definitely raised the most concerns when it was released in the fall,” he said. Macchiarola said the program as proposed by EPA would give local activists and environmental groups an opening to participate directly in oversight of industry — something he and other industry advocates have argued strenuously is not supported by the Clean Air Act. “Congress doesn’t set those [statutes] up for third parties to regulate our industry,” he said on the Feb. 14 call, which was timed for the end of the draft rule’s public comment period. “They set them up for experts and officials within the government to regulate our industry.” Macchiarola suggested that API might back a voluntary program that takes advantage of third-party data to detect leaks. But he decried EPA’s proposal to load that data on a publicly searchable online portal — especially if EPA hasn’t vetted it first. EPA’s proposal is an attempt to solve a problem. Traditionally the agency has relied on industry estimates for its data on oil and gas methane. But in the last decade, studies based on empirical data collected and analyzed by third parties — academic scientists and organizations like the Environmental Defense Fund — have shown that the industry’s climate footprint exceeds the levels shown in EPA inventories. EPA has moved to incorporate some of those findings in its inventory and in the oil and gas rules due to be final this summer.

Xcel Energy played a leading role in a stealthy plan to defend natural gas in Colorado | Colorado Public Radio - Anyone who's seen ads for Xcel Energy knows the company is in the green energy business. Its frequent television spots show workers erecting new wind turbines and touting its promise to deliver 100 percent carbon-free electricity by 2050. What's less featured is its massive role in Colorado's natural gas industry. While Xcel Energy has put solar and wind at the center of its electricity plans, newly released documents prove the company is a prominent force behind Coloradans for Energy Access — a non-profit dedicated to fighting a growing movement to shift buildings from natural gas heat to renewable electricity. The group’s 2021 tax documents show Joni Zich, the senior director of gas strategy for Xcel Energy, served as a board member when the group formed in late 2021. In addition, a political contributions report the company published last Thursday notes it donated $80,000 to the organization in 2022. The company maintains its participation doesn't undermine its larger climate commitments. Michelle Aguayo, an Xcel Energy spokesperson, said the company has pledged to meet a short-term goal to cut emissions from its natural gas system by 25 percent by 2030. That work defies the consensus among climate scientists, who have concluded further investments in fossil fuel infrastructure aren't compatible with international climate goals. A state analysis also shows Colorado’s widespread reliance on natural gas helped drive a spike in household energy costs this winter. The gas network nevertheless remains one of Xcel Energy’s most lucrative assets. The company’s latest annual financial report shows it now serves 1.5 million gas customers in Colorado and owns around 2,600 miles of gas transmission and distribution lines, making it by far the state's largest company delivering the methane-based fuel to buildings. Continued expansion projects are one reason the regulated monopoly earned a record $1.74 billion in profits last year. It's now clear the company helped launch a stealthy political project to defend the investment. The tax forms for Coloradans for Energy Access showed it received $205,000 in donations from five different individuals. As a social welfare nonprofit, it faces no legal requirement to publicly disclose the identity of those donors.

Fossil fuel companies donated $700m to US universities over 10 years -Six fossil fuel companies funneled more than $700m in research funding to 27 universities in the US from 2010 to 2020, according to a new study.Such funding at universities that conduct climate research can shift not just research agendas, but also policy in the direction of climate solutions the industry prefers, the report’s authors argue.Those solutions typically include biofuels, carbon capture, and hydrogen, according to the research by the thinktank Data for Progress and the nonprofit group Fossil-Free Research. Oil majors also invest in public policy and economics research that favors deregulation.“$700m is probably an absolute bare minimum,” Grace Adcox, polling analyst for Data for Progress, said. “There’s so little transparency around these gifts.”The top five schools on the list, include some that champion their climate research, like University of California at Berkeley ($154m), Stanford University ($56.6m) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology ($40.5m), as well as those with long-standing fossil fuel ties, like George Mason University ($64m), the largest recipient of funding from the Koch Foundation.These schools have also long been the targets of campus divestment campaigns, with students and faculty urging administrators to pull university funds from fossil fuel companies; Berkeley fully divested in 2020, Stanford and MIT’s resistance to the idea has resulted in a student-led lawsuit.Asked about the new research, several universities described measures they had taken to mitigate concerns, or pointed to more recent reductions in accepting donations.The report includes a poll indicating that a majority (67%) of both college-educated and non-college-educated voters agree with the statement: “Colleges and universities studying the impacts of climate change and sustainability should refuse donations from fossil fuel companies so they can remain unbiased in their research.”The study was created from publicly available data, including tax-form 990s from fossil fuel company foundations, annual reports from both universities and oil companies, and press releases or media coverage about big new donations. It’s an imperfect approach, but it is enough to give the public some hint of how much money fossil fuel companies are investing in research that has a real impact on policy.“These research projects have real-life implications – for example a lot of the fossil fuel-funded research has re-centered natural gas in the conversation about renewables,” Bella Kumar, lead author of the Data for Progress report, said.In response to the research, Dan Mogulof, assistant vice-chancellor at Berkeley, sent the Guardian a full accounting of the university’s fossil fuel donations, which he said represent less than 1% of its total research funding. Stanford spokesperson Mara Vandlik said: “It’s unclear how these numbers were calculated as we do not share this information publicly,” adding that the university has formed a committee to review the question of fossil fuel funding of research.

DEQ gives update on 2018 oil spill at BNSF yard - The Montana Department of Environmental Quality has released an update regarding assessment of an oil spill in 2018 in the BNSF rail yard. That site, an active locomotive fueling and maintenance rail yard, has operated since the 1890s and spills and leaks in the yard have led to the designation of the location as a state superfund facility, where DEQ works to facilitate the investigation and cleanup of hazardous substances. The update said the 2018 spill, of more than 2,000 gallons from the rail yard’s wastewater treatment plant, was of a mixture of water and oil. The spill was quickly contained and no impacts to the Milk River or Bullhook were identified, the update said. However, soil contamination was found under the treatment plant, in soil that cannot be removed without impacting the structural integrity of the building, the update said. A risk assessment was conducted in 2018, and an addendum was added to address the exceeding levels at the plant, the update said. DEQ and BNSF continue to work on finalizing the addendum, which includes information on additional small releases that have occurred in the rail yard since 2018. The update also said DEQ recently approved BNSF’s background evaluation on manganese in groundwater. Manganese is naturally occurring in Montana and has been identified as having a higher level in the Havre area. BNSF also has performed investigative work to identify contamination and evaluate the risk to human health at the property located at 801, 811 and 829 First Street, known as the former Crowder Oil. The results of the investigation will be provided to DEQ, the update said. Once the risk assessment addenda is finalized, the update said, that information and clean-up levels specific to sites investigated will be used in the next phase of the superfund process which is, the feasibility study, the update said. That will serve as the road map in the evaluation of cleanup options. The update said BNSF continues to evaluate groundwater contamination twice a year, with sampling in June and December to represent low and high groundwater conditions. The sampling occurs at locations including in the rail yard and at residential wells in North Havre that are down gradient from the rail yard and have historically shown petroleum and chlorinated solvent impacts, the update said.

Pollution Control Team Removed Almost 500 Gallons of Fuel in Marine Sanctuary in Hawaii - Yacht Harbour -- The 31-meter charter yacht Nakoa has spilled fuel around a protected bay on Maui, Hawaii. The incident, which was named by the owner a freak accident, resulting in the boat drifting ashore, happened on Monday, February 20. Eight passengers have been returned to shore by the Maui Fire Department. On Tuesday, after the bilge pumps activated, the diesel released into the water. Honolua Bay is a popular diving destination and a part of a state-administered marine life conservation district. To minimize the risk of environmental harm Maui Mayor Richard Bissen Jr. has asked Hawaii Gov. Josh Green to expedite the response effort.

Tugboat partially sinks off Lopez ferry terminal -A 45’ tugboat partially sank off the Lopez ferry terminal Wednesday morning, Feb. 22, with an estimated 400 gallons of diesel fuel onboard. Initial reports indicated the semi-submerged tug sank in the vicinity of a larger barge operation that was onsite to repair the Lopez ferry dock. According to Elaina Thompson, the new Executive Director of Islands’ Oil Spill Association, the vessel sinking was reported by American Construction Company, owner of the tug and barge. “We got a call this morning at 8:45 a.m. that this was happening,” says Thompson. “We sent a responder out on Lopez Island who got eyes on the scene and took some photographs and assessed the weather.” “We reported that to the Department of Ecology and the US Coast Guard,” adds Thompson. “We confirmed that all the proper channels were notified and responders were en route, and now due to the weather and other factors are taking command from DOE and US Coast Guard and waiting as this unfolds.” Early Wednesday morning photos taken at the scene showed the vessel’s flybridge was visible above the surface, and a diesel sheen visible drifting towards shore. According to Ty Keltner, Public Information Officer for the Department of Ecology, responders were enroute with air quality monitors to assess any diesel vapors. In addition, the response contractor that had been hired was Global Diving and Salvage, the same group that recovered the Aleutian Isle back in 2022.

Activists resist Biden move to okay ConocoPhillips's Willow oil project - White House officials suggested to environmental groups in recent days that they may pair approval for a controversial Arctic oil project with new conservation measures in Alaska, but have failed to convince activists the idea is an acceptable compromise, according to three people involved in or briefed on the calls.The high-stakes talks involve what some officials see as one of the most consequential climate decisions of President Biden’s term, a multibillion-dollar drilling project called Willow. The administration can announce a decision within days, and rejecting the project could lock the administration into a costly legal challenge and alienate key Alaska lawmakers in Congress.The compromise measures under discussion would include a new ban on drilling in the Arctic Ocean off Alaska’s North Slope and more habitat protections for other parts of the state, said two of the people familiar with the talks, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential communications. They added that administration officials are seriously considering shrinking the Arctic project to just two approved drilling pads, a size so small that officials for ConocoPhillips — the company that has spent nearly five years pursuing federal approval — have suggested it would cause them to back out.ConocoPhillips has controlled leases in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska awarded by the Interior Department since 1999, giving it a strong case if the federal government blocks its ability to develop, legal experts said. That has pushed the administration to search for a compromise, hoping to curb backlash on a project that conservationists see as an irreversible catastrophe.So far, environmental groups aren’t buying it. While President Warren G. Harding set aside the nearly 23 million-acre reserve a century ago to ensure that the U.S. Navy would have an adequate supply of oil, only a portion of it has been developed, and the expanse provides critical habitat for migrating caribou, waterfowl and other wildlife.Many critics have focused on the proposal’s climate impact. The Biden administration’s own environmental review — released last month — estimated that Willow would generate roughly 9.2 million metric tons of carbon dioxide a year, which is equal to driving nearly 2 million gas-powered cars or burning nearly 51,000 rail cars’ worth of coal. “Rejecting a project like Willow should be a no-brainer for a climate leader like Biden. And if he doesn’t, it’ll be a stain on his legacy,” said Lena Moffitt, chief of staff at the climate advocacy group Evergreen Action. “No form of this project is okay.”Based on its cost, Willow would be the largest pending oil development in the country, analysts say. The Bureau of Land Management’s final environmental impact statement said the project could best go forward with three of the five well pads ConocoPhillips initially proposed. Now that the report is finished, the law allows the Interior Department to issue a final decision on permits as soon as this coming Monday. But according to individuals familiar with the process, White House officials have taken control of final deliberations, struggling to figure out whether a scaled-back version of the project can appease both environmentalists and Alaskan allies. The individuals said the decision is primarily between approving the three well pads, or only two pads with a postponed decision on a third. State officials and Alaska Native groups have been lobbying the administration to approve all three to avoid the risk of ConocoPhillips backing out.

Biden faces 'no good options' to keep gasoline prices in check -- US President Joe Biden promised he would lower prices at the pump, which have eased since topping $5/gal last summer, but the president will face new challenges and limited options if domestic fuel prices surge again as Russia has shown no signs of ending its war with Ukraine.US gasoline prices averaged $3.38/gal the week ended Feb. 20, down $1.63/gal from their mid-June 2022 peak, according to the Energy Information Administration. But as the Russia-Ukraine war enters its second year, more price spikes and supply dislocations are possible.Price caps on Russian seaborne exports of crude and petroleum products that went into effect Dec. 5 and Feb. 5, respectively, could begin to present limitations on oil supplies, especially as analysts have suggested good odds for G7 countries agreeing to lower the $60/b price threshold on Russian crude during a March review. Preliminary signs already point to a slowdown in Russian crude and refined product exports, and Russia's announced 500,000 b/d cut in oil production could be the start of counter sanctions imposed by Russia.The White House last year leaned heavily on the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to curtail global oil supply shortages and bring down domestic fuel prices, to the chagrin of Republicans and the oil industry. But the SPR currently stands at 371.6 million barrels and will soon be drained of another 26 million barrels as part of a congressionally mandated sale, leaving about 93 million barrels before the emergency reserve hits minimum stock levels of 252.4 million barrels that limit Biden's authority for further drawdowns."The Biden administration needs to realize that it cannot control global oil prices through the US SPR," Ellen Wald, chief industry officer at Washington Ivy Advisors, said.She and industry advocates have instead called on the administration to encourage the expansion of US refining capacity, relax some regulations on oil producers while they contend with labor and supply chain issues, and hold federal oil and gas lease sales to help bring gasoline prices down as sanctions on Russia will continue to make oil more expensive.Efforts to replenish the emergency crude stockpile got off to a rocky start with the Department of Energy turning down all of the offers it received as part of its first solicitation to repurchase up to 3 million barrels of sour crude to begin refilling the SPR. The DOE indicated that bids it received did not meet the crude specifications and price it was looking for.David Goldwyn, president of Goldwyn Global Strategies and chairman of the Atlantic Council Global Energy Center's Energy Advisory Group, said Asia is now the key market for OPEC and thus global oil production from that bloc will be significantly driven by market impacts in Asia rather than those in the US and Europe."The response of the US oil patch is driven far more by how private equity investors and companies see the future of the market and how much they are focused on maximizing returns rather than reinvesting," Goldwyn said. "Despite the rhetoric, oil companies never pay much attention to the desires of any US administration, Republican or Democrat, when deciding whether they want to ramp up production or pay higher dividends."With oil prices in the midst of a multiyear boom cycle, "the president has no good options to reduce short-term oil prices," Bob McNally, founder and president of Rapidan Energy Group, said. "However, his administration has been considering resorting to bad options, such as restricting oil exports and windfall profits taxes."Punitive taxes on the oil sector would require congressional support, an unlikely feat with Republicans controlling the House, but Biden could move to restrict exports on his own."While some in the Biden administration understand that export restrictions would be counterproductive, help [Russian President Vladimir] Putin, and hurt our allies, others will likely insist on imposing restrictions if SPR releases fail to restrain any future oil price spike," McNally said.Increased demand from Europe has helped to push US crude exports to record highs. Exports in the week ended Feb. 17 were at 4.6 million b/d, according to the US Energy Information Administration.Other policy tools that could rein in prices at the pump include tax holidays that some states experimented with last year and could be expanded on a national basis by Congress, as well as air quality waivers for certain fuel specifications like the one that allowed retailers nationwide to continue selling a higher ethanol blend mix through the summer.

