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Humans are naturally drawn to neat, compelling narratives that simplify complex issues into clear-cut battles of good versus evil. It’s a storytelling instinct that helps us make sense of the world, but it also leads us to oversimplify the real problems we face. When it comes to the state of our food systems, the dominant story points the finger at big business and flawed government policies, positioning them as the evil villains who exploit consumers and degrade the planet. The story we have been fed—if you’re reading this, I assume you’re in the camp that has heard this—is that government subsidies are the reason farmers grow what they grow. These subsidies are a result of collusion between big business and the government; they reduce the price of unhealthy food and are the driving force of why we eat what we eat. The story continues to say that even though the people are demanding healthy, regeneratively produced food, the government is unwilling to act and companies are unwilling to produce it. There are some elements of truth to this narrative, and the idea that big business has an ability to influence policy is certainly true. But government ignoring the will of the people to produce better food in better ways is not the reason our politics and our businesses are failing us. While this tale is easy to digest, it overlooks a more uncomfortable truth: Voters and consumers, the very people these systems serve, are complicit in the problem. At the root of this is our culture.

The reality is that most people don’t prioritize climate change or regenerative agriculture when making decisions about food and politicians. Most don’t even consider it. Convenience, price, and taste reign supreme in consumer choices, and as a result the market responds to those demands rather than focusing on sustainability. Right now, in the mass market, no one cares about regenerative agriculture (or has any idea what it is), and people are simply not willing to pay more for sustainably produced food. There are a number of reasons for that which we will discuss later, but this is a massive barrier to change. Similarly, politicians tend to craft policies that align with voter priorities. Right now, voters are not voting on climate policy, let alone food policy. In essence, while corporations and government are failing us, they are simply not going to change unless we change. Both our businesses and our politicians are reflections of our cultural values. We have not yet overcome the most fundamental obstacle to progress: widespread apathy or disinterest among the people who have the power to drive meaningful change. Our businesses will keep degrading the planet if consumers don’t purchase differently. Our politics will continue to fail if voters do not vote on these issues.

This is starkly reflected in the data around voter priorities in the 2024 election. According to a Pew Research Center survey, only 38 percent of registered voters consider climate change a “very important” issue in deciding their vote, placing it well behind concerns like the economy (81 percent) and health care (65 percent). Even among younger, more environmentally conscious voters, climate change often ranks behind issues like student debt and health-care access. In fact, a Gallup poll found that while 66 percent of Americans recognize climate change as a major issue, only 11 percent view it as their top concern for the election. And that is climate change as a whole; for the vast majority of voters, food policy is simply not a top issue.

These numbers reveal a sobering truth: While climate change is widely acknowledged, it is not treated with the urgency it deserves in the political arena. Voter priorities shape policy, and if the electorate doesn’t demand action on climate and sustainable food systems, politicians have little incentive and mandate to act, even if they actually care about the issue. But mostly, the reality is worse: The people we send to office tend to reflect our values, and the majority of us are simply not invested in these critical issues. Of course, democracy is not simply about voting and winning massive majorities at the ballot box: It’s also about calling your elected officials, going to town halls, and showing them that this issue does matter. The real challenge, then, is not just holding businesses and governments accountable; it’s that to do so, we need to be changing the mindset of the mass of voters and consumers who underpin these systems.

There is no getting around it. I cannot emphasize that enough. The hard truth is that we have to shift the core values of Americans’ food culture before we can bring about the changes in the food system we so desperately need. We may land some wins here and there, but the cultural barriers we currently face are a massive roadblock to true systemic change. Doing so is the hardest and most important thing to accomplish if we want to see food produced in a manner that harms neither the environment nor the humans who eat, and we need to do so in rapidly changing climatic conditions.

True, thanks to advocates’ efforts, “organic,” “local,” “seasonal,” and “artisanal” became buzzwords, and food culture has changed, but only for a minority of the population—primarily conscientious eaters who live in a bubble of distorted culinary reality. I am one of them, as are nearly all of the people in my social circle. I frequent “locavore” restaurants. My garden is the source of most of the produce my family eats in the warm seasons, with much of the remainder coming from nearby farms. But in reality, even after a couple of decades of exposure to the so-called food movement’s mantra, the vast majority of Americans give little thought to the food they eat aside from its cost, convenience, and taste. I don’t mean that as a criticism; it’s just seeing reality and understanding how much culture-change work lies ahead of us. Sales of organic food have doubled since the early ’00s. Which is great. But organic still represents a mere 6 percent of total grocery sales. Farmers markets, those cornucopias of local fare, have more than quadrupled in number since the turn of this century, but today local food represents a minuscule 1.5 percent of agricultural production’s value. So far, good-food advocates’ efforts, however praiseworthy, are not nearly enough to get the food system to where it needs to go in time to stave off catastrophe.

Although well meaning, the embryonic food movement preached to a choir of like-minded souls, but we neglected to consider how government and business leaders actually make decisions that have the potential to create massive changes in food production. As I learned in Washington, these leaders can safely ignore the entreaties of a well-meaning few, but they take careful measure of the majority of their constituents—voters for politicians, customers for business executives. The key question leaders ask before taking any action is, What changes do our constituents want? What do they need? Neither politicians nor business executives will take on much risk unless they are pushed by constituents and stakeholders, and believe the risk will pay off. Only after they are confident the conditions will result in positive outcomes do legislators and managers of successful businesses begin to take action in earnest. Pressure to act is important, but in the end a smaller part of the equation. Winning on the other side of risk taking will drive far more change. Meaning, if a politician successfully moves us in the right direction, do they see fundraising numbers go up and improved chances of winning the next election? If the answer is yes, we will see more and more action on the issues we care about. If a business leader launches a new regeneratively sourced product, do they see sales spike and continue to grow? If the answer is yes, we will see more and more products launching with sustainable ingredients. Our cultural values underpin our politics and business.

Unfortunately, shifting people’s attitudes toward food is an amorphous task. Progress, if we are fortunate enough to get it, is painstakingly slow and can be boring—the opposite of a silver bullet. It often comes, if it comes at all, in imperceptible increments. Changing culture is also messy and complicated. This is true in any area, but doubly so with food culture. In tinkering with it, you are messing with people’s very identity. Food is one of the deepest expressions of our identity. It is how we express who we are and who we are not. It is how we show love to ourselves, our families, and our communities. What we eat ties us to our ancestors and our childhoods. When we are told what we are eating is bad, the implication is that we are bad. No one wants to hear that from anyone else, let alone the government. And the tricky part is that everyone happens to be an expert on food. After all, most of us eat at least three times a day.

No wonder food activists generally haven’t focused effort on the challenge of culture and instead move directly to try to change government policies and politicians’ priorities. But that shortcut dramatically limits what we can accomplish through policy. It’s no wonder why politicians are generally very cautious when approaching any major food-related policy issue. Politicians will never move forward unless they feel the pressure of culture pushing them in that direction. This failure to lay the necessary cultural groundwork is the main reason why we’ve seen so little in the way of concrete change we hope for.

Excerpted from THE LAST SUPPER: How to Overcome the Coming Food Crisis by Sam Kass. Copyright © 2025 by Sam Kass. Published by Crown, an imprint of The Crown Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC.

