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British advertising conglomerate WPP has helped oil companies ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and BP spend an estimated $1 billion on ads in the United States since the 2015 Paris Agreement to tackle climate change, a new report shows. 

The figure is nearly twice the respective amounts linked to U.S. rivals Omnicom and Interpublic Group (IPG), which merged in November. London-based WPP was the leading advertising group serving America’s oil industry over the past decade, according to the analysis by DeSmog. 

During this period, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and BP had employed “deceptive and misleading” communications strategies designed to thwart policies to tackle the climate crisis by curbing the use of fossil fuels, a congressional investigation concluded in April 2024.

WPP’s services — from developing ideas for ads and designing logos, to securing ad space and analysing target audiences — were “crucial” to maintaining the oil industry’s public image, current and former WPP employees said. WPP is estimated to have earned millions of dollars a year from this work.

“The UK prides itself on climate leadership, and yet WPP, the supposed jewel of the British advertising industry, is facilitating dangerously misleading advertising in the U.S.,” said Victoria Harvey, holder of a PhD in the ad industry’s response to the climate crisis from the University of East Anglia, who reviewed DeSmog’s methodology.

“By creatively articulating the deception from big oil and gas, WPP has set the climate agenda back and continues to do so,” Harvey said.

ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and BP spent an estimated combined total of $1.5 billion on buying U.S. ad space such as TV slots and social media feeds since the Paris Agreement, according to the analysis. That’s roughly equivalent to running ads on every billboard in New York’s advertising hotspot Times Square every day for the last decade.

WPP’s global network of subsidiary advertising agencies made an estimated two-thirds’ worth of those ads, the analysis found. WPP, which is one of Britain’s biggest companies by revenue and also works with clients such as Coca-Cola and Unilever, was the only major ad company to partner with all four oil giants on advertising projects during this time.

This work may have breached a policy WPP adopted in 2022 not to accept projects that may “frustrate” the goals of the Paris Agreement, the current and former employees said, since the oil majors were committed to increasing oil and gas production and promoting speculative climate solutions.

A version of this article has been published by the Guardian.

WPP agencies Ogilvy and Wavemaker have both worked on U.S. campaigns for BP and Chevron respectively which received misleading advertising complaints, for taglines such as “We see possibilities in planes that fly on garbage.” Neither complaint was taken forward, although BP voluntarily withdrew its ads.

A 2022 U.S. Congressional committee report cited several ExxonMobil ads made by WPP’s Group SJR as examples of greenwashing, including one that compared fossil gas paired with renewable energy to “a peanut butter and jelly sandwich”.

An ExxonMobil ad featuring peanut butter and jelly made by WPP agency Group SJR, shown on Twitter (now X). (Credit: University of Oxford Climate Litigation Lab)

Staff who raised concerns about this work have been told by seniors that they are helping clients communicate about their shift to cleaner business models, the WPP employees said. But many who have worked on these projects fear they serve primarily to deflect criticism from polluters.

WPP clients BP and Shell have both weakened their own climate targets in the past three years. At the same time, their advertising output has pivoted to promoting the necessity of fossil fuels, a report published in March by industry campaign group Clean Creatives found.

BP’s 2023 campaign “And, not or” suggested that renewables should exist alongside oil and gas rather than replace them. The campaign included ads saying BP was reducing the climate impact of oil by running wells on electricity in Texas’ Permian Basin.

In a Shell YouTube ad run in October, a drone inspector identified as Tori describes how she is “helping provide American energy security” by carrying out safety checks on a drilling platform.

“We heard that a lot internally, that we were influencing them in the right direction,” said a former employee who worked on projects for BP at WPP branding agency Landor. “In reality, whatever BP decides to do, we would just deliver it.”

WPP and the other ad agencies mentioned did not respond to requests for comment.

Shell declined to comment. BP, ExxonMobil and Chevron did not respond to a request for comment.

Piece of the Pie

Advertising companies do not publish details about how much their clients spend on ad space, and increasingly avoid publicising their fossil fuel contracts.

To generate its estimates, DeSmog mapped the dozens of ad agencies that have worked for the four oil companies, using public sources such as staff social media profiles and industry award listings, confidential information shared by employees, and previous research by DeSmog and Clean Creatives. These contracts were then cross-referenced with ad spend estimates obtained from market research platform MediaRadar by the University of Oxford’s Climate Litigation Lab.

Most of the oil majors’ U.S. ad spend was channelled via subsidiaries of the handful of advertising holding companies that dominate the industry globally. After WPP, Omnicom and IPG, Tokyo-based holding company Dentsu ranked fourth in terms of its exposure to this ad spend ($255 million) and Paris-based rival Havas ranked fifth ($230 million).

(Credit: Sari Williams/DeSmog)

The analysis did not seek to capture the millions of dollars the fossil fuel industry spends every year advertising in countries outside the U.S., as well as on lobbying, branding, public relations, and other marketing activities.

Advertising industry insiders say momentum around climate initiatives has slowed over the past few years as competition from big technology companies and artificial intelligence (AI) has squeezed margins.

New WPP CEO Cindy Rose is due to present her strategy to reverse declining profits at the company’s annual general meeting on May 8. A preview in February did not mention sustainability.

Under previous CEO Mark Read, WPP committed to reduce carbon emissions and prevent greenwashing, including via the policy adopted in 2022 “not to take on any client work…designed to frustrate the objectives of the Paris Agreement.”

But employees claim these moves have changed little. 

There are concerns that WPP’s ongoing work with Shell, BP, and Chevron may breach the policy because many of these clients’ ads have distracted from or justified fossil fuel expansion, according to six current and former employees, who spoke to DeSmog anonymously for fear of professional repercussions.

New fossil fuel projects planned by the companies are incompatible with the Paris goal to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees and prevent catastrophic climate change, scientific assessments have found.

“I don’t think there’s anything that WPP could possibly be saying for BP or Shell that would adhere to the policy,” said a former director at two WPP agencies in New York.

In total, WPP has held at least 82 contracts with the fossil fuel industry around the world since the start of 2025, according to industry campaign group Clean Creatives. More than a quarter of those contracts relate to work wholly or partially targeted at U.S. audiences.

Experts say that the impact of WPP’s moves to lower carbon emissions by reducing employee travel and powering buildings with green energy is outweighed by its work for polluters.

“By shaping public narratives, increasing consumption, and normalising fossil fuel use, agencies like WPP can significantly influence emissions far beyond their operational footprint,” said Alexis McGivern, a researcher on corporate climate policy at Oxford Net Zero, a research group at the University of Oxford.