Alberta Eyes Massive Budget Surplus Thanks To High Oil Prices -Alberta could see a budget surplus of some C$2.4 billion, equal to around $1.8 billion, in its new fiscal year, assuming a price for the local crude oil benchmark of C$78 per barrel.This is what the Finance Ministry of Canada’s biggest oil province said in thepresentation of budget 2023. The ministry also forecast a surplus for the next two fiscal years, although slightly lower than the 2023/24 expected surplus. It is, for its part, substantially lower than the surplus Alberta expects to book for fiscal 2022/23 when oil prices surged over $100.According to the Finance Ministry, Alberta’s total revenues this fiscal year will top C$70 billion, or over $51 billion. However, this will be a decline of close to $4 billion on revenues projected for the previous fiscal year because of lower oil prices and the looming global recession. However, revenue will rise over the next two fiscal years.The ministry expects oil sands production at 3.345 million barrels daily in the current fiscal year, with conventional oil production at 497,000 bpd.“At $76 oil, it would land us at about $18 billion in resource revenues, if that were to hold for the full fiscal year,” a University of Calgary economist told the Calgary Herald days before the release of the budget. “Despite oil prices coming down from their highs last year, we’re still in a really strong position,” Trevor Tombe noted.The budget assumes a slightly higher oil price, which could boost revenues even further as the oil industry remains essential for the province’s income, despite increasing pressure from environmental activist groups and the federal Canadian government.In fact, the Canadian oil industry has become notorious for that pressure, although companies continue to produce oil and gas and support provincial and federal budgets. The latest blow to Canada’s oil came from the Trudeau government’s Just Transition bill that eyes, among other things, the re-employment of oil industry workers elsewhere as the country moves away from fossil fuels.

Mexico's Oil Giant Reports Staggering Losses - The past several days have been devastating ones for Mexico’s state-run Pemex, which reported three refinery fires last week that have left two dead and more injured, followed by quarterly reporting that downs a tripling of losses against an impossible level of debt and a stark failure to revive output. Pemex released Q4 2022 results on Monday, reporting $9.4 billion in losses in a single quarter, more than triple the losses of the previous quarter. According to Bloomberg, Pemex output fell to 1.62 million barrels per day in 2022, the third year that Pemex has reported a decline. Simultaneously, debt ballooned to $107.7 billion by year’s end, with $8 billion of that set to mature this year. Mexico’s president Andres manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) campaigned on promises of reviving Pemex for the national interest; however, while oil companies the world over raked in windfall profits on the back of Russia’s war on Ukraine and sanctions last year, Pemex has moved sharply in the opposite direction. Government intervention, in the form of $45 billion in capital injections, tax breaks and other machinations has failed to move the needle, according to Bloomberg, and the plan to boost production by moving offshore production to shallower waters and focusing more attention on onshore plays has likewise met with no success. Pemex is now knocking on the door of Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan for $1-billion in financing to cover outstanding debt this year. Talks between Pemex and the banks are said by Bloomberg to be linked to Pemex’s gasoline sales in Mexico in the form of securitized payments.

Mexico’s Oil Major Has A Flaring Problem Mexico’s state-controlled oil and gas giant Pemex has continued gas flaring at a massive field despite a pledge to stop doing so by mid-January, according to satellite data researchers have analyzed exclusively for Reuters. In November, Pemex’s chief executive Octavio Romero said that the company would stop gas flaring at the Ixachi field by January 15, 2023, after it was fined for breaching its emission-control plan. Pemex has a poor environmental record and has regularly failed to reduce flaring as promised due to a lack of infrastructure to process all the natural gas it is extracting. Natural gas flaring has been an issue for Pemex and Mexico for years. Despite the pledge from November to stop gas flaring at Ixachi by the middle of January, Pemex has increased the rate of flaring, according to satellite imagery of the field analyzed for Reuters by scientists. The plants Papan and Perdiz, which were set to process the gas from the Ixachi field, burned an estimated 1.3 billion cubic feet of gas in January, according to satellite data. The flaring increased from November, when the pledge was made, and when the plants burned 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas. “We have a spike in flaring in January for two of the largest flares,” Mikhail Zhizhin, a researcher from the Earth Observation Group at the Payne Institute for Public Policy, Colorado School of Mines, told Reuters. As of last week, the flares were still active, the researcher told Reuters. While Pemex appears to have made no progress with controlling gas flaring, it also posted staggering losses for last year—unlike all other oil companies who reported record profits amid soaring oil and gas prices and extreme volatility in 2022.

Report: World's Fossil Fuel Subsidies Surged to $1 Trillion After Ukraine Invasion - Global fossil-fuel subsidies doubled last year to $1.1 trillion, by far the highest number ever recorded, according to a new report from the International Energy Agency, or IEA. The surge in financial support for oil and gas was largely a response to the energy crisis caused by the war in Ukraine, which caused many countries to abruptly reconsider their dependence on Russian fossil fuel reserves. Experts say the subsidies could be difficult to unwind, if consumers become accustomed to having a cushion against high prices.“In an energy crisis, governments prioritize shielding consumers from damaging price impacts over commitments to phasing out subsidies,” wrote the report authors. “This reduced hardship but diminished the incentive for consumers to save or to switch to alternative sources of energy, thereby delaying a lasting resolution of the crisis.”The world’s fossil-fuel consumption subsidies have risen and fallen over the last decade in tandem with the price of oil, but they have tended to hover somewhere between $400 and $600 billion. The biggest supporters of oil and gas over the past decade were large developing economies like Russia, China, Iran, India, and Saudi Arabia, with Iran spending almost one-fifth of its gross domestic product to pad fuel prices.That dynamic changed last year with the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The sudden loss of Russian oil and gas supplies forced European countries to seek out alternative fuel sources, causing oil and natural gas prices to soar. This in turn drove a huge increase in heat and electricity costs. Meanwhile, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC, cut production later in the year, keeping crude prices high. The price increase wasn’t limited to Europe, either: As European countries outbid their poorer neighbors for shipments of liquefied natural gas, countries like Pakistan saw record prices and intermittent power outages.Countries around the world responded with a slew of tax breaks and subsidies for homeowners and businesses who had come to rely on lower prices. Thailand and Peru capped the price of gasoline and diesel; South Africa and Belgium froze or waived fuel taxes; and Italy and South Korea sent direct payments to consumers who were struggling with energy bills.However, more than half of the new fossil fuel subsidies that appeared last year were implemented within the European Union, or EU, according to the IEA. The EU spent $349 billion last year to cushion consumers from volatile prices. The rest of the world’s advanced economies added only $163 billion in new subsidies to deal with the energy crisis.The authors of the IEA report argue that these subsidies could make political and social sense in some cases, since high fuel costs often hit poor populations hardest, and expensive gas doesn’t by itself speed a transition to clean energy. This is because energy demand is what economists call “inelastic” over the short term: Most consumers are unlikely to dramatically change their energy usage based on a change in price, and instead are more likely to cut back their spending on other needs. That’s why most energy subsidies go to consumers, rather than producers like oil and gas companies. While subsidies for consumers have skyrocketed recently, subsidy growth on the production side has been much smaller.“High and volatile fossil fuel prices drive home the unsustainability of today’s energy system and underscore the benefits of energy transitions, but these episodes come with significant economic and social cost,” the authors write. “High fossil fuel prices are no substitute for consistent climate policies.”

European LNG Imports Soar 63% In 2022: IEA -- European imports of liquefied natural gas soared last year as nations sought to cover for drops in Russian pipeline supplies, a report from the International Energy Agency said Tuesday. The jump in demand from European nations sent prices spiking higher, with global sales doubling in value to $450 billion even though volume rose only 5.5 percent, the IEA said in a quarterly report on the gas market. It said it expects LNG volumes to rise by 4.3 percent in 2023. "LNG import growth in 2022 was led by Europe with a sharp 63 percent increase, compensating for a significant drop in pipeline gas imports from Russia," the IEA said. European imports of LNG rose by 66 billion cubic metres, with the United States supplying two-thirds of that increased consumption. "LNG played a critical role in mitigating the impact of Russia's deep cuts in piped gas supply to the European Union and was instrumental in avoiding gas supply shortages in 2022," said the IEA. For 2023, the IEA expects European gas demand to dip by three percent after having fallen by 13 percent in 2022. It sees further reductions in the use of gas by the power sector as renewables expand and French nuclear production increases after repair works are completed. While industrial use of gas is expected to recover by 10 percent, the evolution of gas for residential heating will depend on weather. The mild 2022-2023 European winter helped the region avoid shortages. The IEA said a complete cut-off of Russian gas delivered by pipeline would require a steeper reduction in demand of eight percent. Global gas consumption, pipeline plus LNG, dipped 1.6 percent last year to 4.042 trillion cubic metres. The IEA sees it stagnating in 2023.

Germany’s Natural Gas Bill Doubled In 2022 Despite Import Volumes Falling - Germany paid more than double for natural gas last year compared to 2021 amid soaring prices in the energy crisis despite a 30% decline in import volumes, according to data from the Federal Office for Economic Affairs and Export Control, BAFA. Germany paid as much as $79 billion (74 billion euros) for natural gas imports, more than double compared to the $37.8 billion (35.4 billion euros) it spent on importing gas in 2021, showed the official data reported by Reuters. In 2022, the average price Germany paid at the border surged by 197.3% to $22,440 (21,007 euros) per terajoule (TJ). Germany no longer receives Russian gas via Nord Stream, which was sabotaged in the autumn of 2022. Even before that, Russia had slashed pipeline flows via Nord Stream, citing Western sanctions that prevented gas turbine maintenance.Faced with the prospect of no Russian gas this winter, Germany rushed to install floating storage and regasification units (FSRUs). Two of those FSRUs are already operational, while a third is in the commissioning stage.Europe’s biggest economy plans to have as much as 70.7 million tons per year of LNG import capacity by 2030, which will make it the fourth-largest LNG import capacity holder in the world by the end of this decade, Argus reported last week, citing plans by the German economy ministry and energy group RWE.Germany plans to have a total of 10 FSRUs, some of which will be removed and replaced by onshore regasification facilities once they are built. The rush to have LNG import terminals as soon as possible will make Germany the fourth largest import capacity holder behind the major Asian LNG buyers South Korea, China, and Japan.Governments in Europe, including Germany, are now more comfortable with the gas supply situation for the rest of the winter, especially after the warm start to the heating season and a warm start to January. The unseasonably warm weather has prevented massive drawdowns from gas inventories and has sent the benchmark EU gas prices lower in recent weeks.

Exclusive: Russia set to mothball damaged Nord Stream gas pipelines – sources (Reuters) – Russia’s ruptured undersea Nord Stream gas pipelines are set to be sealed up and mothballed as there are no immediate plans to repair or reactivate them, sources familiar with the plans have told Reuters. Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2, each consisting of two pipes, were built by Russia’s state-controlled Gazprom to pump 110 billion cubic metres (bcm) of natural gas a year to Germany under the Baltic Sea. Three of the pipes were ruptured by unexplained blasts in September, and one of the Nord Stream 2 pipes remains intact. But soaring tensions between Moscow and the West over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had by then already brought Nord Stream 1 to a standstill and prevented its twin, criticised by Washington and Kyiv for increasing Germany’s dependence on Russia, ever coming online. Gazprom has said it is technically possible to repair the ruptured lines, but two sources familiar with plans said Moscow saw little prospect of relations with the West improving enough in the foreseeable future for the pipelines to be needed. Europe has drastically cut its energy imports from Russia over the past year, while the state-controlled Gazprom’s exports outside the former Soviet Union almost halved in 2022 to reach a post-Soviet low of 101 bcm. One Russian source said Russia saw the project as “buried”. Two others said that, while there was no plan to repair the ruptured pipelines, they would at least be conserved for possible reactivation in the future. Another source familiar with the plans confirmed that the stakeholders are considering conservation. This would most likely mean sealing the ruptured ends and putting a coating into the pipes to prevent further corrosion from seawater.

European Natural Gas Prices Post Longest Monthly Losing Streak Since 2020 - Europe’s benchmark natural gas prices fell in February for the third consecutive month, extending the monthly losing streak to the longest since 2020, as milder weather, comfortable inventories, and a plunge in demand dragged down prices. The front-month futures at the TTF hub, the benchmark for Europe’s gas trading, lost 19% in February, and have slumped by around 40% since the beginning of the year, according to Bloomberg’s estimates. On the last day of February, the TTF futures settled at $49.50 (46.67 euros) per megawatt-hour (MWh) in Amsterdam, down by 1.3% on the day. Last month, the benchmark European price fell below the threshold of 50 euros($53) per MWh for the first time since August 2021. Prices are now more than 85% down from the record high of 300 euros ($318) per MWh from August 2022. With only March left to go in the winter, concerns about a gas crisis in Europe continue to recede amid mild weather and above-average inventories across the continent. One year after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Dutch TTF benchmark gas contract is trading more than 40% below pre-invasion levels, The European Union managed to beat its target for cutting gas demand this winter, Eurostat data showed last week. According to the data, the EU’s winter demand had so far dropped by 19.3% compared to the five-year average, beating the 15% goal it set for itself to help it survive the winter.