Photo courtesy of Nina Luong, Unsplash

The post Book Excerpt: Changing Culture appeared first on Food Tank.

Endangered bearded vultures disappeared from the cliffs of southern Spain decades ago. But a peculiar legacy remains, one that offers a glimpse back in time more than 600 years.

The massive nests these vultures built are also a sort of guano-stained archive, full of human bric-a-brac dating as early as the 13th century. Scientists studying the vultures uncovered a trove of more than 200 human-made odds and ends when they picked through 12 abandoned nests.

The robust, long-occupied nests built in a dry climate in caverns sheltered from the elements “have acted as natural museums,” a team of Spanish scientists reported last month in Ecology. “This opens up future research initiatives to analyze the accumulated anthropogenic contents of ancient Bearded Vulture eyries.”

Add that to the list of benefits from this class of underappreciated scavengers. Recent research, for example, has found that vultures in India help control diseases that kill hundreds of thousands of people.

Bearded vultures are just one of the animals whose dwelling spaces double as messy historical records, thanks to their quest for building material and the human penchant for littering the world with our detritus. Packrat nests have shed light on more than a thousand years of human history in the desert Southwest of the United States and preserved insect DNA dating back  more than 30,000 years. The U.S. Geologic Survey even maintains a database with detailed accounts of all the ancient treasures extracted from packrat middens.

In Spain, the scientists picked through the nests between 2008 and 2014, cataloguing 2,483 remains mixed in with sticks and other natural debris. That included 2117 bits of bone, 43 pieces of eggshell, 86 hooves, 72 chunks of leather and 126 scraps of clothing.

Some were likely part of the meals for these vultures, whose diet is made up largely of bones from carrion. But that doesn’t explain other items.

 

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For example, what was a vulture doing with the tip of a wooden lance and a metal crossbow bolt? Or a woven shoe made from grass and twigs that was some 670 years old, according to radio carbon dating?

Then there were the slightly more enigmatic but nevertheless human-made items: A 650-year-old bit of sheep leather with red lines painted on it; a 150-year-old bit of a woven basket; and part of a slingshot made from braided grass.

While the researchers don’t offer any conclusions about what these items mean, such finds can offer insights into both the condition of surrounding ecosystems and the ways in which human societies evolved along with them, the scientists write.

The natural detritus could also provide valuable clues about the past. For instance, eggshells could be analyzed to look for evidence of historic exposure of the vultures there to toxic chemicals.

These vultures, meanwhile, are in danger of becoming historic curiosities themselves in Europe. For centuries the massive birds were shot and poisoned as pests.  There are fewer than 500 breeding pairs left on the continent, nearly half of them in the Pyrenees.

There are signs of a comeback, thanks to recent conservation efforts. And there are other populations in parts of Africa, the Middle East and central Asia. But overall, the world has  between 1,675 and 6,700 bearded vultures, and their populations are dwindling, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

If these birds endure, who knows what modern-day refuse future scientists will be extracting from their nests. Bits of wire? Broken cell phones? A scrap of polyester clothing?

Margalida, et. al. “The Bearded Vulture as an accumulator of historical remains: Insights for future ecological and biocultural studies.” Ecology. Sept. 11, 2025.

Image:Animalia and Sergio Couto/Ecology 2025

Headline News:

• “New Solar Glass Cranks Up Lettuce Crop Yields By Almost 40%” • Despite the abrupt U-turn in federal energy policy, the march of American innovation carries on. In the latest example, the US startup UbiQD has developed a new form of solar glass that can help boost productivity in greenhouses. The new glass could have important implications. [CleanTechnica]

UbiQD demonstration in side-by-side images (Courtesy of CEE Lab, UC Davis via prnewswire.com)

• “Solar Energy Named The World’s Cheapest Power Source” • A study from the University of Surrey named solar energy the cheapest source of power. In the sunniest countries, solar costs as little as €0.023/kWh. The UK sits at 50°N latitude and is famous for its dreary weather, but solar is the cheapest option for grid electricity even there. [Euronews]
• “Global Energy Transition Stays On Track” • The global shift towards cleaner energy remains resilient despite a slowdown in the US, according to DNV’s latest Energy Transition Outlook. The annual report found that policy reversals and renewed support for fossil fuels in the US will delay that nation’s emission reductions by around five years. [reNews]
• “White House Doubles Down On Alaska Mining, Buys 10% Of Trilogy Metals” • The White House unveiled its investment in the Canadian mining company as it gave the green light to the Ambler Road project in Alaska, advocating for greater supply-chain security. The plan is to buy roughly 10% of Trilogy Metals for $35.6 million with warrants for more. [Euronews]
• “China’s Cleantech Exports Overtake US Fossil Fuel Energy Dominance” • Bloomberg put the numbers together with DOE and EIA data to show how China’s cleantech exports are greater than US fossil fuels. CleanTechnica published a piece on it a few hours ago: “Renewables Drive A Stake Through The Cold, Dark Heart Of King Coal.” [CleanTechnica]

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

Sunday, September 21, was a national day of action to celebrate clean energy and share strategies for transitioning away from fossil fuels. Speakers included Senator Jeff Merkley and Senator Khanh Pham. While many of the images from the day are joyful, speakers and attendees addressed the serious realities of climate change, ICE activity, the ongoing genocide in Gaza, and government cuts to healthcare and food assistance. As the connections between these issues become clearer, we hope more people will be moved to take collective action for justice, for the planet, and for each other.

 

 

Photos: Irene Tejaratchi Hess

The post Sun Day Portland appeared first on 350PDX: Climate Justice.

Policy Now | October 2025 – Fall into Producer Responsibility

Fall is here and Policy Now is bringing you the latest updates on extended producer responsibility and other legislation impacting the industry. I’m Stefanie Valentic and I would like to introduce myself as a new reporter here at Resource Recycling. …

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The post Policy Now | October 2025 – Fall into Producer Responsibility appeared first on Resource Recycling News.

Global Confluence on Radical Democracy, Autonomy and Self-Determination (RaDASD) - 2025 Introduction in this link This encounter occurred from February 1-6, 2025, on the Wild Coast of South Africa. This gathering, organised by the Global of , WoMin African Alliance, Academy of Democratic Modernity, Jineoloji, and hosted by the alternatives

Today marks two years of Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza, where 90 percent of the 2.3 million population has been displaced, and many Palestinians have been displaced multiple times.

Gaza has been reduced to rubble by the Israeli state. The official count is 67,000 Palestinians killed by Israel in the last two years, with independent studies suggesting that the actual number of deaths is significantly higher from disease and starvation.

Israel has targeted and crippled the healthcare sector in Gaza, with less than a third of the hospitals left partially functioning. The water and sanitation systems are on the brink of total collapse. The education infrastructure has been decimated, with almost all of the schools and universities damaged or destroyed. Estimates are that 70 percent of all structures and almost 90 percent of housing units have been damaged or destroyed. Gaza’s cultural and religious institutions, museums and libraries, mosques and churches, have been bombed and looted of historical documents and ancient artifacts that date back to the fourteenth century.

