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Photo by Diné CARE’s Ali Tsosie-Harvey

The Air is Shared 

What happens at an oil and gas site doesn’t stay there. It moves. Out here there aren’t many barriers separating well sites from homes or schools. Emissions travel with the wind, across dirt roads, and into spaces where families live, breathe, and recreate. Wells and equipment are not tucked far away. They exist alongside homes and near schools. That close proximity means exposure is not limited to workers at a well site. It also means exposure to children in classrooms, families in their homes, and to anyone moving through the area. 

Rural communities across the country face similar conditions: limited oversight, fewer basic resources, and less access to information about what they are being exposed to. Exposure doesn’t stop at the fence line of a well site. Exposure exists in and outside the well sites. When emissions are invisible, it becomes easier to overlook them.  

Photo by Diné CARE’s Ali Tsosie-Harvey

March 2026

In March, we visited 18 total oil and gas well sites across the Eastern Navajo Agency of which 14 were observed emitting either consistently or intermittently. Six complaints were filed with the New Mexico Environmental Department. That means we saw harmful pollution coming from over 75% of oil and gas sites we visited in just one day. These emissions were commonly found coming from equipment such as storage tanks. 

April 2026

On April 16, 2026, community members gathered in Lybrook, New Mexico for a Toxic Tour led by Earthworks and Dine CARÉ to better understand oil and gas impacts in the Lybrook area. Using a FLIR camera, participants were able to see otherwise invisible emissions from oil and gas well sites located near Lybrook Elementary School and residential areas. Attendees noted strong odors near active sites, reinforcing ongoing community concerns about air quality and health. Residents shared experiences of headaches, nausea, and frequent exposure to harmful smells while living near industry activity. As a direct result of the tour, 6 complaints were filed with the New Mexico Environment Department. The Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency was also notified. 

Photo by Diné CARE’s Ali Tsosie-Harvey

Using a FLIR camera, participants observed emissions from well sites near schools, including Hanaadli Community School and Dzith-na-o-dith-le Community School. At one site, faint black smoke rose from an enclosed flare. At another, the smell of gas was noticeable. For many in the Counselor area, this confirmed lived experiences. Community members shared experiences of headaches, nausea, and persistent odors. 

Why Toxic Tours?

Community toxic tours are important because they give community members the opportunity to see oil and gas operations up close and better understand how these sites may impact air quality, health, and safety. The tours also create space for people to share their own experiences and observations living near the development. Through these tours, we hope to increase awareness, strengthen community knowledge, and encourage ongoing conversations about health, safety, and protecting the land for future generations.  

Photo by Diné CARE’s Ali Tsosie-Harvey

As someone who lives and works here as a certified thermographer, I see the importance of documenting emissions. The FLIR camera helps map areas that are not receiving consistent inspections. Responsibility is complex across federal, state, tribal, allotment, and private lands and oversight is inconsistent. That’s why Earthworks uses a tool like the FLIR camera to help communities see what they’ve been feeling for years and have the ability to push for greater accountability in Indigenous communities.

Take action by contacting representatives, learning more about how oil and gas infrastructure harms the public health and safety of communities, and engage in processes like showing up to give public comments when new rules and regulations are under consideration.

The post Seeing What We’ve Been Breathing: What I’ve Witnessed in 2026 So Far appeared first on Earthworks.

• Global real worker pay fell 12 percent while real CEO pay surged 54 percent between 2019 and 2025.
• At least four CEOs of major corporations each pocketed over $100 million in pay and bonuses last year. Broadcom CEO Hock Tan led the pack at over $205 million.
• Billionaires were paid $2,500 per second in dividends in 2025.
• The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and Oxfam are calling for urgent action to rein in extreme wealth, including higher, fairer taxes on the richest and binding limits on CEO pay.

Chief executives of the world’s largest corporations enjoyed a 11 percent real-terms pay hike last year, while the average global worker saw real wages increase by just 0.5 percent, reveals new analysis by the ITUC and Oxfam ahead of International Workers’ Day (1 May).

The analysis covers the top-paying 1,500 corporations across 33 countries which have reported CEO pay for 2025. The average CEO pocketed $8.4 million in pay and bonuses last year, up from $7.6 million in 2024. It would take the average global worker 490 years to earn the same amount.

So far, four corporations, including Blackstone, Broadcom and Goldman Sachs, have reported paying their CEO more than $100 million in 2025. The top 10 highest-paid CEOs collectively made over $1 billion.

The gender pay gap for the workforce across these 1,500 corporations averages 16 percent, meaning that these women workers effectively work for free from 4 November each year.

The growing chasm between CEO compensation and average worker pay is part of a long-term trend in which executives and shareholders are capturing an ever-larger slice of the global economic pie.

Global real wages for workers have fallen by 12 percent since 2019. This means they have effectively worked 108 days for free between 2019 and 2025 (31 days for free last year alone). Meanwhile, CEO pay has skyrocketed ―from an average of $5.5 million in 2019 to $8.4 million in 2025, a 54 percent increase in real terms.

The ITUC and Oxfam’s analysis of shareholdings reveals that the super-rich are receiving significant payouts from the corporations they control. Nearly 1,000 billionaires whose investment portfolios were identified collectively received $79 billion in dividends in 2025 —equivalent to $2,500 per second. The average billionaire made more in dividends in less than two hours than the average worker earned in pay in an entire year.

Some of the largest payouts in 2025 went to Bernard Arnault, owner of luxury brand LVMH, who pocketed $3.8 billion and Amancio Ortega, owner of Inditex (Zara), who received $3.7 billion.

Payouts from corporations are often funneled into undermining workers’ rights and democracy.

• Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle, has used his wealth to become a major stakeholder in Paramount, which was purchased by his son’s company and includes major broadcast networks CBS.
• In France, far-right billionaire Vincent Bolloré now controls CNews, and has rebranded it as the French equivalent of Fox News.
• In 2024, Oxfam filed a formal UN complaint against Amazon and Walmart’s systematic human rights violations. Amazon and Walmart’s outsized wealth and power in the economy have enabled them to clamp down on unionization efforts and collective organizing.