WPP ad agencies Ogilvy and VML have led BP and Shell’s respective advertising strategies since at least 2000, DeSmog found.

Ogilvy devised BP’s “Beyond Petroleum” campaign in 2000. It also popularised the concept of the “carbon footprint” through a series of BP ads in 2004 which sought to emphasise individual responsibility for reducing emissions. 

Screenshot from a Shell YouTube ad featuring a drone inspector identified as Tori, 19 October, 2025. (Credit: University of Oxford Climate Litigation Lab)

Today, WPP agencies such as Ogilvy are still “deeply embedded” in BP’s advertising process and have some staff dedicated solely to working on BP projects, according to the former Landor employee.

In 2020, BP briefed seven WPP agencies — including Ogilvy, Landor, and VML — to create a new brand strategy to tackle the company’s image as “the bad guys,” according to a WPP document obtained by investigative outlet Drilled.

Subsequent U.S. ad campaigns launched by BP repeatedly promoted the company’s “#netzero” goals and said it supported regulation to limit methane emissions, despite BP having successfully lobbied the U.S. government to roll back such rules, an investigation by Unearthed found.

“WPP has had oil clients for decades, whether they were promising to go green or not,” said one former partner at a WPP agency, who has worked on Shell campaigns. “That tells you everything you need to know about whether we are actually trying to change things.”

Risks Rising for Protecting Polluters

Pressure is building on advertising companies to acknowledge their role in delaying climate action by protecting the reputations of polluters.

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres has urged ad agencies to drop fossil fuel clients, calling ad executives “Mad Men fuelling the madness.”

The OECD, an intergovernmental economic organisation, is considering a complaint against WPP filed by climate and human rights campaigners in February last year. At the time, a WPP spokesperson said, “Contrary to the claims being made, we adhere to the highest regulatory standards in our work for clients.” Protesters have since targeted WPP’s Thames-front offices in London with banners reading “climate criminals”.

The “increased reputational risk associated with working on client briefs perceived to be environmentally detrimental” could affect revenue, WPP said in its 2025 sustainability report.

Climate activists from Extinction Rebellion protest outside WPP’s offices in London, June 25, 2025. (Credit: Extinction Rebellion)

Legal risks are rising, too.

In a first-of-its-kind ruling in October, a Paris court found French oil giant TotalEnergies misled consumers by saying it had put “climate at the heart of its strategy” during a 2021 rebrand, despite continuing to heavily invest in new oil and gas projects.

WPP agency Wavemaker advised TotalEnergies on where to buy ad space for the rebrand campaign but was not named in the case.

In January, Michigan state filed the latest of dozens of U.S. lawsuits being brought by local and federal governments against ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, BP, and other oil companies accusing the companies of climate deception and disinformation.

So far, a U.S. court is yet to find against an oil company in such a case. The companies deny any wrongdoing, arguing that the courts are the wrong venue to determine climate policy.

“In the context of increasing litigation to recover substantial damages for the escalating costs of climate change on the basis of oil majors’ deceptive activities, doing large amounts of the same companies’ advertising work does not seem legally advisable,” said Johnny White, a lawyer at environmental law firm Client Earth, which advised on the TotalEnergies case.

Additional reporting by Kathryn Clare and Ellen Ormesher

The post Revealed: British Ad Giant’s Billion-Dollar Greenwash of U.S. Oil Industry appeared first on DeSmog.

Registered nurses, community members, labor advocates, and local supporters will hold a press conference on Friday, May 1 outside Bakersfield Memorial Hospital to demand hospital leadership reverse plans to close the hospital’s burn unit.

Two months ago, everyone was still wondering whether the First Conference for Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels would carry the relevance it promised in Brazil. Would governments around the world care enough to show up after the excitement of COP30 had faded? In a world that seemed to be sinking into new wars with global consequences?

Paradoxically, the escalating aggressions by the United States and Israel in Southwest Asia (Middle East) have shown the world exactly why we need to leave behind our dependence on fossil fuels. Entire communities have been destroyed, families buried under rubble, children killed, livelihoods erased, all in a region whose political fate has been shaped for over a century by the control of oil and gas. People in Palestine, Lebanon, and across the region are paying with their own lives for the world’s thirst for fossil fuels.

These are not abstract arguments. They are the bombs that fall, the blockades that starve, the occupations that endure, all because fossil fuel wealth concentrates power in the hands of those willing to use violence to protect it. Not only do fossil fuels poison our planet, they fuel instability, deepen inequality, and tie our futures to volatile and unjust energy systems. Moving beyond fossil fuels is no longer a distant goal. It is a shared necessity.

The response? Fifty-seven countries representing roughly a third of the global economy came together, signaling that the transition is not only possible but already underway.

But what truly defined this conference was not just who showed up at the governmental level. It was who was finally let in.

Indigenous peoples from around the world, trade unions, youth groups, academics, Afro-descendant communities, peasant associations, women and diverse identities, activists and NGOs, among others, engaged for the first time in a participation mechanism that actually listens to their voices and puts their demands on the table.

And beyond the high-level spaces, communities were building, not just speaking. During both days of the Peoples Summit, 350.org with 32 organizations across Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico and the Caribbean Islands a Fair of Alternatives, showing that futures beyond fossil fuels are already here. Community leaders hosted a panel within the Peoples Summit space, and their voices fed into the final declaration.

Frontline communities from all around the world had a voice on the Santa Marta conference

 

It was no small thing to see Indigenous women leaders from Putumayo and Bolivia connecting over their shared concern about an energy transition being carried out without consultation in their territories, one that threatens to bring extractive models for copper and lithium that would gravely affect their environments and communities. But ready, too, to share models of community energy generation through biodigesters they have built themselves. Because communities around the world have not sat around waiting for their governments to act. They have thought of solutions and carried them out.

That same spirit drove the Popular Assemblies we co-organized in three territories in Colombia and Ecuador, where affected communities named the crisis in their own terms. Two of the communities that led these Assemblies — Cesar sin Fracking and Alianza Libre de Fracking — attended the high-level Conference, including Yuvelis Morales Blanco, now a winner of the Goldman Environmental Prize. 350.org also held an organizing space toward a common Latin American campaign against fracking and LNG with leaders from Colombia, Argentina and Mexico.