For those who are able and willing to bypass the legacy media’s dishonest coverage and disingenuous debates, they have been able to see, hear, and read for themselves a clearer picture of what has been a live-streamed genocide over the past two years that was built on a foundation of 75 years of Israel’s continuous crimes against the humanity of the Palestinian people.

Israel has banned international journalists since October 7, 2023, from independent access in Gaza. Western journalists are only allowed to cover what is directly happening in Gaza if they agree to be embedded with the Israeli military and their coverage has to be approved by the military censors.

The old ways of relying on the legacy media in Western countries to ignore historical context and parrot Israeli talking points have also been undermined by the growing presence of alternative media. The implicit bias and Islamophobia that are rooted in much of the political establishment’s narrative are present strategically in Israel’s decision to restrict media access to Palestinian journalists that they could conceal their genocidal actions by attacking the messengers as not trustworthy, not objective, and make false accusations of terrorist ties has been less effective with a younger generation that has been raised at a distance from the re-established myths of Zionism born out of Western guilt over the holocaust, whose political consciousness was formed from the lies presented during the “War on Terror”, multiple capitalist economic collapses, a mishandled pandemic, and social uprisings from the Arab Spring to the Black Lives Matter movement.

Israel has adjusted to this new reality by targeting and killing more journalists and media workers over the last two years than any other country since we started keeping records on this matter. As of October 2025, Israel has killed more than 300 journalists in Palestine, Lebanon, Iran, Syria, and Yemen during the genocide. They have done so with the complicity and silence of much of the political and media establishment in the United States and throughout the Western world. They have instead worked alongside these institutions to assist in the censorship of pro-Palestinian speech, and the crackdown on pro-Palestinian student protests. The attempts to initially ban TikTok and, since, force its sale to a pro-Trump and Zionist ownership group for the U.S. audience version of the app have been done in the service of restricting pro-Palestinian content on the platform.

It has been left to the tireless and relentless pursuit of the truth by mostly Palestinian journalists in Gaza and the West Bank at great risk to their own lives that they continue to share and tell these stories. We mourn the more than 300 journalists who have been murdered alongside their partners, family members, friends, and neighbors as part of the Israeli genocidal campaign, with gratitude for their life’s work by sharing their names with our audience here. And we honor their mission by supporting and sharing the superior journalism that will continue to be done every day in Gaza and in the West Bank by the bravest of journalists who refuse to be silenced in the face of Zionist terror, and who will not stop advocating for the Palestinian story to stay alive until we all get to witness the liberation of Palestine.