Billionaires are also leveraging their wealth to buy political influence. A global survey found that half of people believe “the rich often buy elections” in their countries. Oxfam estimates that billionaires are 4,000 times more likely to hold political office than ordinary people. Many super-rich politicians have sought to erode workers’ rights, cut public services, and deliver tax cuts to the richest.

“This analysis exposes the billionaire coup against democracy, and its costs for working people. Companies promise us a virtuous cycle, but what we see is a vicious cycle led by mega corporations —they undermine collective bargaining and social dialogue while billionaire CEOs capture the wealth created by productivity gains. The super-rich then use enormous resources to fund anti-democratic political projects,” said ITUC General Secretary Luc Triangle.

“These projects shift the blame for growing inequality onto marginalized groups, such as migrants, women and minorities in order to distract from the true culprits: their rich benefactors. They divide working people while dismantling and undermining democratic institutions and promoting policies that allow the super-rich to become even richer, at the expense of workers’ rights, safety and livelihoods. They attack democratic organizations like unions and block any avenues for popular reform, ensuring that the vicious anti-worker cycle continues.”

Billionaire wealth has reached record highs in 2026. In just 12 months, they have gained $4 trillion —bringing their wealth to $1.5 trillion more than that of the poorest 4.1 billion people combined. There are 400 more billionaires compared to last year, and 45 of these new billionaires have made their fortunes in artificial intelligence.

“We can’t continue to let a handful of super-rich people siphon off the rewards of work that belong to millions. Governments must cap CEO pay, fairly tax the super-rich and ensure minimum wages at the very least keep pace with inflation and ensure a dignified living. And workers must be able to exercise, without fear or obstruction, their rights to organize, to strike, and to bargain collectively. They are the ones who generate society’s wealth; they should be able to claim, as a matter of justice, what they are due,” said Oxfam International Executive Director Amitabh Behar.

"These measures can do far more than redistribute income; they can create economies that reward work, invest in communities, and hold powerful interests accountable. This is how we turn a system rigged for the few into one that works for everyone."

Today, more than 100,000 students across the country are walking out of their classrooms as part of the largest one-day student strike in over 80 years, joined by coordinated Sunrise Movement actions and community mobilizations nationwide, from Minneapolis to New York City.

Students are participating in school walkouts while community members organize alongside them in a coordinated effort to interrupt normal operations across schools and local economies. Over a dozen schools have already cancelled classes in anticipation of widespread absences.

Across the country, the school walkouts and actions reflect a broad coalition of students, educators, and local residents coming together on May Day.

The actions come amid increasing frustration among young people with rising costs of living, lack of climate action, and endless wars in a political system that is unresponsive to working people.

“The conditions young people are facing are not new, but the scale of their response is,” said Sunrise Movement Executive Director Aru Shiney-Ajay. “Young people are fed up with billionaire rule. We are refusing to accept war, poverty, and climate collapse as inevitable. Today isn’t a one day strike. It’s day one of a mass youth uprising.”

The scale of today’s mobilization reflects a broader escalation in youth organizing and a growing shift toward strategies of mass noncooperation. These historic May Day actions are not an isolated event, but part of a sustained and expanding movement to build long-term power.

Italy has seen a growing number of wolf-dog hybrids, raising concerns about the future of its wolves.

Read more on E360 →

Several studies show that biochar can benefit soil. Now, new research shows one crucial way it appears to do that: by supporting ants which were found to build stronger, more complex colonies in the presence of this soil improver. But as the new study shows, there’s also a trade-off: too much biochar, and ants go into a decline. 

This is the first study to examine the effects of biochar on “large soil fauna” like these, looking beyond just microbes and agricultural yields, the researchers say. They went in with a hunch that the enriching substance would influence ant behaviour in some way, and to test it out they designed a series of experiments. 

First, starting with biochar made of pyrolized rice straw, they mixed varying amounts—2.5%. 5% and 10%—into samples of soil. These they compared with a soil sample that didn’t contain any biochar. To each of the four soil experiments, they added 30 worker ants from a common local species. Then, they watched and waited. 

Of particular interest was how the ants nested, socialized, and foraged in each of the soil experiments. The first thing the researchers recorded was a sharp difference in survival rates: over 83% of the ants survived when they were exposed to no biochar, or to limited amounts ranging from 2.5% to 5%. Meanwhile at 10%, their survival declined precipitously, to about 55%. 

 

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The ants were also more productive with biochar, but at lower doses. At levels of 2.5%, they developed larger and more complex nest sites, in fact almost threefold more complex than in experiments containing 10%. Ants also foraged with double the efficiency in samples with 5% biochar compared to higher dosing, travelling more quickly through the soil, showing the most success at securing food, and also finding it more quickly. As well as this, at more moderate doses of biochar ants displayed stronger social cohesion, yet were more aggressive towards invasive species and protective of their colonies, compared to ants in soils containing no biochar. 

The researchers think these interesting behavioural differences come down to biochar’s variable effects on soil chemistry. At low doses biochar slightly raises pH, which improves moisture retention in the soil and might make conditions more appealing to nest-building ants. However in larger quantities the pH can rise to levels that threaten ants’ internal balance and so become toxic to them. And because ants use elements of the soil to communicate, even small shifts in its chemistry and microbial makeup brought about by biochar can change the way they interact with one another, sharpening or dimming their communication. 

The reason any of this matters is because ants are major architects of quality soil. Socially-bonded and efficient foragers that make large, complex nests will improve soil structure and function, distribute nutrients through the terrain, and improve drainage, among other things. 

The authors’ main takeaway? Biochar may be more important to the wider health of the ecosystem than we realized—and that means thinking more carefully through precisely how it’s used. “Too much can disrupt the very biological systems we aim to restore,” the authors say.

Liu et. al. “Biochar application enhances ant (Formica japonica) ecological functions as indicated by their social behaviors.” Biochar. 2026.

Image: ©Anthropocene Magazine

Keeping accurate crop records not only helps you manage your farm business, but also can unlock access to USDA programs, loans, crop insurance, and disaster assistance. Here's some record keeping and reporting best practices for small and beginning farmers.

The post Record Keeping & Reporting appeared first on RAFI.