These connections between communities were perhaps the most powerful thread running through the conference. Activists from across the world linked militarization and the climate crisis in a country with more than 60 years of armed conflict, where multinationals like Glencore and Drummond have used armed groups to displace and kill local communities, seize their lands and waters, and leave surrounding populations in misery and fear. The Climate Justice Flotilla traveled across Caribbean islands still under Dutch colonial rule to bring their voices to this space — possibly the first time Aruba and Curacao had representation at a conference like this, even as the Netherlands, their colonial power, co-hosted while opposing a fossil fuel transition treaty.

During the Santa Marta conference, activists and local communities blocked the entrance of one of the main coal ports in Latin America.

 

It was also no small thing to see these same activists blockade one of the largest coal ports in Latin America with solar panels — Drummond’s port in Ciénaga. The action put the demands of affected communities front and centre: making polluters pay for the loss of land, biodiversity and life, and the need for a just transition. For local communities, doing something like this would mean enormous security risks — just weeks earlier, armed groups had kidnapped 25 fishermen from the community most affected by Drummond. But these young people from around the world used their foreign origins as a kind of shield, standing in solidarity with the communities of Ciénaga, Santa Marta, and all of Colombia affected by this multinational. Those same solar panels used in this action will now go to the communities most harmed by that coal port.

So what did governments actually deliver?

Let’s be clear: they could have been far more ambitious. The world is on fire, sometimes literally, and the political outcomes of this conference reflect cautious, small steps that do not match the urgency communities are living every day.

Governments from 57 countries meet at the First Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels Conference, in Colombia

 

That said, the fact that this conference happened at all, that it finally named fossil fuels as the root cause of climate chaos and created a dedicated space to address them outside of the pressures of formal COP negotiations, is itself a significant victory. Five concrete outcomes came out of the high-level segment:

1. Continuity. A second conference has been announced for 2027, co-hosted by Tuvalu and Ireland, with the main event taking place in Tuvalu. And who better than our brothers and sisters from the Pacific nations, on the frontlines of climate chaos, to carry forward what started in Santa Marta and remind the world of the urgency?
2. A coordination group has been established to ensure continuity between conferences, bringing together countries leading different alliances and initiatives on the fossil fuel transition, including the co-hosts of the first and second conferences.
3. The outcomes will be handed over to the COP30 Presidency, shared ahead of the intersessional meetings in Bonn this June and formally presented at London Climate Action Week, with plans to bring them to the UN Secretary-General during New York Climate Week. The intention is to feed these results into the second Global Stocktake, making sure this process does not live in isolation from the UNFCCC.
4. Three workstreams have been launched to identify concrete opportunities for cooperation: one focused on national roadmaps guided by the Science Panel, another on economic dependencies and financial architecture, and a third on aligning fossil fuel producers and consumers toward trade systems free of fossil fuels. These workstreams will remain open for countries to join or lead.
5. A Science Panel for the Global Energy Transition will anchor the entire process in evidence rather than politics. Academics and scientists from around the world joined forces to ensure that science guides the process of leaving fossil fuels behind, and to help countries develop roadmaps aligned with the 1.5°C trajectory and to dismantle the legal, financial, and political barriers standing in the way.

Are these outcomes enough? No. Are they the kind of bold, binding commitments that the scale of the crisis demands? Not even close. But in a world where the largest historical emitter has abandoned climate action entirely, where wars rage over the very resources we need to leave behind, the fact that 57 countries sat down, opened the doors to movements and communities, and committed to a sustained process is not nothing. It is the floor, not the ceiling, and it is up to all of us to push it higher.

Communities everywhere will keep building the solutions their governments have been too slow to deliver. And the rest of us? We stay loud, stay connected, and keep showing up, because the transition has already begun, and it was never going to be led from the top.

Because if this conference showed anything, it is that the transition is not only about energy systems. It is about power. The power of who gets to decide. Who benefits. Who is heard. And for perhaps the first time at this scale, the answer is beginning to shift.

The Great Power Shift has started. Join us!

The post Santa Marta was just the beginning appeared first on 350.

Anne Jellema is Executive Director of 350.org.

The war on Iran and Lebanon is a deeply unjust and devastating conflict, killing civilians at home, destroying lives, and at the same time sending shockwaves through the global economy. We, at 350.org, have calculated, drawing on price forecasts from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Goldman Sachs, just how much that volatility is costing us. 

Even under the IMF’s baseline scenario – a de facto “best case” scenario with a near-term end to the war and related supply chain disruptions – oil and gas price spikes are projected to cost households and businesses globally more than $600 billion by the end of the year. Under the IMF’s “adverse scenario”, with prolonged conflict and sustained price pressures, we estimate those additional costs could exceed $1 trillion, even after accounting for reduced demand.

Which is why we urgently need a power shift. Governments are under growing pressure to respond to rising fuel and food costs and deepening energy poverty. And it’s becoming clearer to both voters and elected officials that fossil dependence is not only expensive and risky, but unnecessary. 

People who can are voting with their wallets: sales of solar panels and electric vehicles are increasing sharply in many countries. But the working people who have nothing to spare, ironically, are the ones stuck with using oil and gas that is either exorbitantly expensive or simply impossible to get. 

Drain on households and economies

In India, street food vendors can’t get cooking gas and in the Philippines, fishermen can’t afford to take their boats to sea. A quarter of British people say that rising energy tariffs will leave them completely unable to pay their bills. This is the moment for a global push to bring abundant and affordable clean energy to all.

In April, we released Out of Pocket, our new research report on how fossil fuels are draining households and economies. We were surprised by the scale of what we found. For decades, governments have reassured people that energy price spikes are unfortunate but unavoidable – the result of distant conflicts, market forces or geopolitical shocks beyond anyone’s control. But the numbers tell a different story. 

• Apr 28, 2026 News Santa Marta: Ministers grapple with practicalities of fossil fuel phase-out Around 60 governments that want to make progress on transitioning away from coal, oil and gas are meeting in Colombia to work out how they can do it an equitable way Read more
• Apr 24, 2026 Comment Why the transition beyond fossil fuels depends on cities and collective action Cities will help identify concrete pathways for an equitable shift to clean energy at the Santa Marta conference, with C40 members aiming to halve their fossil fuel use by 2030 Read more

What we are living through today is not an energy crisis. It is a fossil fuel crisis. In just the first 50 days of the Middle East conflict, soaring oil and gas prices have siphoned an estimated $158 billion–$166 billion from households and businesses worldwide. That is money extracted directly from people’s pockets and transferred, almost instantly, into fossil fuel company balance sheets. And this figure only captures the immediate impact of price spikes, not the permanent economic drain of fossil dependence. Fossil fuels don’t just cost us once, they cost us over and over again. 