—William Gifis on behalf of the Tempest Editorial Board

In Palestine

Mohammad Al-Salhi – October 7, 2023

Mohammad Jarghoun – October 7, 2023

Ibrahim Mohammad Lafi – October 7, 2023

Assaad Shamlakh – October 8, 2023

Hisham Alnwajha – October 10, 2023

Mohammed Sobh – October 10, 2023

Saeed Al-Taweel – October 10, 2023

Mohamed Fayez Abu Matar – October 11, 2023

Ahmed Shehab – October 12, 2023

Husam Mubarak – October 13, 2023

Salam Mema – October 13, 2023

Yousef Maher Dawas – October 14, 2023

Abdlhadi Habib – October 16, 2023

Issam Bhar – October 17, 2023

Mohammad Balousha – October 17, 2023

Sameeh Al-Nady – October 18, 2023

Khalil Abu Athra – October 19, 2023

Mohammed Abu Ali – October 20, 2023

Hani Madhoun – October 21, 2023

Roshdi Sarraj – October 22, 2023

Mohammed Imad Labad – October 23, 2023

Salma Mukhaimer – October 25, 2023

Ahmed Abu Mhadi – October 25, 2023

Saed al-Halabi – October 25, 2023

Jamal Al-Faqaawi – October 25, 2023

Zaher Al-Afghani – October 25, 2023

Duaa Sharaf – October 26, 2023

Yasser Abu Namous – October 27, 2023

Nazmi Al-Nadim – October 30, 2023

Majed Kashko – October 31, 2023

Imad Al-Wahidi – October 31, 2023

Iyad Matar – November 1, 2023

Majd Arandas – November 1, 2023

Muhammad Abu Hatab – November 2, 2023

Mohamad Al-Bayyari – November 2, 2023

Haitham Harara – November 3, 2023

Mohamed Al Jaja – November 5, 2023

Mohamed Abu Hassira – November 7, 2023

Yahya Abu Manih – November 7, 2023

Ahmed Al-Qara – November 10, 2023

Yaacoub Al-Barsh – November 13, 2023

Ahmed Fatima – November 13, 2023

Mossab Ashour – November 18, 2023

Amro Salah Abu Hayah – November 18, 2023

Mostafa El Sawaf – November 18, 2023

Hassouneh Salim – November 18, 2023

Sari Mansour – November 18, 2023

Abdelhalim Awad – November 18, 2023

Belal Jadallah – November 19, 2023

Alaa Taher Al-Hassanat – November 20, 2023

Ayat Khadoura – November 20, 2023

Jamal Hanieh – November 21, 2023

Mohamed Nabil Al-Zaq – November 22, 2023

Assem Al-Barsh – November 22, 2023

Mohamed Mouin Ayyash – November 23, 2023

Mostafa Bakeer – November 24, 2023

Amal Zahed – November 24, 2023

Nader Al-Nazli – November 25, 2023

Adham Hassouna – December 1, 2023

Montaser Al-Sawaf – December 1, 2023

Marwan Al-Sawaf  – December 1, 2023

Abdullah Darwish – December 1, 2023

Shaima El-Gazzar – December 3, 2023

Hassan Farajallah – December 3, 2023

Hamada al-Yaziji – December 3, 2023

Abdul Hamid al-Qarnawi – December 4, 2023

Saeed Al-Shorbaji – December 7, 2023

Ola Atallah – December 9, 2023

Mohamed Abu Samra – December 9, 2023

Duaa Jabbour –  December 9, 2023

Narmeen Qawwas – December 11, 2023

Hanan Ayyad – December 13, 2023

Abdel Kareem Odeh – December 13, 2023

Ahmed Abu Absa – December 13, 2023

Samer Abu Daqqa – December 15, 2023

Rami Badir – December 15, 2023

Assem Moussa – December 17, 2023

Haneen Kashtan – December 17, 2023

Abdallah Alwan – December 18, 2023

Adel Zorob – December 19, 2023

Ala Abu Muammar – December 21, 2023

Mohamed Khalifeh – December 22, 2023

Mohamed Naser Abu Huwaidi – December 23, 2023

Ahmad Jamal Al Madhoun – December 24, 2023

Mohamed Azzaytouniyah –  December 24, 2023

Mohamad Al-Iff – December 24, 2023

Ahmed Khair al-Din – December 28, 2023

Mohammad Khair al-Din – December 28, 2023

Jabr Abu Hadros – December 29, 2023

Narmeem Harboush – December 30, 2023

Hamza al-Dahdouh – January 7, 2024

Mustafa Thuraya – January 7, 2024

Abu Ali Ajwa – January 7, 2024

Abdullah Baris – January 8, 2024

Muhammad Abu Dayer – January 8, 2024

Heba Al-Abadla – January 9, 2024

Shareef Okasha – January 9, 2024

Ahmed Badir – January 10, 2024

Mohamed Jamal Sobhi Al-Thalathini – January 11, 2024

Yazan Al-Zuweidi – January 14, 2024

Wael Fanouneh – January 18, 2024

Karam Ahmed Abu Ajiram – January 21, 2024

Eyad al-Rawagh – January 26, 2024

Iyad Ahmed al-Rawag – January 27, 2024

Mohammed Atallah – January 29, 2024

Rizq Al-Gharabli – February 7, 2024

Nafez Abdel Jawad – February 8, 2024

Yasser Mamdouh El-Fady – February 11, 2024

Angam Ahmad Edwan – February 12, 2024

Ala’a al-Hums – February 12, 2024

Ayman Al-Rafati – February 14, 2024

Zayd Abu Zayed – February 15, 2024

Ihab Nasrallah – February 21, 2024

Mohamed Yaghi – February 23, 2024

Mohamed Salama – March 5, 2024

Abdul Rahman Saima – March 14, 2024

Mohamed El-Reefi – March 15, 2024

Saher Akram Rayan – March 25, 2024

Mohammad Abu Sukheil – March 29, 2024

Amna Hamid – April 24, 2024

Mohammed Bassam Al Jamal – April 25, 2024

Ayman Mohamad Al-Gharbawi – April 26, 2024

Ibrahim Mohamad Al-Gharbawi – April 26, 2024

Salem Abu Toyour – April 29, 2024

Mustafa Ayyad – May 6, 2024

Bahaa Okasha – May 11, 2024

Amna Mahmoud Hamid – May 16, 2024

Moataz Mustafa Al-Ghafrit – May 16, 2024

Mahmoud Jahjouh – May 16, 2024

Hael Al-Najjar – May 16, 2024

Ola al-Dahdouh – June 1, 2024

Abdullah Ahmed Al-Jamal – June 9, 2024

Ahlam Ezzat Al-Ajla – June 9, 2024

Dina Abdullah Al-Batniji – June 9, 2024

Mahmoud Qassem – June 17, 2024

Salim al-Sharafa – June. 20, 2024

Muhammad Mahmoud Abu Sharia – July 1, 2024

Ahmad Sukar – July 5, 2024

Saadi Madoukh – July 5, 2024

Rizq Abu Ashkian – July 6, 2024

Amjad Jahjouh – July 6, 2024

Wafa Abu Dabaan – July 6, 2024

Muhammad Manhal Abu Armana – July 13, 2024

Muhammad Abdullah Mishmish – July 16, 2024

Muhammad Abu Jasser – July 20, 2024

Mutasim Mahmoud Gharab – July 21, 2024

Haider Ibrahim al-Masdar – July 22, 2024

Ismail al-Ghoul – July 31, 2024

Rami al-Rifee – July 31, 2024

Mohammed Issa Abu Saada – August 6, 2024

Tamim Muammar – August 9, 2024

Ibrahim Muharab – August 19, 2024

Hamza Abdul Rahman Murtaja – August 20, 2024

Hussam al-Dabbaka – August 22, 2024

Medo Halimy – August 26, 2024

Ali Tuaima – August 26, 2024

Mohamed Abd Rabbo – August 28, 2024

Abdullah Shakshak – September 15, 2024

Wafa Al-Udaini – September 30, 2024

Hassan Hamad – October 6, 2024

Abdul Rahman Bahr – October 6, 2024

Mohammed Tanani – October 9, 2024

Omar al-Balawi – October 9, 2024

Ayman Muhammad Ruwaished – October 14, 2024

Saed Radwan – October 27, 2024

Hamza Abu Salmiya – October 27, 2024

Haneen Baroud – October 27, 2024

Bilal Rajab – November 1, 2024

Baraa Ali Daghish – November 2, 2024

Khaled Abu Zir – November 8, 2024

Ahmed Abu Sakhil – November 9, 2024

Zahra Abu Sakhil – November 9, 2024

Mohammed Khreis – November 11, 2024

Mahdi al-Mamluk – November 11, 2024

Mohammed Saleh al-Sharif – November 16, 2024

Ahmed Abu Sharia – November 19, 2024

Mahmoud al-Khatib – November 20, 2024

Abdul Rahim al-Tahrawi – November 20, 2024

Wael Abu Quffa – November 22, 2024

Alaa Fawzi Barhoum – November 27, 2024

Mamdouh Quneita – November 30, 2024

Maysara Ahmed Salah – December 1, 2024

Mohammad Hijazi – December 5, 2024

Iman al-Shanti – December 11, 2024

Mohammed Baalousha – December 14, 2024

Mohammed Jaber Al-Qerainawi – December 14, 2024

Ahmed al-Louh – December 15, 2024

Hazem Abu Arqoub – December 21, 2024

Fadi Hassouna – December 26, 2024

Ibrahim Al-Sheikh Ali – December 26, 2024

Ayman Al-Jadi – December 26, 2024

Mohammed Al-Lada’a – December 26, 2024

Faisal Abu Al-Qumsan – December 26, 2024

Shatha al-Sabbagh – December 27, 2024

Hassan al-Qishaoui – January 2, 2025

Omar Salah Al-Derawi – January 3, 2025

Areej Shaheen – January 3, 2025

Saed Abu Nabhan – January 10, 2025

Ahlam Nafeth Al-Taluli – January 13, 2025

Mohammed al-Talmas – January 14, 2025

Aqel Saleh – January 15, 2025

Ahmed Abu Alrous – January 15, 2025