Silvopasture intentionally integrates trees, animals, and pasture into a single functioning system that offers innumerable benefits to both the farm’s bottom line and the health and resilience of the land. Silvopasture experts and practitioners share the secrets to designing a successful silvopasture system at any scale.

The post Silvopasture Stories appeared first on RAFI.

Ready to scale up your farm operation? Farmers Cherie Jzar and Howard Allen share lessons and strategies for sustainably and intentionally growing a farm business.

The post Scaling Up Smarter appeared first on RAFI.

Access to affordable farmland is one of the top challenges facing new and beginning farmers, especially farmers of color. Commons offer a potential solution - a new model for land ownership that helps bridge the gap from one generation of farmers to the next.

The post Land for the Common Good appeared first on RAFI.

Compost: good for your soil, and good for your farm business. Learn the basics of composting from Sundiata Hardy-El, owner of Tallahassee's only compost pick-up service.

The post Farm Sustainability is Brewing in the Compost appeared first on RAFI.

When meat processing options fell short, North Carolina farmer Marvin Frink built a workaround rooted in culture, care, and community.

The post Building the Bridge for Local Livestock Processing appeared first on RAFI.

Vanuatu

1st May marks the boreal spring to be in full swing – our fisheries are open, Pacific tour is concluded, new honorary member accepted and restoration of habitats proceeds.

Captain Karoliina and the crew have begun their harvests on lake Onkamo and Särkijärvi, and pike, bream and perch fill the fyke traps. Also the delicacy – i.e. vendace cans have started to make their impact in Helsinki high street and in Europe, with more to come towards autumn. Early spring enabled the start of the open water fishery historically early.

The Finnish restoration season has also kicked off, with peatland restoration work commencing in Koitajoki, and new boreal sites that have been added in Kemijärvi, Muonio and Pelkosenniemi. We look forwards to a busy season ahead especially in Eastern Finland and Lapland as well as Sámi forest restoration early in the year.

Visiting the Thao community

Pacific tour of 2026 has concluded. Teams visited Japan, Taiwan and Vanuatu with a large workshop over in Sun Moon Lake that gathered delegates from the Solomon Islands, Tasmania, and Maori as well as the Indigenous Taiwanese communities. We heard from across the ocean the results of last years restoration of wetlands, and plans for community-led mangrove and other initiatives. We met with the Thao people in solidarity and made plans also for the Festival of Fishing Traditions slated for Taiwan in 2027. Sutej Hugu, Indigenous philosopher and leader from Taiwan, summarized the gatherings and approaches in his keynote by saying:

“We would like to clarify with you about the fundamentals of Indigenous conservation and restoration in the perspective of Indigenous peoples’ self-strengthening process and self-determination for survival and revival. By the living traditions of Indigenous peoples, as human species we are embedded in inter-species habitats, and as human beings we are connected to all beings around us. The embeddedness and connectedness are the kernel and basis of our knowledge and institutions, and the deep origin of our strength and resilience.”

Cultural and linguistic connections over the Pacific and beyond

In other news, Snowchange has a new Honorary Member. Occasionally when an individual deserves the merit, Snowchange makes a decision to call a person to be an Honorary Member for Life in the Cooperative, i.e. they have shown extraordinary skills, devotion and dedication to the causes, ideological foundings and work of Snowchange Cooperative. It is the highest honor of the organisation. 

The new Honorary member is John Macdonald from Canada. Following an informative upbringing in Malawi, central Africa, John MacDonald spent most of his working life in the Canadian Arctic, including twenty-five productive years in Igloolik, as coordinator of Nunavut Science Institute’s Igloolik Research Centre.

John cleaning an Arctic Char

Beginning in 1985, he collaborated closely with Igloolik’s Inuit elders and community leaders (including Leah Otak, Louis Tapardjuk, and George Qulaut) to establish and develop a major program designed to record and document the rich oral history and traditional knowledge of the Amitturmiut.

Among many publications flowing from this collaboration, is his foundational study of Inuit astronomy, cosmology, and environmental understanding (The Arctic Sky: Exploring the InuitUniverse (2022). He is also co-editor of The Hands’ Measure: Essays Honouring Leah Aksaajuq Otak’s Contribution to Arctic Science (2018). Since his retirement in 2009, he continues his research on Inuit oral history and primary historical contact between Inuit and Europeans in the Canadian eastern Arctic.

Today, 1st May, 2026, Chair Tero Mustonen has made an executive decision to call researcher John Macdonald to be a lifelong Honorary Member of the Cooperative. This honour also includes the rights to use and benefit of all of Snowchange services, assets and operative bases. Mustonen states:

“We have been working with John and the Inuit people of Igloolik since 2002. John, through his devotion, brilliance and dedication to the questions of Inuit oral histories, in particular the star lore and celestial issues, has contributed to Snowchange in outstanding ways over the past 20 years. For example our Finnish oral history archives have benefitted in major ways from the work John and the Elders have carried out over in Igloolik. We thank John for his lifelong devotion and commitment to Inuit and Arctic cultures and work. It is a great honor to invite John to be our next lifelong Honorary Member of the Cooperative.” 

Previously Eero Murtomäki and his wife Rita Lukkarinen, as well as cartographer Johanna Roto have been called to be lifelong Honorary Members of the Cooperative – the highest honour of the organization.

John in fish camp, Igloolik.

Check back in May, as we head to June and we ll have SNOW25 and other celebrations awaiting once the summer gets here.

