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By Christopher Collins and Mike O’Sullivan

The version of record of this op-ed appeared in Barron's.

Europe has effectively been at war since 2022. Russia’s drones are still flying over European airports, their ships continue to sabotage critical undersea cables, and their cyberattacks across the continent are surging.

Europe still isn’t ready to fight back.

There have been fits and starts of ambitious defense measures: last year, the European Commission sought to mobilize €800 billion under its Readiness 2030 plan, the European Union earmarked €150 billion for the Security Action for Europe, or SAFE, program, and the European Investment Bank (EIB) quadrupled its defense spending to €4 billion. But if Europe is to take full responsibility for its own security—and President Donald Trump is making clear it needs to—what currently exists isn’t enough.

The SAFE program is a demand-side instrument. It helps EU governments borrow to procure defense materials by issuing low-interest, long-maturity loans. It does nothing to promote more supply; SAFE offers no mechanism for guaranteeing commercial bank lending to defense firms, for instance. And the fact that the program is so heavily oversubscribed clearly signals both the demand and the urgency for more help. Meanwhile, the EIB is limited in what it can do by structural constraints: its own policies prevent it from financing weapons and ammunition. As the EIB’s president has rightly said, the bank “is not a defense ministry.”

This is where the proposed Defence, Security and Resilience Bank (DSRB) could come in—not as a rival to the existing European mechanisms, but as a complement that covers the ground they cannot.

The concept of the DSRB was developed by Rob Murray, formerly the head of innovation at NATO, who began working on the idea in 2018. The bank was officially launched last year and is now well beyond the drawing board: major global banks have signed on to help structure the institution, and its backers aim to have it operational by the end of 2026.

It is a straightforward idea: a multilateral bank, owned and overseen by democratic states. The DSRB would raise funds by issuing AAA-rated bonds on global capital markets and would then lend to member governments and guarantee loans made to defense firms by commercial banks. By pooling allied credit strength, these loans would be made at rates most NATO members cannot access on their own and over the long time frames that defense investment demands. Importantly, with the DSRB, there is no joint debt and no shared liability. Each country answers only for its own equity stake, which preserves national control.

The gap the DSRB is best placed to fill is on the supply side, helping companies that develop and build defense equipment access capital. This is especially true for the growth-stage firms across Europe, that are too mature for early-stage venture capital but too small and too risky for conventional bank lending.

Europe has relatively few investment funds that do the type of investing required to scale these companies. And European commercial banks, after years of ESG-driven retreat from the defense sector, lack both the appetite and the internal expertise to lend to these firms without guarantees. A DSRB-backed guarantee structure would address both these issues.

The European capital markets argument also deserves more attention. The EU’s Savings and Investment Union project aims to keep European capital in Europe, channeling it into productive, long-term capital market investments. The DSRB’s AAA-rated bonds would be precisely the kind of high-quality, euro-denominated instrument that a deeper European capital market could absorb, investing European savings into European security. Far from competing with the Savings and Investment Union, the DSRB could become a compelling use-case for the program.

Canada has emerged as a champion of the DSRB. Under Prime Minister Mark Carney — who has made strengthening Canada's strategic autonomy a national priority — Canada has taken a leading role in establishing the bank and hosting meetings with partner countries to begin negotiations on the bank’s charter. Canada has already lined up all of its major banks as partners and the country’s biggest cities are all vying to host the bank’s headquarters.

European defense and finance ministers are more lukewarm.

Germany says it prefers the existing SAFE program. But the DSRB would complement SAFE, not compete with it. Berlin knows this, or at least Deutsche Bank does, given that the German bank is one of the DSRB’s partner institutions. The German government’s current position amounts to telling its country’s flagship lender that it is wrong about how defense should be financed. That is an unusual stance for an export economy that prides itself on listening to industry.

The United Kingdom’s Treasury has said the DSRB would not deliver sufficient value. More than 800 British defense companies have publicly disagreed. The UK says it wants to spend 2.5% of GDP on defense, yet the country faces serious fiscal constraints. A multilateral guarantee structure is precisely the kind of tool that could help square that circle.

With major firms such as Naval Group, Dassault, Thales, and MBDA, France has the strongest defense industrial base in Europe; last year the country became the world's second-largest arms exporter. Yet Paris has barely commented on the DSRB. In diplomacy, that signals internal disagreement or caution.

Perhaps France fears that its strategic autonomy would be weakened by joining a bank that it would only partly own. But joining the DSRB would actually strengthen France’s strategic position by facilitating capital inflows. If Paris doesn’t become involved now, it risks spending the next decade complaining about rules it chose not to shape.

As the joke goes, Europe likes being concerned. The DSRB is a way to translate that concern into action. The countries that join the DSRB now will write the charter, while latecomers will accept terms drafted by others.

Europe’s three largest economies have every reason to be leading voices around this table. After all, the threats driving the DSRB, such as Russian aggression, supply chain fragility, and defense industrial underinvestment, are European problems. Letting Canada solve them isn’t a viable strategy.

Christopher Collins is a fellow with the Polycrisis Program at the Cascade Institute. Mike O’Sullivan is author of ‘The Levelling – what’s next after globalization?’(PublicAffairs), and former CIO at CS Wealth. 

Read the article in Barron's The post Europe Needs to Get Serious About Its Defense. A New Bank Is the Answer. appeared first on Cascade Institute.

“The Hub” is a weekly round-up of transportation related news in the Philadelphia area and beyond. Check back weekly to keep up-to-date on the issues Clean Air Council’s transportation staff finds important.

Celebrate Cobbs Creek Trails Day this Sunday, 4/26 from 10am to 2pm, at the park at Thomas Ave & Cobbs Creek Parkway north of Whitby Ave. More information and activities can be found here.

Are you interested in improving the health and built environment of Philadelphia? The Nutrition and Physical Activity Team in the Health Department of Philadelphia is hiring a Built Environment Coordinator, and a Community Health Infrastructure Coordinator. Click the links in the titles to learn more about these roles and their impact!

Image Source: BillyPenn

BillyPenn: Advocates push for around-the-clock access to public transit for kids in Philadelphia – Councilmember Rue Landau and Transit Forward Philly held a press conference for expanding the student fare program. The SEPTA card provided for students, the student fare program, is currently limited by distance, time of day, and days of the week. Limiting factors can include going to summer jobs, living too close to their school, and even involvement in sports. Advocates pointed out that universal access benefits kids, giving them opportunities in education, professional development, summer opportunities, and more.

Image Source: ABC21

PhillyVoice: PA Turnpike is testing a system that will warn drivers of slow traffic – Pennsylvania Turnpike drivers will be alerted of upcoming traffic jams, due to a pilot program that began this week. Drivers can expect two alerts, the first being an electronic sign about 2 miles away, and another screen alert placed about half a mile out from the slowdown. The pilot program is initially along the Northeast Extension of I-476, with review planned afterwards, to see if outward expansion would be beneficial.

Image Source: The Inquirer

The Inquirer (via MSN): Why city council is threatening to block Mayor Cherelle Parker’s ‘Uber tax’ if it doesn’t get its way on school closures – Philadelphia’s Board of Education has pushed the vote to cancel schools to April 30th, instead of this week as it was originally scheduled. During the past week, Philadelphia City Council members have pushed to delay the vote, as the facilities plans as written contain some concerning flaws. Mayor Parker introduced legislation that would add a $1-per-ride tax on services like Uber and Lyft to try and patch the Philadelphia School District’s budget. This tax would generate an estimated $50 million per year, but that would not offset the closures of several schools. Uber has also begun a public campaign to make clear that it will be passing along this tax directly to the rider.

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By Olivia Bahena Sahagún, Federal Carol Brantley Climate Justice Fellow, Chesapeake Climate Action Network

In July 1995, Chicago endured one of the deadliest climate disasters in U.S. history. A heatwave pushed temperatures above 100°F and heat index values to 115°F, causing more than 700 heat-related deaths. What made this heatwave so deadly for certain communities was not just the temperature, but poor housing infrastructure, weak emergency response, and social inequality. Thirty years later, as climate change increases extreme heat in cities, the lessons from 1995 are still relevant today. This disaster demonstrated that extreme heat is not just a weather problem; it is a policy failure shaped by infrastructure, governance, and social inequality.

Climate change is now making heat policy more urgent, as the frequency and intensity of extreme heat events are increasing, and heatwaves like 1995 are no longer rare events. Without addressing climate change, we cannot protect our communities from extreme heat. President Trump’s recent proposed budget cuts to the EPA, NOAA, and FEMA only threaten to undercut efforts to keep Americans safe from extreme heat. A decrease in funding for climate and environmental programs will limit localities’ ability to prepare for future heat events and properly adapt to climate change. Without sustained investment in climate resilience, the same structural inequalities that made the 1995 heatwave so deadly will continue to put lives at risk.

The Legacy of Redlining Lives On: Systemic Inequalities Increase Risk to Extreme Heat

Urban infrastructure played a major role in determining which Chicago communities felt the biggest impact of the heatwave and which didn’t. Predominantly low-income, Black neighborhoods had and still have fewer trees and more pavement than other areas, which intensifies heat. Many residents in those neighborhoods also did not have AC units or could not afford to use them. A New England Journal of Medicine study found that half of the deaths could have been prevented with a working AC in each home. These conditions demonstrated how unequal infrastructure directly shaped who faced the greatest risk.

These infrastructure disparities are rooted in Chicago’s history of redlining, a practice that denied loans and investments to communities of color and left them in hotter, less resilient neighborhoods. Through this racist housing practice, the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation made the city extremely segregated, and this legal segregation has led to the urban infrastructure and housing issues that caused low-income, Black communities to feel the worst of the 1995 heatwave. 

Social isolation was also a determining factor in whether residents survived the heatwave. A 1996 study found that living alone doubled the risk of death during the heat and that those who died from heat-related deaths were less likely to leave home frequently or have friends in Chicago. Without strong social networks, victims of extreme heat who lived alone, especially the elderly, could remain unnoticed for long periods of time, not receiving immediate medical attention needed to possibly save their lives.

Beyond Chicago: How Patterns of Inequities Create Urban Heat Islands 

This pattern is not unique to Chicago. Cities like Washington, D.C. show the same inequities, where historically underinvested neighborhoods become urban heat islands, metropolitan areas significantly hotter than surrounding areas. These similarities show that the 1995 heatwave isn’t an isolated event caused by one-time failures, but part of a larger national pattern of unequal climate vulnerability, which is why a stronger federal response is needed. 

Chicago improved its heat response after 1995, but these changes focused mostly on emergency management. During a 1999 heatwave, the city issued more warnings and press releases, opened cooling centers, and sent police to check on vulnerable residents. Today, Chicago has a very extensive extreme heat emergency plan. However, improved emergency planning does not address the structural issues that create risk in the first place.

The federal government has also responded more seriously to heat since 1995. In 2015, NOAA and the CDC launched the National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS) to support heat resilience in the U.S.

In 2022, the NIHHIS created the Heat.gov website to educate the public and decision-makers on reducing heat risk. Additionally, the EPA has also increased attention and public awareness of heat. Today, heat is recognized as a public health issue.