First, through our bills. Every time there is a war, an embargo or a supply disruption, fossil fuel prices surge. For ordinary people, this means higher costs for energy, transport and food. Many Global South countries have little or no fiscal space to buffer the shock; instead, workers and families pay the price.

Second, through our taxes. Governments around the world continue to pour vast sums of public money into fossil fuel subsidies. These are often justified as a way to protect the most vulnerable at the petrol pump or in their homes. But in reality, the benefits are overwhelmingly captured by wealthier households and corporations. The poorest 20% receive just a fraction of this support, while public finances are drained.

Third, through climate impacts. New research across more than 24,000 global locations gives a granular account of the true costs of extreme heat, sea level rise and falling agricultural yields. Using this data to update IMF modelling of the social cost of carbon, we found that fossil fuel impacts on health and livelihoods amount to over $9 trillion a year. This is the biggest subsidy of all, because these massive and mounting costs are not charged to Big Oil – they are paid for by governments and households, with the poorest shouldering the lion’s share. 

Massive transfer of wealth to fossil fuel industry

Adding up direct subsidies, tax breaks and the unpaid bill for climate damages, the total transfer of wealth from the public to the fossil fuel industry amounts to $12 trillion even in a “normal” year without a global oil shock. That’s more than 50% higher than the IMF has previously estimated, and equivalent to a staggering $23 million a minute.

The fossil fuel industry has become extraordinarily adept at profiting from instability. When conflict drives up prices, companies do not lose, they gain. In the current crisis, oil producers and commodity traders are on track to secure tens of billions of dollars in additional windfall profits, even as households face rising bills and governments struggle to manage the fallout. 

Fossil fuel crisis offers chance to speed up energy transition, ministers say

This growing disconnect is impossible to ignore. Investors are advised to buy into fossil fuel firms precisely because of their ability to generate profits in times of crisis. Meanwhile, ordinary people are told to tighten their belts.

In 2026, unlike during the oil shocks of the 1970s, clean energy is no longer a distant alternative. Now, even more than when gas prices spiked due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, renewables are often the cheapest option available. Solar and wind can be deployed quickly, at scale, and without the volatility that defines fossil fuel markets.

How to transition from dirty to clean energy

The solutions are clear. Governments must implement permanent windfall taxes on fossil fuel companies to ensure that extraordinary profits generated during crises are redirected to support households. These revenues can be used to reduce energy bills, invest in public services, and accelerate the rollout of clean energy.

Second, we must shift subsidies away from fossil fuels and towards renewable solutions, particularly those that can be deployed quickly and equitably, such as rooftop and community solar. This is not just about cutting emissions. It is about building a more stable, fair and resilient energy system.

Finally, we need binding plans to phase out fossil fuels altogether, replacing them with homegrown renewable energy that can shield economies from future shocks. Because what the current crisis has made clear is this: as long as we remain dependent on fossil fuels, we remain vulnerable – to conflict, to price volatility and to the escalating impacts of climate change.

The true price of fossil fuels is no longer hidden. It is visible in rising bills, strained public finances and communities pushed to the brink. And it is being paid, every day, by ordinary people around the world.

It’s time for the great power shift. 

Full details on the methodology used for this report are available here.

The Great Power Shift is a new campaign by 350.org to pressure governments to bring down energy bills for good by ending fossil fuel dependence and investing in clean, affordable energy for all.

Logo of 350.org campaign on “The Great Power Shift” Logo of 350.org campaign on “The Great Power Shift”

The post What fossil fuels really cost us in a world at war appeared first on Climate Home News.

The next great hunger Channel News brendan 30th April 2026 Teaser Media

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DENVER—Interior Secretary Doug Burgum claimed in a Senate Energy and Natural Resources hearing this morning that President Donald Trump’s $10 billion “slush fund” request in his 2027 proposed Interior department budget is solely for deferred maintenance at National Park Service sites in and around Washington, D.C., and will not go toward any new construction. See their exchange HERE.

Trump’s proposed NPS budget requests the establishment of a “new $10.0 billion Presidential Capital Stewardship Program in order to carry out priority construction and rehabilitation projects in the Washington, D.C. area.”

But the Interior department estimates the NPS deferred maintenance backlog in D.C. to be just over $2 billion. Adding in the maintenance backlog for all of Virginia and Maryland brings the total to only $4 billion, leaving $6 billion or more unaccounted for in Burgum’s request for Trump’s slush fund.

Trump’s NPS budget also calls for a 55 percent reduction in the annual National Park Service construction and major maintenance budget, leaving NPS less than $50 million to address repairs at historic sites and national parks across the country, and a 53 percent, or $213 million, reduction in resource stewardship funds.

The Center for Western Priorities released the following statement from Communications Manager Kate Groetzinger:

“Doug Burgum finally gave Congress insight into the shady $10 billion request for ‘beautification’ projects in Washington D.C. But his answer doesn’t square with his own department’s deferred maintenance numbers. He’s already spent $17 million in taxpayer money on a fountain across from the White House. President Trump has made it clear he wants more vanity projects, from giant arches to sculpture gardens, in his own backyard.

“It’s time for Secretary Burgum to tell President Trump that all of America’s parks need attention, not just the ones outside the president’s window.”

Learn more:

• Burgum blunders through budget hearings, taking heat for NPS cuts and Trump ‘slush fund’ – Westwise

• DOI Deferred Maintenance backlog – Interior Department

• President’s Budget Proposal Slashes National Park Service Funding Amid Ongoing Attacks on National Parks – NPCA

• Firm Building Trump’s Ballroom Got a Secret No-Bid Contract for a Nearby Job – New York Times

The post Fact Check: Burgum claims $10 billion Trump slush fund request is for NPS deferred maintenance only appeared first on Center for Western Priorities.

Federal court orders DTE Energy to pay $100M for Clean Air Act violations at EES Coke on Zug Island, marking a major win for Southwest Detroit residents; appeal ongoing.

The post An update on Southwest Detroit Industrial Impacts: The Zug Island Ruling appeared first on FracTracker Alliance.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Burning time for North American wildfires is going into overtime. Flames are lasting later into the night and starting earlier in the morning because human-caused climate change is extending the hotter and drier conditions that feed fires, a new study found.