Headline News:

• “In Colombia, 57 Nations Chart A Path To A Future Without Fossil Fuels” • The Guardian, unlike most mainstream media, covered the climate talks in some detail and reported that the participating governments were asked to develop national “road maps” that set forth how they will end the production and use of fossil fuels. France was one that did that. [CleanTechnica]

Conference (Transition Away Conference image)

• “Grid Connection Requested For US Fusion Power Plant” • Commonwealth Fusion Systems, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology spinout company, has applied for grid connection. CFS said the application is the first request from a grid-scale fusion power plant developer to a major regional transmission organisation. [World Nuclear News]
• “House, Senate Negotiators Reach Deal On Next-Generation Nuclear, Solar Net Metering” • Lawmakers in Concord reached a deal to lay the groundwork for next-generation nuclear power in New Hampshire. If small, modular reactors are to be an energy source, New Hampshire lawmakers said they don’t want state laws or officials to get in the way. [WMUR]
• “Rice Is A Greenhouse Gas Emitter” • Rice farming has long been a major source of methane emissions, a potent greenhouse gas formed when organic matter decomposes in flooded soils deprived of oxygen. Traditional rice paddies create exactly these conditions, making the crop one of the largest global agricultural contributors of methane. [CleanTechnica]
• “CPUC Protects Ratepayers, Rejects SoCalGas’ Attempt To Charge Customers For Hydrogen Pipeline” • The California PUC, in a written decision, denied a SoCalGas application that would have charged customers $266 million to fund the Angeles Link Project pipeline. SoCalGas can either fund the controversial project itself or drop it entirely. [CleanTechnica]

For more news, please visit geoharvey – Daily News about Energy and Climate Change.

On 128 acres in Pennsylvania, Christa Barfield is building something bigger than a farm. She founded FarmerJawn, now the largest Black-owned farm in the state, with a vision of agriculture rooted in equity, access, and care for the land. Today, the farm is a model for regenerative organic food production that is by and for underserved communities.

Barfield returns to her central philosophy often: “Agriculture is the culture.” This means that farming is not separate from daily life. From food to clothing to building materials, agriculture underpins the systems people rely on, even if they rarely see it, she says: “Everything you touch on a daily basis…that is thanks to a farmer somewhere sometime.”

Barfield did not set out to become a farmer. But after spending her early career in a high-volume medical office in Philadelphia, she took a trip to the island of Martinique. There, she encountered a community-based model of food production, where people sourced food directly and regularly from those growing it. The experience shifted her perspective on what food systems could look like.

Barfield describes drinking tea picked fresh from her hosts’ backyard garden and joining community members distributing boxes of fresh fruits, vegetables, and herbs for their neighbors. These were direct, human-to-human transactions paid in cash—something she rarely saw at home.

“The real magic of that moment was that I then was able to see these multicultural people walking in, and they were coming in and taking these boxes,” says Barfield. She remembers thinking, “What is this that I’m seeing?”

She was hooked, deciding shortly after that she would become a farmer. “I was going to start a tea company, and I was going to start a farm,” Barfield says. “And that’s exactly what we did.”

But bringing FarmerJawn to life required a period of intense work and instability. Barfield says she would drive for ride-share companies from 5 to 9 a.m., manage her business all day, then make grocery deliveries from 5 to 9 p.m. to make ends meet. She experienced housing insecurity for years.

“I built it brick by brick,” says Barfield.

Now FarmerJawn is expanding its impact, with the farm now eligible for regenerative organic certification. Barfield is prioritizing stable, well-paying jobs—an approach she sees as essential to building a more just food system.

“The only way that businesses can actually grow the right way is if you’re paying and taking care of your team,” says Barfield.

Her work has earned national recognition, including a James Beard Award in 2024 and a role in state-level agricultural leadership. But Barfield says visibility does not shield her from the challenges facing Black farmers: “Just a few months after winning that James Beard award, there was an eight-foot swastika painted on my barn. It reminded me and my team that our safety was in question.”

For Barfield, these experiences reinforce the urgency of her work. She sees agriculture as a critical front line in addressing interconnected crises, from climate change to public health.

“What I’m getting to do is really just be used as a tool to tell the story that the Earth can’t,” she says. “That it’s literally dying right before our eyes.”

Barfield believes, however,  that agricultural systems can reconnect people to land, food, and each other. She believes that transforming agriculture can help transform broader systems of health and equity.

“When I think about, is it worth it?” Barfield says. “Honestly, the only answer, it is.”

Watch Barfield’s story below and find others from our farmer storytelling events on Food Tank’s YouTube channel.

This article is part of Food Tank’s ongoing Farmer Friday series, produced in partnership with Niman Ranch, a champion for independent U.S. family farmers. The series highlights the stories of farmers working toward a more sustainable, equitable food system. Niman Ranch partners with over 500 small-scale U.S. family farmers and is committed to preserving rural agricultural communities and their way of life. 

Photo courtesy of FarmerJawn

The post ‘Agriculture Is the Culture’ at Pennsylvania’s Largest Black-Owned Farm appeared first on Food Tank.

This International Workers’ Day, Spring is excited to announce the launch of our 2026 Fund Drive! 2026 has already seen US President Donald Trump launch...

The post Support Spring’s 2026 Fund Drive! first appeared on Spring.

For almost half a century, the vast majority of climate experts have agreed on a solution to global warming: stop burning fossil fuels like coal, oil, and natural gas. But despite the political efforts of governments across the world to promote replacing these fuels, fossil sources have remained a stubbornly large share of global energy — around 80 percent at last count.

But the war in Iran, which the United States and Israel launched two months ago this week, may turn out to be the push that dislodges fossil fuels’ place atop the world’s energy system. The Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway near Iran through which 20 percent of the world’s oil and natural gas supplies flow, has been blocked since early March, with no relief in sight. This has created the biggest energy crisis in modern history. Twenty-five countries are now reporting critical road fuel, jet fuel, or heating oil shortages. 

But unlike the oil shock of the 1970s, which occurred in a time when substitutes for fossil fuels were not yet powerful or cheap enough to build at scale, this disruption is happening as renewable energy sources are beginning to outcompete fossil fuels, providing countries with new energy options at costs that have plummeted in recent years.

“We now have a viable alternative,” said Selwin C. Hart, a special adviser to the United Nations Secretary-General, at a first-of-its-kind international conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels in Colombia this week. “Renewables have changed the equation.” 

But even though this calculus has changed, it’s too soon to say where the chips will fall as the world’s energy system evolves. While the reliability of a huge chunk of the world’s oil and natural gas is now perhaps permanently in question, it’s not certain that renewables will fill all or even most of the gap. Coal, the most polluting fossil fuel, is taking on a renewed appeal in a world desperate to replace natural gas for electricity, and it remains difficult for solar and wind to replace the around-the-clock power provided by both of those fossil fuels.