The Path Forward: Recognize Extreme Heat as a Major Disaster

Despite greater awareness, the underlying inequities that make heat deadly have not been solved. Extreme heat waves are often viewed as temporary weather emergencies, rather than long-term infrastructure problems. FEMA can change that by recognizing extreme heat as a major disaster, just like floods or tornadoes, and ensuring cities are prepared for heatwaves. FEMA could then provide funding for cooling centers, AC installations, housing improvements, and expanded tree canopy, all of which would protect vulnerable communities.

The 1995 Chicago heatwave revealed that when extreme temperatures intersect with poor housing, segregation, and weak preparedness, the outcome is deadly for vulnerable communities. Although some cities now have stronger emergency response programs, many underlying structural inequalities remain. As climate change increases the frequency of extreme heat, a federal policy response is needed to make cities resilient and adaptable to extreme heat. FEMA must recognize heat as a major disaster so that localities can receive support with immediate danger and the deeper inequities that make heat so dangerous; it’s how we save lives in a hotter, more unequal world.

As we face more frequent and severe climate disasters, it’s clear that our federal systems must be ready for every kind of extreme weather event. With recent winter extreme weather disasters and hurricane season quickly approaching, there is uncertainty about whether FEMA will deliver aid when communities need it most. Tell your member of Congress to pass the FEMA Act of 2025 to strengthen and reform FEMA. Urge them to make sure FEMA is fully staffed, funded, and prepared to respond to ongoing and future climate disasters.

Tell Your Representative to Pass the FEMA Act of 2025

About the author: Olivia Bahena Sahagún (she/her) is the Federal Carol Brantley Climate Justice Fellow for spring 2026. In her role, she supports the Federal team by assisting their campaigns to advance impactful climate policy. She is currently a student at Wake Forest University where she is working to receive a bachelor’s degree in Politics and International Affairs.

Olivia’s passion for the environment began at a young age, shaped by her grandma, who passed down her deep care for animals and the planet. She hopes to pursue a career in environmental policy and work to advocate for a sustainable future. In her free time, Olivia enjoys thrifting, going on walks, and spending time with her cat Pancho.

The post Why Chicago’s 1995 Heatwave Was More than a Weather Disaster appeared first on Chesapeake Climate Action Network.

A farmworker takes a break to drink water. Fair Food Program farms comply with mandatory heat stress protections that include the provision of water, electrolytes, rest breaks, training, and the ability to stop work and seek medical treatment without fear of retaliation. The Washington Post called the FFP’s standards “America’s strongest workplace heat rules” in a 2024 front page report. Dr. Joaquin Alfredo-Angel Rubalcaba, lead author on study of the FFP: “We do show that mothers are getting healthier… Their health, in terms of gestational diabetes and hypertension, [is] improving.” Jon Esformes, CEO of Pacific Tomato Growers and first grower to join the FFP: “At the end of the day, when someone shows up to do a job, they want to go to the job, do their job, earn their money, know that they’re safe and go home.”

A few weeks ago, we shared some remarkable news from the Fair Food Program with you: a multi-state, peer-reviewed public health study found that mothers working on Fair Food Program farms gave birth to healthier infants than their counterparts on non-FFP farms — a powerful reminder that when workers are protected, entire families thrive.

This landmark research — published by Duke University Press in the widely respected journal Demography — is the first to demonstrate that a Worker-driven Social Responsibility program can generate population-level public health gains by guaranteeing fundamental human rights on the job. Its findings suggest that the protections embedded in the Fair Food Program — and similar worker-driven models — can reach far beyond the workplace, functioning as targeted public health interventions in communities long exposed to extreme labor exploitation. 

Today, we are proud to share a feature-length article that takes a deeper look at this study, tracing how the Fair Food Program’s worker-drafted human rights standards, backed by multi-layered monitoring and enforcement mechanisms, translate into something profoundly human: healthier families and stronger communities. The feature comes courtesy of The Packer, the nation’s leading produce industry news outlet, which has for years documented the evolution and expansion of the Presidential Medal-winning Fair Food Program.

Written by The Packer’s Produce Editor Christina Herrick, the article brings forward new insights from the study’s lead author, who explains that beyond the reduction in low-birth-weight births, the program is also linked to decreases in diabetes and hypertension. These conditions, long prevalent among farmworkers, are closely tied to birth outcomes but also carry serious, lifelong consequences of their own — underscoring how the same protections that support healthier pregnancies are improving overall health in farmworker communities. The story also features reflections from Laura Safer Espinoza, Executive Director of the Fair Food Standards Council, and Jon Esformes, CEO of Pacific Tomato Growers and the first grower to join the FFP back in 2010. At a glance, the piece offers a deeper understanding of the FFP’s win/win impact, showing how its protections safeguard workers’ health while helping participating growers recruit and retain employees by becoming employers of choice.

We’re excited to share the article in full with you below. If you’d like to read the article on The Packer’s website, click here.

New Research Links Better Pay and Safer Conditions to Healthier Babies A peer-reviewed study finds that infants born to farmworkers on Fair Food Program farms are 10% less likely to be born at a low birth weight.

A peer-reviewed study published in the journal Demography has found a direct link between participation in the Fair Food Program and improved birth outcomes for farmworkers. Infants born to farmworker mothers on Fair Food Program-certified farms were 10% less likely to be born at a low birth weight.

Low birth weight, the Fair Food Program notes, is closely linked to perinatal mortality, cognitive development, chronic disease risk and more.

Joaquin Alfredo-Angel Rubalcaba, the study’s lead author and an associate professor of public policy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, says low birth weight is a good marker to track, as it’s a sensitive indicator of the “health spillover” for both mothers and infants.

“We do show that mothers are getting healthier,” he says. “Their health, in terms of gestational diabetes and hypertension, [is] improving.”

Quantifying the Health Spillover

Birth weight, which has already been measured and validated through public health research, would also be a way to quantify how the Fair Food Program influenced maternal and infant health outcomes.

“It’s not just the income; it’s all of these other things that go along with that,” Rubalcaba says, noting that improved working conditions create a positive health spillover that extends beyond the individual.

“When you’re healthy, you don’t have to worry about your child being malnourished,” he says. “When you don’t have to worry about the things that we take for granted on a day-to-day basis, you’re able to focus on the things that make you productive.”

Rubalcaba says this spillover effect continues beyond just a nuclear family and into communities.

“The community is thriving as a result of the efforts, at least, in my opinion, in my survey of the data, and the fact that we were able to see a result in publicly available data, in the birth records data, was pretty remarkable,” he says.

Moving Beyond the Paycheck

While the data is remarkable, the three drivers of these health outcomes — safer conditions, higher wages and reduced stress — manifest in personal ways for the workers.

Wage premiums and stricter enforcement against wage theft for farms in the Fair Food Program raised worker incomes by 24%. Legal protections against sexual harassment, forced labor and verbal abuse helped decrease maternal stress levels. The program’s focus on safety standards also helped to reduce physical strain and environmental hazards.

Workers clock in with a timekeeping system–a mandatory feature on Fair Food Program farms that ensures workers are paid for each minute they work

Laura Safer Espinoza, a retired New York State Supreme Court justice and executive director of the Fair Food Standards Council, says the study’s outcome highlights the strong correlation between improvements in overall working environments and increased birth rates.

Safer Espinoza says more than $50 million has been distributed to workers on Fair Food Program farms. What’s more remarkable, she says, is that retailers and brands have pledged to support this program.

“They have agreed to commit their market power and put those purchasing practices to work to incentivize good practices at the bottom of the food supply chain,” she says.

More Than Just Better Pay

Safer Espinoza points to other successes within the program that speak to the broader themes of family. These include requiring workers to be paid at call time, which she says resulted in later starts.

“For the first time, workers who were called to the field at a later time were able to eat breakfast with their children. They were able to walk their children to school,” she says.

As researchers surveyed workers in Immokalee, Fla., about the benefits of the Fair Food Program, it wasn’t only better pay; it was more family time, says Safer Espinoza.

“Families reported that their children were healthier and happier, and parents were delighted to be able to have that precious time with their children in the morning,” she says. “And that’s simply because the law was being enforced.”

Safer Espinoza says this study shows tangible benefits when women working on Fair Food Program farms earn more through increased pay or the elimination of wage theft. She says eliminating sexual harassment and verbal abuse reduces stress and tension, too.

“When mothers can work and expectant mothers can work in an environment where it is safer, where they are treated with more respect, where they don’t have to be fearful and stressed every day, this is the proof that it makes a huge difference,” she says.

And she says the study’s results aren’t necessarily an expected outcome that she and the Fair Food Standards Council members thought would happen on participating farms. She says the survey’s results show a greater impact on the Fair Food Program. 

“We were not necessarily thinking, ‘This will increase birth rate and be transformational across generations in the way that it obviously is and has been proven to be,” she says. “It will make a huge difference for the children who are born to workers on Fair Food Program farms. They’ll be healthier and have better futures, and that’s something that I don’t think was necessarily contemplated when we set out, but it is a very beautiful result of this collaboration.”

A New Standard for Growers Lucas Benitez with John Esformes, CEO of Pacific Tomato Growers DBA Sunripe Certified Brands as the CIW and Pacific agree to join forces to launch Fair Food Program in 2010

Jon Esformes, CEO of Sunripe Certified Brands and the first grower to join the Fair Food Program, says he’s proud of how his company has become an employer of choice thanks to the positive culture created on his family’s farm. He says a couple of years ago, when he was on a panel about labor shortage with then-Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, he had to say that he had no trouble recruiting and retaining workers as an employer of choice.

“That spoke to over a decade of bridge building and creating what we call a safe and fair work environment where everybody understands their rights, everybody feels safe and making complaints, everybody feels like the company is open to evolution, and that’s been the history of the relationship with the coalition,” he says.

And that’s truly what workers want, Esformes says.

“At the end of the day, when someone shows up to do a job, they want to go to the job, do their job, earn their money, know that they’re safe and go home,” he says.

And this study, Esformes says, helps highlight the intangible benefits from creating this type of workplace culture quantitatively.

“People tend to be evidence-based and need that evidence to convince them to keep doing something,” he says. “We didn’t need that for ourselves. For us, we knew what was happening. But in the meantime, it’s good for the general population to have a greater understanding of the efficacy of this type of program and its impact on the community.”

By Christopher Collins, Polycrisis Fellow, Cascade Institute

The version of record of this op-ed appeared in The Globe and Mail

Earlier this month, during a panel discussion on the Canadian economy at the Liberal Party convention in Montreal, former Google CFO Patrick Pichette suggested that the government should restrict the ability of young Canadians to work in the United States, because Canadian taxes had funded their education. A clip of these remarks went viral, and for good reason: as Shopify founder Tobi Lütke said in response, “making Canada a cage” is not the right strategy to build a strong economy.

But Mr. Pichette’s remarks highlighted a real anxiety: many of Canada’s most talented young people do leave to work outside the country. I was one of these people: from age 24 to 31, I lived and worked abroad – both in the U.S. and overseas. Many of my friends also fall into this category. Eventually, I came back to Canada, as did some of my friends; others put down roots and stayed in San Francisco, New York, Boston or London. But we all benefited from professional opportunities that did not exist in our home country.