Fires used to die down or even die out at night as temperatures dropped and humidity increased, but that’s happening less often. The number of hours in North America when the weather is favorable for wildfires is 36% higher than 50 years ago, according to a study published earlier this month in Science Advances.

Places such as California have 550 more potential burning hours than in the mid-1970s. Parts of southwestern New Mexico and central Arizona are seeing as many as 2,000 more hours a year when the weather is prone to burning fires, the highest increase seen in the study, which looked at Canada and the United States. The research looked at times when conditions were ripe for fire, but that didn’t mean fires occurred during all that time.

Recent big fires in LA and Hawaii burned at night

Fires that surge at night are tougher to fight and included the Lahaina, Hawaii fire in 2023, the Jasper fire in Alberta in 2024, and the Los Angeles fires in 2025, the study said. Maui’s fire ignited at 12:22 a.m.

It’s not just the clock that is getting extended. The calendar is too. The number of days with fire-prone weather increased by 44%, which effectively added 26 days over the past half-century.

It’s mostly from warmer, drier nighttime weather, with a bit of extra wind, the study authors said.

“Fires normally slow down during the night, or they just stop,” said study co-author Xianli Wang, a fire scientist with the Canadian Forest Service. “But under extreme fire hazard conditions, fire actually burns through the night or later into the night.”

And Wang said Earth’s warming atmosphere means it’s like to get worse.

Tougher to fight fires at night

Fires that don’t “go to sleep” get a running start the next day, making it harder to knock them down, University of California, Merced fire scientist John Abatzoglou, who wasn’t part of the study, said in an email.

“Nights aren’t what they used to be — that is, more reliable breaks for wildfire,” he added. “Widespread warming and lack of humidity is keeping fires up at night.”

Wildland firefighter Nicholai Allen, who also founded a firm that makes home fire prevention tools, said it’s very difficult to fight fires at night.

“You have to understand that you have snakes and bears and mountain lions and all the stuff you have in daytime,” Allen said, noting a colleague was bitten by a bear. “But at night, they’re really scared, and they’re running away from the fire.”

The Canadian researchers analyzed nearly 9,000 larger fires from 2017 to 2023 using a weather satellite and other tools to get hour-by-hour data on atmospheric conditions during the fires, such as humidity, temperature, wind, rain, and fuel moisture levels. They created a computer model that correlated weather conditions and fire status and applied to historical data in Canada and the United States from 1975 to 2106.

Nights are warming faster than days

Scientists have long said heat-trapping gases from the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas make nights warm faster than days because of increased cloud cover that absorbs and re-emits heat down to Earth at night like a blanket. Since 1975, summers in the contiguous U.S. have seen nighttime lowest temperatures warm by 2.6 degrees Fahrenheit (1.4 degrees Celsius), while daytime highest temperatures have gone up 2.2 degrees Fahrenheit (1.2 degrees Celsius), according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Humidity at night “doesn’t rebound” from its daytime dryness like it used to, said study lead author Kaiwei Luo, a fire science researcher at the University of Alberta.

Wildfires often coincide with drought, especially extreme drought, which means not only drier air, but hotter, drier air that sucks up more moisture from the ground and plants, making fuels for fire more flammable, Wang said. In a drought, there’s often a vicious circle of drying and when it is quite dry, a warmer atmosphere has more power to suck moisture out of fuels.

Just as warmer nights, especially in heat waves, don’t let the body recover, the warmer nights are not allowing forests to recover, Wang said. It can take weeks for dead fuel to recover its lost moisture and be less fire-prone, he said.

“It’s just a stress to the plants,” Wang said. “That also increases fuel load.”

From 2016 to 2025, wildfires in the United States on average burned an area the size of Massachusetts each year, slightly more than 11,000 square miles (28,500 square kilometers). That’s 2.6 times the average burn area of the 1980s, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. Canada’s land burned on average for the last 10 years is 2.8 times more than during the 1980s, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre.

Syracuse University fire scientist Jacob Bendix, who wasn’t part of the research, called the study a sobering reminder of climate change’s role in driving “increased fire potential across almost all of the fire-prone environments of North America.”

The founder and director of a company behind new plans to use UK onshore gas for bitcoin mining, has resigned.

Rathlin Energy’s West Newton-B site in East Yorkshire. Photo: We Said No

John Hodgins, a Canadian geologist, left the Rathlin Energy board on 1 April 2026, according to the official Companies House register.

He had been a director since January 2008.

Rathlin operates two sites in Holderness, East Yorkshire, at West Newton-A and B.

The company’s majority investor, Reabold Resources, has proposed using gas from the sites to generate electricity for crypto currency transactions. See DrillOrDrop report from August 2025

Mr Hodgins is the chief executive of Connaught Oil & Gas Ltd, Rathlin’s former parent company, based in Calgary, Canada.

He has worked in western Canada, the North Sea, China, the US and Australia, as well onshore in the UK.

Before joining Connaught, he held positions in eight different oil and gas companies.

Rathlin’s most recent accounts, for the year ending 31 December 2024, reported that Mr Hodgins held 427,272 ordinary shares and 272,000 share purchase options.

In the past two years, two other directors have resigned, Howard Mayson (April 2024) and Paul McGarvey (May 2025), as well as Rathlin’s auditor. Paul Harris joined the board in March 2025.

Earlier this month, an environmental campaigner took the first steps in a legal challenge to the approval by the Environment Agency of lower-volume fracking at West Newton-A.

Spring has arrived in North Texas, and with it comes one of the most exciting seasons at Dogwood Canyon. As trees leaf out, wildflowers bloom, and insects begin to buzz, migratory birds return to the...

This week, the Sacramento County Superior Court denied a motion by the State Water Contractors to disqualify Judge Stephen P. Acquisto, who has presided for more than two years over coordinated cases challenging the Department of Water Resources’ (DWR) approvals of the Delta Tunnel project. 

More than ten cases are currently pending, including challenges to DWR’s approvals under the California Environmental Quality Act, the Delta Reform Act and other statutes.

Petitioners, including all five Delta Counties, North, Central and South Delta Water Agencies, the City of Stockton, the Sacramento Area Sewer District, and a broad coalition of Tribes and environmental organizations, opposed the motion, citing the advanced stage of the proceedings and the risk of unnecessary confusion and delay. 

Restore the Delta welcomes the court’s decision to deny the State Water Contractors’ attempt to remove the presiding judge and looks forward to transparent proceedings of the Delta Tunnel challenges. 

Read more on the decision here.