Ahmad al-Shayah – January 15, 2025

Alaa Hashim – March 15, 2025

Mahmoud al-Sarraj – March 15, 2025

Bilal Abu Matar – March 15, 2025

Mahmoud Isleem al-Basos – March 15, 2025

Husam al-Titi – March 17, 2025

Mohammed Mansur – March 24, 2025

Hossam Shabat – March 24, 2025

Mohammed Saleh Al-Bardawil – March 31, 2025

Islam Miqdad – April 6, 2025

Helmi al-Faqawi – April 7, 2025

Ahmad Mansoor – April 7, 2025

Fatima Hassouna – April 16, 2025

Saeed Abu Hassainen – April 23, 2025

Noor al-Din Matar Abdu – May 7, 2025

Yahya Sobeih – May 7, 2025

Hassan Aslih – May 13, 2025

Hassan Samour – May 15, 2025

Ahmed Al-Helou – May 15, 2025

Aziz al-Hajjar – May 17, 2025

Nour Qandil – May 17, 2025

Abdul Rahman al-Abadleh – May 17, 2025

Ahmed al-Zenati – May 17, 2025

Khaled Abu Seif – May 17, 2025

Yaqeen Hammad – May 23, 2025

Bilal al-Hatoum – May 23, 2025

Hassan Majdi Abu Warda – May 25, 2025

Moataz Rajab – May 28, 2025

Yousef al-Nakhala – May 31, 2025

Suleiman Hajjaj – June 5, 2025

Ismail Badah – June 5, 2025

Samir Al-Rifai – June 5, 2025

Ahmad Qalaja – June 5, 2025

Moamen Abu Alouf – June 9, 2025

Amin Hamdan – June 22, 2025

Mahmoud Abu Sharbi – June 25, 2025

Ismail Abu Hatab – June 30, 2025

Ahmad Salama Abu Aisha – July 11, 2025

Hussam Al-Adlouni – July 13, 2025

Fadi Khalifa – July 13, 2025

Tamer Al-Zaanin – July 21, 2025

Walaa Al-Jabari – July 23, 2025

Adam Abu Harbid – July 25, 2025

Ibrahim Hajjaj – July 30, 2025

Marwa Musallam – August 1, 2025

Anas Al-Sharif – August 10, 2025

Mohammed Qreiqeh – August 10, 2025

Ibrahim Zaher – August 10, 2025

Mohammed Noufal – August 10, 2025

Moamen Aliwa – August 10, 2025

Ziad Al-Razi – August 11, 2025

Islam al-Koumi – August 18, 2025

Khaled al-Madhoun – August 23, 2025

Hussam al-Masri – August 25, 2025

Mariam Dagga – August 25, 2025

Mohammed Salama – August 25, 2025

Moaz Abu Taha – August 25, 2025

Ahmed Abu Aziz – August 25, 2025

Hassan Douhan – August 25, 2025

Islam Abed – August 31, 2025

Rasmi Jihad Salem – September 2, 2025

Iman Ahmad Al-Zamli – September 2, 2025

Ayman Haniyeh – September 2, 2025

Osama Balousha – September 8, 2025

Mohammad al-Kuwaifi – September 15, 2025

Mohammed Alaa al-Sawalhi – September 18, 2025

Mohammed al-Daya – September 27, 2025

Yahya Barzaq – September 30, 2025

In Lebanon

Issam Abdallah – October 13, 2023

Farah Hisham Omar – November 21, 2023

Rabih Al Maamari – November 21, 2023

Hadi Al-Sayed – September 23, 2024

Kamel Karaki – September 25, 2024

Ghassan Najar – October 25, 2024

Mohammed Rida – October 25, 2024

Wissam Qassim – October 25, 2024

Sakina Mansour – November 13, 2025

Ahmad Farhat – February 16, 2025

In Syria

Safaa Ahmad – October 1, 2024

In Iran

Fereshteh Bagheri – June 13, 2025

Saleh Bairami – June 15, 2025

Nima Rajabpour – June 16, 2025

Masoumeh Azimi – June 16, 2025

In Yemen

Abdulaziz Al-Sheikh – September 10, 2025

Abbas Al-Dailami – September 10, 2025

Youssef Shams Al-Din Al-Bahri – September 10, 2025

Mohammed Al-Omeisi – September 10, 2025

Abdullah Al-Harazi – September 10, 2025

Murad Halboub Al-Faqih – September 10, 2025

Ali Naji Al-Shara’i – September 10, 2025

Ali Mohammed Al-Aqel – September 10, 2025

Jamal Al-Adhi – September 10, 2025

Sami Mohammed Hussein Al-Zaidi – September 10, 2025

Mohammed Ismail Hazam Al-Amsi – September 10, 2025

Bashir Hussein Ahsan Dablan – September 10, 2025

Aref Ali Abdo Al-Samahi – September 10, 2025

Mohammed Hamoud Ahmed Al-Matari – September 10, 2025

Abdul Wali Abdo Hussein Al-Najjar – September 10, 2025

Abdo Taher Musleh Al-Saadi – September 10, 2025

Abdulaziz Saleh Ahmed Shas – September 10, 2025

Mohammed Ahmed Mohammed Al-Zaakri – September 10, 2025

Zuhair Ahmed Mohammed Al-Zaakri – September 10, 2025

Mohammed Abdo Yahya Al-Sanfi – September 10, 2025

Mohammed Al-Azzi Ghaleb Al-Harazi – September 10, 2025

Issam Ahmed Murshid Al-Hashidi – September 10, 2025

Salim Abdullah Abdo Ahmed Al-Wateeri – September 10, 2025

Abbas Abdul Malik Muhammad Al-Dailami – September 10, 2025

Lutfi Ahmed Nasser Hadiyan – September 10, 2025

Qais Abdo Ahmed Al-Naqeeb – September 10, 2025

Muhammad Ali Hamoud Al-Dawi – September 10, 2025

Faris Abdo Ali Al-Rumaisa – September 10, 2025

Abdul Rahman Mohammed Mohammed Jaman – September 10, 2025

Amal Muhammad Ghaleb Al-Manakhi – September 10, 2025

Abdullah Mahdi al-Bahri – September 11, 2025

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

The post Killing the messengers  appeared first on Tempest.

Downtown Sunnyvale might hopefully include a new 100% affordable housing complex. This exciting 122-home development project is currently in its early entitlement phase, but has already drawn the attention of Greenbelt Alliance’s Development Endorsement Program. That’s why Greenbelt Alliance is excited to endorse this bold project by MidPen Housing.

Affordable and Accessible

This project meets Greenbelt Alliance’s SMART criteria, as a proposed development that is Sustainable, Mixed-Use, Affordable, Resilient, and Transit-Oriented (SMART). In addition to being completely affordable, 295 S. Mathilda aims to support the housing-insecure in Sunnyvale: at least 25% of all homes will be reserved for the unhoused population. This aligns with MidPen Housing’s broader mission to provide affordable and stable housing that enables people to thrive. 

As an infill development, 295 S. Mathilda replaces an old commercial building in the heart of Sunnyvale, providing future residents with access to numerous amenities, including grocery stores, parks, and restaurants. It is also within a 10-minute walking distance from the Caltrain station, making the project a transit-oriented development.

Sustainable and Climate Resilient

The project will be 100% electric, generating a portion of its electricity from rooftop solar panels. It will also include 66 bike parking spaces—in addition to its 67 car parking units—to promote multi-modal mobility. 295 S. Mathilda is also climate resilient, as it faces minimal flood and wildfire risks in the area.

And according to GreenTRIP—a free online tool created by Transform that models traffic and greenhouse gas impacts of residential projects in California—this project will result in:

• 2,534 fewer miles driven every day compared to the Santa Clara County average.
• 64% fewer GHG impacts every day compared to the Santa Clara County average.
• 41% less parking use every day compared to the Santa Clara County average.

295 S. Mathilda expects to obtain their entitlements by the end of 2025. Construction would then begin at the start of 2028 and be completed by the end of 2029. 

Greenbelt Alliance believes 295 S. Mathilda will bring much-needed affordable housing to the South Bay and further support the Sunnyvale community. We are proud to give it our endorsement, and we hope to see it break ground soon.

The post Greenbelt Alliance Endorses the 295 South Mathilda in Sunnyvale appeared first on Greenbelt Alliance.

Sun Day in Upstate New York was an amazing day of learning, celebration, and progress toward our clean energy future. Thank you for being a part of it! You are receiving this email because you registered online or on-site for a TA-UNY Sun Day event in Albany or Tupper Lake. 

As a recap, we hope you’ll enjoy this 3 minute highlights reel from the big festival in Albany and browse through our Third Act Upstate NY Sun Day Album chock full of photos, recordings, and resources from both events.