Saudi Aramco Looks To Invest In LNG Export Facility Abroad --Saudi Aramco is interested in investing in an LNG export facility outside Saudi Arabia and is in early talks with developers aiming to secure a stake in a project in the United States or Asia, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, quoting sources familiar with the matter. The Saudi oil giant, the world’s largest oil company by both production and market capitalization, prefers an LNG plant that could easily export the fuel to Asia, according to Bloomberg’s sources.Apart from investing in a stake, Aramco is also reportedly looking to secure a long-term off-take agreement with the project developer, the sources added.Going into LNG trading could be another lucrative business for the Saudi oil giant, considering that LNG demand is only set to grow in the coming years as Europe ditches Russian gas and Asia looks to use more natural gas instead of coal.Amid soaring spot prices, the value of global LNG trade surged to an all-time high in 2022 to $450 billion, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Tuesday in its quarterly Gas Market Report Q1-2023.“Despite rising by a mere 5.5% in volumetric terms, the value of global LNG trade doubled in 2022 to an all-time high,” the agency noted.Natural gas supply security is now taking centre stage amid a new wave of market reforms in Europe and developed Asian economies, the IEA said.The significantly higher LNG demand in Europe is set to intensify competition with Asia in the short term and to dominate LNG trade in the longer term, Shell said in its annual LNG outlook last month.European countries, including the UK, saw their LNG imports jump by 60% last year to 121 million tons, Shell, the world’s largest LNG trader, said as it issued a bullish outlook on the fuel through 2040.

Kazakh Officials Urge Citizens To Conserve Gas As Imports Become Necessary - Kazakhstan’s state-owned natural gas company has vowed that there will be no repeat shortages of the fuel next fall and winter like the ones that the country began to experience in late 2022. But Arman Kasenov, the deputy chairman of QazaqGaz, has said that consumers must in future also do their share in helping avoid crunches at times of peak demand by being more economic in their use of gas. Anybody failing to do so could face stiff bills, he hinted. In the short-term, Kazakhstan plans to prevent shock deficits by refraining from exporting gas. “Taking the growth in gas consumption within Kazakhstan into account, QazaqGaz cannot count on exports in the next fall-winter period,” Kasenov said on February 24. Indeed, far from thinking about exports – and China is the only game in town in this area – Kazakhstan is now resorting to buying imported gas. Earlier this week, Energy Minister Bolat Akchulakov said at a government meeting that plans are being drawn up to import gas from Russia to provide for areas in the east of Kazakhstan. Akchulakov said no prices have yet been discussed. The infrastructure for those specific imports does not yet exist, however. Extending gas supplies to those regions of Kazakhstan will be contingent on completion of a transnational pipeline running from Russia to China. “We have earlier proposed to Gazprom the idea of a transit route through the territory of the East Kazakhstan Region,” Kasenov said at a meeting held under the auspices of the Samruk-Kazyna state holding company. “It is under development. We have already carried out technical and economic feasibility studies.” In October, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said QazaqGaz had reached a sales agreement with Turkmenistan’s Turkmengaz and that he hoped up to 1.5 billion cubic meters of gas could be imported annually under a long-term deal. According to QazaqGaz data, gas consumption in Kazakhstan in 2022 reached 21 billion cubic meters, while 5 billion cubic meters were earmarked for export. The expectation is that consumption will soar to 40 billion cubic meters by 2030. The irony of Kazakhstan’s reliance on imports is that it has more than enough gas of its own. As the country’s energy officials enjoy boasting, Kazakhstan sits atop 3.8 trillion cubic meters of gas, enough to last them 100 years. A good 70 percent of that total is concentrated in four huge fields: Karachaganak, Tengiz, Kashagan and Zhanazhol.

Russian Oil And Gas Project Misses Output Targets After Exxon Exit - Russian oil and gas output at the Sakhalin-1 project in the Far East is only half of what it was projected to be for 2022 after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine set off a series of Western sanctions that led to the departure of ExxonMobil. In a televised meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Sakhalin governor Valery Limarenko said production was less than 50% of that planned, Reuters reported."First, in May, oil production was practically stopped, and in September, it was gas production. We lost a large amount, more than half, of the annual plan," Limarenko was quoted as saying. September last year saw oil production of around 84,000 barrels per day, which is less than half the figure projected. The governor further clarified that the regional budget would lose an estimated $664 million due to the lower production levels, noting that two-thirds of the regional budget comes from oil and gas taxes. “We will somehow get out, but this problem really exists," Limarenko told Putin, as reported by Reuters. The televised lamentation was likely intended to draw further attention to Moscow’s attempts to leverage political capital related to Exxon’s withdrawal from the project. Russia’s General Prosecutor’s Office is attempting to wrangle some $220 million in unpaid taxes from Exxon. In April 2022, Exxon declared force majeure on the Sakhalin-1 project due to Western sanctions against Moscow. Before the war in Ukraine, the project exported some 273,000 barrels daily of Sokol crude, with the main destination for the shipments being South Korea. Sakhalin-1 crude was also shipped to Japan, Australia, Thailand, and the United States. In early January this year, Russia claimed that it had ramped up production at Sakhalin-1, expecting the field to start pumping 220,000 bpd soon, up from 150,000 bpd at the time.

Polish refiner says Russia halted pipeline oil supplies to Poland - Russia has halted oil supplies to Poland via the Druzhba pipeline, the chief executive of Polish refiner PKN Orlen says, adding that the company would tap alternative sources to plug the gap.The supply halt via the pipeline – exempted from EU sanctions imposed on Russia following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine – came a day after Poland delivered its first Leopard tanks to Ukraine.“We’re effectively securing supplies. Russia has halted supplies to Poland, for which we are prepared. Only 10 percent of crude oil has been coming from Russia and we will replace it with oil from other sources,” PKN Orlen Chief Executive Daniel Obajtek wrote on Twitter.The company said it could fully supply its refineries via sea and that the halt in pipeline supplies would not affect deliveries of petrol and diesel to its clients.As of February, after a contract with Russia’s Rosneft expired, Orlen has been getting oil under a deal with Russia’s oil and natural gas company Tatneft.Tatneft and Russian oil pipeline monopoly Transneft did not immediately make statements over the issue.The supply halt came after US President Joe Biden visited Warsaw and Kyiv this week in a show of support for Ukraine a year after the invasion.On Friday, the European Union agreed on a 10th package of sanctions on Russia.Poland delivered four Leopard tanks to Ukraine already and is prepared to deliver more quickly, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Friday.“Poland and Europe stand by your side. We will definitely not leave you, we will support Ukraine until complete victory over Russia,” Morawiecki said during a visit to Kyiv, standing next to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Following the invasion of Ukraine and before the EU embargoed seaborne supplies from Russia, Orlen stopped buying Russian oil and fuels via the sea.It said the company’s supply portfolio now includes oil from Western Africa, the Mediterranean, the Gulf and the Gulf of Mexico. It also has a supply contract with Saudi Aramco as of 2022.

Russia halts pipeline oil deliveries to Poland – Russia has halted supplies of oil to Poland via the Druzhba pipeline, the CEO of refiner PKN Orlen said on Saturday (25 February), adding that the Polish company would tap other sources to plug the gap.The halt in supplies via the pipeline – which has been exempted from European Union sanctions imposed on Russia following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine – came a day after Poland delivered its first Leopard tanks to Ukraine.“Russia has halted supplies to Poland, for which we are prepared. Only 10% of crude oil has been coming from Russia and we will replace it with oil from other sources,” PKN Orlen Chief Executive Daniel Obajtek wrote on Twitter.Orlen said it could fully supply its refineries via sea and that the halt in pipeline supplies would not impact deliveries of gasoline and diesel to its customers.As of February, after a contract with Russia’s Rosneft expired, Orlen has been getting oil under a deal with Russian oil and natural gas company Tatneft. Tatneft and Russian oil pipeline monopoly Transneft did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Oil transport to the Czech Republic, where Orlen operates two refineries, via the southern branch of the Druzhba pipeline was running to plan, pipeline operator Mero said on Saturday.The supply halt came after US President Joe Biden visited Warsaw and Kyiv in a show of support for Ukraine a year after the invasion. And on Friday, the European Union agreed on a 10th package of sanctions on Russia.Following the invasion of Ukraine and before the EU embargoed seaborne supplies from Russia, Orlen stopped buying Russian oil and fuels transported by sea.It said its supply portfolio now includes oil from Western Africa, the Mediterranean, the Gulf and the Gulf of Mexico. It also has a supply contract with Saudi Aramco as of 2022.Seaborne supplies reach Poland via Naftoport, an oil terminal in Gdansk on the Baltic Sea. It can receive 36 million tonnes of oil annually topping volumes that can be processed by Polish refineries and is in part used to supply oil to refineries in eastern Germany that are linked to Druzhba.“Given the capacity of Naftoport and the fact that we also have other routes to import motor fuels, clients will not feel any impact, while Orlen has been prepared for this for months,” Mateusz Berger, Poland’s Secretary of State in charge of strategic energy infrastructure told Reuters by telephone.

Russia’s Oil Exports Still Strong Despite Sanctions | Russia’s crude oil producers managed to export 7.32 million barrels per day of crude oil and crude oil products in February, Kpler data showed, indicating to some that the ban on Russian seaborne crude shipments into Europe and the price cap mechanism have done little to curb the flow of Russia’s crude. The 7.32 million barrels per day of crude oil exported from Russia in February is largely on par with that exported in December, shortly after the crude sanctions went into effect. But that comparison is based on a December that saw Russia’s exports lower due to weather-related disruptions, pushing some shipments into January. Russia’s January petroleum exports increased as a result, and now February’s exports have fallen back to December levels. And once again, inclement weather has restricted the amount of crude Russia has been able to export this month, with the port of Novorossiysk “repeatedly shut down this month.” Kpler crude analyst Viktor Katona told Bloomberg. For March, Russia has stated its intention to cut its crude oil production by 500,000 barrels per day, and India is facing increased scrutiny from financiers to prove that its crude oil purchased from Russia was purchased below the $60 price cap, Bloomberg noted. Earlier this week, new calculations from the Institute of International Finance, Columbia University, and the University of California determined that Russia took in more money in the weeks that followed the oil price cap than the cap allowed. On average, the calculations show that Russia sold its crude oil for about $74 in the four weeks following the December 5 price cap. The authors of the published analysis called for “further investigation of these transactions and reinforces the need for stepped-up enforcement.”

Russian Fuel Exports Dropped By 20% In February - Russian oil product exports dropped by 20 percent last month, hitting the lowest level since May last year, BNE IntelliNews reported, citing data from S&P Global. The February average was also 24% lower than the average pre-war level of oil product exports.The data follows an earlier report that crude oil exports from Russia had remained relatively stable despite the pileup of sanctions, including an embargo on both oil and oil products in the European Union.According to cargo tracking data from Kpler, Russian oil and fuel exports last month averaged 7.32 million barrels daily, almost unchanged from December before the fuel embargo kicked in.What’s more, according to fresh research from the Institute of International Finance, Columbia University, and the University of California, Russia has been selling its crude oil at higher prices than the cap of $60 per barrel that the G7 in partnership with the EU imposed on those exports last year.The average selling price for Russian crude, according to the researchers, has been $74 per barrel for the four weeks following the imposition of the crude oil export embargo by the EU on December 5.Meanwhile, Russia has said it would reduce oil production by half a million barrels daily this month in response to sanctions, a move that may affect the level of its oil and fuel exports.According to JP Morgan, Russian fuel exports could slip by 300,000 bpd as a result of the EU embargo but the bank added Russia could maintain production of crude oil at pre-war levels. It would be harder, however, to return to pre-pandemic levels of production, JP Morgan also said. Pre-war production stood at 10.8 million bpd, while production rates before the pandemic averaged 11.3 million bpd, according to the bank.

Spain detains oil tanker over Mediterranean fuel spill - Spain has detained and fined a Maltese-flagged oil tanker it says discharged oil in open waters near the northeastern port city of Tarragona, a transport ministry department said. Spain’s Mediterranean and Atlantic coastlines have become hubs for shipping activity including the transfer of oil known as ship-to-ship (STS) operations, which industry sources say are becoming an increasing safety concern. Spanish authorities said they had intercepted the Lagertha after a discharge of hydrocarbons was detected by aircraft sensors and satellite radar on Feb. 11. “The slick, in the stern area of the vessel, extended over an area of 12.7 square kilometres,” Spain’s Merchant fleet, a transport ministry department, said on Tuesday in a statement. It said the vessel was being detained until the owners paid bail of 100,000 euros ($106,680), adding that on the basis of the evidence, authorities will begin disciplinary proceedings. The Merchant Fleet told Reuters that the Lagertha was in open sea and it was unable to measure if there was any environmental damage. The vessel’s Turkey-based manager Besiktas Shipping Group – according to shipping databases and its website – did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In 2021, another tanker was intercepted by Spain for illegally discharging oil at sea over some 55 square kilometres off the coast of La Palma in the Canary Islands. ELEPHANT HELD Separately, the Merchant Fleet told Reuters that it had detained another tanker, the Elephant, on Feb. 14 after authorities detected “deficiencies of a technical and documentary nature” during an inspection in the northwest port of Ferrol and also for failure to notify Spain’s maritime administration with documents related to STS operations. The Elephant’s owner, according to shipping databases, is Vietnam-based Hung Phat Maritime Trading, which could not immediately be located by Reuters for comment. Spanish officials said the Elephant had transferred a cargo to the Singapore-flagged tanker Maersk Magellan, which was banned from Spanish ports earlier this month. Authorities in Spain said the Elephant had previously loaded a cargo from the Cameroon-flagged Nobel. This vessel, they said had been working under a Russian flag until July 1, 2022, which was in breach of European Union sanctions. Denmark’s Maersk Tankers declined to comment last week about the Elephant, but said that official documents showed the cargo it moved to the Maersk Magellan was of Turkish origin. The company operates the Maersk Magellan.