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When we speak of a revolution’s failure, we usually mean that it did not fulfill its stated aims. In the case of Iran’s 1979 revolution, however, the failure runs far deeper. That revolution not only failed to achieve its declared objectives; it failed in the most profound sense. It brought to power a force even more reactionary than the one it overthrew. What occurred was not simply a transfer of power but a historical regression whose consequences endure to this day. This regression extended beyond politics into the social and cultural fabric and even reshaped the intellectual horizons of society, setting the trajectory of development sharply backward.

It is within this context that the discussion of the “bleak scenario” versus the “bright scenario” acquires meaning. This distinction does not stem from naïve optimism about revolutionary processes, but from a concrete historical concern. In classical—and, to some extent, ideological—communist theory, political change is typically imagined as a revolutionary process in which the working class and organized popular forces seize power from the bourgeoisie to establish a new order. This vision presupposes a minimum level of social organization, continuity of production, and the capacity for political reconstruction. In other words, even amid revolution, it assumes that society does not disintegrate entirely and that the essential foundations for rebuilding remain intact.

A coherent state in the conventional sense has never fully taken shape within the Islamic regime. What exists instead is a constellation of rival power factions.

The realities of Iranian society under the Islamic regime cast doubt on such assumptions. The systematic and often brutal destruction of every form of independent organization has rendered such social structuring practically impossible. For nearly five decades, the regime has crushed collective organization with extraordinary severity: dismantling political parties, dissolving councils, erasing labor unions, and imprisoning anyone who attempted to organize. Under such conditions, the idea of a coherent, conscious transfer of power to emancipatory forces seems less a political possibility than an expression of hope divorced from reality.

At the same time, Iranian society is caught in a structural deadlock. The Islamic Republic has reached a point where it can neither retreat nor advance. There is no clear horizon for resolving its intertwined economic, political, and social crises. Structural reform has become unfeasible, yet maintaining the status quo demands ever-deeper repression. This stalemate creates a situation where social explosions are always possible, but the organizational capacity to direct them is extremely weak—if not entirely absent. This tension between an explosive potential and the absence of conscious direction forms the primary foundation of the “bleak scenario.”

Moreover, the very structure of the Islamic regime has evolved into a permanent source of instability. From its inception, the system has been anchored in an apocalyptic religious ideology that has shaped not only politics but also economic life, culture, and foreign policy. This ideology, animated by a self-ascribed historical mission, transcends the rational logic of a modern state. Decision-making, therefore, has been guided not by functional necessities but by ideological and security imperatives. (I have increasingly come to believe that the Islamic regime does not perceive itself as a conventional state. Instead, it acts as a marginal, semi-insurgent force with nothing to lose—resembling groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah, or Hashd al-Shaabi. Interestingly, Putin once referred to it in similar terms as a “rogue” entity.)

Continuous repression has destroyed parties and civil institutions, creating an ever-wider gulf between society and the state.

Over the following decades, segments of the ruling establishment began to recognize this contradiction. They understood that governing a complex society in the 21st century through rigid, theological instruments was unsustainable. Attempts were made—under banners such as “reconstruction” and “reform”—to adjust the system, yet always within the same ideological limits. Each time demands for change surfaced, core power centers and autonomous hardline networks blocked them. Thus emerged a dual reality: the necessity of change, and the structural impossibility of realizing it from within. The result has been the cumulative deepening of crises and a progressive erosion of governing capacity.

Consequently, a coherent state in the conventional sense has never fully taken shape within the Islamic regime. What exists instead is a constellation of rival power factions, shifting with each presidential administration, each seeking to consolidate its own position and privileges. These are not merely political rivals, but entrenched networks embedded across institutions. With each change at the top, these networks are reshuffled while the underlying logic persists. Each faction strives to expand its grip over resources—from state contracts to financial assets. Over time, this dynamic has produced a rentier, predatory political economy. Economic decisions serve factional interests, not societal needs. Development projects function primarily as mechanisms for distributing rents. Public wealth is systematically siphoned into private networks—oil rigs can vanish overnight. In such an environment, long-term planning becomes meaningless. Even at managerial levels, instability reigns: each political shift brings sweeping replacements, erasing institutional memory and undermining policy continuity.

A transition beyond the Islamic Republic will not, by necessity, produce a more progressive or stable order—though such a future remains possible and desirable.

The real danger becomes evident when this exhausted structure faces an acute crisis. The same factions now competing over resources may become the drivers of the “bleak scenario” during collapse. Importantly, this scenario is not chiefly produced by opposition groups. While external opposition may play a role, the core threat stems from forces currently inside the system. Each network, in its bid for survival, may resort to violence—some through direct repression, others through paramilitary or localized armed groups. In such conditions, rivalry over resources may evolve into open conflict. Past experiences—the brutal crackdowns of January 2018 and November 2019, and the regime’s intervention in Syria—show that the ruling establishment recognizes no limits when it comes to violence. This violence is not merely reactive but intrinsic to its mode of survival. When real solutions are unavailable, repression becomes the only remaining tool—not to resolve crises, but to buy time. Yet this delay yields nothing: there is neither a strategy for exit nor the will for transformation. Each new wave of repression only deepens the crisis and moves society closer to explosion.

For this reason, whether in the context of external war or mass protest, the risk of widespread violence is very real. The ruling factions see themselves as the rightful owners of the country—and particularly its wealth—and perceive no viable path toward relinquishing power or achieving peaceful transition. Meanwhile, a society deprived of organization and intermediary institutions lacks the means to manage a complex transition. Continuous repression has destroyed parties and civil institutions, creating an ever-wider gulf between society and the state. In such conditions, large-scale protests risk encountering both extreme violence and the absence of structures capable of guiding them. This volatile mix is what makes the “bleak scenario” genuinely possible. At the regional level, the Islamic Republic’s close ties to aligned militant groups only heighten this risk, allowing domestic crises to escalate and spill beyond borders.

The central question … is how to carve out a … path amid this dark horizon … that neither rests on revolutionary illusions nor surrenders to the existing order.

Thus, discussing the “bleak scenario” is not an abstract exercise but a sober warning. It underscores that a transition beyond the Islamic Republic will not, by necessity, produce a more progressive or stable order—though such a future remains possible and desirable. The immediate aftermath may involve instability, violence, or even social fragmentation. Yet this is not a historical dead end. Eventually, society will be compelled to move beyond it. The crucial point is that this transition—whether imminent or delayed—will inevitably carry immense tension and cost. The current structure is incapable of stepping aside or yielding peacefully. The longer the transition is postponed, the deeper and more destructive the coming crisis is likely to be. Hence, the issue is not one of when, but of how—of the quality and character of that transition.