In case you missed it, one action you can take right now to help accelerate the rapid transition to clean energy is to sign the ASAP Accelerate Solar Petition. 

Our next TA-UNY All-In call is Oct. 17 at 2pm Eastern. We’d love to see you there!

In solidarity and with gratitude,

Third Act Upstate New York

American Federation of Government Employees National President Everett Kelley issued the following statement in response to a report that the White House is considering withholding the backpay of federal employees furloughed due to the government shutdown:

“The frivolous argument that federal employees are not guaranteed backpay under the Government Employee Fair Treatment Act is an obvious misinterpretation of the law. It is also inconsistent with the Trump administration’s own guidance from mere days ago, which clearly and correctly states that furloughed employees will receive retroactive pay for the time they were out of work as quickly as possible once the shutdown is over.

“As we’ve said before, the livelihoods of the patriotic Americans serving their country in the federal government are not bargaining chips in a political game. It’s long past time for these attacks on federal employees to stop and for Congress to come together, resolve their differences, and end this shutdown.”

Warning that retaliation against the press is a tactic that “belongs to a society much different and more oppressive than our own,” the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of the District of Columbia filed a brief late last night in support of the Associated Press in their lawsuit against the Trump administration.

The brief supports the AP’s claim that the White House violated the First Amendment when it restricted the AP’s access to official events because the outlet refused to adopt the administration’s preferred name for the Gulf of Mexico. The brief argues that incursions on free expression, left unchecked, frequently lead to greater repression, as demonstrated by American history and the modern experience of other nations, and the brief catalogues the Trump administration’s alarming campaign of retaliation against dissenting voices.

“Attacking a free press is a key play in the autocracy playbook, as we have seen around the world in recent years,” said Scott Michelman, legal director at the ACLU of D.C. “When countries like Hungary and the Philippines have regressed from democracy toward autocracy, the punishment of journalists critical of the ruling party has been a harbinger of worse to come. By punishing the AP for refusing to parrot the administration’s worldview, Trump is taking a step down a dangerous road. The First Amendment exists to block any incursion against press freedom, and we are asking the court to heed the lessons of our own history and of world history by enforcing the First Amendment here.”

In January, President Donald Trump signed an executive order aiming to rename the Gulf of Mexico to “Gulf of America.” When the Associated Press chose not to use the new moniker, the White House retaliated by barring the AP’s reporters from participating in the press pool in the Oval Office or aboard Air Force One. The news organization filed suit in February and was granted reinstatement by a federal judge in April. Part of the judge’s decision was temporarily stayed by a panel of the D.C. Circuit.

“The president cannot punish a press outlet for its choice of words,” said Brian Hauss, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. “The White House press pool guarantees the public’s timely access to important information about the president and the executive branch. If the president can banish any media outlet that refuses to parrot the administration’s talking points, the American public will hear exclusively from sycophants and stenographers.”

Participation in the White House press pool is historically managed by the White House Correspondents Association, and the president has not in recent history had the power to remove individual outlets based on the content of their coverage.

The AP’s suit, Associated Press v. Budowich, was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. It is currently before the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, where the ACLU and the ACLU of D.C. filed the amicus late Monday.

Related Documents

• AP v. Budowich Amicus Brief

• Denuncian que SEMARNAT y diversos legisladores impulsan iniciativas bajo el discurso de “economía circular”, favoreciendo a la industria plástica y buscando aplazar la prohibición de plásticos de un solo uso, incumpliendo un amparo ganado en 2024 que obliga a eliminarlos.
• Propuestas legislativas—como las de la senadora Maki Ortiz y los diputados Gutiérrez Luna y Ballesteros— priorizan el reciclaje y la valorización energética, lo que promueve la incineración y el “greenwashing”, en lugar de atender la crisis ambiental y sanitaria generada por el plástico.
• Las organizaciones alertan que proyectos como el Polo de Desarrollo de Economía Circular en Hidalgo perpetúan la contaminación y la injusticia ambiental en comunidades ya afectadas, beneficiando a grandes corporaciones y contraviniendo el derecho a un medio ambiente sano.

Ciudad de México, a 7 de octubre de 2025 – Organizaciones de la sociedad civil denunciaron el avance de iniciativas legislativas y acciones impulsadas por legisladoras y legisladores y la Secretaría de Medio Ambiente y Recursos Naturales (SEMARNAT), que favorecen a la industria plástica bajo un supuesto modelo de “economía circular” que busca perpetuar la producción insostenible de plásticos de un solo uso en México, situación que se aleja del cumplimiento del amparo ganado en agosto de 2024, encaminado a prohibir dichos productos.

Entre las iniciativas señaladas se encuentran las de la Senadora Maki Esther Ortiz Domínguez, con el “Proyecto de Decreto por el que se expide la Ley General de Economía Circular y Gestión Integral de Residuos”, que abroga la Ley General de Prevención y Gestión Integral de Residuos (LGPGIR) y
pospone la prohibición de plásticos de un solo uso hasta 2040. Esta propuesta, en los hechos, funciona como un blindaje para impedir acciones inmediatas que garanticen el cumplimiento del amparo. Además, clasifica a los plásticos como “residuos estratégicos” para la economía circular, lo que fomenta su generación, evade la obligación legislativa de dar una solución real a la contaminación y contraviene la sentencia ganada y los compromisos internacionales de México.

Asimismo, es inaceptable la iniciativa que reforma y adiciona diversas disposiciones a la LGPGIR, impulsada por el Diputado Sergio Carlos Gutiérrez Luna y la Diputada Laura Ballesteros, ya que excluye al PET transparente, uno de los principales plásticos contaminantes. Con ello se priorizan nuevamente los intereses de la industria por encima de la salud humana y de la protección ambiental. De igual forma, la iniciativa del Senador Waldo Fernández González para crear la Ley General de Economía Circular pone como criterios centrales el reciclaje y la valorización energética, ignorando la jerarquía de la gestión de residuos y los principios precautorios.

Las organizaciones señalaron que la misma SEMARNAT está promoviendo una Ley General de Economía Circular que presume fue consensuada con la sociedad civil y el sector privado; sin embargo, hasta el momento, dicha ley no se ha dado a conocer públicamente ni ha sido compartida de manera transparente. Las organizaciones señalaron que estas iniciativas representan un claro caso de greenwashing o ecoblanqueo, ya que presentan al reciclaje y la valorización energética como la principal solución al problema del plástico de un solo uso, fomentando la incineración de residuos y enalteciendo sus beneficios para la “economía circular”, pese a que la evidencia demuestra que es insuficiente. En realidad, esta estrategia beneficia a las grandes corporaciones, mientras coloca la carga de la contaminación en comunidades, gobiernos locales y en la salud de la población y el ambiente.

“Estas iniciativas no son soluciones, son estrategias de greenwashing disfrazadas de economía circular. El gobierno federal y algunos legisladores están ignorando las verdaderas soluciones que protegen la salud , el ambiente y los derechos de las comunidades. No podemos permitir que se legisle para perpetuar la contaminación plástica hasta 2040 bajo el pretexto del reciclaje y la incineración”, afirmó Viridiana Lázaro, de Greenpeace.