The data show record numbers of people are leaving the country. Many of these are skilled young professionals, and the majority head to the U.S., drawn by greater professional opportunities, deeper networks and higher wages. This has major implications for Canadian businesses and the broader economy; as a trade publication for Canada’s human resources professionals put it last week: “the people leaving are disproportionately the ones your workforce plans were built around.”

One dimension to this story that older Canadians of Mr. Pichette’s vintage often miss is the generational divide in how the U.S. is perceived. While polls show that Canadians overall disapprove of President Donald Trump’s America, that sentiment is strongest among those over 55. This is a global phenomenon; in many countries around the world, adults under 35 hold a more favourable view of the U.S. than those over 50. We should not assume that anti-Trump sentiment is sufficient to keep young talent at home.

Younger Canadians appear to be more willing to hold their nose and move to a country whose politics they dislike if it puts them in a better economic position. This makes sense; people building their careers don’t have as much flexibility as those who’ve already made it. We see a similar dynamic in Canada when it comes to attracting specialized talent to new governmental organizations such as the Major Projects Office – it has been harder to attract the younger professionals still building their careers.

So, what do we do about the brain drain? The instinct behind Mr. Pichette’s idea – wielding the stick – is wrong. In Canada, we don’t restrict interprovincial migration, and no one demands that an engineer trained in Ontario reimburse the province before moving to Alberta. And Canada also benefits from talent trained abroad. For example, the Philippines sends hundreds of thousands of health care workers abroad, including many to Canada; imagine the outcry if Manila tried to prevent them from leaving. The free movement of people is a foundational principle of liberal democracies; restricting it is an admission of policy failure and a concession to complacency.

The answer, then, is to look for carrots. For example, Canada could develop a scholarship model that generously funds graduate education but attaches this funding to a service obligation requiring recipients to work in the country for a defined period. This program could target fields where the brain drain is most acute, from AI research to health care to clean energy.

Finally, it is worth noting that not all emigration is a loss. True, some Canadians who leave will settle permanently abroad. But others will return with skills, networks and capital that benefit Canada enormously. We should want some of our future leaders to have spent their formative years operating in global nerve centres – not punish them for doing so. Perhaps the best example of this is Prime Minister Mark Carney, whose global experience and network from years working in the U.S., Britain and Japan undoubtedly help him navigate our country through an increasingly complex world.

People are rational economic actors, and they go where the opportunities are. This is not just a Canadian story: across the West, record numbers of young professionals are moving abroad. The question Canada should be asking is not how to stop people from leaving, but whether we are building the kind of economy that compels talented people to stay – or return home. Think of it as the Field of Dreams problem: if you build it, they will come.

So let’s focus on building, not caging.

Read article in the Globe and Mail The post Punishing young Canadians for leaving doesn’t solve the problem appeared first on Cascade Institute.

The right to protest is sacrosanct. That is why thousands of New Yorkers spoke out when Council Speaker Julie Menin and Councilmember Eric Dinowitz introduced two bills that infringe on our constitutional rights under the cynical and false pretense of fighting antisemitism.

And it is why today, as Jewish New Yorkers, we welcome Mayor Mamdani’s decision to veto Intro 175B, which would have limited our right to protest in front of educational institutions. We remain outraged with the City Council members who passed the other bill, Intro 1B, to undermine protest in front of houses of worship, with a veto-proof super majority.

Eliza Klein, JVP New York City Organizer:

“These bills are not about Jewish safety. Especially at a time when the federal government is attacking our cities — including specifically targeting those who speak out for Palestinian freedom — New Yorkers want elected leaders to protect our constitutional rights, not limit them.”

Organizing matters. Thanks to meetings, calls, letters, and testimony from thousands across the city, these anti-democratic bills were watered down and no longer have an enforcement mechanism. However we are clear-eyed about the dangerous precedent these anti-Palestinian City Council bills send: that if you want to violate international law or US law, you need only to do it inside a house of worship and you will be insulated from protest.

Despite what some have claimed, these bills are not about Jewish safety. They were introduced following protests outside houses of worship hosting non-religious political events, including auctioning off occupied Palestinian land from the West Bank – which is illegal under international law, federal fair housing law, and state and local anti-discrimination law.

We call on New York City’s legislators to stop weaponizing our identities to justify repression of dissent – which is sacred to our Jewish tradition. Rather than limit our Constitutional right to protest, our legislators should end the sales of stolen Palestinian land in our city.

The City Council has failed New Yorkers by passing these bills. We affirm Mayor Mamdani’s decision to veto Intro 175B. This fight is not over – we have one month to prevent the City Council from trying to override Mayor Mamdani’s veto, and we will continue to organize and protect the right to protest in our city.

Not in our synagogues. Not in our name.

Councillors have opposed controversial plans to drill and frack for gas in the village of Burniston, near Scarborough.

North Yorkshire Council’s strategic planning committee meeting in Scarborough. Photo: DrillOrDrop

Members of North Yorkshire’s strategic planning committee voted almost unanimously, with just one abstention, against an appraisal gas well and proppant squeeze, a form of lower-volume fracking.

Councillors rejected the application this afternoon because they said it represented major development on the North Yorkshire Heritage Coast, against local policy.

The meeting decided there would be an unacceptable impact on residents living within 500m of the site and the development was against mineral policy because of lighting and the rig height would harm the North York Moors National Park, which is protected by a 3.5km buffer zone.

Councillors said there would be an unacceptable impact on tourism and offered no definite economic benefits. The proposal was also contrary to the council’s climate commitment and there was a risk of induced seismicity and damage to local cliffs.

The decision overruled the recommendation of officials, who had said the plans, by Europa Oil & Gas, should be approved.

Councillors voted for a “minded to” refuse decision.

The formal decision will be deferred until the local government minister has reviewed what should be included in the detailed environment statement that accompanied the application. This follows a request by Friends of the Earth earlier this month.

The vote, which came after more than four hours of discussions and presentations, was greeted with cheers from the public gallery.

Europa Oil & Gas said it would appeal.

Official support

Principal planner, Amy Taylor, told the meeting:

“The application is recommended for approval as it is considered on balance that there were no material planning considerations that warrant its refusal and there would be no unacceptable adverse environmental impacts resulting from the proposed development.”

She said noise, air quality, lighting, vibration and other impacts on local residents and the landscape would be controlled by 36 conditions.

She reported that the North York Moors National Park authority had not opposed the development, about 800m from its boundary, despite its concerns about the principle of the development for climate change.

But Ms Taylor said the plans were acceptable in climate change terms.

Local opposition

The meeting heard that all the local parish and town councils opposed the scheme, including Burniston, Newby & Scalby, Cloughton and Scarborough.

Other objections included Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, Salby and Newby Village Trust, Frack Free Coastal Communities, Frack Free Scarborough, Frack Free Ryedale, North Yorkshire Moors Association, CPRE and Friends of the Earth.

Key concerns included earthquakes, water contamination, increased traffic, noise, air pollution, climate change and damage to landscape, wildlife, recreation and tourism.

A large rally of opponents gathered outside the meeting. Only 20 members of the public were allowed into the council chamber to watch the meeting.

There are two formal complaints against the way the application was handled by council officials.

Proppant squeeze

The company’s scheme proposes to drill from farmland on the edge of Burniston, close to fragile cliffs on the North Yorkshire heritage coast.

Site construction is expected to last seven weeks, followed by two weeks to mobilise drilling equipment and five weeks for drilling with a rig up to 38 m high.

As part of its testing programme, Europa plans to carry out up to four stages of lower-volume fracking. The operations aim to release gas by creating fissures in the rocks surrounding the wellbore.

The company denies this is fracking. It says its operation does not propose to use the volume of fluid high enough to qualify for associated hydraulic fracturing (1,000m3 per fracking stage or 10,000m3 in total). These operations are currently prevented in England under a moratorium

Ms Taylor told the meeting that proppant squeeze was “fundamentally different” from higher volume fracking.

But campaigners have argued that Europa Oil & Gas is exploiting a legal loophole which allows operators to carry out fracking despite the moratorium.

They have pointed out that 500m3 of fluid that could be used in each stage at Burniston would exceed that injected by Cuadrilla at Preston New Road in Lancashire in 2019, which caused earthquakes felt across the Fylde region.

Councillors question plans

Many of the 12-person planning committee appeared sceptical at times about Europa’s proposals. Members spent more than 90 minutes asking questions about the application.

Cllr Andy Brown (Green), who proposed refusal, said the application contradicted policy on the North Yorkshire heritage coast, which states that major development was unlikely to be accepted unless it contributed to the area’s protection. This was a prime reason for rejection, he said.

Cllr Brown also said the application was covered by the region’s mineral plan policy on fracking. There were 38 homes within 500m of the site, he said.

There was no adequate assessment of seismic impact, he said. Fugitive releases could not be prevented by conditions. The flare stack would be on the site for 15 weeks. That was a lot of impact, he added.

He said the site could be seen from the North York Moors National Park. We do not have adequate information of light pollution from the flare stack, he said. There was also no assessment of the impact on tourism, he said. It would have a negative impact, he said.

There were also concerns about the the risk of earthquakes, possible methane leaks from the site, stability of the local cliffs, the economic impact, light pollution and the effect on tourism.

Opposition speeches

Chris Garforth, of Frack Free Coastal Communities (FFCC), said:

“Today is a major test of the council’s commitment to reduce carbon emissions; a test too of your minerals plan, key provisions of which this proposal ignores, notwithstanding the officer’s assertions”.

He said:

“To be clear, this application is a type of hydraulic fracturing or fracking, as defined by your minerals and waste joint plan”.

He said many of the objections concerned seismic risk from fracking.

The minerals plan asked for an assessment of the potential for induced seismicity and compelling evidence that it can be managed and mitigated to an acceptable level.

But he said:

“There is no assessment, no evidence – compelling or otherwise – in the application nor the officers’ report. Therefore, as the decision maker, how can you be satisfied that other regulatory regimes will work effectively as national planning guidance tells you to be?”

He also said there had been no health impact report, against council policy.

Gas from North Yorkshire would not bring domestic energy security. The only economic benefit would be for the company’s investors and shareholders.

The proposal would blight the landscape, which attracts visitors to the heritage coast

Katie Atkinson, planning consultant for FFCC, said the application was “strewn with errors and inconsistencies”.

“The company says it will restore the site after appraisal. But the planning documents also say it will retain equipment on site.

“Meanwhile, the proposed planning conditions are inadequate to protect residents’ health and amity, including night time noise levels which the World Health Organisation says are harmful to health through the lack of sleep.”

She said 920 residents live within 1km of the site.    

She added:

“We believe the application is contrary to several national planning policies and several of our own minerals local plan policy and your responsibility to further the purposes of the national park. We ask that you refuse this unwanted and unnecessary proposal.”

Helen Bore, vice-chair of Newby and Scalby Town Council, said there were noted geological faults around the drilling site.

She said local planning policy required that proposals should be supported by detailed evidence about seismic risk. No such evidence exists, she said.

She said the industrial development was out of keeping with the local environment. It is in heritage coast and near the Cleveland Way. Where is the high level of protection in this application, she asked.

She also asked how North Yorkshire Council could be certain that Europa Oil & Gas, a company on the junior stock market, would have the funds to restore the site. She asked for a cash-backed bond before planning permission was approved.