“It’s hard to say which direction things will go,” Daan Walter, a lead researcher at the energy think tank Ember, told Grist.

Still, two months after the war began it’s becoming clear which sources of energy stand to win and which stand to lose as the world changes in response to the conflict. As prices rise and supplies dwindle, countries around the globe are reevaluating their energy futures. While some have fallen back on dirty fuels to fill the gaps caused by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, others have announced significant investments in clean energy to chart a path away from the sources of energy they have relied on for more than a hundred years. 

Iraq has begun exporting oil by sending tanker trucks through Syria. An official said oil revenue dropped more than 70 percent in March.
Bakr ALkasem / AFP / Getty Images Losers: Oil and natural gas

The Strait of Hormuz is the chokepoint through which more than 20 percent of the world’s oil supply passes, including exports from major producers such as Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia. The small nation of Qatar produces around one-fifth of the world’s liquefied natural gas, or LNG, which it exports on boats in superchilled tanks. Iran’s drone attacks have damaged Qatar’s major gas infrastructure and prevented all the nations in the region from sending both oil and LNG shipments through the Strait of Hormuz.

The main buyers of this oil are in Asia, but tankers from the strait travel all over the world, including to the U.S. The first month of the war set off a scramble to replace this lost supply. Major buyers like China and Japan started hoarding refined oil products they would normally export and began rationing their strategic fuel reserves. Rich importers like Australia and California paid more to secure seaborne oil from other countries.

Most nations don’t have the same luxuries; they simply have to use less oil. In Asia, the loss of LNG compounds the problem tremendously. Several major Asian economies including Japan, Korea, and Singapore rely on LNG to run their power plants and factories. Many LNG shippers sign long-term contracts with importing countries, meaning there weren’t any spare shipments floating around, as was the case with crude oil after the start of the war. If they wanted to keep the lights on, these countries had to turn back to dirtier coal power.

Nepali consumers line up to receive partially-filled liquefied petroleum gas cylinders at a depot of the Nepal Oil Corporation in Kathmandu, Nepal, on March 14, 2026.
Sanjit Pariyar / NurPhoto / Getty Images

The loss of LNG from Qatar was a big win for the United States, which is the world’s other biggest exporter of liquefied gas. The LNG exporters who did have spare capacity available could command eye-watering prices from countries that needed the fuel. But there’s a limit to how much more gas the U.S. can send to fill the gap: liquefying natural gas requires the construction of massive factories on the coast, which can take years, and existing plants are already running at full capacity. In the meantime, the disruption has dampened enthusiasm for what had been a very popular fuel, said  Anne-Sophie Corbeau, a researcher at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy and the former head of gas analysis at BP. 

“If you are an LNG importer and you are looking at the global market, you’re thinking, ‘do I want to be exposed in that way?’” she said.

Meanwhile, governments across Asia have rolled out a host of policies intended to cut down on the consumption of oil and natural gas: They lowered speed limits, mandated remote work, set thermostats higher despite hot weather, and asked employees to take the stairs rather than using the elevator. They have also waived fuel taxes and banned price increases to prevent an affordability crisis. These measures have contained unrest and economic collapse for now, but further warning signs are emerging. Airlines in Europe, Africa, and New Zealand have cancelled hundreds of flights, and small carriers in the U.S. are facing bankruptcy as the price of jet fuel rises.

In the long term, the oil crisis may accelerate a preexisting shift to electric vehicles and hybrids, which had already begun to outsell gas cars in many countries in Europe and Asia. In the first month of the war, electric-vehicle sales jumped by more than 50 percent in big European economies like France and Germany, and by almost 200 percent in Brazil. While gas cars still make up the vast majority of vehicles on the road today, a fast shift to EVs — juiced by government mandates such as Indonesia’s — could cause oil demand to plateau or decline in the coming years.

Winners: Coal, solar, nuclear

Coal is the dirtiest fossil fuel; it produces far more carbon dioxide than oil or natural gas to generate the same amount of energy. Although some major economies like China and India still burn tremendous amounts of it, many world powers have been shifting toward liquefied natural gas and renewables over the past decade, cutting emissions in the process.

Even so, most of these coal-to-gas switchers never decommissioned their old coal plants — they just stopped using them. Since the beginning of the war, the availability of this legacy coal fleet has allowed countries across Asia to ramp up coal capacity to fill the gap in lost LNG imports. South Korea lifted a previous emissions limit that barred coal plants from running at more than 80 percent of total capacity, allowing the coal fleet to generate as much power as possible. On the other side of the globe, some European countries like Italy are extending the lifespans of their coal plants, in some cases by more than a decade. 

“The real question is how governments balance short-term energy security with long-term climate commitments,” said Dinita Setyawati, a Jakarta-based analyst for Ember who studies decarbonization in Asian economies.

Japan’s government plans to temporarily lift restrictions on coal-fired power plants like the Isogo Thermal Power Station.
Kazuhiro NOGI / AFP / Getty Images

Although most experts believe coal power will continue its decline as a major source of primary energy, Corbeau said that the crisis could prolong its lifespan in Asia, breaking natural gas’s role as a so-called “bridge fuel” between coal and renewables.

“They could definitely keep coal, add more renewables, and do less LNG in the end,” said Corbeau. “It may be that a lot of countries say that coal is a lot less subject to geopolitics, therefore we are going to use more coal.”

No renewable source is in a better position to surge than solar. Solar farms already made up the vast majority of new power plants even before the war, and Chinese exports of solar panels, batteries, and electric vehicles hit records in March, according to recently-released export data. (China is by far the world’s most prolific exporter of renewable energy technology.)

The countries most affected by the Iran War are among the areas seeing the “sharpest increases in demand” for these products, according to Ember. Exports of Chinese batteries rose 44 percent; the European Union, Australia, and India were top customers. The flow of solar components to India rose by 6.6 gigawatts between February and March, a nearly 150 percent increase. Solar exports to Africa rose 176 percent over the same time frame. Nigeria, Kenya, and Ethiopia led the way with more than a gigawatt of growth each. All told, 50 countries set records for Chinese solar imports in March. 