De acuerdo con Ana Larrañaga, de El Poder del Consumidor, entre los actores beneficiados por estas propuestas, se encuentran ECOCE, una agrupación fachada que incluye a grandes industrias contaminantes, como Pepsico, Danone, Nestlé, Coca Cola, entre otros, además de Walmart de México y Centroamérica, con quien SEMARNAT se ha aliado para impulsar el llamado Polo de Desarrollo de Economía Circular para el Bienestar (PODECIBI). Este proyecto busca imponer un Parque de Economía Circular en Hidalgo, pese a la reiterada oposición de las comunidades que se verían afectadas por sus operaciones contaminantes.

Al respecto, Alain Castruita, de la organización No es Basura, mencionó que “al modelo de desarrollo industrial llamado Polos de Desarrollo de Economía Circular para el Bienestar lo han dotado de un manto de sostenibilidad y bienestar; cuando en realidad estamos ante una era donde las regiones de sacrificio que son comunidades que ya viven asediadas y azotadas por la contaminación y el despojo; ahora son reconfiguradas bajo ese discurso humanista y verde que se lanza desde el oficialismo”.

“Detrás del discurso de sostenibilidad y de una supuesta economía circular, lo que se esconde es la autorización para seguir inundando al país con plásticos tóxicos de un solo uso. Esto no solo agrava la crisis ambiental y sanitaria, también condena a las comunidades a convertirse en zonas de sacrificio. No olvidemos que la región de Tula en Hidalgo ha sido declarada oficialmente como una Región de Emergencia Ambiental y Sanitaria, proyectos como este sólo perpetúan la injusticia ambiental que se vive en esa zona desde hace décadas” manifestó Larisa de Orbe, de Acción Ecológica, quien además criticó que SEMARNAT ponga como ejemplo de gestión de residuos, una plantas incineradoras en Copenhague, que han resultado desastrosas para el medio ambiente y la salud, requiriendo más basura para su operación. “Lo que dicen ser circular bajo el mismo modelo de negocios, realmente significa circular sustancias tóxicas en las comunidades”, añadió.

Lejos de responder a esta emergencia, las políticas impulsadas desde el Ejecutivo y el Congreso están legitimando el modelo de producción lineal, asegurando los intereses de la industria plástica y petrolera. Además, se encuentran en incumplimiento de la sentencia emitida por el Vigésimo Tribunal Colegiado en Materia Administrativa del Primer Circuito el 15 de agosto de 2024 (expediente 32832764), que reconoce la omisión legislativa del Congreso de la Unión para que se prohíba la venta, distribución y consumo de plásticos de un solo uso a nivel nacional estableciendo la obligación constitucional e internacional de legislar en favor del derecho humano a un medio ambiente sano y a la salud. Esta resolución es resultado del amparo promovido por Greenpeace México, El Poder del Consumidor y Acción Ecológica, acompañadas de la Asociación Ecológica Santo Tomás, Fronteras Comunes y No es Basura.

“Se debe dar cumplimiento al amparo, por ello, necesitamos una legislación que proteja la salud y los derechos humanos, no los intereses industriales, no más iniciativas que incentiven la gestión de residuos plásticos a través del coprocesamiento o waste to energy: prohibir los plásticos de un solo uso es la única solución real”, declaró Claudia Romero, de Fronteras Comunes.

Por su parte, José Manuel Arias, de la Asociación Ecológica Santo Tomás, exigió al Poder Legislativo detener las diversas iniciativas que se cocinan en estos momentos ya que solo perpetúan la generación de residuos y de los plásticos de un solo uso en particular en nombre de una supuesta conomía circular. Así mismo, pidió a la SEMARNAT cancelar el Proyecto de Economía Circular en Hidalgo que solo repite una política colonialista que busca mantener el nivel de hiperconsumo en detrimento de una región ya afectada.

Las organizaciones exigieron:

• Cumplir con el amparo para prohibir la producción de plásticos de un solo uso.
• Detener el avance de las iniciativas legislativas que únicamente perpetúan la dependencia al plástico, y terminar con las alianzas con organismos de la industria plástica, al representar un claro ejemplo de conflicto de interés.
• Establecer políticas firmes rumbo a la eliminación en la producción de plásticos de un solo uso, en concordancia con el nivel más alto de protección a los derechos humanos concedido por el amparo.
• Garantizar la protección de las comunidades que ya enfrentan contaminación por residuos plásticos y procesos de incineración, y evitar la creación de más zonas de sacrificio.

“México no puede seguir apostando por falsas soluciones que ponen en riesgo el futuro de la población y del planeta. Exigimos que se ponga un alto al greenwashing y se trace un rumbo hacia verdaderas alternativas que prioricen la salud de las personas y la justicia ambiental”, concluyeron.

The post México | Organizaciones de la sociedad civil alertan sobre greenwashing en iniciativas de plásticos y falsas soluciones verdes del gobierno federal first appeared on GAIA.

In September, we held our first-ever Energy Advocates retreat in Portland, in partnership with GEI, Citizens Utility Board, Oregon Solar + Storage Industries Association, Multnomah County, Verde, Clackamas Community College, and Climate Solutions.

The idea for the retreat followed the 2025 Oregon legislative session and the huge wave of implementation that’s now moving to the Oregon Public Utilities Commission (OPUC). With so many big bills coming down the pipeline, it felt important to create space for the Energy Advocates to step back and strategically think about how we can remain coordinated and proactive. We also wanted to be mindful of the current federal landscape and any short session opportunities coming up.  

The goal of the retreat was for Energy Advocates to identify capacity gaps, talk through organization priorities, and align on messaging and strategy for both implementation and upcoming legislative work. We held a full-day hybrid retreat with more than 50 people attending in person and virtually. OPUC and Oregon Department of Energy staff also joined, and we went over implementation timelines, expectations and challenges, desired outcomes, and strategies. Each bill had its own breakout session and included topic overviews, time for questions and discussion, and time to chat without OPUC staff present. We are so grateful to everyone who participated and look forward to more retreats in the future. 

The post Energy Advocates Retreat first appeared on NW Energy Coalition.

Russ Lester died peacefully on Sept. 22, 2025, surrounded by family and on the farm that he loved and stewarded since 1976. Russ was an influential farmer, including during CalCAN’s formative years, where he served as one of our farmer

The post Remembering Russ Lester appeared first on CalCAN - California Climate & Agriculture Network.

Los Angeles, CA — On October 2, a massive explosion at Chevron’s El Segundo oil refinery shocked South Bay residents, with the resulting fireball and flare visible for miles. Petroleum refineries are inherently dangerous facilities that regularly release toxic air contaminants into surrounding communities that are linked to serious health threats. Neighbors, like those around Chevron’s El Segundo refinery, live with the constant fear of explosions and fires, like the one that occurred late Thursday night. 

The explosion shook the homes of neighbors near the facility, and despite the fact that flames raged overhead, it took the South Coast Air Quality Management District an hour to send nearby residents any information about what had happened. Eventually, the agency emailed nearby residents seriously downplaying the situation by calling it an “unplanned flaring event.”