She also said Europa’s suggestion that the proposal was short-term and temporary was “seriously misleading”.

Councillors were making the decision on behalf of local people, she said. She asked them to refuse the application and for there to be a recorded vote.

Karen Fanthorpe, a member of Cloughton Parish Council, challenged that the application was temporary and time-limited. Europa had always been clear that they intended to drill for oil on the coast, she said.

She described the current application as a “foot in the door”. Future applications would be harder to resist because the area had already been industrialised, she said.

The local community would get no benefit but bear all the costs, she said.

She also said there were key issues missing in the planning report:

• geological faults
• potential impact on UK energy security – we expect it to be less than 1%
• climate change
• mineral waste dump under Scalby that has not been consulted upon
• financial robustness of the company

Demand proper answers on this matter before a decision is made, she said.  Future generations are relying on you. She also called for a financial bond.

The chair of Burniston Parish Council, Richard Parsons, said the application was the first step in the industrialisation of a piece of beautiful countryside.

He said two 25m wind turbines had previously been refused on landscape grounds. The site is not suitable for a development of this nature, he said.

He said there had been a recent cliff fall near the site. You have responsibility to be sure the site is suitable and secure, he said.

You are expected to make a decision without the evidence. The responsibility lies here and now, he said.

For our residents, this application means night lighting, within sight of the dark skies area, as well as dust and vibration. This would destroy the peace that Burniston represents. People will not come to see an industrial site on a hill.

You must not be fooled by the words temporary or short-term, he said. He urged them to protect our coast, our economy and our community. He urged them to refuse the application. This is the wrong proposal, in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Cllr Derek Bastiman, who represents Burniston on North Yorkshire Council, told the meeting he had lived in the Burniston area all his life.

He said the government was seeking to remove the great weight in favour of hydrocarbon applications.

According to the North Yorkshire minerals plan, the proppant squeeze meets the definition of fracking, he said.

If this application were approved, he said, it would open the door to fracking across North Yorkshire.

The application does not comply with local planning policy, he said.

This site is a “dead weight” to the heritage coast. It does not protect the landscape, it will destroy it. He described it as “vandalism”.

The council had a responsibility to protect its residents. Think long and hard about this application and the damage it will do, he said.

North Yorkshire Councillor Rich Maw said:

You are being asked to decide that this application is sufficiently certain and sufficiently evidenced and robust and I would say it is not.

He said the proposal lacks seismic evidence and a health impact assessment.

Cllr Maw said the council was treating the application was for exploration when it was for appraisal. The council was not applying appraisal requirements to assess the impacts of any future production, he said.

Steve Mason, North Yorkshire Councillor, an anti-fracking campaigner and sustainability researcher, said:

“This application is presented as small and limited. It isn’t. It creates the appearance of fitting with policy, without actually doing so. This is not sound planning.”

He said:

“There are three main ways this application games the system. First, a fracking proposal is re-labelled to avoid the UK ban on fracking. And to evade our Minerals plan’s stricter, yet considered, approach.

“Second, ‘low volume’ is implied as meaning ‘low risk’, despite the evidence to the contrary. 

“Third, the climate impact from burning the gas is treated as too uncertain to count, even though the Supreme Court’s Finch case judgment, says otherwise, and our own policy demands the complete assessment of development as a whole.”

He said:

“The applicant frames a “proppant squeeze” as not fracking. I disagree and so does our policy. A proppant squeeze is simply part of the fracking process. Shatter the rock, squeeze in the proppant to hold the cracks open, release the gas. Our minerals plan defines fracking by what it does and its intent: stimulating rock to produce hydrocarbons.”

He said the Burniston site could produce three weeks of UK gas usage in total but with large-scale industrial impacts.

This development would industrialise a heritage coastline. It conflicts with the existing national planning policy framework, fails the test on climate change and conflicts with North Yorkshire’s own climate reduction plan.

“North Yorkshire must not be returned to an experiment for unconventional gas exploitation again.”

Company speeches

Paul Foster, Europa’s planning officer, said the application was for a single appraisal well. It was not for production.

He said there would be impacts but they were time-limited and could be controlled by planning conditions.

Subsurface, including potential seismic effects, would be controlled by separate regulatory regimes, such as the Environment Agency, HSE or the North Sea Transition Authority.

The issue was whether the application was acceptable in planning terms, he said. He asked the committee to approve the application.

Alastair Stuart, Europa’s chief operating officer, said he acknowledged that this was the local people’s landscape and environment.

He said all that was proposed was a single borehole, drilled for  five weeks, followed by testing, and restoration. Nothing else can happen without a further planning application.

The decision should be evidenced-based and fair. It must be able to be defended and upheld, he said.

You are being asked whether this can be done acceptably, under strict condition, or not at all. If Europa were allowed to go further in the development, he was sure it would win local trust.

He said the decision today was not about national energy policy but about whether this development was acceptable at tis location.

Some of the concerns raised were dealt with other regulatory regimes.

 Jamie McGill, also from Europa, read quotes from some local residents living near the Wressle oil site in North Lincolnshire, in which the company is an investor.

He said despite earlier reservations, they had not noticed any impact of the site. The comments included that people did not know it was there, it had proved to be a considerate neighbour and there had been no major impacts.

A local councillor said there had been “no problem with it”. The mayor of Broughton said the operator, Egdon Resources, had been a good neighbour. Mr McGill also referred to a community benefit fund, paid from production revenues.

William Holland, the company’s chief executive, said he was confident in Europa’s planning process, because it had done it before at Wressle in North Lincolnshire.

The views of the community had changed positively over time based on their experience of the Wressle site, he said.

Campaigners outside began shouting “Liar, liar, pants on fire”

Mr Holland said the company was committed to working constructively with the local community. He hoped the quotes from Wressle would reassure people.

He said likening Burniston with Preston New Road was like comparing apples and pears. He said the earthquakes during shale fracking at Preston New Road were why fracking had been banned and proppant squeeze was not.

Mr Holland said a production well at Burniston would lead to Yorkshire gas for Yorkshire people.

People in the public gallery shouted in response.

We will update this article so please check back for more details

What does it take for people to meaningfully participate in democracy? For millions of workers, the answer starts with something basic: being able to afford to live.

Saru Jayaraman, President of One Fair Wage, has spent decades organizing restaurant workers and advocating for fair wages across the country. In her keynote at Bioneers 2026, she made the case that economic justice is not separate from democracy or climate action, but foundational to both.

This is an edited transcript of her talk.

Saru Jayaraman: 

For 25 years, I’ve been organizing and representing workers in the restaurant industry. It employs 13.6 million people in the United States, many in the lowest-wage jobs in the country.

In past talks at Bioneers, I’ve shared that the subminimum wage for tipped workers was $2.13 an hour. Still today, in 2026, the largest employer of women, people of color, youth, immigrants, and really so many of us can legally pay just $2.13 an hour.

I’ve said again and again that when so much of America cannot afford to feed themselves or their families, they also cannot engage politically. There is no way people can take on issues like the climate crisis when they are working three jobs instead of one, and when those in power represent the opposite of what they need.

As I’ve continued to share this, I’ve faced a lot of pushback. In 2024, when we were raising money to put wage increases on the ballot in states like Arizona and Michigan, donors told me, “That’s cute. You’re trying to raise wages. We’re trying to save democracy.”

But raising wages is saving democracy.

Despite these repeated warnings, we’ve landed in a crisis that has been building for a long time. One clear example: Trump campaigned on and delivered “no tax on tips,” even though two-thirds of tipped workers don’t earn enough to pay federal income tax. But he at least recognized these workers as worth speaking to.

When that happened, I urged Kamala to engage this audience as well. The answer was no, again and again.

In the last election, many tipped workers either stayed home or shifted their support elsewhere. Not because they didn’t care, but because they felt unseen. We didn’t speak to them. We didn’t say, “Your lives matter.”

What the whole “no tax on tips” moment revealed is this: When you leave people out, you do it at your own peril. When large groups of people are excluded, they become vulnerable to being co-opted by the right.

In April of last year, a series of articles in USA Today documented a rumor spreading among MAGA voters that Trump had already raised the federal minimum wage to $25 an hour. The videos were widely shared and gained significant traction among right-wing audiences.

Now, we all know it’s a lie. That’s not the news. The news is that they didn’t claim he raised wages to $15, or $17, or even $20. They said $25 an hour: the minimum needed to live anywhere in the United States right now. They chose the number that reflects people’s lived reality, including their own base. And it resonated.

We have a five-alarm fire. The right is talking about $25 and energizing their base around it, while the left is stuck arguing for $17, or in some places, still $15. I’ll be blunt. This is why people are frustrated with us. They see us negotiating against ourselves before we even enter the room. They see us settling for half a loaf.

When we saw this, we organized an emergency convening in Los Angeles in June, bringing together 140 labor and community leaders from 15 states. The message was clear. It’s time to move beyond the Fight for $15. It’s time to demand a living wage for all, with a national floor of $25.

Since that gathering, we’ve launched campaigns, bills, and ballot measures in dozens of states calling for $25 across the board, and $30 in higher-cost areas. Several counties have already taken action.

Within our own movement, there was hesitation. “$25? That’s too high. $30? Impossible.” So we polled it across red, blue, and purple districts. The result was overwhelming support. And when we tested the opposition’s messaging, that this would raise prices, cost jobs, or hurt small businesses, support actually increased.

People are angry. If you tell them wages can’t go up because prices will rise, they respond, “What are you talking about? Prices have already gone up.”

The only thing that hasn’t increased is the value of human labor.

There’s so much talk about affordability, but most of it centers on bringing costs down. There is no world in which affordability comes from bringing costs down alone. Inflation over the last 75 years has never meaningfully reversed. The only way to make life more affordable for half of working Americans, and it is half who earn less than $25, is to increase wages.

This unprecedented affordability crisis is also a democracy crisis. And that makes this a moment of real consequence.

I know there’s a lot to be unhappy about. There’s a lot to defend. But if all we do is play defense, we will lose. We need a proactive vision that is bold, that shows people we are fighting. And it has to focus on the issue they keep telling us matters most, the cost of living.

We’re in a moment of real opportunity. The pendulum could swing toward a world where people work one job instead of three, where they can thrive instead of just survive, where they have time with their kids, and the capacity to engage with the issues they care about, including the climate crisis.

I believe we can achieve this because fair wages is one of the few issues working people across the political spectrum can agree on.

It’s time for our country to deliver.

The post Democracy Doesn’t Work Without a Living Wage appeared first on Bioneers.

Despite not yet paying out any money, a UN-backed fund meant to address the loss and damage caused to developing countries by climate change could face “liquidity issues” by the end of next year, its head warned today.

With ten projects already requesting $166 million in total, the fund’s Executive Director Ibrahima Cheikh Diong warned a board meeting in Zambia that the fund was likely to be “oversubscribed” and should anticipate cashflow problems.

A framing paper prepared by the fund’s secretariat similarly warns that “given the current status of the capitalization of the Fund, there is a risk of the Fund exhausting its capital by the end of 2027, which could result in a loss of operational momentum and expose the FRLD to reputational risk”.

Since governments agreed to set up the fund at UN climate talks in Egypt in 2022, wealthy nations have promised $822 million, but delivered just $449 million.