The central question now is how to carve out a genuine path amid this dark horizon—a path that neither rests on revolutionary illusions nor surrenders to the existing order. A path that, even under these harsh conditions, can nurture organization, solidarity, and conscious agency. Addressing this question demands further analysis, which I hope to undertake in a future piece.

Opinions expressed in signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of the editors or the Tempest Collective. For more information, see “About Tempest Collective.”
Featured Image credit: Khamenei.ir; modified by Tempest.

The post Iran’s “bleak scenario” appeared first on Tempest.

PHILADELPHIA (April 29, 2026) — After the Shapiro Administration announced Tuesday a $267 million investment in industrial projects through the Reducing Industrial Sector Emissions in Pennsylvania (RISE PA) program, Clean Air Council and labor leaders are pointing to both the promise of the initiative and the need to ensure funds are directed toward truly clean solutions. 

At a press conference in Johnstown, Bernie Hall, District 10 Director for the United Steelworkers, underscored the opportunity to align economic growth with health and environmental progress.

“Too often people try to frame this as a choice between growing our economy and doing the right thing for our environment,” Hall said. “But good jobs and doing right aren’t mutually exclusive.”

Clean Air Council welcomed many of the awarded projects, including investments in solar, battery storage, electrification, energy efficiency, and industrial upgrades that can reduce pollution, cut energy costs, create jobs, and lower greenhouse gas emissions. 

“The funded projects show the tremendous potential to grow jobs, combat climate change, improve public health, and strengthen Pennsylvania’s industrial future,” said Alex Bomstein, Executive Director of Clean Air Council. “We applaud the RISE PA team for directing funds to the solutions to clean up and modernize our economy. But some of these grants miss the mark.”

The announcement included more than $31 million for projects to capture coal-mine methane, an approach that extends the reliance on fossil fuels rather than transitioning to cleaner technologies.

“Investments in fossil fuel infrastructure like mines and gas distribution, even in the name of efficiency, push our clean energy future farther out of reach,” Bomstein said. “The projects that truly modernize industry, like electrification and zero-emission technologies, are the ones that will deliver long-term economic, health, and environmental benefits.”

Yesterday’s RISE PA grants, funded through the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Climate Pollution Reduction Grants, are expected to reduce more than 1.3 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions in their first year. Another round of funding, totaling $52 million, will open on May 15.

The next round will be critical.

“As the next round of funding moves forward, Pennsylvania has a clear opportunity to invest in solutions that lower energy costs, reduce pollution, and create family-supporting jobs,” Bomstein said. “That means prioritizing projects that move us toward a zero-emissions future, not ones that keep us tied to outdated fossil fuel infrastructure.”

The Wednesday, April 29, 2026, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features George Price, an indigenous and African American, organic farmer, history educator, writer, and eco-socialist advocate in Montana, talking about the critical planetary boundaries of human existence, destructive activities causing current ecological overshoot, and solutions that replace industrial capitalism with cooperative, alternative, societal and economic structures.  We also share news, videos, and reflections on the history and upcoming workers rights demonstrations of May Day as International Labor Day, public comment opportunities to resist the proposed Bridger tar sands pipeline from Canada across eastern Montana to Wyoming, and a crucial Atlantic Ocean current system that could soon collapse and bring catastrophic cold to northern Europe and sea level rise to the U.S. East Coast.  Broadcast for fourteen years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online at KRFP and the Pacifica Network AudioPort, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ.

International Labour Day: Know the History of May Day and How Workers Fought for Rights, May 1, 2023 In Depth

May 1 Actions, April 29, 2026 May Day Strong

Proposed Bridger Pipeline Creating Debate, April 9, 2026 Northern Plains Independent

See also for maps: Why a Proposed Pipeline Ending in Wyoming Draws Comparisons to Keystone XL, April 28, 2026 Wyoming Public Radio

See also to comment: Bridger Pipeline Expansion Project, March 31, 2026 Bureau of Land Management

A Catastrophic Climate Event is Upon Us. Here is Why You’ve Heard So Little about It, April 23, 2026 George Monbiot/Guardian

An Indigenous Perspective on Ecological Overshoot: In Conversation with George Price, April 18, 2026 System Change Not Climate Change

New study finds ‘clean’ products for textured hair contain hidden hazards  Ketura Persellin April 29, 2026

Americans spend billions of dollars on hair care products every year, with growing demand for those marketed as “clean,” “natural” or “free from” harmful chemicals. But a new study finds the claims don’t always stand up to scrutiny and highlights the need for transparency in labeling to reduce uncertainty for consumers. 

The article was published in the Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology.

This means some consumers who think they’re buying a safer product could still be exposed to potentially harmful substances in their products. And products marketed to Black women contain more hazardous ingredients, resulting in disproportionate exposure from personal care products for Black women and women of color.

Scientists led by researchers from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Columbia University along with Black Women for Wellness and Silent Spring analyzed products marketed as “clean,” focusing on textured hair described as curly, coily or wavy. Researchers reviewed products available at a Target in Los Angeles and used EWG’s Skin Deep® database to review ingredients in 150 hair products. 

Skin Deep scores over 144,000 personal care products based on the potential toxicity of their ingredients.

Some of the products included undisclosed “fragrance” compounds that can be endocrine disruptors linked to allergies, skin irritation and potential harm to the reproductive system. Other brands included ingredients that have been linked to these and other health concerns.

Around 40% of the products the researchers analyzed are listed in EWG’s Skin Deep database. The main findings were:

• 70% of products contained undisclosed fragrance, which is an umbrella term that refers to a mixture of potentially 100 or more chemicals. 
• 90% were classified as a “moderate” hazard (between 3 and 6 in Skin Deep). 
• “Free from” claims were inconsistently used on products. For example, only 60% of products formulated without sulfates were described as “sulfate free.”

Inequitable hazards

This isn’t just a marketing or labeling problem. It’s an equity problem. 

The study focused on textured hair products because they are disproportionately used by women of color, who already bear a heavier burden of exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals. 

EWG’s 2025 report on products marketed to Black women found disparities in the availability of safer personal care products. Using data from Skin Deep, EWG found the products were, on average, more hazardous than products without demographic marketing. 

Studies that have measured the concentration of certain personal care product chemicals in the body have also consistently reported that concentrations are higher in Black women, compared to white women.  