Tanker with 800,000 liters of oil capsizes off Romblon– A tanker carrying 800,000 liters of industrial oil capsized near Tablas Island, Romblon, early Tuesday, February 28, a local port official said. The MT Princess Empress, an oil tanker, was on its way from Limay, Bataan, to Iloilo when it was slammed by strong waves near Tablas Island at around 2 am, port manager Joselito Sinocruz of Port Management Office (PMO) Batangas said in a radio interview on dzBB. “Batay sa report, lubog talaga ‘yung barko sa lugar. May laman ho ‘yun na 800,000 liters,” Sinocruz said. (According to the report, the boat already sank in the area. It contained around 800,000 liters.) All 20 crew onboard the MT Princess Empress were rescued by the foreign general cargo vessel MV EFES at around 6 am, he said. Sinocruz said the rescued crew will be brought to the Port of Subic Bay. Authorities have yet to confirm whether an oil spill occurred, but Sinocruz said the Philippine Coast Guard has been alerted of the incident. The Coast Guard has dispatched a marine environment protection unit to contain a possible spill. It said in a Facebook post that it deployed BRP Melchora Aquino and one airbus helicopter to respond to the incident.

Coast Guard reports oil spill from capsized tanker in Oriental Mindoro – The Philippine Coast Guard reported late Tuesday afternoon, February 28 an oil spill from the oil tanker MT Princess Empress that capsized earlier in the day off the coast of Naujan, Oriental Mindoro. Reports of the five-kilometer long and 500-meter wide oil spill from the diesel fuel that powered the oil tanker prompted environmental groups to urge the Philippine government to end the country’s dependence on fossil fuels. The Philippine Coast Guard, which had deployed air and water assets to monitor the effects of the maritime mishap off Balingawan Point, said the oil spill did not involve the 800,000 liters of crude oil that the tanker was ferrying from the port of Limay in Bataan to the port of Iloilo. “We monitored spillage of diesel fuel, not industrial fuel oil (cargo),” the PCG said in a statement. The PCG also said the vessel owners’ representative promised to send two tugboats with an oil spill boom to contain the damage. The initial report, from a GMA interview with port manager Joselito Sinocruz of the Port Management Office (PMO) Batangas, placed the vessel in the Tablas Strait off Romblon island when it capsized around 2 am. The PCG later clarified that the accident took place off Balingawan Point. Tablas Strait is a body of water separating Mindoro Island from Panay and Romblon islands. Later in the day, Bantay Dagat personnel of Pola in Oriental Mindoro recovered life vests, safety tubes, rafts, and belongings from oil tanker MT Empress in Barangay Tagumpay, Naujan. Authorities said they are also monitoring the site of another maritime accident off the coast of Occidental Mindoro. Commodore Innocencio Rosario Jr., the commander of the Philippine Coast Guard Southern Tagalog told Rappler that cargo vessel MV Manife V ran aground in the evening of February 26 north of Lubang, Occidental Mindoro, 110 meters from the shoreline of Barangay Maligaya. All the 20 crew members of the MT Princess Empress and the 14 from the MV Manife V were safely rescued and brought to shore. A foreign vessel rescued the oil tanker’s crew and brought them to Subic Bay port.

Philippines dispatches resources to contain oil spillage from sunken tanker 'Princess Empress' - World News - Philippine coast guard authorities are rushing to find out and secure a tanker which sank in rough seas and is now spilling the industrial fuel oil cargo it was carrying. The tanker MT Princess Empress was carrying 800,000 litres (210,000 gallons) of industrial fuel oil and sank off the northeast coast of Mindoro island, Philippines on 28 February. The oil product tanker was on its journey from Bataan province, near the capital, Manila, to the central province of Iloilo. The vessel faced an issue with its engine and sank into the sea. After the tanker sank, a spillage was spotted by the coast guard and was initially thought to be just the malfunctioned engine's diesel fuel. However, after conducting a test of the water samples, the authorities confirmed on Thursday that it was in fact some spillage of the industrial oil cargo the tanker was carrying. The industrial oil leakage was spotted off Oriental Mindoro province. By Wednesday, the coast guard said that a spill had spread in an area of over 24sq km (9 square miles). However, anything certain could not be said about the extent of the spillage. Philippines Coast Guard spokesperson Rear Admiral Armand Balilo, as quoted by media portals, said, “A ship’s structural integrity may be compromised during the sinking, and it may develop a hole through which oil will leak under pressure." It is becoming difficult for the divers to reach the tanker as the vessel sank into over 400 metres deep (1,300 feet) seas, he said. Balilo added that the cargo was not sealed and was loaded directly into the tanker. Oriental Mindoro provincial Governor Humerlito Dolor said that a search is underway. The coast guards are using oil spill booms to contain the oil spillage. The areas where the oil spillage is spotted include Verde Island Passage, a marine ecosystem that provides food and livelihood to millions of people. Environmental groups are expressing concerns that the oil spill could potentially endanger protected 21 marine protected areas.

Oriental Mindoro oil spill threatens Philippine, global diversity - The Philippines is the center of marine biodiversity in the world, and the February 28 Oriental Mindoro oil spill occurred smack in the heart of the country’s richest fishing and aquatic area. The Oriental Mindoro oil spill threatens the marine ecology not only of the Philippines but the world, Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) Secretary Ma. Antonia Yulo-Loyzaga warned on Friday, March 3. The DENR secretary flew to the province south of Metro Manila to assess the damage caused by the oil spill from the sunken MT Princess Empress, which capsized on February 28 in Balingawan Point off the coast of Naujan town. The DENR secretary said the government was “looking at the big picture” in determining the impact of the oil spill. The most urgent task, she stressed, was finding the exact location of the sunken vessel, to allow scientists to pinpoint how broad and deep the damage to the marine environment could get. Loyzaga said the oil spill would have “vast implications” not only for the country, but for the world. The Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) said black, foul-smelling sludge has reached the shores of eight of Oriental Mindoro’s 13 municipalities: Naujan, Pola, Pinamalayan, Gloria, Bansud, Bongabong, Roxas, and Mansalay. An aerial reconnaissance flight by the Coast Guard Aviation Force (CGAF) observed a shortening of the oil spillage, from six kilometers on March 1 to under three kilometers on March 3. Coast Guard Romblon reported signs of oil on Sibale Island on Friday. Romblon is east of Oriental Mindoro. Around 5 pm on the same day, the Coast Guard district in Western Visayas said officials had called an emergency meeting after a report from their station in Semirara Caluya indicated sighting of an “undertermined quantity of oil probably coming from MT Empress.” The PCG on Thursday, March 2, said the MT Princess Empress cargo of industrial oil had started to leak after a spill of the vessel’s diesel fuel. The PCG deployed a water depressant at the site of the oil spill, around 13.7 kilometers off Naujan. But in Pola town, Mayor Jennifer Cruz said local government personnel and residents were reduced to manually scooping and mopping up the shoreline sludge with pails, dippers, sponges, and rugs. The Pola town council approved on March 3 the state of calamity declared by Cruz. The general area of the maritime accident, the Tablas Strait, is a strategic waterway connecting Luzon and the Visayas.The oil spill threatens some of the country’s richest areas of biodiversity like the Verde Island Passage linking the island of Mindoro to Batangas on the Luzon mainland. The Verde Island Passage covers the village of Anilao in Mabini, Batangas, as well as Puerto Galera town in Oriental Mindoro, and Verde Island.Mindoro Oriental has a coastline of around 342.45 kilometers and almost 311,000 hectares of municipal waters. This is according to the Oriental Mindoro Integrated Coastal Area Management Plan 2019-2023, which was drafted by the Provincial Agriculture Office-Provincial Fisheries and Coastal Resource Management Division with the Malampaya Foundation Inc. and the Partnerships in Environmental Management for the Seas of East Asia.The province has around 2,392 hectares of mangroves, 4,537 hectares of coral reefs, and 1,196 hectares of seagrass habitats.Almost 18,000 persons – 12,570 males and 5,402 females – rely on municipal fishing for livelihood.A separate report by the provincial agriculture office said that the province’s fisheries production from January to October 2019 was recorded at 7,301.12 metric tons. The bulk of production, almost 5 MTs, was contributed mainly by municipal fisheries, which the government agency credited to the continuous establishment of marine protected areas.Three badly-hit towns – Pinamalayan, Pola, and Gloria – and Puerto Galera exhibited “highly diverse fish species,” the report said.After decades of struggle to establish marine protected areas (MPA) where human activities are strictly managed to protect the environment, commercial maritime traffic caused one of the most serious threats to the country’s marine economy.Here are the natural resources in the many protected areas and sanctuaries threatened by the MT Princess Empress oil spill.

Fishing banned as Philippine oil spill spreads | Philstar.com — Thousands of fishermen in the Philippines have been ordered to stay ashore as authorities struggled Friday to contain an oil spill from a sunken tanker that is threatening the region's rich marine life and economy. The slick off Mindoro island, south of the capital Manila, stretched for 120 kilometres (75 miles) and was about nine kilometres offshore, said Ram Temena, disaster operations chief in the affected province of Mindoro Oriental. The Philippine Coast Guard is still looking for the Princess Empress, which had engine trouble and sank in rough seas off Naujan municipality on Tuesday. It was carrying 800,000 litres (210,000 gallons) of industrial fuel oil from Bataan province, near Manila, to the central province of Iloilo. Another vessel rescued the 20 crew members on board. Diesel fuel, which had been powering the Philippine tanker, and some of the cargo have leaked into the sea, the coast guard said previously, sparking concern for the environment and industries dependent on the ocean. Coast guard spokesman Armando Balilo said experts and major oil firms were being consulted over how to recover the industrial fuel oil from the tanker, which is more than 400 metres (more than 1,300 feet) below sea level. "It is beyond the capability of technical divers," Balilo told reporters. "Second, we do not have the mechanical equipment, submersible, that can dive to syphon it off without endangering (crew) lives." Rough seas have prevented the deployment of oil spill booms to stop the toxic material from spreading, Balilo said. Instead, they were spraying chemical dispersants on the water surface to break down the oil. It is not known how much diesel fuel and industrial fuel oil are in the water. The situation was "getting worse", said Provincial Governor Humerlito Dolor. He had ordered the province's 18,000 registered fishermen to stay on shore until it was safe to fish. In the meantime, they would receive food packs. "It will have a big impact on us," Dolor said. "Based on experience, the adverse effects on the community will be long term." An estimated 591 hectares (1,460 acres) of coral reefs, 1,626 hectares of mangroves and 362 hectares of seaweed could be "potentially affected" by the oil spill, Environment Secretary Maria Antonia Loyzaga said. The tanker sank near the Verde Island Passage -- a busy sea lane between the main island of Luzon and Mindoro -- which Loyzaga said was "globally recognised" for its marine biodiversity. Pola Mayor Jennifer Cruz said some dead fish coated with oil had washed up on the shores of the municipality, which is one down from Naujan. "Our entire coastline was hit by the oil spill," said Cruz. "Earlier, we could smell the foul odour. It's like we're inside an auto shop." Coast guard personnel and volunteers were cleaning up oil from beaches, some using their bare hands, and had already filled several drums with the toxic material, she said.

Farmers, elders, Teals meet to thwart Santos fracking the Pilliga and the Liverpool Plains Kamilaroi elders, farmers and politicians gathered under a temporary pavilion on the Gunn property east of Gunnedah this week, right in the middle of the Liverpool Plains. They want to stop the fossil fuel developments that threaten our food supply, reports Callum Foote.Farmers and landholders organised a conference this week with the sole intent of stopping Santos’s expansion into the Liverpool plains through the proposed development of the Hunter Gas Pipeline; and if possible, stop the development of the Narrabri and Pilliga gas fields. Cattle farmer Rosemary Nankivell told the meeting:Nankivell has lived in the area, on the same property, for her whole life. Her husband Paul quips that “she has only changed bedrooms”. Along with many other farmers, they have been fighting fossil fuel developments in their backyard for over a decade. Many were a part of the Caroona Coal Action Group which managed to successfully block both BHP’s Caroona and Shenhua’s Watermark coalmines which were to be developed in the region.This success remains a touchstone for how powerful rural communities can be when they put their minds to it. And many are hopeful they will see Santos off.“We will do this, however the reality is that we have a hard fight ahead. We’ve stared down BHP, we stared down Shenhua, and we won’t be backing down now,” says Nankivell.Meanwhile, water extracted from the Great Artesian Basin is already at record levels thanks to extraction by CSG operators to supply Gladstone LNG plants. Fracking NSW will propel extraction levels far higher.

Guaya oil spill cleanup ongoing - Heritage Petroleum’s Oil Spill Response Team’s clean-up operation at the site of last Saturday’s oil spill in Guayaguayare is still underway. The source of the leak was in a heavily forested area, but it was quickly repaired on Sunday and additional checks have revealed no further seepage. However, air quality monitoring is ongoing after residents from a nearby community complained about an odour. So far, no harmful emissions have been detected. Along with its contractors, Heritage assured that it’s working to remove the residual oil from the forested area. The contractor has also employed members of the community to expedite the cleanup and restoration work. Heritage added that the Ministry of Energy and Energy Industries (MEEI) and the Environmental Management Authority (EMA) continue to be updated on the cleanup an ongoing basis.

OPEC’s February Oil Production Jumped By 150,000 Bpd - OPEC’s crude oil production for February was, on average, 150,000 bpd more than it was in January, a Reuters survey found on Tuesday. OPEC’s February crude oil production rose to 28.97 million bpd, the survey said, but is still 700,000 bpd less than it was in September. OPEC+--responsible for producing around 40% of the world’s crude oil-- cut its oil production targets as demand took a tumble during the pandemic. The group slowly raised its production targets last year as demand increased but consistently failed to meet its monthly production targets. In September last year, OPEC+ decided to begin cutting the group’s production targets, effective in October. The first cut was mild, at just 100,000 bpd. The cut was considered mostly symbolic, with the group at the time still underproducing by nearly 3 million bpd. But with oil prices falling from $120 Brent to less than $90 Brent by their October meeting, OPEC+ moved to tighten oil markets even further by making a drastic cut to its production targets by 2 million bpd, effective in November. The group’s production targets have not changed since then. For the ten OPEC members that are part of the wider OPEC+ agreement, February production was 880,000 bpd below its targets. This is closer to their target than they were in January when they produced 920,000 bpd less than their target. For February, Nigeria was behind OPEC’s largest increase in production, with the African nation boosting production by 100,000 bpd, according to the Reuters survey. Iraq saw the second-largest increase in production. Angola saw a drop in crude oil production in February of 80,000 bpd. The Reuters survey is based on shipping data, Petrologistics, and Kpler, along with information provided by OPEC and consultants, Reuters said.