After Europe saw its solar market contract slightly last year, demand for rooftop solar in countries across the continent is surging as electricity bills rise, according to a report from Reuters. Three major energy equipment wholesalers interviewed for the report have seen their sales spike more than 30 percent, with one company’s net sales tripling in March. The European Commission, which released a document last week calling for more electrification, renewables, and energy efficiency measures to counteract the ongoing energy shortage, will present energy ministers with proposals for how to reduce short-term fossil fuel exposure at a meeting in Greece next month.

Solar panels on a residential building’s balconies in Germany.
Martin Schutt / picture alliance / Getty Images

In Vietnam, a company that planned to build a 4.8-gigawatt liquefied natural gas plant — which would have been the country’s largest — has axed those plans and now aims to build a wind, battery storage, and solar facility instead. South Korea recently announced a fast-tracked plan to deploy 100 gigawatts of renewables by 2030, a plan that includes 400 billion won, or roughly $270 million, for low-interest loans for village solar projects. (One hundred gigawatts is roughly enough electricity to power Ho Chi Minh City 10 times over.)

While solar is a clear winner in light of the new bottleneck in the Middle East, the outlook for wind power is less clear. On the one hand, the German wind turbine maker Nordex saw its shares reach a 24-year high in the first quarter of 2026, as demand for clean energy in Europe continues to rise. But the Iranian and American blockades of the Strait of Hormuz could stymie the delivery of wind turbine components such as foundations and substations, many of which are manufactured in the Persian Gulf. This could have a depressive effect on wind growth even if countries in Europe and the United Kingdom wish to boost development. 

There’s a chance, however, that the biggest winner may be the most controversial form of climate-friendly power. For decades, the growth of nuclear energy has been constrained by high prices and long development timelines; it can take over a decade to get a plant licensed and built. Disasters like the 2011 tsunami that damaged the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan further dampened nuclear’s growth. In Europe, pressure from anti-nuclear environmental groups led many countries to decommission their nuclear power fleets. As a result, the share of power coming from nuclear reactors globally reached its lowest point in four decades in 2022.

Anti-nuclear sentiment was starting to soften before the war in the Middle East began, but the Iran War is speeding up this trend, prompting countries that shunned nuclear for decades to reevaluate the role that around-the-clock carbon-free energy plays on their grids. Early evidence for a nuclear surge is strongest in Asia, which is most reliant on Middle Eastern oil and natural gas. In Taiwan, a country that gets a third of its liquefied natural gas from Qatar, the state utility formally submitted a restart plan for its Maanshan nuclear plant a month after the war began.

South Korea, which already gets about 30 percent of its power from nuclear, signed a cooperative agreement with Vietnam to jointly develop new nuclear capacity, building on talks that began last year. After restarting Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, which is the world’s largest nuclear plant, in January, Japan inked a$40 billion deal to build advanced small nuclear reactors in the American south during a visit to the White House in March. Japan also signed a 5-year “memorandum of cooperation” with Indonesia aimed at advancing nuclear power and critical minerals development around the same time.

Construction at the Penly nuclear power plant in Petit-Caux on the English channel coast. France’s nuclear recovery program provides for the construction of six new reactors.
Ludovic MARIN / POOL / AFP via Getty Images

Elsewhere, countries are delaying nuclear phase-outs and talking about how to boost capacity. “I believe that it was a strategic mistake for Europe to turn its back on a reliable, affordable source of low-emissions power,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in March this year as she announced a $232 million fund to galvanize private investment in new nuclear technologies. The Commission warned member states like Spain and Belgium against prematurely phasing out nuclear power plants. In Africa, Kenya, Rwanda, and South Africa reaffirmed their support for nuclear; nearly half of the countries on the continent had long-term nuclear development plans before the war began. This week, the government of Belgium began negotiations to take over a fleet of nuclear reactors that the utility Engie had been planning to shut down.

“All decommissioning activities are being halted with immediate effect,” said the country’s prime minister, Bart De Wever, in a statement.

toolTips('.classtoolTips4','The process of reducing the emission of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that drive climate change, most often by deprioritizing the use of fossil fuels like oil and gas in favor of renewable sources of energy.');

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Two months in, the Iran war has changed the global energy system forever on May 1, 2026.

I caught a raccoon almost literally red-handed the other day. The night before, it (and presumably the comrades in its pack, technically known as a “gaze” of raccoons, because sure why not) had assaulted my garden, digging holes willy-nilly and uprooting seedlings I’d just put in the ground. In my three years of gardening, I’ve never actually seen the critters I’ve been at war with, on account of their nighttime raids. I’ve only found their aftermath. But now I had solid evidence: A muddy paw print on a watering can the invaders had tipped over to get a drink. 

You might wonder, then, why in his new Netflix docuseries, This Is a Gardening Show, Zach Galifianakis gushes about the joys of adding water and nutrients to a plot of land, hoping something actually grows, and then further hoping that it doesn’t get uprooted by omnivorous nocturnal bandits. “I honestly think for human beings and for the world itself, the only future is agrarian,” says Galifianakis, himself a gardener, in an episode about composting. “We should all know how to garden. It’s a better hobby than jetskiing.”

It’s exactly because gardening can be so frustrating and seemingly arbitrary — though, admittedly, much safer than jetskiing — that it is, in fact, joyful. Visiting various farms across six short episodes, Galifianakis finds that gardeners seem happier and funnier than most folk. Maybe it’s because they get to be outside all the time, or they’ve got balanced diets, or because they’re reliving their childhoods as they search for earthworms wiggling in compost. Or, more likely, it’s because raccoons have somehow vanished from that part of the world. 

Damning evidence left by the critters ravaging my garden. Courtesy of Matt Simon

This is not the Galifianakis of Between Two Ferns fame, in which he eviscerates celebrities who are in on the joke. His new show is still funny, of course, though in a sweeter, bucolic way. (A good chunk of the humor comes from not-especially-insightful — at least as far as gardeners are concerned — segments in each episode in which he asks school children about food.) When Galifianakis is traipsing around gardens, the biting, sardonic wit of Ferns gives way to genuine awe of what these farmers can accomplish. 