Regulatory gaps

Personal care product brands and retailers should take steps to develop and promote safer options that are genuinely free from chemicals of concern.

But it’s not just the industry’s duty to act – the lack of a federal definition for “clean” products means consumers must still navigate a complex and often opaque marketplace. No U.S. government agency requires companies to back up safety claims about their products.

The European Union has taken steps to protect consumers from greenwashing, a marketing tactic that involves making misleading claims so the product appears safe, environmentally friendly or sustainable. The EU’s 2023 Green Claims Directive outlined criteria to prevent companies from using unsubstantiated claims on their products. 

While the Federal Trade Commission says it is illegal to make claims that are “unfair or deceptive,” these terms are not closely regulated. This leaves little protection for consumers from greenwashing claims.

What you can do 

If you’re shopping for hair care or any other personal care products and you want to avoid problematic ingredients, here are some tips:

• Look for the EWG Verified® mark. In lieu of stronger regulations, third-party certification can fill the gap. That’s why EWG Verified exists: It gives consumers a mark they can trust. These products have been reviewed by our scientists and meet our most rigorous standards for health and transparency. 
• Avoid undisclosed fragrance. Watch for this term on product labels. Fragrance can hide hundreds of undisclosed chemicals. Instead, choose products that disclose all their fragrance ingredients, or look for the EWG Verified mark.
• Look for low hazard options. Check the list of the 4,000+ products marketed to Black women, and choose low hazard options. Or search our Healthy Living app or Skin Deep database to identify products that score low hazard (a 1 or 2). 

Areas of Focus Cosmetics Authors Alexa Friedman, Ph.D. April 29, 2026

When Mark Stoeckle went fishing in New York City’s East River, he caught a lot more than he was expecting.

The scientist from The Rockefeller University was focused on testing whether DNA floating in the water could shed light on which fish were living in the notoriously polluted stretch of water that separates Manhattan from Brooklyn and Queens.

But the buckets of water he hauled up from the eastern edge of Manhattan contained evidence of a lot more than just aquatic life. They also illuminated New Yorker’s eating habits and the abundance of classic urban wildlife such as rats and pigeons, according to a paper appearing today in PLOS One. In other words, each bucket of water was a little window into the Anthropocene.

“Environmental DNA doesn’t just tell us what lives in the water, it reveals insights into the entire ecosystem surrounding it, including the city itself,” says Stoeckle.

Beyond just being a curiosity (Who knew you could find DNA from tropical tilapia in the river?), the findings could help people track a plethora of interesting and important phenomena: changes in fish populations, the effectiveness of environmental restoration, trends in what people are eating, and whether New Yorker’s are making any headway in their war on rats.

“Urban biodiversity monitoring could expand dramatically and inexpensively using minimal equipment at relatively low cost,” said Stoeckle. “This ability to integrate environmental and human signals positions eDNA as a powerful tool for understanding the Anthropocene – the era defined by human influence on Earth’s systems.”

The primary focus of this research was to see if environmental DNA, or eDNA, testing could be used to gauge fish populations near a city. This DNA, shed by organisms into the environment, has been hailed as a potentially powerful tool that could alert people to the presence of particular species even if they never set eyes on the creature. Scientists have repurposed air quality monitors to detect dozens of species, counted species in zoos from sniffs of the air, and used air and water samples to assemble a surprisingly detailed picture of who and what were nearby.

But there have been obstacles to making good on the technology’s promise. It’s one thing to tell if a species is there. It’s another, more complicated thing to use DNA to estimate the size of a population. Then there’s the possibility that a flush of DNA in a crowded place like New York City might drown out the signals from fish, especially when rainstorms overwhelm the city’s sewer system, sending 18 billion gallons of raw sewage into nearby waterways each year.

 

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“After a heavy rain, the DNA of almost everything that makes the city tick—and squawk and squeak—ends up in the East River,” said coauthor Jesse Ausubel, who heads The Rockefeller University’s Program for the Human Environment.

“Genetically speaking, a rainstorm turns the river into something akin to Times Square on New Year’s Eve: crowded, noisy, and full of signals.”

To test what could be seen amid this chaos, each week between May 2024 and May 2025 the scientists collected two buckets of water from the same spot on the Manhattan side of the river and hauled it back to a lab. There, they ran the water through a filter much like a coffee filter. They took the residue left in the filter and put it through a series of treatments to see what DNA was there and compare it to a library of known DNA patterns.

When it comes to fish, the results revealed a number of fascinating patterns. The scientists didn’t claim to be able to produce counts of individual species populations. But they found that the amount of DNA from one species compared to another tracked closely with the comparative numbers that turned up in traditional net surveys. That means changes in DNA levels of different fish species over months or years probably reflects real rises and declines in their relative abundance.

That connection was buttressed by seasonal changes in the amount of fish DNA in the water. During the winter months, when fish numbers are lowest, so is their DNA. Their DNA surges tenfold during the warmer summer months, in line with population patterns.

The study also turned up evidence suggesting that efforts to rebuild reefs of oysters starting in 2015 are attracting fish. They turned up lots of DNA from skilletfish and feather blenny, which both are drawn to oyster reefs. A similar DNA survey in 2016 found little sign of those species. That matches results from nearby fish traps, where the species began appearing in 2020.

The more unexpected results were about what was happening on the surrounding land. The levels of DNA from different commonly eaten meats aligned with what New Yorkers are eating. Chicken came out on top, followed by beef and then pork. They also found traces of sheep, goat, turkey, salmon and tilapia.

They also found traces of city-dwelling wildlife. Top billing there, in terms of the concentration of their DNA in samples, went to Norway rats, followed by pigeons, Canada geese and ring-billed gulls. But it also turned up some less urban critters, including white-tailed deer and beavers.

The results show that a relatively simple, low-cost method could be used around the world to monitor the wild and not-so-wild pulse of cities, says Ausubel. A year’s worth of monitoring cost $15,000 and a slice of someone’s time, far less than traditional fishing surveys.

“Urban waterways worldwide could become distributed observatories of ecological change, reporting almost real-time what lives in and near them, not only fish but bats, beavers, and foxes,” Ausubel said. “With the right coordination, this approach could become the backbone of urban coastal monitoring.”

Stoeckle, et. al. “Biomonitoring in the Anthropocene: Urban estuary environmental DNA tracks marine fish, terrestrial wildlife, and human diet.” PLOS One. April 15, 2026.

Image: ©Anthropocene Magazine/AI-generated