Goldman Sees Oil Price Spike In 2024 As Spare Capacity Runs Thin -Events in China, not Russia, drove oil prices this past year, and now that Chinese manufacturing activity is on the upswing, the next 12-18 months are likely to see another spike in oil prices, says Goldman Sachs. That could mean crude oil targeting prices above $100 per barrel in the fourth quarter of this year. The situation is “tighter” today, Jeff Currie, global head of commodities research at Goldman Sachs, told Bloomberg Surveillance Early Edition on Wednesday. The big event last year was not Russia. It was China. “Global oil demand contracted 2% in the fourth quarter of last year, and that’s a recession in my book,” Currie said. That contraction, said Currie, created the spare capacity in oil and other commodities, but manufacturing data coming out of China this morning shows that is now reversing. The Chinese manufacturing purchasing managers’ index (PMI) jumped to 52.6 in February from 50.1 in January, data from China’s National Bureau of Statistics showed on Wednesday. The surge in factory activity was the fastest in over a decade.. Additionally, the index for non-manufacturing sectors also jumped, signaling an overall expansion of the Chinese economy in February. Altogether, it signals the potential for a faster-than-expected rebound after the reopening from the ‘zero-Covid’ policies abandoned by Beijing just at the end of 2022. “We created new supply, not through investment, but through China contracting, through lockdowns. Now, as China comes back, we’re gonna lose that spare capacity and we’re gonna be back to the same problems we had before,” Currie warns. The real focus, according to Goldman, is supply scarcity. “At this point, the ability to get from one year to the next given how scarce supply is, is really the focus. And the markets have been trading that way,” Currie said, noting that a commodities supercycle is not an “upward trend”; rather, it is a “sequence of spikes”.

Oil prices fall on renewed inflation fears and stronger dollar -Oil prices fell in volatile trade on Monday, as a stronger dollar and fears of recession risks offset gains arising from Russia's plans to deepen oil supply cuts. West Texas Intermediate U.S. crude futures (WTI) traded at $75.98 a barrel, 34 cents, or 0.5% lower, while Brent crude futures were down 48 cents, or 0.6%, at $82.68 a barrel at 0733 GMT. Both benchmarks closed more than 90 cents higher on Friday. The dollar hovered near a seven-week peak on Monday after a slew of strong U.S. economic data reinforced the view that the Federal Reserve will have to raise interest rates further and for longer. A firm dollar makes commodities priced in the U.S. currency more expensive for holders of other currencies. "Crude continues to take direction from the sentiment in the broader financial markets," said Vandana Hari, founder of oil market analysis provider Vanda Insights. Fears of a hawkish Fed returned to the fore on Friday after the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index, shot up 0.6% last month after gaining 0.2% in December. "If risk-aversion continues to grow, crude will likely come under renewed pressure," said Hari. Adding to the downside pressure, U.S. crude oil inventories surged to the highest level since May 2021 last week, data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) showed. "The EIA data continue to raise more questions instead of providing clarity on markets," analysts at the consultancy Energy Aspects said in a note, referring to the steep supply adjustment in the data that contributed to the build. On the supply side, Russia plans to cut oil exports from its western ports by up to 25% in March versus February, exceeding its previously announced production cuts of 5%. Oil prices have fallen by about a sixth in the year since Feb. 24, 2022, when Russian troops first marched into Ukraine. Two weeks after the invasion, prices surged to a record high of nearly $128 a barrel over supply concerns but have since cooled over fears of a global economic slowdown. Russia halted supplies of oil to Poland via the Druzhba pipeline, the chief executive of Polish refiner PKN Orlen (PKN.WA) said on Saturday, a day after Poland delivered its first Leopard tanks to Ukraine. Separately, investors are bracing for China's manufacturing surveys this week for a clear direction on oil demand. China is holding its annual parliamentary meeting from this weekend and will see new economic policy targets and policies.

NYMEX WTI Futures Fall on Weak US Manufacturing Activity -- West Texas Intermediate futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange settled Monday's session with losses under pressure from weaker-than-expected U.S. manufacturing data that showed protracted weakness in the industrial sector, undermining the outlook for refined fuels demand. The Commerce Department reported on Monday durable goods orders dropped 4.5% in January -- the steepest decline since April 2020 when the country was in COVID lockdown -- reflecting a sharp pullback in bookings for commercial aircraft. January's decline followed a 5.6% jump in durable goods orders in December that was tied to aircraft orders. The Commerce Department's report showed bookings for commercial aircraft, which are volatile from month to month, slumped 54.6% at the start of the year. Other indicators also pointed to a weak manufacturing sector. The Institute for Supply Management's gauge of factory activity has shown contraction for three straight months, and several regional Federal Reserve banks showed shrinking activity in January. For context, Texas factory activity in February declined for the first time since May 2020, according to the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank's Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey released Monday morning. Following the bearish data, the U.S. dollar index declined 0.5% against a basket of foreign currencies to settle at 104.624, but the weakness failed to lend support for the front-month West Texas Intermediate futures. WTI April futures on NYMEX fell $0.64 to $75.68 bbl. Internationally, the global crude benchmark Brent contract for April delivery eased $0.71 to settle at $82.45 bbl ahead of expiration Tuesday afternoon, with the May contract falling $0.78 to $82.45 bbl. NYMEX RBOB March added $0.0096 to settle at $2.3683 gallon, with the next-month RBOB futures widening its premium to the expiring contract to $0.2157. NYMEX ULSD March futures advanced $0.0236 to $2.8198 gallon and ULSD April futures settled at $2.8003 gallon. Early in the session, the oil complex got a leg up from reports Russia cut oil supplies on the Druzhba pipeline to Poland a day after Warsaw sent the first Leopard tanks to Ukraine. "We're effectively securing supplies. Russia has halted oil deliveries to Poland, for which we are prepared. Only 10% of crude oil has been coming from Russia, and we will replace it with oil from other sources," said Chief Executive Officer of Poland's largest refiner PKN Orlen Daniel Obajtek. It must be noted that the Druzhba pipeline, which supplies oil to Poland and Germany, as well as to Hungary, Czech Republic, and Slovakia, was exempted from EU sanctions to help the landlocked countries of Eastern and Central Europe secure oil supplies. It doesn't appear that disruption in Poland affected deliveries to Hungary, Slovakia, and Czech Republic. Before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Druzhba pipeline, whose name means "friendship" in Russian, delivered around 2 million bpd to the European Union, making it one of the world's largest pipelines.

Oil Set for 4th Monthly Loss Thanks to Worries About Fed Hit to Demand --Oil prices are on track to post a monthly loss for the fourth time in a row, as traders stay firmly focused on the prospect the Federal Reserve will keep hiking interest rates. That potential hit to demand appears to be overshadowing the chances of a jump in appetite for crude as China's economy reopens or as Russia slashes supply. A buildup in US stockpiles is also likely weighing on prices. Brent crude futures, the global benchmark, have fallen 2.2% to $83 a barrel in February so far, while West Texas Intermediate crude futures have dropped 3.2% to $77 a barrel. The declines put the benchmarks on track to fall for a fourth consecutive month. "Crude oil prices have remained volatile this year, with markets torn between fears of an extended Federal Reserve rate-hiking cycle due to a tight US labor market and optimism over a recovery in oil demand as China's economy reopens," UBS CIO Mark Haefele said in a research note. In February, investors returned to bracing for US interest rates to be higher for longer, after a string of positive economic data including a surge in job numbers. That offers the Fed the scope to raise borrowing costs above 5% and then hold them there, as it tries to rein in sticky high inflation. Higher interest rates in the US weigh on oil prices because they curb consumer demand and drag on economic activity. They also strengthen the dollar, which can pull down prices for Brent and WTI that are denominated in the US currency. "While better US economic data should mean better oil demand, the concern is that this forces the Fed to overtighten monetary policy to bring inflation under control," UBS analyst Giovanni Staunovo said earlier this month. Another factor is the growth in US crude inventories, which have logged nine weekly rises in a row. Supplies are now over 15% higher than they were last year, according to FXPro. Crude's losing streak comes even though China has started to rapidly reopen its economy after nearly three years of strict zero-COVID lockdowns. Some strategists expect it could boost global demand and fuel a price rally, and Vitol CEO Russell Hardy has said it could push oil demand to record highs later this year. But many analysts expect oil prices to rally again once Russia starts cutting its production levels. Moscow said earlier in February that it plans to cut its oil output by 500,000 barrels a day in March, as Ukraine sanctions hit its ability to find willing buyers. Those Russian output cuts would squeeze global supply tighter, and that would drive prices higher as long as demand continues to hold up. "We believe that the tightening of the oil market this year will eventually put prices on an upward trajectory," UBS CIO Haefele said. "Russia's announcement last Friday of an output cut in March is a reminder of these dynamics."

Crude oil higher; still on course for another monthly loss - Oil prices rose Tuesday but are still heading for a fourth straight monthly drop on further U.S. interest rates hikes will hit economic activity in the world's largest consumer. By 09:15 ET (14:15 GMT), U.S. crude futures traded 2.7% higher at $77.67 a barrel, while the Brent contract rose 2.2% to $83.86 a barrel. Crude oil futures have pushed higher on hopes that upcoming economic data will point to a recovery in the Chinese economy, the largest import of crude in the world. China's per capita spending fell 0.2% in 2022, data showed on Tuesday, as COVID restrictions ground economic activity to a halt. However, the country's Purchasing Managers' Indices, due overnight, are expected to show some improvement in February from the prior month, with the country's manufacturing sector - which acts as a bellwether for economic growth - likely to push further into expansion territory. That said, the two benchmark crude indices are still on course to post losses of around 3% this month as hotter than expected inflation numbers in the U.S. have largely cemented expectations the Federal Reserve will continue raising rates. This has raised concerns of a hard landing for the U.S. economy, as well as aiding the dollar, hurting commodities like oil that are priced in the greenback, making them more expensive for foreign buyers. Attention is likely to now focus on U.S. inventory data from the American Petroleum Institute later in the session, which is likely to show another hefty build. Commercial crude stocks have risen steeply in the last eight weeks – by a combined total of more than 50 million barrels – adding to concerns that demand is waning in the U.S., the world's largest economy. The latest market positioning data showed that money managers trimmed their net long positions in both the ICE Brent and Nymex WTI contracts over the last week, after hitting a one-year high. "Speculative net longs in ICE Brent are still comfortably higher when compared to the range over the past year and reflect the possibility of further liquidation if economic expectations deteriorate," said analysts at ING, in a note.

The market traded higher as it awaits key economic data over the next two days | Sprague -- The oil market on Tuesday traded higher, erasing Monday’s losses as expectations of demand recovery in China underpinned its gains. The market traded higher as it awaits key economic data over the next two days, with expectations that China’s factory activity increased in February. Meanwhile, Refinitiv Eikon reported that Urals crude exports to China from Russia’s western ports increased in February from the previous month due to lower freight rates and increased demand. The oil market posted a low of $75.55 in overnight trading before it retraced its previous losses and breached its downward trendline at $76.66. The market extended its gains to over 2 cents as rallied to a high of $77.83 early in the session. The market retraced more than 50% of its move from a low of $73.80 to a high of $80.62. The market later erased some of its gains and settled in a sideways trading range from $76.85 to $77.70 during the remainder of the session. The April WTI contract settled up $1.37 at $77.05 and the April Brent contract settled up $1.44 at $83.89. The product markets settled higher, with the heating oil market settling up 11 points at $2.8209 and the RB market settling up 6.6 cents at $2.4343. The EIA reported that U.S. crude oil production in December fell by 276,000 bpd to 12.101 million bpd from a revised level of 12.377 million bpd in November. It revised the November production level by 2,000 bpd. It reported that U.S. crude oil exports in December fell to 3.853 million bpd from 4.042 million bpd in November. Total refined oil product exports increased to 3.366 million bpd in December, up from 3.088 million bpd in November. U.S. distillate fuel exports increased to 1.421 million bpd in December, up from 1.172 million bpd in November and gasoline exports in December fell to 962,000 bpd from 984,000 bpd in November. The EIA also reported that U.S. total oil demand in December fell by 5.6% or 1.166 million bpd on the year to 19.491 million bpd. U.S. distillate demand in December fell by 5.9% or 233,000 bpd on the year to 3.717 million bpd and U.S. gasoline demand fell by 3.5% or 307,000 bpd on the year to 8.572 million bpd. According to a Reuters survey, OPEC’s oil output increased in February led by a further recovery in Nigerian supply, despite strong adherence by top producers to an agreement by the wider OPEC+ alliance to cut production. OPEC produced 28.97 million bpd in February, up 150,000 bpd on the month. Output is still down more than 700,000 bpd from September. With the rebound in Nigerian output in February, compliance with the agreement increased to 169% of pledged cuts, against 172% in January. The 10 OPEC members required to cut production pumped about 880,000 bpd below the group's target. The shortfall in January was about 920,000 bpd. According to a Reuters survey, the oil market will tip into a deficit, lifting prices above $90/barrel towards the second half of 2023, as Russia cuts its supply and China increases its consumption. Economists and analysts forecast Brent crude would average $89.23/barrel this year, falling from a previous estimate of $90.49, but still above current levels of around $83. West Texas Intermediate is projected to average $83.94/barrel in 2023, below the previous month's $85.40/barrel forecast.