I identify. While I’m walking around the garden in the morning, watering and assessing the damage, I’m also cutting flowers to hang inside and dry. I’m watching bumblebees bumble around, fertilizing my native plants. I’m snapping new spears from my asparagus plants and eating them raw. (You haven’t lived until you’ve had asparagus straight out of the ground — they’re unbelievably tender, and mine have a somewhat peppery, garlicky taste.) Unlike the masterful producers profiled in This Is a Gardening Show, I’m not generating nearly enough sustenance even to feed myself, true enough. But in my experience, that’s not the point.

A glimpse into their operations stands in stark contrast to modern industrial agriculture. Food prices are skyrocketing as farmers struggle to pay for fuel and fertilizer, especially after Iran closed the Straight of Hormuz. People are freaked out about ultra-processed fare. Droughts are exhausting water supplies as the world gets too hot to feed itself. While humble gardens can’t feed the world on their own, they can certainly help with food security, especially when tucked into cities. Heck, you can even grow crops on top of buildings, under the shade of solar panels, thus generating both nutrition and clean electricity. 

Whereas industrial farms grow monocrops, like vast fields of wheat, gardens are more diverse and adaptive to a changing planet. Galifianakis, for instance, visits Royann Petrell and Sylvain Alie, founders of Steller Raven Ecological Farm, who’ve developed a variety they call the “future of tomatoes,” in that it “doesn’t mind 140 degrees in a greenhouse.” They say its taste improves the hotter it gets, in fact. Compare that to the industrial, perfectly formed, perfectly tasteless tomato you’ll find in the supermarket. 

Asparagus spears grow out of the ground like this, ready to eat. Courtesy of Matt Simon

Even though it was released on Earth Day, this is not a show centered on climate change, which is a massive threat to farmers big and small. We can imagine that these gardeners might be struggling with water shortages or extreme heat waves withering their crops, or growing seasons getting thrown out of whack. But more often, Galifianakis jokingly predicts a kind of generalized civilizational collapse. “There will be mass population decline, and there will be a small group of people that will be able to continue on, and their lineage will be able to continue on,” he says. “But a lot of us are gonna die.” 

Apocalypses aside, This Is a Gardening Show is a charmer, much more about triumphs of gardening than its many lows. A garden abhors arrogance — one thing after another lies in wait to humble you. From your many struggles, you realize the futility of struggling: Pests will come and go, weeds will grow even in the event of a nuclear winter, and a carefully tended vegetable will simply give up and die on you. Sometimes it’s your fault, and sometimes a plant is just trying to be difficult. Living in San Francisco, our infamous microclimates mean one species might grow big and strong in someone’s backyard a mile away, but struggle to survive in my own. I’m still learning, and will probably always be learning. And I’m very jealous of the masterful gardeners in the series.

As the seasons come and go, you find a rhythm in gardening, and things click into place. You learn that as much death as life visits a garden, and that’s OK. You problem-solve and improvise not just because you have to, but because it’s fun. Share a garden with someone and you forge a unique bond, like Petrell and Alie strolling hand-in-hand among their tomatoes. “Can I just say, off the record, seeing you guys hold hands through the garden, that’s what does it to humans, right?” Galifianakis says. “The garden is good for us. It can be a lifesaver.”

But then, inevitably, return the frustrations, which we don’t see too much of in the show, and the adaptations they demand from the gardener. For my part, I imagine raccoons are digging up my garden to find earthworms, grubs, and other invertebrates. (To be fair to raccoons, I can’t rule out an opossum as the culprit, or they might even be co-conspirators that trade off nights. But living near Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, raccoons are absolutely everywhere in my neighborhood.) But I drew the line when they repeatedly dug up my sugar pea seedlings last year, which I had for weeks grown from seed, then transplanted into the ground. So this year, instead of providing a single A-frame trellis for the plants to climb, I locked the seedlings inside by breaking a second frame in half and zip-tying the two pieces to either end of the structure. Irony among ironies, though: Research suggests that raccoons love solving puzzles for the fun of it, so they’ll get the same pleasure breaking the cage that I enjoyed improvising. 

But back to the show. The quaint farms that Galifianakis visits are as much producers of sustenance as they are of knowledge. You’ll learn a lot from the series, like where apples came from, how to graft a fruit tree, how corn will develop weirdly if not pollinated properly, and what you shouldn’t add to your compost bin (if you think plastic utensils are OK, maybe gardening isn’t for you after all). 

The short series won’t turn you into a master gardener. But it doesn’t have to, because much of the thrill of gardening is figuring it out for yourself through trial and error, when dealing with raccoons or otherwise. “Very pompously, if I were to offer a remedy to the human condition, it would be a garden,” Galifianakis says. “Or acid.”

So Zach, the next time you’re in San Francisco and want to lend me a hand, let me know. With the raccoons, not the acid.  

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline While Zach Galifianakis finds peace in gardening, I’m at war with raccoons on May 1, 2026.

Abigail Spanberger won a landslide victory in the Virginia governor’s race last November with a platform that focused on reining in rising electricity costs. Virginia is home to the world’s largest concentration of artificial-intelligence data centers, and the state’s biggest utility is straining to meet an expected surge in power demand. Spanberger, a Democrat, promised on the campaign trail to “make Virginians’ bills more affordable.”

It might seem surprising, then, that the new governor signed a bill last month that would return Virginia to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, or RGGI, a carbon pricing program that covers electrical utilities in states across the Northeast and mid-Atlantic. Spanberger’s Republican predecessor, Glenn Youngkin, pulled out of the program in 2022.

“Cap-and-trade” programs like RGGI put a ceiling on the amount of planet-warming carbon dioxide that utilities are allowed to emit when they generate electricity, and they require utilities to pay for every ton of carbon they emit below that cap. These programs can help drive utilities toward cleaner fuels, but they also increase costs, and those costs get passed on to consumers.

As a result, cap-and-trade programs have come under scrutiny as Democrats pivot to a focus on lowering costs for voters concerned about inflation. Democrats in California have called for relaxing the state’s cap-and-trade system this year, and New York Governor Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, has tried to punt on launching a cap-and-trade system that would apply to emissions from cars and buildings, on top of the state’s membership in RGGI. 