The fund is expected to approve its first projects at its next board meeting in July. Early proposals submitted include strengthening responses to floods in Bangladesh and the Nigerian city of Lagos, and improving water infrastructure in Jamaica following Hurricane Melissa last year.

A woman walks over debris, outside a store where food is being distributed, after Hurricane Melissa made landfall in Black River, Jamaica, October 30, 2025. (REUTERS/Octavio Jones ) Millions not billions

ActionAid Zambia climate justice coordinator Michael Mwansa told the board meeting that he was concerned about “the failure of the Global North governments to deliver on their climate finance obligations, making it largely impossible to scale up [the fund’s initial stage] significantly, if at all”.

“Pledges remain nowhere near the billions and even the trillions needed to address loss and damage to the Global South,” Mwansa added, highlighting reports which found that financing loss and damage could cost developing countries up to $400 billion a year.

The fund’s board discussed its strategy for raising more money at its meeting this week while climate campaigners called, in an open letter, for it to aim to secure $50 billion a year from developed countries starting next year, rising to $100 billion a year by 2031 and $400 billion by 2035.

The World Bank-hosted fund aims to have revenue-raising rounds known as replenishments every four years, with the first in 2027.

Governments have agreed to “urge” developed countries to contribute but only to “encourage” other nations to do so and the fund’s secretariat wants to appoint a “high-level champion” to lead the replenishment team.

The fundraising strategy will be discussed further at the next board meeting in the Philipines in June.

The campaigners’ open letter calls for developed countries to contribute more and for them to introduce taxes on fossil fuel companies, financial transactions, luxury air travel and wealth to raise money for the fund.

“Rich countries must be held strictly accountable for the devastation they have caused,” said Climate Action Network International head Tasneem Essop. “Their failure to fulfil their responsibility to the Loss and Damage Fund is not just an oversight; it is a shameful betrayal of humanity.”

The post New loss and damage fund could run out of money next year appeared first on Climate Home News.

This is a guest blog post by John Lang about his new "Climate Trunk" graphics project and website. He will add one graphic per week for about 2 years rounding out the big picture of human-caused climate change graphic by graphic.

If you had to explain climate change in 10 seconds, what would you say? 

Climate scientists Katharine Hayhoe and Kimberly Nicholas have long boiled it down to five phrases: It’s real. It’s us. It’s bad. We’re sure. And we can fix it.

This framing has helped millions cut through a topic swamped by jargon, acronyms and complexity. The first four Climate Trunk graphics owe a debt to that tradition. 

You’ll notice below I leave one off: we’re sure. Not because scientific certainty doesn’t matter. It does. The evidence is overwhelming. Scientists have passed the gold standard of certainty on human-caused climate change: the five-sigma level. The scientific consensus is as solid as gravity – and like gravity, it doesn’t care what you believe. 

I just don’t want to start on the defensive. I want to start by showing the big picture as simply as possible – ‘we’re sure’ will get its own graphic later. 

With that caveat out of the way, here’s the Trunk version of the really big picture:

1. It’s real.

Earth is heating.

Global temperatures are rising, and faster than most people realise. The planet has heated by around 1.3°C since the late 19th century, with the bulk of that increase concentrated in the last 50 years. Land – where people tend to live – has heated by about 2°C on average already. (Ocean takes longer to heat up than land.)

In 2024, the global average reached 1.53°C above the pre-industrial baseline. That doesn’t mean the 1.5°C temperature goal of the 2015 Paris Agreement has been breached, since that threshold refers to the long-term average, not a single year. But it’s a warning that we’re inching closer.

2. It’s us.

And it's 'unequivocal'.

Modern global heating is overwhelmingly caused by human activity. The best estimate of the human contribution is around 100%, and possibly a little more, because natural factors have likely had a slight cooling influence over the last 50 years or so.

Our greenhouse gas emissions, namely CO2, acts like an extra blanket, trapping more heat. Meanwhile, air pollution has removed a little of that blanket by reflecting some sunlight back to space, but only temporarily. Natural factors like the sun and volcanoes do not explain the long-term heating trend.

As the IPCC puts it: ‘It’s unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land.’

3. It’s bad.

The future has not been written.

Climate change is not just a gradual rise in temperature. It is a destabilisation of the conditions under which human civilisation developed. Food systems, water supplies, infrastructure, ecosystems and political institutions were built under, and for, a relatively stable climate. That stability is now being disrupted at speed.

The risks rise with every increment of heating: more extreme heat, heavier rainfall, worsening droughts, greater strain on nature and growing odds of ‘double whammy’ shocks across societies. The future is far from pre-written, but it will branch according to the choices made by societies over the next decade or so.

4. We can fix it: net zero

Net zero is the only way to stabilise rising temperatures.

This is the part that sometimes gets lost, between ‘it’s too late’ and ‘everything’s fine’. Or, as the late scientist Stephen Schneider put it: ‘the “end of the world” or “good for you” are the two least likely [climate] outcomes.’

We know that achieving net zero CO2 is the only way to stabilise rising temperatures, and the first step towards net zero greenhouse gases. Net zero means cutting emissions as far and as fast as possible, then using durable removals to counterbalance what’s left – the ‘residual’ emissions we can’t eliminate entirely. Net zero also means protecting the land and ocean sinks that already absorb about half of our CO2 emissions.

Durable removals will help, they have to. But emission cuts will do the heavy lifting. Cutting emissions now is almost always easier and cheaper than trying to remove them from the atmosphere later.

In a nutshell, the practicalities of net zero are almost as simple as Hayhoe and Nicholas’s five climate basics:

• replace fossil fuels with clean energy
• electrify energy systems as fast as possible
• protect, restore and strengthen land and ocean sinks
• scale up durable carbon removal to industrial levels.

The good news is the first two above are underway, and moving faster than many expected.

Clean energy is beginning to grow in line with — and at times faster than — energy demand: the key to squeezing fossil fuels out over time. Slowly at first. Then all of a sudden. 

Solar has gone bananas. Together with wind, it now accounts for more than 90% of new power capacity. Clean electricity has surged past 40% of global generation, helping put a brake on CO2 emissions growth since 2015.

Yes, the norm-wrecking ball in the White House has dented investment confidence. But global spending on clean energy is roughly double that of fossil fuels – and growing. Meanwhile the Iran crisis is rewriting energy policy in real time: away from imports and volatility, and towards energy sovereignty, stability and lower fuel import bills.

As veteran energy analyst Michael Liebreich reminds us, we’re now about one-third through the energy transition in final energy terms. We're also close to a tipping point, where a China-led plateau in emissions should turn into a structural global decline.

Which brings us back to the most important of Hayhoe and Nicholas’s basics: we can fix it. We’re making progress – even if you can’t always see it.

Net zero isn’t a political slogan or culture war football. It’s physics and chemistry. And it’s the only way to stop global heating.

Want to get a notification when a new graphic gets published? Then subscribe to John Lang's newsletter!

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The post Tell the NY Assembly Insurance Committee: We need the IOC NY Act! appeared first on Stop the Money Pipeline.

Introduction

Last year at COP30 in Belem, Brazil, 80 countries around the world reiterated their commitment to transition away from fossil fuels. The First Conference on Transition away from Fossil Fuels being held in Santa Marta, Colombia from 24-29 April is an important and urgent first step in making that commitment from last year a reality. The call to transition away from fossil fuels has become unavoidable. For peoples and communities across the Global South, this is not just a future policy choice but a very urgent question of survival in the present. The Indigenous Peoples, afro-descendants, farmers, peasants, fisherfolk, workers, youth, women, gender diverse, and frontline communities are already living through the impacts of the climate crisis with worsening floods, droughts, hunger, displacement, debt, militarisation, and the destruction of lands, livelihoods, and ecosystems. These communities, who are least responsible for this crisis, have long insisted that there can be no climate justice without ending large scale fossil fuel extraction, production, and consumption.

While the demand to move away from fossil fuels has gained political ground, there has been a consistent and coordinated effort to redefine what that transition entails and looks like. At the very moment when governments should be agreeing to phase out fossil fuels rapidly, equitably, and with public finance and reparations, corporations and many states are pushing a different agenda. Fossil fuels are not truly being phased out, but extended through offsets, carbon capture, false finance, and large-scale “green” projects that continue to reproduce extraction and dispossession.

It is important that the first global conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels does not become another forum where governments and corporations adopt the language of transition while protecting the systems that created the crisis. It must instead draw a firm political line that there can be no real transition away from fossil fuels if false solutions continue to dominate the agenda.

What do we mean by False Solutions?

False solutions are policies, technologies, market instruments, and investment models that claim to address the climate crisis while allowing fossil fuel extraction, corporate power, and existing extractive and economic models to continue unfettered. Instead of confronting the root causes of the crisis like reducing emissions at source at the speed and scale required and redistribution of wealth, power, or responsibility, false solutions create new opportunities for profit and extraction and control over land, labour, and nature to continue.

These false solutions include carbon markets and offsets, carbon capture and storage, so-called “abated” fossil fuels, geoengineering, net-zero accounting tricks, the commodification of forests and ecosystems through market-based “nature” schemes, and fossil gas being reframed as a transition fuel. They also include large-scale, corporate-controlled renewable energy projects when these are imposed through land grabbing, enclosure, debt dependence, ecological destruction, and centralised corporate control rather than democratic public planning and community self-determination. When “green” energy expansion reproduces extractivism, land grab and displacement and reinforcement of inequality, it becomes another false solution rather than a pathway to justice.

Why False Solutions Are a Real Barrier to Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels

False solutions do not exist in fringes but are central to any discussion that is looking to define just transition away from fossil fuels. They are an active barrier to transitioning away from fossil fuels because they delay phase-out, redirect finance, deepen structural inequality, and reinforce the extractive economic models most responsible for the current crisis.

Carbon capture, offsets, and “abated fossil fuels” are increasingly used to justify new oil and gas projects, new infrastructure, and continued investment in fossil energy. They are often used as loopholes by governments and companies to avoid real emissions cuts. They provide cover for big polluters to continue polluting, and come with devastating impacts on communities and ecosystems. In past decades, climate policy discussions have actively led to legitimising carbon based approaches as a mode to reduce emissions, especially Article 6 of the Paris Agreement which has opened the door for countries to participate in various forms of carbon markets.

False solutions allow the Global North to continue consumption of fossil fuels and to continue emitting, while outsourcing the social, ecological, and territorial costs of “transition” to the Global South. Forest and land-based offsets, or nature-based solutions (NBS) rely on the idea that the continued pollution of wealthy countries and corporations can be mitigated by controlling forests, farms, coastlines, and territories elsewhere, especially in the Global South.

However, considerable research in the past few years has consistently shown the failure of markets based approaches in actual emission reduction. Corporate Accountability’s 2025 report, Built to Fail, found that in 2024 roughly 207.8 million offset credits were retired through the voluntary carbon market and that the largest 100 projects accounted for about half of that volume. Its review of major projects with publicly available ratings found that many high-volume projects had only low, moderately low, or very low likelihood of delivering the claimed climate benefit, including renewable energy, hydropower, wind, solar, cookstove, and forest carbon projects. It shows how the voluntary carbon market is saturated with projects whose emissions claims are not only weak but deeply questionable.