U.S. Crude Oil Inventories Continue To Build - Crude oil inventories in the United States saw another significant increase, with a 6.203 million barrel increase last week, the American Petroleum Institute (API) data showed on Tuesday, bringing the total number of barrels gained so far this year to nearly 59 million barrels. This week, SPR inventory held steady for the seventh week in a row at 371.6 million barrels—the lowest amount of crude oil in the SPR since December 1983. But the Biden Administration previously announced that there would be further releases from the SPR in the amount of 26 million barrels after the stockpiles dropped by 221 million barrels last year. Oil prices traded up on Tuesday in the run-up to the data release. At 12:29 p.m. EST, WTI was trading up $1.80 (2.38%) on the day to $77.48 per barrel, and up nearly $1.50 per barrel from this time last week. Brent crude was trading up $1.54 (+1.87%) on the day at $83.99—a weekly increase just shy of $1 per barrel. U.S. crude oil production stayed at 12.3 million bpd for week ending February 17—the highest production rate since last April 2020. U.S. production is still 800,000 bpd lower than the peak production seen in March 2020. WTI was trading at $76.86 shortly after the data release. Gasoline inventories fell by 1.774 million barrels after last week’s API data showed the fuel inventories rising by 894,000 barrels. Distillates fell 341,000 barrels after rising by 1.374 million bpd in the week prior. Inventories at Cushing, Oklahoma, increased by 483,000 barrels on top of the 781,000 barrel hike reported last week.

Oil Prices Climb As China’s Manufacturing Data Stuns Markets Crude oil prices rose today driven by new data from China, which suggested its manufacturing activity was picking up after the slump amid last year’s lockdowns. Brent crude was trading at just above $84 per barrel at the time of writing and West Texas Intermediate was changing hands at over $77.60 per barrel, both up by about 0.7 percent from yesterday’s close. Reuters reported that China’s factory activity rose last month, for the first time in seven months. PMI data also showed manufacturing activity expanding at the fastest rate in over a decade, reinforcing expectations of a strong economic rebound in the world’s largest oil importer. China’s oil demand is seen as the chief factor behind expectations for higher oil prices later in the year. A recent Reuters poll among economists showed most expect Brent crude to top $90 per barrel in the second half of the year. The respondents cited Chinese demand and Russian supply as factors. The China demand expectations were so pronounced this week that they offset the American Petroleum Institute’s estimate that crude oil inventories in the United States had expanded for yet another week. According to the API, the build came in at 6.2 million barrels. Government data on U.S. inventories from the Energy Information Administration is out later today but the EIA, too, has been reporting sizeable inventory builds over the past several weeks. The U.S. inventory reports have capped oil price gains to an extent lately, and OPEC production data may add to that cap. According to a Reuters survey, the group’s combined output rose by 150,000 bpd in February from the previous month to a total 28.97 million barrels daily. This is still 700,000 bpd lower than what OPEC produced in September last year but if the increase is confirmed, it would suggest OPEC is not as rigid about its output limit enforcement as demonstrated.

WTI Rebounds After Smaller-Than-Expected Crude Build, Cushing Stocks Highest Since June 2021Oil prices are considerably lower again this morning after a major rollercoaster ride higher last night and back down again this morning. This price action follows another big crude build reported by API, and hawkish policy fears sparked by German inflation and US PMIs (prices jumped) all offsetting buying pressure after China reported big jumps in its manufacturing data. "Oil prices have fallen for the month due to an extremely warm winter in the U.S. and Europe . "In addition, recent mixed data on inflation and associated hawkish [Federal Reserve] commentary have been a headwind for oil as the dollar strengthened and stock prices came off of highs." Overhanging the market is uncertainty around the global economic outlook as the Federal Reserve and other major central banks continue to push interest rates higher in a bid to rein in inflation, and the signs from week-after-week of inventory increases remains an ominous one. API

• Crude +6.203mm (+350k exp)
• Cushing +483k
• Gasoline -1.774mm (-300k exp)
• Distillates -341k (-700k exp)

DOE

• Crude +1.166mm (+350k exp)
• Cushing +307k
• Gasoline -874k (-300k exp)
• Distillates +179k (-700k exp)

Crude stocks rose for the 10th straight week and inventories at the Cushing Hub rose for the 9th straight week. Gasoline inventories drewdown for the 2nd week in a row... US Crude inventories are at their highest since May 2021... Stocks at the Cushing Hub surged to their highest since June 2021... Graphics Source: Bloomberg Before we move on, it's worth reflecting once again on the so-called "adjustment factor" that is used to fudge the numbers in the crude inventory process... it just hit a new high... US Crude production was flat at cycle highs despite the drop in rig counts... WTI was hovering around $76.75 ahead of the official data and bounced on the smaller crude build (smaller than API reported and BBG's whisper number of +3mm)

WTI Gains as US Oil Exports Surge to Record-High 5.6M Bpd -- Reversing earlier losses, oil futures settled Wednesday's session with gains between 1% and 2%. The advances come after the weekly inventory report from the Energy Information Administration showed U.S. crude oil exports surged to a record-high 5.6 million barrels per day at the end of February, while domestic demand for gasoline improved to a two-month high 9.1 million barrels per day (bpd) amid easing prices at the pump and unseasonably warm winter weather. More evidence of surging demand for U.S. oil barrels on the global market could be found in EIA's inventory report for the final week of February, showing the total U.S. oil and petroleum products exports jumped to 11.1 million bpd. The volume of U.S crude and petroleum products being exported to Europe has risen sharply in recent months and looks set to remain high as the region deals with a shortage of Russian crude oil following an EU ban on Russian crude imports. Total U.S crude exports to Europe reached 1.75 million bpd at the start of 2023, a rise of around 75% over 2021 levels. The jump in oil exports comes as demand for refined fuels remained remarkably weak at the start of the year but showed nascent signs of recovery. For instance, U.S. gasoline consumption topped 9 million bpd for the first time this year last week, while 202,000 bpd above the same week a year ago. A combination of easing prices at the pump and mild weather could have contributed to an unseasonal jump in gasoline demand. On the bearish side, U.S. commercial crude inventories still increased for the tenth consecutive week through the end of February, building by almost 60 million barrels (bbl) since the start of the year. The rate of the builds, however, slowed to 1.2 million bbl, down from 7.64 million bbl and 16.284 million bbl in the second and third weeks of February. At 480.2 million bbl, nationwide crude inventories now stand about 9% above the five-year average. Internationally, China released the first set of post-lockdown economic data overnight showing its manufacturing sector expanded at the fastest pace since 2011. China's manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index, a gauge of industrial activity, grew for the first time in six months, jumping to 56.7 reading from the prior month's 49.8. Goldman Sachs estimated that China's oil demand is still roughly 1.6 million bpd below the trend. The revision of this trend could boost oil prices by $15 bbl in the second half of the year, with several forecasting agencies expecting global supply and demand balances to tighten this Spring. At settlement, NYMEX West Texas Intermediate April contract advanced $0.64 to $77.69 per bbl, while international crude benchmark Brent crude gained to $84.31 per bbl, up $0.86 per bbl on a session. NYMEX RBOB April futures rallied $0.0328 to $2.6748 per gallon, and ULSD April futures gained $0.0682 for a $2.8738-per-gallon settlement.

Crude oil holds gains on China rebound, even as US crude stocks rise - Oil prices inched up in early Asian trade on Thursday, extending gains from the previous two sessions on signs of a strong economic rebound in China, the world’s top oil importer, which offset worries about a rise in U.S. crude inventories. Brent crude futures rose 12 cents, or 0.1%, to $84.43 a barrel at 0231 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were up 7 cents, or 0.1%, at $77.76 a barrel. Both contracts rose about 1% in the previous session after data showed manufacturing activity in China in February grew at the fastest pace in more than a decade, adding to evidence of an economic rebound after the removal of strict COVID-19 curbs. However a tenth consecutive week of crude stock builds in the United States capped the market’s gains. U.S. crude inventories rose by 1.2 million barrels in the week ending Feb. 24 to 480.2 million barrels, their highest level since May 2021, the Energy Information Administration reported. Analysts polled by Reuters had expected a 500,000-barrel rise. Fear of breaching Western sanctions might slow Russian oil imports to India Record exports of U.S. crude oil, however, kept the build smaller than in recent weeks, with shipments rising to 5.6 million barrels per day (bpd) last week, according to the EIA. “U.S. crude inventories slowed their increases but sit at above the five-year range, with the slowdown of builds due to surging gross exports to new records,” Citi analysts said in a client note. Meanwhile, crude oil processed by Indian refiners reached record levels in January, provisional government data on Wednesday showed, as the country boosted imports of Russian barrels that Western countries shunned. Refinery throughput in the world’s third-largest oil importer and consumer reached 5.39 million barrels per day for January, the highest since Reuters records going back to 2009.

The Oil Market Continued to Trend Higher on Thursday Amid Signs of an Economic Recovery in China -The oil market continued to trend higher on Thursday amid signs of an economic recovery in China. Data released on Wednesday showed that manufacturing activity in China grew last month at the fastest pace in more than a decade and China’s seaborne imports of Russian oil are expected to reach a record high this month. The oil market breached its previous highs and retraced more than 62% of its move from a high of $80.62 to a low of $73.80 and also breached a trendline at $78.18 as it rallied to $78.35. The market erased some of its gains on fears over the impact of potential increases to European interest rates following the news that inflation in the euro zone increased in February to a higher than expected annual rate of 8.5%, with faster than expected acceleration in consumer prices in France, Spain and Germany. The oil market, however, retraced its losses and continued to rally higher. It extended its gains to 90 cents as it posted a high of $78.59 by mid-day. The April WTI contract erased some of its gains and settled up 47 cents at $78.16, while the April Brent contract settled up 44 cents at $84.75. The product markets were mixed, with the heating oil market settling down 76 points at $2.8662 and the RB market settling up 2.55 cents at $2.7003. J.P. Morgan forecast Russia would be able to maintain its oil output at pre-Ukraine conflict levels of 10.8 million bpd due to steady demand from China and India but said it might struggle to reroute some of its oil product exports away from Europe. J.P. Morgan expects Indian and Chinese demand collectively to increase by 1 million bpd this year. J.P. Morgan said Russia's oil product exports were expected to drop by about 300,000 bpd to "lows last seen in May 2022" as it struggles to reroute refined products exports. The bank also said Moscow could face more competition from refiners in the Middle East coming online in the second half of the year. Bloomberg reported that the amount of crude held in floating storage has declined significantly, contributing to a surplus that has impacted the market during the past six months. According to the IEA, tankers used as temporary storage facilities held 79.5 million barrels by the end of 2022, down nearly 40% from the year before. The flow equates, when averaged over the year, to about 100,000 bpd. One reason for the distributions from floating storage is the end of a trade that started in mid-2020. The flow appears to have continued in January as Iran is selling down its stockpile of crude and condensates. At its peak, Iran had more than 100 million barrels in tankers around the world. The IEA estimates that Iranian oil accounts for about 50% of all the crude and condensate that is left in floating storage. Bloomberg stated that as with the SPR releases that largely ended this year, the distribution from floating storage are declining, removing another supply source that will cause the market to tighten. China's seaborne imports of Russian oil are set to reach a record in March after refiners took advantage of lower prices as domestic fuel demand rebounded. However, Russia's plan to cut exports will likely cap buying in coming months. Tanker tracking consultancies Vortexa and Kpler estimated nearly 43 million barrels of Russian crude oil, comprising about at least 20 million barrels of ESPO Blend and 11 million barrels of Urals, are set to reach China in March.

Oil Prices Drop after Report on UAE Debating OPEC Exit - Oil prices slumped on Friday after the Wall Street Journal reported that the United Arab Emirates had an internal debate about leaving the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and pumping more oil. Brent crude futures fell $1.57, or 1.8%, to $83.18 a barrel by 1412 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down $1.52, or 1.9%, at $76.64. Oil prices this week had been boosted by strong Chinese economic data, underpinning hopes for oil demand growth, but those gains were all but erased on Friday. "The driver was the WSJ story, with concerns that this might impact the OPEC+ production (cut) deal. The UAE and Saudi Arabia are the two countries with significant spare capacity," said UBS analyst Giovanni Staunovo. In China, activity in the services sector expanded at the fastest pace in six months in February as the removal of tough COVID-19 restrictions revived demand, a private sector survey showed on Friday. Manufacturing activity in China also grew last month, at the fastest pace in more than a decade, reinforcing expectations of a fuel demand recovery. China's seaborne imports of Russian oil are set to hit a record high this month. The world's top oil importer is becoming increasingly ambitious with its 2023 growth target, aiming as high as 6%, sources involved in policy discussions told Reuters this week. "Those betting on higher oil prices are basking in the afterglow of the positive macro data out of China," said PVM analyst Stephen Brennock. The market broadly shrugged off a 10th consecutive week of crude stock builds in the United States, as record exports of U.S. crude made for a smaller increase than in recent weeks. Russia's plan to deepen oil export cuts in March also helped to buoy prices. Meanwhile, analysts polled by Reuters expect the dollar to weaken in the next 12 months, which would make dollar-denominated oil cheaper for holders of other currencies. On the central bank front, hawkish signals continue to emanate from the European Central Bank, with Governing Council member Pierre Wunsch saying its key interest rate could climb as high as 4% if underlying inflation remains high.