This refinery disaster comes on the heels of a legislative session increasingly overshadowed by concerns about planned refinery shutdowns across California. That session culminated with Governor Newsom signing SB 237 — a move that environmental and climate advocates broadly condemned as a reckless concession to oil-industry pressure. SB 237 will result in thousands of new oil wells every year that will continue to expose Californians to the toxic pollution and dangers of oil infrastructure. 

Last Chance Alliance members offered the following quotes in response to the El Segundo refinery fire:

“We’re very glad Chevron’s refinery workers are reportedly safe and without injuries. The workers also always strive to keep neighbors safe. We don’t yet know what sparked last night’s explosion, but we do know that California’s oil refiners have been repeatedly found by the State and the U.S. Chemical Safety Board to neglect upkeep and skimp on maintenance. The deeper problem is the inherent danger of oil refining — processing thousands of barrels a day of explosive, flammable, toxic materials, with most of California’s refineries over 100 years old. We need a serious plan for gradual phaseout of this antiquated, dirty energy, through a Just Transition Plan for the community and workers, consumers, and the planet,” said Julia May, Senior Scientist with CBE

“Last night’s fire is another painful reminder that California families — especially in frontline communities — are paying the price for Big Oil’s recklessness. While families are closing their windows and doors and worrying about toxic exposure, Governor Newsom is handing out deals to oil companies that reward them for their negligence,” said Seng So, Organizing Director with Asian Pacific Environmental Network.

“Time and again, I see patients living near pumpjacks and in the shadow of the refineries struggling to breathe. My patients with asthma and COPD struggle to breathe simply for daring to spend time outside their own homes—homes that sit beside active oil wells. Los Angeles’ most vulnerable residents are paying for the oil industry’s “business as usual” with their health. Last night’s incident is yet another painful reminder of the burdens these communities are forced to endure. Families deserve better—health is not optional,” said Lorenzo González, MD, MPL., Health Professional Ambassador for Physicians for Social Responsibility – Los Angeles 

“It is not safe for our communities to live next door to the Chevron refineries. As a lifelong community member of Richmond, CA, we know too well what a refinery explosion does to our community, and we are in complete solidarity with the community of El Segundo,” said Lazuli Trujano, Richmond Community Organizer with Communities for a Better Environment. “When the Richmond Chevron refinery exploded in 2012, it sent more than 14,000 workers and community members to local hospitals. This is not okay, and we must put a stop to the harms that Chevron causes to our frontline communities.” 

“This massive fireball shows how dangerous aging, fire-prone fossil fuel infrastructure is to our communities,” said Christina Scaringe, California Climate Policy Director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “It’s outrageous that our state legislature just rammed through a bill aiming to prop up refineries that pose clear dangers to Californians. This explosion is one more reminder of how urgently we need our leaders to speed the transition to clean energy to protect people and the planet.” 

“As long as fossil fuel infrastructure is near our schools, homes, transit hubs and communities, we will constantly be at risk of explosions, fires, and deadly pollution, like what happened last night,” said Food & Water Watch Southern California Senior Organizer Andrea Vega. There is no other way to say it, this infrastructure is dangerous. And while the fossil fuel industry is putting us and our families and neighbors at risk, our state leaders and Governor Newsom spent the last session conceding to Big Oil’s demands and cozying up to the industry, including pushing to use state funds to pay Valero to keep its Benicia refinery open, tipping the scales in favor of dirty industry. We need a rapid transition to safe, sustainable renewable energy now, not to keep entrenching these facilities in our communities.”

“The explosion at the Chevron refinery last night is yet another example of the tragic and  predictable consequences that will continue as Governor Newsom increases reliance on fossil fuel infrastructure across California,” said Gabriela Facio, Sierra Club California Senior Policy Strategist. “The threat that oil and gas refineries pose to frontline communities is not abstract. The longer our state relies on dangerous, explosive  fuels, the greater the damage will be to our environment and public health. Bills like SB 237 that roll back environmental protections are the exact kind of policies that put Californians at an even higher risk of disasters like this. It’s past time for Governor Newsom and the legislature to take serious and immediate steps to reduce California’s investment in fossil fuels and transition our economy to clean, renewable energy sources, and it’s disappointing to see the state move away from its climate and public health goals. This decision will have devastating impacts for decades to come. We can’t allow refinery explosions to become the norm.”

“Our supporters and neighbors of the Ballona Wetlands Ecological Reserve – in Playa del Rey and other local communities are regularly concerned about possible explosions at the fossil gas storage facility here (a facility similar to that at Aliso Canyon).  So to feel and watch the explosion just across the border from Los Angeles/Playa del Rey— they were extra horrified to see this massive fire.  We are calling for a full independent investigation, not just the internal one promised by Chevron,” said Marcia Hanscom, Community Organizer for Defend Ballona Wetlands.

The post Climate and Environmental Justice Groups Respond to Massive Fire at Chevron’s El Segundo Refinery appeared first on Last Chance Alliance.

Last week, on the same day the prime minister talked about the importance of “climate competitiveness” in keeping Canada’s economy strong and secure, his government gave the go-ahead to a major new piece of fossil fuel infrastructure.Well, not quite...

Federal Recycling expands Denver operations

Federal Recycling & Waste has moved its Denver MRF to a new location, bolstering capacity and its ability to process materials.

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The post Federal Recycling expands Denver operations appeared first on Resource Recycling News.

Colorado $10m grant fuels new MRF on state’s Western Slope

The City of Grand Junction received a nearly $10 million grant to increase recycling access on Colorado's Western Slope, including construction of a new MRF.

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The post Colorado $10m grant fuels new MRF on state’s Western Slope appeared first on Resource Recycling News.

Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline.

Do errors in Al Gore's 'An Inconvenient Truth' disprove climate change?

While Gore’s 2006 documentary proved incorrect about the extent and timeline of some predictions, it does not negate the reality, confirmed by decades of peer-reviewed evidence, that humans are warming the planet.

One erroneous claim is that Kilimanjaro’s ice loss was driven mainly by warming. Research now indicates sublimation and local dryness as dominant causes. 

Another is that sea levels could rise by 20 feet in the near future as ice sheets face imminent collapse – outcomes scientists expect over longer timescales than the documentary stated.

These errors do not change the general facts: glaciers worldwide are melting and seas are rising due to human-emitted heat-trapping greenhouse gases.

A 2007 U.K. court review found the film “substantially founded upon scientific research and fact” but required schoolteachers to clarify speculative or exaggerated points for students.

Inaccuracies in Gore’s presentation do not disprove the broad, robust scientific consensus on human-caused climate change.

Go to full rebuttal on Skeptical Science or to the fact brief on Gigafact

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Sources

HowStuffWorks What 'An Inconvenient Truth' Got Right (And Wrong) About Climate Change

DeSmog An Inconvenient Judgment? U.K. Court Actually Endorsed Gore's Film

ScienceLine Al Gore’s movie ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ says sea levels could rise up to 20 feet. Is this true?

NOAA Climate Change: Mountain glaciers

Environmental Research Letters Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming

NASA Scientific Consensus

Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide Stuart Dimmock v. Secretary of State for Education and Skills, [2007] EWHC 2288 (Admin) (Inconvenient Truth case)

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