NBS are another group of false solutions that enable rich countries to keep on profiting at the expense of people and the planet. It provides cover for Big Polluters to continue emitting whilst appropriating vast amounts of land, often disregarding  Indigenous and Human rights. NBS poses a significant threat to our climate as well as food sovereignty, agroecology, and land rights across the world. Similarly, REDD+ and related schemes commodify land, forests and our commons, while giving the developed countries a way out of their obligations. REDD+ was pushed by the Global North rather than originating from Indigenous Peoples, custodians and protectors of forests, or Global South countries.

This is precisely why market based approaches, policies that commodify our lands, forests, oceans, and our commons are not the legitimate solutions to transitioning away from fossil fuels as positioned by the big polluters, but in fact are a structural barrier. They play a destructive role by transforming the urgent political task of keeping fossil fuels in the ground into an accounting exercise through which polluters can continue polluting as long as their burden can be shifted elsewhere.

Role of False Solutions in Deepening Debt Crisis and Injustices in the Global South

False solutions are barriers because they displace the wider transformation that is actually needed, especially because they tend to centre private finance, blended finance, carbon revenues, and speculative markets.

In recent years, Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) have also played a significant role in financing false solutions. MDBs claim alignment with the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals but their recent energy investments show a troubling pattern: Public finance continues to flow to large-scale, centralised, high-risk projects, with no consideration of social and environmental protections. These kinds of projects, including large hydropower, industrial biofuels, nuclear, carbon capture and storage (CCS), ‘blue’ and ‘green’ hydrogen for export, waste-to-energy, fossil gas, and carbon markets, are false solutions to the climate crisis.

False solutions have been known to fail at a policy level because they deepen injustices through interconnected systems of oppression. They threaten Indigenous Peoples’ rights and territorial sovereignty by treating land and nature as carbon sinks or energy zones rather than living territories. They undermine food sovereignty by converting land for offset plantations, bioenergy, mining, and large-scale renewable projects instead of supporting agroecology and local food systems. These false solutions often deepen the unpaid and invisible labour of women and carer-givers, who absorb the social and economic impacts of displacement and ecological damage. Transitions that centre these false solutions further harm workers because they are often shaped by corporate interests rather than public planning, labour rights, and social protection. They reinforce racism, casteism, patriarchy, colonialism, and class inequality by concentrating the costs of transition on those already marginalised.

Hence, any pathway to just transition away from fossil fuels needs to look beyond the issue of energy. This matters because a just transition must address not only how energy is produced, but also how societies are organised. It must transform food and agrosystems rather than sacrificing land to offsets and industrial bioenergy. It requires transformation of economic and trade systems over preserving export dependence and investor rights. It must centre care economies and public services rather than intensifying the unpaid labour that women and communities already shoulder when crises deepen and more importantly it must protect land, Indigenous sovereignty, labour rights, and gender justice as core transition principles and not as secondary safeguards.

What DCJ Demands from the Santa Marta Conference

Real, proven, community-centered, cost effective solutions to justly address the climate crisis are increasingly being swept aside in favor of industry-basked, risky, expensive, and harm-inducing false solutions. They are not a bridge to a just transition but one of the main barriers standing in its way. They promise action while entrenching inaction and speak the language of transition while blocking real peoples led solutions proven to fight the climate crisis effectively. Climate justice begins with ending financing for and promotion of false solutions. DCJ calls for a transition away from fossil fuels that is real, just, equitable, and rooted in peoples’ rights. This requires rejecting false solutions and advancing real, transformative alternatives.

We demand:

1. An immediate end to fossil fuel expansion led by the Global North countries: No new coal, oil, or gas projects, infrastructure, or public support for the same, especially in Global North countries

2. A full rejection of false solutions: No carbon markets, offsets, geoengineering, carbon capture and storage as a license to continue extraction, nature commodification, or “abated fossil fuels.” No large-scale renewable energy projects that drive land grabs, displacement, and corporate control

3. A just and equitable phase-out led by historical responsibility: Global North countries must phase out first and fastest, reduce excessive consumption, and stop shifting burdens onto the Global South

4. Public, grant-based climate finance as reparations: The transition must be funded through public finance provided by the Global North countries and historical polluters, not debt or private markets, including debt cancellation and support for public and community-led energy systems

5. Energy democracy and decentralised real solutions: Renewable energy must be publicly owned, decentralised, and community-led. This includes small-scale, locally owned and legitimate systems that prioritise energy access, livelihoods, and ecological sustainability over profit.

6. Protection of rights, land, labour, and livelihoods: Transition pathways must centre Indigenous Peoples, afro-descendants, farmers, peasants, fisherfolk, workers, youth, women and gender diverse peoples, and frontline communities, ensuring land rights, labour protections, participation, and self-determination

7. Real solutions rooted in system change: These include agroecology, food sovereignty, care-centred economies, public transport, reduced overconsumption in the Global North, and development pathways based on justice rather than extraction

Because this is the first global conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels, it carries a particular political responsibility. This conference must do more than endorse a vague transition narrative and must clearly reject the mechanisms that are blocking a real one. For an effective outcome out of Santa Marta, false solutions need to be rejected globally. The world does not need more junk credits, more accounting tricks, more greenwashed mega-projects, or more corporate-managed delay. We need an actual transition away from fossil fuels that is rooted in the principles of historical responsibility, fair shares, reparations, decolonisation, democracy, peoples-led, justice and equity.

The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ)is a membership-driven network of more than 200 climate justice and human rights organisations, grassroots movements, and communities, largely from the Global South, working to advance climate justice and system change. DCJ and its members work to challenge corporate capture and false solutions in global climate policy and advocate for peoples led real solutions rooted in principles of historical responsibility, equity, and justice. This briefing is developed for the Santa Marta conference to articulate a clear climate justice perspective on transitioning away from fossil fuels. It can be used by movements, civil society actors, and allied negotiators to strengthen coordinated messaging challenging the inclusion or reinforcing of false solutions in any outcome of the First Conference on Transition away from Fossil Fuels being held in Santa Marta, Colombia.

The post No False Solutions in the Transition Away from Fossil Fuels: A Climate Justice Position from the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice appeared first on Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice.

Indigenous people and their supporters protested in Milan to highlight the connection between Italy’s leather industry and its impact on uncontacted people in Paraguay. #

Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed. 
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.

This week Europe’s energy plan

ENERGY CUSHION: On Wednesday, the European Commission set out a package of measures to offset surging energy prices caused by the Iran war, reported Reuters. The draft “actions” include cutting electricity taxes and coordinating the filling of fossil-gas storage this summer, the newswire explained. It added that the package stopped short of “major market interventions”, such as ​capping gas prices or taxing the windfall profits of energy companies. (Carbon Brief published an interactive table of the 44 actions.)

‘BAD SCENARIO’: The newswire quoted EU energy commissioner Dan Jorgensen, who said to expect higher gas prices ​for a “couple of years”, adding: “We really do need to get rid of our dependency on gas as fast as possible. So, for us, this means speeding up more clean energy.” Legal proposals to change tax rules are expected in May, the article said, noting: “Tax changes require unanimous approval from EU countries, making them difficult to pass.”

FLIGHT RISK: The 16-page “AccelerateEU” document also includes plans to coordinate on jet fuel and diesel supplies “to fend off a looming shortage”, said Politico. Jorgensen told Sky News that European summer holidays were “very likely” at risk of “flight cancellations or very, very expensive tickets”. The Financial Times reported that German airline Lufthansa has already “cancelled 20,000 flights between May and October to save fuel”.

Around the world

• RENEWABLES RECORD: Renewable energy overtook coal last year to become the world’s largest source of electricity, according to analysis by thinktank Ember, covered by Carbon Brief.
• ‘PRIORITISE UNITY’: France chose to omit climate change from the agenda of a G7 meeting in Paris this week in order to “avoid a row with the US”, said Agence France-Presse.
• CHINA WARNING: China has pledged to “strictly control” coal use and will grade local authorities on how well they meet the country’s climate goals, according to two new policies covered in a Q&A by Carbon Brief. 
• ‘DOUBLE  DOWN’: The UK government said it will “move…to break [the] link between gas and electricity prices” in response to the spike in fossil-fuel prices, reported Carbon Brief.
• EXTREME HEAT: A report from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) warned that global food systems are being “pushed to the brink” by increasingly common and severe heatwaves on land and at sea, reported the Guardian.
• WHAT’S IN A NAME: In a national vote, Japan selected “kokushobi” – translated as “cruelly hot” – as the new term to describe days that hit 40C, reported BBC News.

£785

The amount that a new electric vehicle is cheaper, on average, than a new petrol car, according to car sales website Autotrader. The Guardian described this as a “significant milestone in Britain’s transition away from fossil fuels”.

Latest climate research

• Climate-driven extremes in temperature and pH put “underwater cultural heritage”, such as shipwrecks in the Taiwan strait, at greater risk of corrosion | Climate Services
• As many as 98% of environmental claims and commitments made by meat and dairy companies over 2021-24 could be categorised as “greenwashing” | PLOS Climate
• Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) is “unlikely to generate negative emissions within 150 years” and is “likely to increase electricity costs by ~3.5-fold” | Nature Sustainability

(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)

Captured

With a strong – or even “super” – El Niño event expected to develop later this year, Carbon Brief estimated that 2026 is on track to be the second-warmest year on record. The prediction puts global average temperature in 2026 at between 1.37C and 1.58C above pre-industrial levels, with a best estimate of 1.47C. This means that 2024 is “virtually certain” to be one of the top-four warmest years, but there is still a 19% chance that 2026 will be the warmest year on record – beating the prior record set in 2024.

Spotlight Countries mull fossil-fuel transition in Colombia

This week, Carbon Brief reports from a first-of-its-kind summit on transitioning away from fossil fuels being held in Santa Marta, Colombia.

Around 60 countries are arriving in Santa Marta, Colombia today where – against a backdrop of white-sand beaches, rolling forested hills and stifling humidity – they will consider ways to move away from fossil fuels.

The first global summit on transitioning away from fossil fuels comes after a large group of nations campaigned for – but, ultimately, failed – to get all countries to formally agree to a “roadmap” away from coal, oil and gas at the COP30 climate summit in Brazil last November.

The nations gathering in Santa Marta for the summit, co-hosted by Colombia and the Netherlands, call themselves the “coalition of the willing”.

Together, they account for one-third of global fossil-fuel demand and one-fifth of global production, according to the Colombian government.

The group includes major oil-and-gas producers such as the UK, Canada, Australia, Brazil and Norway. Some big emitters – such as the US, China and India – are not expected to attend. (There is a question mark over whether China and India were invited.)

Academics to advise

In a departure from COP summits, the six-day event, from 24-29 April, will begin with a “science pre-conference”, where academics from across the world will present and discuss the latest scientific evidence on ways to transition away from fossil fuels.

Ahead of this, countries attending the talks have already been handed a draft scientific report with “action recommendations”, such as “halting all new fossil-fuel expansion” and “reject[ing] gas as a bridging fuel”, as revealed by Carbon Brief.

The report will be further debated and refined by scientists attending the academic segment of the Santa Marta talks, before a final version is made public towards the end of April, Carbon Brief understands.