 Oil pares drop after UAE officials say no plans to leave OPEC - Brent oil pared a sharp drop as UAE officials said there was no plan to leave the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. The global benchmark had retreated as much as 2.8 per cent, though later pared some of those losses to trade near US$84 a barrel. The officials were responding to a Wall Street Journal report that a growing rift with Saudi Arabia meant it is having internal discussions about quitting the alliance. The UAE has said publicly and privately it is sticking to the current OPEC output deal for at least this year. If the UAE were to quit the grouping, it would risk a political fallout not just with Saudi Arabia, one of its biggest trading partners, but with other Gulf allies such as Kuwait and Iraq. UAE officials have for some years been contemplating what alliances best suit its long-term interests, as the country seeks to monetize recent expansion in its production capacity. In a previous OPEC+ dispute with Saudi Arabia, the group’s policy decision was held up for weeks, though in the end a compromise was found. The flurry of headlines sparked a rare bout of oil-price volatility on Friday, with crude sharply shedding about US$2, before eventually recovering to trade where futures were before the first report. Last month in an interview with Bloomberg TV, the UAE’s Energy Minister Suhail Al Mazrouei said he wasn’t concerned about his country’s current production quota agreed with the OPEC+ alliance, though it will consider whether to seek a higher level when the group comes to discuss output for 2024. Days earlier, delegates said Russia’s partners in the OPEC+ coalition won’t boost production to fill in for cutbacks announced by Moscow. For much of this year, oil prices have struggled to break out of a US$10 range, with traders weighing a bout of interest rate hikes by the Federal Reserve against expectations of higher crude consumption led by a reopening of China’s economy. Traders largely expected OPEC production to remain stable for the rest of this year. Prices and other news: Brent fell 0.9 per cent to US$84 a barrel by 10:14 a.m. New York time. WTI lost 0.7 per cent to US$77.59 a barrel.

Oil Futures Reverse Higher After US Rig Count Falls -- Reversing earlier losses triggered by a report suggesting the United Arab Emirates is considering leaving the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, oil futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange and Brent crude traded on the Intercontinental Exchange settled Friday's session higher following weekly data on U.S. drilling activity that showed another decline in active oil rigs, suggesting producers are slowing output in response to building inventories. Oilfield service provider Baker Hughes on Friday said the number of active rigs drilling for oil in the United States declined for a third consecutive week this week, down eight to 592 -- the lowest total in six months. The data reinforces the view that domestic producers are beginning to pull back on drilling activity amid a slowdown in the manufacturing sector of the U.S. economy, which is responsible for a large chunk of domestic oil consumption. Separate data released earlier this week showed business activity in the manufacturing sector contracted for the fourth consecutive month in February, with the headline index remaining at the lowest level since May 2020 when the economy was under nationwide lockdown. What's more troubling, input prices paid by the producers jumped 6% from the previous month despite extremely weak demand, meaning parts of the economy are gradually entering into stagflation. Friday's economic calendar was dominated by the Institute of Supply Management surveys on U.S. services activity that showed more resiliency compared to manufacturing, with the headline index little changed from the prior month at 55.1. The headline reading remains highly important, as the central bank wants to cool down the economy, but the markets and the Federal Reserve are paying even closer attention to the Prices Paid component, which reflects inflation. Input prices for service providers unexpectedly declined by 2.2% from the prior month. Earlier in the session, oil futures came under selling pressure from a Wall Street Journal report suggesting U.A.E. is considering leaving OPEC over its rift with Saudi Arabia. "Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E. have diverged on several fronts, competing for foreign investment and influence in global oil markets and clashing on the direction of the Yemen war," states the article. WSJ claims the most intense disagreement between the two Gulf producers is over OPEC+ quotas that obligate the U.A.E. to pump much less oil than it is capable of, hurting its oil revenue. U.A.E. has invested heavily in its oil industry, and has long pushed to pump more oil, but the Saudis have said no, according to OPEC sources cited in the article. The potential for the U.A.E. to leave the OPEC+ coalition and increase oil production unilaterally initially pressed oil prices lower Friday morning, but the oil complex quickly recovered losses in afternoon trading. On the session, NYMEX West Texas Intermediate April contract advanced $1.52 to $79.68 per barrel (bbl), while the international crude benchmark Brent contract for May delivery gained to $85.83 per bbl, up $1.08 per bbl. NYMEX RBOB April futures pulled higher $0.0504 to $2.7504 per gallon, and ULSD April futures advanced $0.0469 to $2.9131 per gallon.

Oil up 4% on week after dollar slide, belated response to U.S. exports -- It was a belated response by oil longs though not entirely surprising, given the outsized exports for last week. Crude prices jumped almost 2% Friday and over 4% on the week in a catch-up to record crude exports reported by the EIA for last week. New York-traded West Texas Intermediate settled at $79.68 a barrel, up $1.52, or 1.9%. For the week, the U.S. crude benchmark gained 4.4%. London-traded Brent crude settled at $85.83, up $1.08, or 1.3%. The global crude benchmark was up 3.7% on the week. Crude prices started the week with a stumble, then gained momentum on positive factory data from top oil importer China. Hawkish rate hike talks and inflation concerns kept the market from breaking out after the EIA, or Energy Information Administration, reported on Wednesday that U.S. crude exports hit a record high of 5.629 million barrels last week. Friday’s session was again volatile as prices initially tumbled on a Wall Street Journal report that the United Arab Emirates had an internal debate about leaving OPEC and pumping more oil. By midmorning though, the market retraced the losses and headed higher on the back of a weaker dollar after a Reuters report quoted a UAE official as saying that the WSJ story was "far from the truth." “Prices have fluctuated in a range for months now and the current price sits more-or-less in the middle of that range. The range does appear to be gradually tightening but remains quite large and there appears little appetite for a breakout at this moment in time.” Downside risks could escalate again in the coming week when the Labor Department releases the U.S. nonfarm payrolls report for February. The so-called NFP report is expected to show a slower jobs growth of 200,000 for last month after the blowout 517,000 in January. Runaway jobs growth — and spending by Americans — has made the Federal Reserve’s task of curbing inflation much harder than the central bank had expected. “Core foreign inflation remains high and inflationary pressures are broad,” the Fed said in its semi-annual report to Congress. Referring to its policy-making Federal Open Market Committee, the central bank said: “The committee is strongly committed to returning inflation to its 2% objective. Ongoing increases in the target range will be appropriate in order to attain a stance of monetary policy that is sufficiently restrictive.” To clamp down on runaway price growth, the Fed added 450 basis points to interest rates since March last year via eight hikes. Prior to that, rates stood at nearly zero after the global outbreak of the coronavirus in 2020. Rate expectations for the Fed’s March 22 policy meeting, monitored by foreign exchange traders, remained largely at 25 basis points on Friday, though that could change with the increasing calls for tighter policing from the central bank’s hawks.

Israeli Squatter Terrorists Fire Guns, Set dozens of Fires in Palestinian Town, Killing One and Wounding 100 – Israeli squatters on land owned by Palestinian families went berserk on Sunday, after two squatters were shot by a Palestinian guerrilla in Huwwara, a small town of several thousand residents in the Nablus district. The shooter appears to have been from Nablus and was a member of the “Lion’s Den” resistance movement. The squatters set fire to at least 20 homes in the Palestinian hamlet, sometimes with the family still inside, and burned 30 automobiles and many trees. They threw rocks at people and shot at them and at houses. One Palestinian, Samah Hamdallah Aktash, 37, died from a gunshot wound to the belly, another is in critical condition from being hit in the head by a large rock, and nearly 100 other people were wounded. So reports Josh Breiner at Haaretz and WAFA.The terrorist mob was from the “illegal” squatter-settlement of Evyatar. All squatting by Israelis on Palestinian land is illegal by the 4th Geneva Convention and the Rome Statute. But even the Israeli government frowns on Israelis just going off and building homes on Palestinian farms owned by local families. The Israeli government prefers to take away the Palestinians’ land itself, exercising a sort of eminent domain, and then sending in squatters. Under international law, it is a war crime for Israel to usurp the land of the Palestinians it occupies.Breiner quotes opposition politician Yair Lapid as saying that the current, extremist government of Binyamin Netanyahu is a danger to Israel’s security, after “Smotrich’s militias set out to burn Hawara.”Bezalel Smotrich, the leader of the fascist Religious Zionism Party, has been put in charge of the occupied Palestinian West Bank by Netanyahu, the first time such authority has been invested in a civilian Israeli politician rather than in the Israeli military.Haaretz published an editorial Sunday by Zehava Galon pointing out that Israel is already in breach of international law by sending squatters in to steal Palestinian land. At least the fiction of a military occupation had been maintained, however, by keeping the administration of the Palestinian West Bank in the hands of the Israeli military, as required by the 4th Geneva Convention and the Rome Statute. Making Smotrich the civil administrator was an open declaration of an intent to annex this occupied territory permanently.US State Department spokesman deplored the terrorist attack that killed two Israelis and the “violence of the settlers.” Commenters on social media pointed to the difference in language. Surely what the squatters did is terrorism, which the 1990s US federal code defined as violence undertaken by non-state actors against civilians in order to effect a change in political policy.

Israeli Protesters Confront Benjamin Netanyahu's Wife Outside Tel Aviv Hair Salon - World News -Scores of Israeli protesters clashed with police outside a Tel Aviv Hair Salon, hosting PM Benjamin Netanyahu's wife. Sara Netanyahu was seen being led away and taken off and driven off from the scene as police attempted to disperse the protesters.

Arab Leaders Bring Syria's Assad Back 'In From The Cold', Angering US -- Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry arrived in Damascus on Monday to meet with President Bashar al-Assad and express his country’s solidarity with Syria following the devastating earthquake, signifying continued warming of relations between the Syrian government and regional states.The visit to Syria represents the first by a high-level Egyptian official since the start of the US-backed war in 2011. Upon his arrival at Damascus International Airport, Shoukry was received by Syria’s Foreign Minister, Faisal Mekdad.A day earlier, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry had announced in a statement “that the visit aims to convey a message of solidarity from Egypt to Syria and its brotherly people after the disaster,” according to the state-affiliated Syrian news outlet, SANA. Shoukry is also scheduled to visit Turkey following his visit to Syria.A day after the quake, on February 7, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi held a phone conversation with Assad, expressing his solidarity and “his sincere condolences” in what was “the first official exchange” between the two presidents. Cairo was also among the countries that provided Syria with humanitarian relief aid through the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC).Egypt severed diplomatic relations with Damascus and announced its support for the opposition in 2013, during the presidency of the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Muhammad Morsi, who was overthrown that year in a military coup led by Sisi.Ties were restored the same year following Sisi’s coup. However, relations were never fully mended, and Damascus remains excluded from the Cairo-based Arab League after it was suspended in 2011. In recent years, Jordan and the UAE, two backers of the extremist insurgency in Syria, have restored their relations with the Syrian government.Since the earthquake, Arab states have embraced Syria. Tunisia has expressed its intention to restore diplomatic ties, and even Saudi Arabia – who actively supported extremist groups with the aim of overthrowing the government – has expressed the need to ‘end the status quo’ regarding enmity with Damascus. The US and UK are trying to thwart normalization efforts with Arab capitals...

Race and Erasure: Why don't Syrian and Palestinian Refugees get treated like Ukrainians?– With the war in Ukraine now in its second year, nearly a third of the country’s population has been displaced, including 8 million people who have sought refuge beyond its borders. International support for the plight of these refugees has been heartening. Nearly 4.5 million Ukrainians having been granted temporary protection status across the European Union (EU).But we also need to ask: how does this response compare to the countless other humanitarian crises around the world right now?Last year, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) reported there were ten “forgotten crises” in the world, all in Africa. The suffering of people in these countries or regions rarely makes international headlines. And there is seemingly little political interest or will from the international community to address the situation.Furthermore, the war in Ukraine has redirected humanitarian assistance and resources away from these other crises. While children in Ukraine have been supported, millions of young people in countries like Sudan and Yemen have lost access to vital food aid. They are now at heightened risk of malnutrition and starvation.NRC Secretary-General Jan Egeland put it like this:The war in Ukraine has demonstrated the immense gap between what is possible when the international community rallies behind a crisis, and the daily reality for millions of people suffering in silence [from crises] that the world has chosen to ignore. [This is] not only unjust […] but comes with a tremendous cost.A recent report from Save the Children compared the EU’s response to Ukrainians seeking temporary protection and asylum to those from elsewhere. Syrian refugees, for example, described being detained in inhumane or substandard conditions until their asylum claims were considered.They certainly weren’t granted the temporary protection status afforded Ukrainian refugees. The report called this “dysfunctional at best and cruel at worst”, part of a policy designed to “contain those who arrived and deter others from coming”.

Drones fly deep inside Russia; Putin orders border tightened (AP) — Drones that the Kremlin said were launched by Ukraine flew deep inside Russian territory, including one that got within 100 kilometers (60 miles) of Moscow, signaling breaches in Russian defenses as President Vladimir Putin ordered stepped-up protection at the border. Officials said the drones caused no injuries and did not inflict any significant damage, but the attacks on Monday night and Tuesday morning raised questions about Russian defense capabilities more than a year after the country's full-scale invasion of its neighbor. Ukrainian officials did not immediately take responsibility, but they similarly avoided directly acknowledging responsibility for past strikes and sabotage while emphasizing Ukraine’s right to hit any target in Russia. Although Putin did not refer to any specific attacks in a speech in the Russian capital, his comments came hours after the drones targeted several areas in southern and western Russia. Authorities closed the airspace over St. Petersburg in response to what some reports said was a drone. Also Tuesday, several Russian television stations aired a missile attack warning that officials blamed on a hacking attack. The drone attacks targeted regions inside Russia along the border with Ukraine and deeper into the country, according to local Russian authorities. A drone fell near the village of Gubastovo, less than 100 kilometers (60 miles) from Moscow, Andrei Vorobyov, governor of the region surrounding the Russian capital, said in an online statement. The drone did not cause any damage, Vorobyov said, but it likely targeted “a civilian infrastructure object.” Pictures of the drone showed it was a small Ukrainian-made model with a reported range of up to 800 kilometers (nearly 500 miles) but no capacity to carry a large load of explosives. Russian forces early Tuesday shot down another Ukrainian drone over the Bryansk region, local Gov. Aleksandr Bogomaz said in a Telegram post.