Supporters of RGGI (pronounced “reggie”) say that rather than driving bills up for Virginia households, re-entering the carbon price alliance could protect many families in the state from shouldering the costs of the data center boom. The revenues from selling pollution permits could eventually lower energy bills in many households and speed up Virginia utilities’ shift away from fossil fuels.

“Of course [RGGI] imposes costs on ratepayers, because we’re trying to internalize the costs that pollution is causing on everyone else,” said William Shobe, an original architect of the RGGI program who is now an emeritus professor of public policy at the University of Virginia. “But…if you design it right, it’s another tool for reallocating the costs that data centers are imposing on ratepayers.” 

The 10 other states in the RGGI program agree by consensus to lower the cap on emissions every few years, which should encourage utilities to get more power from renewable energy sources such as solar and wind. Since the program launched in 2009, utilities in the Northeast have reduced their overall emissions twice as fast as the rest of the United States, mainly by replacing dirty coal power with natural gas.

More than half of Virginians get their electricity from a giant utility called Dominion, which serves the state’s populous coast. In the past, Dominion has dealt with RGGI costs by imposing a surcharge on all customers. It came out to around $4.50 a month for the average household. Some have argued that the utility never needed to pass on these charges, but now that Virginia is rejoining RGGI, a representative from Dominion told Grist it will seek to reimpose them.

The price of a RGGI pollution permit has doubled in the past five years — from $8 to $16 for every ton — as member states have tried to ratchet down carbon emissions. At the same time, energy consumption in Virginia has increased by around 15 percent due to the AI boom. Data centers now consume around 20 percent of the state’s electricity, a number that could increase to more than 50 percent by 2030, according to the Electric Power Research Institute, an independent research firm. 

That surge in demand means that Virginia’s utilities will have to purchase more carbon permits from RGGI, which will make it more expensive for them to burn natural gas. Even though Virginia left the alliance for a few years under Youngkin, it will have to keep up with the pace of decarbonization across the rest of the Northeast.

“[Virginia] is coming back at the allocation where they would be if they had not left,” said Andrew McKeon, the head of the nonprofit that manages RGGI, during a talk earlier this month at the BloombergNEF energy summit in New York City. 

But returning to RGGI might not harm Spanberger’s affordability agenda as much as opponents claim. States spend the revenue raised from permits on projects that help reduce energy bills. Before it left the program, Virginia spent about $250 million in RGGI funds to make low-income households more energy efficient by, for instance, weatherizing homes against temperature swings and upgrading HVAC systems. These improvements even benefit customers who don’t receive them because using less energy tamps down prices. That’s not to mention the future health benefits of reduced pollution from coal and gas plants.

Data centers themselves will likely foot a large share of the bill for rejoining RGGI, since they use such a big share of the state’s electricity. Late last year, Dominion rolled out a new rate structure for “large load” users, requiring them to pay for most of the cost of generating and distributing the power they need, an effort to ensure those costs didn’t get spread onto ordinary homeowners. Shobe said that Virginia legislators are weighing whether to change the way they spend RGGI’s revenues so that some of the money gets funneled to help low-income families pay their electric bills. 

“It [would be] an automatic mechanism for recovering some of those increased costs and giving it back,” he said. Some low-income households that don’t use much energy would see their bills go down compared to if Virginia wasn’t in RGGI. (Shobe has been appointed to Virginia’s state air pollution control board, though he doesn’t have an affiliation with the Spanberger administration.)

A coal power plant owned by Dominion Energy in Saint Paul, Virginia. The utility must replace all its fossil fuel infrastructure with renewable energy in the coming decades. Mike Belleme for The Washington Post via Getty Images

Even if RGGI doesn’t threaten Spanberger’s promise to lower energy bills, experts disagree about how much the cap-and-trade program will do to speed Virginia’s shift off fossil fuels. The state legislature has already ordered Dominion to phase out all its fossil fuel plants by 2045, although the utility is allowed to keep them open if it’s necessary to avoid blackouts. Dominion has brought around 2 gigawatts of solar power online over the past decade, and plans another 16 gigawatts over the next decade, at a cost of around $8 billion. In 2024, fossil fuels made up about 60 percent of Virginia’s energy mix, with the rest coming from nuclear and some solar.

Dominion will also soon begin taking power from the country’s largest offshore wind farm, Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, which is nearing completion despite interference from the Trump administration. But the company is also seeking to expand a large gas power plant over the objection of environmentalists and community groups. Dominion plans to spend even more money on gas development than on solar, and it has met data center demand by importing power from dirtier coal and gas plants in West Virginia and Ohio. The utility said last year that phasing out its use of fossil fuels to meet the state’s law would cost $270 billion. (Environmental groups have disputed these estimates.)

Given the existing Virginia Clean Economy Act mandate and the high cost of maintaining reliable round-the-clock power without fossil fuels, some doubt that RGGI will push Virginia off natural gas any faster. 

“I don’t see a magic wand, we’re hitting the ceilings everywhere,” said Shuting Pomerleau, an energy analyst at American Action Forum, a center-right think tank. “I will be very skeptical if all these things combined could accelerate the decarbonization much faster than it currently already is.”

But supporters of Virginia’s rejoining RGGI argue that it will influence decisions made by Dominion and other utilities. These companies will soon need to spend tens of billions of dollars to meet surging demand, and that power has to come from somewhere. The financial nudge of RGGI will make investment in solar and batteries look more appealing compared to holding on to fossil fuels, said Jamie Dickerson, a senior policy analyst at the Acadia Center, a climate policy think tank.

“RGGI will be a direct price signal,” Dickerson said. 

toolTips('.classtoolTips4','The process of reducing the emission of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that drive climate change, most often by deprioritizing the use of fossil fuels like oil and gas in favor of renewable sources of energy.');

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Can a carbon price lower power bills? Virginia is betting yes. on May 1, 2026.

From low-carbon farming to community energy and Amazon restoration, Brazil’s cooperative sector is mobilizing millions to act on climate at a local level. The model highlights how existing co-op networks could be scaled to support a more just and resilient transition.

Twenty years after a global proposal to limit oil extraction, Richard Heinberg revisits its relevance in this interview and argues that equitable rationing may be key to reducing conflict and managing resource decline.