The science pre-conference will also separately see the launch of a new advisory panel on fossil-fuel transition and a scientifically led roadmap for how Colombia can transition away from fossil fuels, sources tell Carbon Brief.

Alongside the science pre-conference, dialogues will also be held with Indigenous peoples, environmental organisations and other stakeholders.

‘High-level segment’

The science pre-conference will be followed by a “high-level segment” from 28-29 April, where ministers and other policymakers will meet to consider ways to transition away from fossil fuels. (Colombia’s president Gustavo Petro Urrego is expected to speak.)

At the end of the conference, countries are due to release a report featuring a “menu of solutions” for transitioning away from fossil fuels, according to Colombia’s environment minister Irene Vélez Torres.

This report is, in turn, set to inform a global “roadmap” on transitioning away from fossil fuels being developed by the Brazilian COP30 presidency, which is due to be presented at COP31 in Turkey this November.

The Brazilian COP30 presidency offered to bring forward a “voluntary” fossil-fuel transition “roadmap” outside of the official COP process, after countries failed to formally agree to one during negotiations in Belém.

Watch, read, listen

‘SHADOW DOCKET’: The New York Times obtained the “secret memos” behind the US supreme court’s decision in 2016 to block the Obama administration’s clean-power plan.

EGREGIOUS ENGAGEMENT: DeSmog identified multiple social media accounts in Sri Lanka posting AI-generated “energy policy rage bait” to UK Facebook feeds (as first revealed by Carbon Brief’s Leo Hickman).

CHINA ‘DOMINANCE’: A “Bloomberg originals” video looked at the “race to challenge China’s EV lead”.

Coming up

• 24-29 April: First conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels, Santa Marta, Colombia
• 28-29 April: Innovation Zero world congress, London, UK
• 29 April: Stop food waste day
• 6-7 May:GLF Africa 2026: stewarding our rangelands, Nairobi, Kenya

Pick of the jobs

• Natural England, chief executive officer | Salary: circa £130,000. Location: UK
• ETH Zurich, postdoctoral position in climate science | Salary: Unknown. Location: Zurich, Switzerland
• International Energy Agency, partnership manager – clean energy ministerial | Salary: €97,180. Location: Paris, France
• Greenpeace, media diversification press officer | Salary: £48,396-£55,644. Location: London, UK (hybrid)
• Our World In Data, writer | Salary: £80,000-£120,000. Location: Oxford, UK or remote

DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.

This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.

DeBriefed 1 May 2026: Countries chart path away from fossil fuels | China’s clean-tech surge | Global forest loss slows

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DeBriefed 10 April 2026: Worst energy crisis ‘ever’ | India withdraws COP33 bid | Drag artists and climate change

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DeBriefed 2 April 2026: Countries ‘revive’ energy-crisis measures | Record UK renewables | Plug-in solar savings

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The post DeBriefed 24 April 2026: Europe’s energy-crisis plan | Renewables overtake coal | Colombia’s fossil-fuel summit appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Chinese government leaders published a policy document on 22 April – Earth Day – calling for stricter controls on fossil-fuel consumption and greater oversight of heavy emitters.

It has been interpreted by experts as a signal of China’s ongoing commitment to climate action and a bridging policy between the 15th five-year plan, published in March, and future thematic and sectoral five-year plans expected to be published in the months and years ahead. 

While the policy document – known as “guiding opinions” – is not strictly binding, it bears the stamp of the two highest bodies in China’s political system, conveying a strong sense of authority.

One expert tells Carbon Brief that this is the first high-level document to explicitly link decarbonisation efforts with energy security and industrial development.

It was also followed on 23 April by a second document, which is binding, that strengthens environmental inspections of provincial governments and creates new metrics for future evaluations, such as total emissions and coal consumption. 

Below, Carbon Brief examines how the policies could impact China’s approach to peaking its carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

• Why are ‘guiding opinions’ important?
• What does the new ‘opinions’ document say about fossil fuels?
• How have climate evaluation rules been strengthened?
• What does the ‘opinions’ document say about energy security?

Why are ‘guiding opinions’ important?

Documents play an important role in disseminating political messages through China’s vast government bureaucracy. There is a well-defined hierarchy for different types of policies, each of which infer a different level of importance and flexibility.

“Opinions” are officially defined by the Chinese government as the “presentation of views and proposed solutions regarding important issues”.

They outline broad principles and general policy directions for lower levels of government to incorporate into more concrete policies. 

Policy recommendations included in an opinion are implied to be non-binding, allowing officials more discretion in how they are implemented on the ground.

Prof Yuan Jiahai from the North China Electric Power University in Beijing previously told Carbon Brief that naming a document “guiding opinions” means it will have a “long-term, directional and systematic impact”.

An example is a set of opinions on a “green and low-carbon circular development economic system” issued in February 2021, which laid out broad policy recommendations across several economic sectors to spur “green planning, green design, green investment, green construction, green production, green circulation, green life and green consumption”.

“Following these opinions, China’s green growth accelerated significantly,” Prof Christoph Nedopil, professor at the University of Queensland, tells Carbon Brief. He adds: 

“This is not to say that some of the developments would not have happened without such a guidance, but the guidance provided the clear direction and authority to various government departments and businesses to strengthen the support for the green and low-carbon transition.”

The new “opinions” document, on energy saving and carbon reduction, carries additional weight because of the bodies that issued it. Specifically, it was issued jointly by the general offices of the central committee of the Communist party of China (CCCPC), the highest party organ and headed by President Xi Jinping, and the state council, the highest government body and headed by Premier Li Qiang. This indicates that it has the approval of all of China’s most senior policymakers.

The document “signals China’s increasing confidence in its clean-energy sector”, says Yang Biqing, energy analyst for Asia at thinktank Ember.

The timing also makes the document important, says Hu Min, director and co-founder for the Beijing-based thinktank Institute for Global Decarbonization Progress.

She notes that the document, published soon after the close of the “two sessions” in March, is a “way to move things forward” in energy and climate policy. Hu adds that it sends a signal of the direction likely to be taken in upcoming thematic and sectoral five-year plans on topics such as peaking carbon emissions, renewable energy and coal.

“I’m quite excited about it,” she tells Carbon Brief.

What does the new ‘opinions’ document say about fossil fuels?

The opinions document includes a plethora of recommendations across several sectors, from promoting energy-saving measures in data centres and clean heating solutions to developing “integrated steel-to-chemicals” projects and “zero-carbon transport corridors”.

But some of the most interesting language was reserved for the use of coal.

China’s carbon reduction “situation…remains relatively severe”, says a government statement summarised by carbon-market information platform Tanpaifang, with the energy system still “reliant” on coal. 

The “opinions” document is, therefore, of “great significance for building broader and stronger consensus across society”, it adds.

In 2025, developers in China submitted new or reactivated proposals to build a total of 161 gigawatts of new coal-fired power plants, as shown in the figure below.

Amount of new coal-power capacity being proposed in China each year, GW, 2015-2025. Source: The Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air and Global Energy Monitor.

The new document acknowledges the need to “strictly control fossil-fuel consumption”, in language significantly stronger than the 15th five-year plan published after the two-sessions meeting in March.

The five-year plan only pledged to “promote the peaking” of coal and oil use.

The document also outlines several other measures for managing fossil-fuel CO2 emissions, including “deepening efforts to reduce coal and oil use”, “actively promoting the clean replacement” of coal-fired equipment and “advancing” the replacement of “dispersed coal” use in an “orderly” manner.

However, it stops short of a complete rejection of coal-fired power, saying, for example, that policymakers should “reasonably control the scale of coal-fired power generation capacity and output”.

Nevertheless, Hu tells Carbon Brief, the document represents efforts by China’s leaders to “articulate” what controlling fossil fuels might look like.

Yang agrees, saying that the shift in the language on coal was “encouraging”. 

She notes the granularity of the recommendations around coal, such as a line urging policymakers to “determine the dispatch sequence and load regulation for coal-fired power”.

“It is very interesting that, at this high level [of government], they have so clearly outlined this obstacle in coal’s [changing] role…from baseload to flexibility,” she says.  

Experts interviewed by Carbon Brief said the language on renewable energy, which signalled ongoing support for China’s clean-energy buildout, was positive but unsurprising. 

The document urges officials to “vigorously develop non-fossil energy sources and new-energy storage technologies”, highlighting the need for technologies such as pumped-storage hydropower and microgrids to boost consumption.

For Hu, market conditions, investment and local policies are now more important than central government signals for China’s clean-energy buildout.

The main debate is fossil fuels, she says, and any signals that encourage limiting coal use will “make a difference”.

How have climate evaluation rules been strengthened?

The guiding opinions document also dedicates significant space to outlining measures for reviewing and evaluating carbon-reduction efforts. 

It states that local officials should undertake “comprehensive” evaluations of the energy consumption, coal consumption and carbon emissions of new projects, with plans to reduce or offset emissions becoming a “key component” of evaluating the project.

Similarly, the plan pledges to strengthen the review by the central government of local governments’ annual reports on energy use and carbon emissions, with warnings issued to local governments for “lagging progress” or “unreasonable increases in indicators”.

The central government will also strengthen supervision through “regular special inspections”, the “opinions” document says.

For regions that are “severely” falling behind on targets or are found to have “insufficient” ability to run their own inspections, the opinions threaten to “adjust or suspend their authority” for conducting evaluations and “delay or restrict” approvals for new projects.

The document also makes “local party committees and governments” responsible for their jurisdictions’ carbon reduction work. Party members and state-owned enterprises must “lead by example”, it adds.

The day after the opinions were released, the CCCPC and state council also issued a series of measures for “comprehensive evaluation” of local efforts to peak and reduce carbon emissions. 

Unlike the guiding opinions, this document is considered binding policy – in this case overseen primarily by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China’s powerful economic planning agency.

Under the new rules, central government officials – led by the NDRC with significant input from the Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE), National Energy Administration (NEA) and other departments – will grade local governments on their carbon-reduction efforts. 

The measures largely align provinces’ emissions reduction evaluations with China’s existing climate pledges for 2030. 

Key targets include reducing carbon intensity by more than 65% by 2030, compared to 2005 levels, “reasonably” controlling coal-fired power generation, achieving a “25% share of non-fossil energy consumption by 2030” and “gradually” covering all new power demand with clean energy. 

The government also sets out 14 indicators, shown in the table below. At the top of the list are five key “control indicators”: total carbon emissions; reductions in carbon intensity; total coal consumption; total oil consumption; and the share of non-fossil energy consumption. 

Table listing the 14 indicators to be assessed under the new evaluation regime. The five “control” indicators are total carbon emissions; reductions in carbon intensity; total coal consumption; total oil consumption; and the share of non-fossil energy consumption. The nine “supporting” indicators are the decrease in energy consumption per unit of regional GDP; the proportion of new clean energy additions in overall annual additions of energy capacity; reductions in energy consumption and carbon emissions per unit of added value in industrial enterprises above designated size; carbon offsetting and implementation status of energy conservation and carbon reduction evaluation outcomes in “dual high” industrial programmes; the green and low-carbon transformation of urban and rural buildings; the green and low-carbon transformation of transport; reductions in the carbon intensity of public institutions; aims by sectors covered in China’s national carbon market to control carbon emissions; and increases in forest stock. Source: Xinhua.