A Russian oil depot caught fire hundreds of miles from Ukraine, the possible result of a daring Ukrainian drone attack A fire broke out at a coastal oil facility in southern Russia in the early hours of Tuesday, the aftermath of a possible drone strike by Ukraine deep into enemy territory. Details on the attack were difficult to come by: Fires broke out in the early morning, as videos and photos that lit up Russian social media appeared to show.Neither Ukrainian nor Russian authorities verified the incident as an attack, though Russian outlets said drones were seen near the oil facility, run by government-controlled oil giant Rosneft. But an expert told Insider that Ukraine has the equipment to carry out such a strike. Similiar strikes, such as two on Russian air fields in December, have been attributed to Ukraine. Local authorities said that the fire, at Tuapse oil depot on the Black Sea coast, spread to an area of around 200 meters square before being put out at around 3 a.m. local time. Tuapse is roughly 300 miles from the nearest Ukrainian-held territory as the crow flies.State news agency RIA Novosti said a drone had been seen overhead, while popular Telegram channels such as Baza and Face of War claimed that two drones struck the site.Officials played down the incident, saying no oil was spilled and there were no casualties.But local news outlet 93.ru cited nearby residents as hearing two loud blasts that shook their homes, while another Telegram channel posted a video purporting to show a massive explosion and a plume of flames.Insider was unable to independently verify the video.The apparent attack comes amid a barrage of both official and unofficial reports of drone attacks on multiple sites in Russia overnight.

Norway emerges as key staging ground for US military provocations against Russia - As the US-NATO war against Russia enters its second year in Ukraine, Washington is recklessly escalating the conflict. After it sent battle tanks to Ukraine, there is public discussion of sending fighter jets and even NATO ground troops, which could quickly trigger a global military conflagration between nuclear-armed powers. Beyond Ukraine, Washington and its European imperialist allies are ratcheting up pressure on Russia, including in the Arctic and Baltic Sea regions. Norway’s Evenes Air Station, north of the Arctic Circle, is to become a regional hub for surveillance of Russia. Details on the joint project between the United States, Britain and Norway were provided earlier this month in comments by Norwegian Minister of Defence Bjørn Arild Gramm, who said the base will host USP-8A Poseidon surveillance aircraft. Two Arctic bases, Evenes and the Ramsund naval base, are the subject of an upgraded bilateral defence cooperation agreement between Washington and Oslo. They are classified as “agreed areas,” which grant US forces unimpeded access to the bases and exclusive rights to certain parts of them. The agreement provides for US jurisdiction over all US Army personnel in the country, including for crimes they commit off-duty, and even over Norwegian citizens who come into contact with the “agreed areas.” Washington initiated talks on the bilateral agreement, and the Biden administration said the deal was an “invariable requirement” for further US investment in Norwegian facilities. Eight months after the agreement’s commencement, it clearly aims to create a framework for a massive military build-up across the Arctic and Scandinavia. Indeed, Washington is negotiating similar arrangements with Denmark, Finland and Sweden. A likely candidate for “agreed area” status in Sweden is the island of Gotland, the site of a key Cold War-era Swedish military base just 300 kilometres northwest of Russia’s Kaliningrad exclave. Charly Salonius-Pasternak, a researcher at the Finnish Institute for International Affairs, said Washington could demand “agreed areas” in Finland as well, including the Rovaniemi Airport in the north, writing: The opportunity to store equipment and materiel in advance, which is included in the Norwegian-American agreement, clearly expresses American commitment. It would be beneficial if the US and Finland agree that American forces can store, for example, 500 anti-tank missiles and 500 anti-aircraft missiles in Finland and that a mechanism is designed so that Finnish forces can use these in extreme cases before US support arrives. On “agreed areas” in Norway, Defence Minister Gramm said: “At Evenes, the aim is to develop cooperation between Norwegian, British, and American P-8 maritime surveillance aircraft—in accordance with the investments that are made in the Norwegian Armed Forces’ long-term plan.” These include five P-8A Poseidon surveillance aircraft bought by Norway, which will work with British Poseidons to search for and destroy underwater targets, i.e., submarines. Evenes also hosts Norway’s US-produced F-35 fighter jets. Ramsund will serve as a “maritime logistics hub” for large-scale military activities in the region by the US and other NATO powers. Gramm said: In the current long-term plan for the defense sector, it is planned that the Ramsund Naval Base will have an expanded role as the Navy's base in the North—and that the base is further developed to support the Navy and allies, including expanded quay facilities, storage of ammunition, logistics, and maintenance. … Our NATO allies train and exercise regularly in Norway, something that may also involve periodical presence in connection with logistics support. Increased cooperation with the US and other allies at Evenes and Ramsund is desired and will provide economies of scale and increased operative effect. Norway’s location on the northwest of the Scandinavian Peninsula and with a 196-kilometre border with Russia make it a key ally for US imperialism to open a northern front in its war with Russia. This was underscored in a new military summit on the Arctic in January in Oslo. Chaired by General Mark Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, it included US and Norwegian officials and from 11 “close allies and partners” that the Norwegian Armed Forces refused to identify.

Russia, China slam West for blackmailing, attempting to interfere in other countries' internal affairs - The verbal confrontation between Russia and the West was on full display as the world leaders gathered in the Indian capital of New Delhi for the G20 foreign ministers' meet on Thursday. On the sidelines of the G20 meeting, Russia and its ally China let out their disgruntlement over the West's position on the Ukraine war in a heavily worded statement. Both nations chastised the West and accused it of interfering with the internal affairs of other countries. “A unanimous rejection was expressed on attempts to interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, to impose unilateral approaches through blackmail and threats, and to oppose the democratisation of international relations,” the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement. The relations between the West and China have strained further in recent days as the US warns Beijing against providing lethal aid to Russia and supporting its war which continues to wage on even after a year of casualties. The statement was released after Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov met Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang and held talks on the sidelines of the G20 meeting. Earlier, at the G20 finance ministers' meeting in Bengaluru, the members of the grouping failed to reach a joint communique over their lack of consensus. Soon after, Indian External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar confirmed that because of the "differences" over the Ukraine conflict, the meeting will only have an outcome document and not a joint statement. "There were issues and very frankly they were concerned with the Ukraine conflict. There were divergences. There were differences, which we could not be reconciled," Jaishankar said.

Western Leaders Privately Admit Ukraine Can't Win The War - Western leaders privately told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that Ukraine can not win the war against Russia and that it should begin peace talks with Moscow this year in exchange for closer ties with NATO. The private communications are at odds with public statements from Western leaders who routinely say they will continue to support Ukraine for as long as it takes until it achieves victory on the battlefield. The Wall Street Journal, which reported on the private remarks to Zelenksy, said: “The public rhetoric masks deepening private doubts among politicians in the U.K., France and Germany that Ukraine will be able to expel the Russians from eastern Ukraine and Crimea, which Russia has controlled since 2014, and a belief that the West can only help sustain the war effort for so long, especially if the conflict settles into a stalemate, officials from the three countries say. ‘We keep repeating that Russia mustn’t win, but what does that mean? If the war goes on for long enough with this intensity, Ukraine’s losses will become unbearable,’ a senior French official said. ‘And no one believes they will be able to retrieve Crimea.’ French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz told Zelensky at an Élysée Palace dinner earlier this month that he must consider peace talks with Moscow, the Journal reported. According to its source, the newspaper quoted Macron as telling Zelensky that “even mortal enemies like France and Germany had to make peace after World War II.” Macron told Zelensky “he had been a great war leader, but that he would eventually have to shift into political statesmanship and make difficult decisions,” the newspaper reported.

European Antiwar Protests Grow As Fears Of NATO vs Russia Spiral -- A series of antiwar protests over the weekend saw Western European citizens in mass demanding their governments pursue diplomacy with Russia and halt arms shipments to Kiev. As the current conflict in Ukraine turned one year old, major demonstrations – which saw people united across the political spectrum – were seen in Germany, France, and Italy.10,000 people gathered in Paris to protest against France’s membership in both NATO as well as the EU. Attendees also demanded an end to the French government’s military aid to Kiev. The demonstration, dubbed the “National March for Peace” was organized by the right-wing Les Patriotes party. According to the group’s leader Florian Philippot – who joined the Paris rally himself – similar but smaller protests were held at 30 other locations throughout the country on Sunday.On Saturday, thousands of people participated in peace demonstrations in the Italian cities of Genoa and Milan. In Genoa, the rally focused on ending weapons shipments to Ukraine and was organized by union members and left-wing activists, whose slogan was “Lower weapons, raise wages.” 4,000 people from across Italy joined the Genoa protest, along with people from France and Switzerland as well, according to local media reports.The Collective Autonomous Port Workers (CALP) helped organize the rally with the Italian communist party. They demanded the port of Genoa’s facilities no longer be used to facilitate arms shipments to Ukraine.CALP’s Riccardo Rudino pointed out that “the conflict in Ukraine did not begin last year” but rather “in 2014, with the massacre of the Russian-speaking population of the Donbass.”Following the U.S. backed 2014 coup in Kiev – which overthrew the government of former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych – Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula, while over 14,000 people were killed, including thousands of civilians, in Kiev’s war on the breakaway republics of Donetsk and Luhansk.In London, a large group carried out a similar demonstration calling for peace in Ukraine and an end to the British government’s weapons transfers to Kiev. The event was held by Stop the War Coalition at Portland Place in Central London and was attended by former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn.Many thousands of people participated in a massive protest in central Berlin, where attendees railed against German military aid to Kiev. The protesters, who were massed at the Brandenburg Gate, demanded additionally that their government engage Russia in peace talks and bring the war in Ukraine to an end.The organizers say as many as 50,000 people joined the “Uprising for Peace” demonstrations. However, the police offered a lower-end estimate of 13,000 people in attendance. The event was organized by Sahra Wagenknecht, a member of the Links Party (the Left Party) in Germany, as well as a feminist author and campaigner Alice Schwarzer.

Parking Lot Of Container Ships Idle Off China On Recovery Bet - The global economy is proving resilient in the first two months of 2023. Supply chain snarls are easing, while demand conditions are neither hot nor cold. The post–Covid-19 recovery is on shaky ground as the world awaits a China recovery. Bloomberg pointed out that "a large number" of container ships are "positioned near China, waiting for a renewed flow of exports as the world's second-largest economy recovers from Covid Zero restrictions." "It makes sense to be close to the main export centers, to be in a ready-to-go position," Simon Heaney, senior manager of container research at maritime consultant Drewry, said. Drewry data shows unused vessel capacity began inching up in the second half of 2022 and has since hit the highest level since late 2020. A slowdown in shipping comes as major central banks sent interest rates sky-high to tackle out-of-control inflation. This has led to falling global demand for goods and services. Spot container freight rates have crashed in the last year. Many investors have bet on a Chinese recovery since Beijing disbanded Covid restrictions late last year. But on Tuesday, the Chinese Communist Party warned the foundation of economic recovery is not yet solid, according to Reuters. After a three-day meeting, a communique released by the Communist Party's Central Committee said the economy still faces triple pressures, including demand contraction, supply shock, and sliding expectations. FreightWaves pointed out last week, "an unprecedented flood of new container ships is about to enter service." This would further increase unused vessel capacity as a welcoming sign of lower container rates. One thing is clear: The world has entered a period of immense economic uncertainty with no definitive timeline for a robust China recovery. Plus, ultra-hawkish central banks worldwide are dampening demand.

At least 59 migrants drown off Italian coast, including newborn baby and 19 other children - At least 59 migrants have been killed after their wooden vessel shipwrecked on the rocks off the Calabrian coast in Italy. A newborn baby and 19 other children were among the dead. Many of the bodies washed up on shore near a seaside resort. Another 81 people are known to have survived, 20 of whom have been taken to hospital, one to intensive care. According to survivors, roughly 150 people were originally on board. They had set sail from Turkey three or four days previously. Responsibility for this terrible crime lies with all the governments of Europe, who have conspired to turn the continent into a “fortress” against desperate people, and with the United States and its allies whose imperialist violence has dismembered societies across the Middle East and Africa, forcing unprecedented numbers to flee their homes. With repulsive hypocrisy, the fascist Prime Minister of Italy Giorgia Meloni proclaimed her “deep sorrow,” before pledging more of the policies responsible for bloodbath on Europe’s borders, a crackdown on routes to Europe by “preventing departures.” Her interior minister boasted last week that such measures, implemented with Libya and Tunisia, had already “averted the arrival” of close to 21,000 people—trapping them in hellish conditions in those countries and pushing countless others to risk more dangerous journeys. The same message as the fascist Meloni could be heard from any of Europe’s rulers. President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen said she was “deeply saddened” by the deaths, before adding, “We must redouble our efforts on the (EU) Pact on Migration and Asylum and on the Action Plan on the Central Mediterranean.” Its details were spelt out at an EU summit earlier this month which discussed an “integrated package of mobile and stationary infrastructures… from vehicles to cameras, from watchtowers to electronic surveillance” to deny entry to asylum seekers and plans to make easier the mass deportation of refugees and to strengthen collaboration with the brutal regimes policing the North African coast. “Fortress Europe” has already seen 2,406 people recorded as dead or missing in the Mediterranean by the International Organization for Migration in 2022. Nearly 26,000 have been lost since 2014. This says nothing of the horrors suffered on the road to the Turkish or North African coast, or the network of internment camps in which tens of thousands of refugees are imprisoned and denied basic democratic rights.

The Limitations Of The EU's New Crypto Regulations -The final vote on the European Union’s much-awaited set of crypto rules, known as the Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) regulation, was recently deferred to April 2023. It was not the first delay — previously the European lawmakers rescheduled the procedure from November 2022 to February 2023. The setback, however, was caused solely by technical difficulties, and thus, MiCA is still on its way to becoming the first comprehensive pan-European crypto framework. But that will happen only in 2024, whereas during the second half of last year, when the MiCA text had already been mostly written, the industry was shaken with a number of shocks, provoking new headaches for regulators. There’s little doubt that in an industry as dynamic as crypto, the whole of 2023 will bring some new hot topics as well. Hence, the question is whether MiCA, with its already existing imperfections, could qualify as a truly “comprehensive framework” a year from now. Or, which is more important, will it for an effective set of rules to prevent future failures akin to TerraUSD or FTX? These questions have certainly appeared in the mind of the president of the European Central Bank, Christine Lagarde. In November 2022, amid the FTX scandal, she claimed “there will have to be a MiCA II, which embraces broader what it aims to regulate and to supervise, and that is very much needed.” Cointelegraph reached out to a range of industry stakeholders to know their opinions on whether the Markets in Crypto Assets regulation is still enough to enable the proper functioning of the crypto market in Europe.