The NDRC is responsible for evaluating all five of the key indicators, with the MEE also overseeing the first three.

Provinces that fail to meet any of the control indicators will receive an “unsatisfactory” rating, leading to “corrective measures”, according to solar news outlet Zhihui Photovoltaic.

In a comment article in finance news outlet Caixin, Chen Lihao says that the two documents together “form the institutional foundation” for China’s “full-scale transition” to a dual control of carbon system.

Chen is the deputy director of the special committee on resources and environment at the Jiusan Society, the political party that environment minister Huang Runqiu belongs to. 

The measures build on China’s existing inspection system to create a “much stronger accountability and compliance system”, says Qin Qi, China analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air. 

The “real step forward”, she adds, is how climate and carbon targets – including China’s international commitments – have now been explicitly placed inside a “party-backed assessment framework” that uses pass-or-fail judgements on each indicator, rather than letting weak performance disappear inside a broad score.

Li Shuo, China climate hub director at the Asia Society Policy Institute echoes this, telling Carbon Brief that the new policy represents a “helpful step toward implementation, bringing greater clarity on tasks and responsibilities”.

Inspections are regarded as a powerful tool for the MEE in enforcing climate policy, allowing it to publicly identify non-compliant bodies, with state media often announcing results. 

In 2021, inspection teams even publicly criticised the NEA, scolding it for “falling behind” on developing low-carbon energy in a move described at the time as “unprecedented”.

The emphasis that the opinions document places on evaluations and the stronger requirements that it represents “shows…the whole system that this is very important…it’s not just talk”, says Hu. (Hu spoke with Carbon Brief before the evaluation framework was released.) 

However, both Li and Qin note that much depends on how the evaluations are enforced.

The strength of the system will “inevitably involve further political bargaining within the Chinese system”, says Li, shaped both by differences in the priorities of different ministries and geopolitical developments – particularly the outcomes of the conflict in the Middle East.

Qin highlights the greater capacity that the measures give the MEE to enforce inspections.

“The ministry has a more formal standing to push back on coal expansion and to speak on climate policy in a more direct way,” she says, but adds that the NDRC will still be the “central driver” of evaluating emissions.

She also notes that, while earlier central government inspections incorporated explicit instructions about making evaluation results public, the new measures place more emphasis on “internal” mechanisms, rather than public disclosure.

What does the ‘opinions’ document say about energy security?

The opinions document also settles a debate on energy security that has been playing out in the Chinese media since the start of the conflict in the Middle East. 

It opens with a statement that “energy conservation and carbon reduction are key” both for China’s “dual-carbon” goals and energy transition and for “safeguarding national energy security”.

“The first sentence connects directly decarbonisation with energy security and industrial development, which is, if I’m not mistaken, the first time…that this has been linked and recognised [in such a high-level policy],” Yang tells Carbon Brief.

Although not always explicitly referencing the conflict, several outlets have run stories highlighting the importance of various energy technologies to China’s energy security. 

Some outlets, including state broadcaster CCTV and the Communist Youth League’s official newspaper, China Youth Daily, focused on the positive role low-carbon energy plays in China’s energy system. Others have underscored the importance of fossil fuels, including state news agency Xinhua, which has run a series on becoming an “energy powerhouse” interviewing representatives of the fossil fuel industry.

On 20 April, NDRC head Zheng Shanjie wrote in the Communist party-affiliated People’s Daily that China should further strengthen energy security, including by increasing oil and gas reserves and production, reinforcing the role of coal-fired power as a “base-load guarantee” and expanding Sino-Russian oil and gas cooperation. He flagged “disruptions” in the Strait of Hormuz as a cause for concern.

Zheng’s article came out on the same day that Chinese premier Li Qiang held a “study session” meeting with other high-level officials discussing the need to implement a “new strategy for energy security”, deepening energy system reforms to support the country’s low-carbon transition. 

The guiding opinions specifically instruct the NDRC, the country’s powerful economic planning agency, to “conscientiously fulfill its duties” in achieving China’s carbon goals, including across planning, implementation and evaluation. 

It adds that “all relevant [government] departments shall perform their respective duties, cooperate closely and form a concerted effort”.

However, experts had differing opinions on whether this signalled heightened scrutiny of the NDRC, or if it emphasised its importance to emission reduction efforts.

“The mention…seems to highlight an elevated scrutiny of its work on energy transition”, says Nedopil, but “does not seem to signal an increase of its responsibilities in the energy transition, considering the mention of [the responsibilities of other departments]”.

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The post Q&A: China’s leadership calls for ‘strict control’ of fossil fuels appeared first on Carbon Brief.

The 13th annual Yale Environment 360 Film Contest is now accepting entries.

Read more on E360 →

Editor’s note: This edition of our “Protect This Place” column is produced in collaboration with the Climate Listening Project, whose short film about this place appears below.

The Place:

We’re traveling the waters of the world, where communities are coming together as gas export development threatens places along the U.S. Gulf Coast — like Lake Charles, Louisiana — and gas import development threatens places in Asia like small islands along the Verde Island Passage in the Philippines.

Why it matters:

The Verde Island Passage is known as the Center of the Center of Marine Shore Fish Biodiversity in the world. It’s the heart of the Coral Triangle and home to a unique concentration of more than 1,700 shore fish species, more than anywhere else on Earth.

Photo by Zachary Kanzler

In Louisiana each year, Mardi Gras brings people together throughout the state for community celebrations unlike any others in the United States. The seafood from Gulf waters is a big part of the culture — from crabs to shrimp and dishes like gumbo — and many of the people along the Gulf Coast of Louisiana are fisherfolk, just like those along the coast of Philippines.

I have been invited to both places, to listen to and film the stories of fisherfolk who are affected by pollution. A recent oil spill in the Verde Island Passage had ripples of impacts on water, wildlife, and communities in this beautiful place, and I touched the oily residue left behind.

When I was last in Lake Charles, Louisiana, I could see and smell the smoke from the fossil fuel refineries and read signs warning that pollution was inside the crabs.

The threat:

Gas from Lake Charles travels by ship, sometimes from the Gulf into the Caribbean Sea through the Panama Canal from the Atlantic Ocean into the Pacific Ocean, then on to the Coral Triangle, where the Verde Island Passage connects the South China Sea to the Sibuyan Sea.

My place in this place:

Five years ago I attended a community listening meeting hosted by Roishetta Ozane in Lake Charles. Ozane, founder of the Vessel Project of Louisiana, is working with communities in southwest Louisiana on environmental education and justice and bringing people together around the world — from Louisiana to Texas to Japan, the Philippines, Canada, and other connected places. I listened with Roishetta for my film effort “Gulf Coast Love Story,” traveling from the borderlands of Texas to New Orleans, listening to people talking about the impacts of liquified natural gas while envisioning a healthy future with clean energy, clean air, clean water, and healthy communities.

Roishetta Ozane / Photo by Dayna Reggero

Since attending Roishetta’s first community meeting, I’ve listened on her journey to Washington, D.C. to join Jane Fonda for Fire Drill Friday, and Jane has joined us over the past couple years, filming Roishetta and frontline heroes for the new film “Gaslit.” I’ve listened as Roishetta has helped and provided aid, and I’ve listened as she’s shared voices from the frontlines calling on the big banks financing fossil fuels with her Gulf South Fossil Finance Hub. I am grateful to listen all the way to the Philippines to meet smiling faces and beautiful communities working together as part of the Protect VIP campaign. We honored the moment when President Biden paused all LNG exports.

Who’s protecting it now:

The Vessel Project of Louisiana, a grassroots mutual aid, disaster relief, and environmental justice organization in Southwest Louisiana. Connect with Vessel Project of Louisiana: VesselProjectofLouisiana.org.

The Center for Energy, Ecology, and Development is a think-do institution aimed at providing relevant data and information on issues pertaining to energy, integrity of ecosystems, and general development pursued by the Philippines. CEED envisions a people-oriented, accessible and sustainable energy that respects the integrity and preservation of the environment and ecology while promoting social progress with social justice. Connect with CEED: ceedphilippines.com.

What this place needs:

Roishetta Ozane, founder of the Vessel Project of Louisiana, believes that “The best way to help people is by asking them what will help.”

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Researchers have developed a novel fresh produce wash that removes up to 93% of pesticides from the surface and doubles as a preservative, keeping fruit fresher for days longer than normal. What’s more, the wash is mostly made up of biodegradable starch.

Pesticides are often loaded onto fruit and veg and even with regulation, it can be hard to keep amounts in check. Data from Canadian food safety agencies found that the non-compliance rate for pesticide residues on food increased from 0.4% to over 2% in the four years between 2016 and 2020, the study reports. 

The researchers’ inventive solution requires just three ingredients: starch, coated in tannic acid, a natural plant compound, and iron, forged together into nanoparticles, and suspended in a solution. 

To test it out, they first applied three types of commonly-used pesticides to apples at real-world levels: thiabendazole, acetamiprid, and imidacloprid. Next, they analyzed how their nanoparticle-infused wash compared with water, the only available method most people have to clean their produce. 

The differences were stark. While rinsing with water was able to remove about 50% of the pesticides attached to the apples’ surface, the nanowash eradicated almost double that, varying slightly depending on the pesticide type: the wash cleared 93.5% of the acetamiprid, 89.03% of the imidacloprid, and 86% of the thiabendazole. 

 

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The success comes down to a precise reaction that takes place between iron and tannic acid, which together create an absorptive effect that helps to sponge chemicals off the fruit’s surface. 

The researchers went a step further, to explore whether their invention could help tackle another huge food system challenge: waste. They suspected that their wash could be used as a treatment to provide a preservative effect—and they were proved right. When they dipped two types of fruit, cut apples and fresh grapes, into a nanoparticle solution, they found that the cut apples took longer to turn brown than the untreated fruit. The grapes, meanwhile, maintained their shape for 15 days, compared to the untreated fruit which had grown noticeably wrinkled and shrunken by that point. 

In both the treated apples and grapes the rate of weight loss was also halved compared to the untreated fruits, suggesting that they had been able to retain more moisture. Tests on the wash showed it had antioxidant and antimicrobial properties, which seem to provide a protective coating on the fruit and to slow its degradation. 

The wash poses no health risks to consumers, and in fact the added sprinkling of iron may have a nutritional benefit, the scientists say. It will take a while for this innovation to reach consumers in their homes, but in the meantime the researchers have set their sights on industry, where they say their invention could be quickly scaled and used to clean produce before it reaches people’s homes. 

“Our early cost estimates suggest it would add roughly three cents per apple—comparable to current commercial coatings, but with the added benefit of pesticide removal and extending shelf life,” the researchers say.

Yang et. al. “Dual-Function Metal−Phenolic Network-Capped Starch Nanoparticles for Postharvest Pesticide Removal and Produce Preservation.” ACS Nano. 2026.

Image: Pexels

2.5% of landowners concentrate 85% of agricultural land, while more than 300,000 peasant families live without land or with insecure tenure.

The post 17 April | Paraguay: On International Peasant Struggles Day, Social Movements Spotlight Land Inequality appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.

Carbon Dioxide Removal is not just about designing new technologies, but also a subject of politics, especially upon implementation when citizens are asked to accept these new technologies. CDR features in both the past and present of climate...