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File:  ltr to Congress, 76 scientists 2012.pdfResource Type: Letters

File:  ltr to Congress, 76 scientists 2012.pdfResource Type: Letters

We did it!

After decades of stagnant fees and a growing oil and gas industry, New Mexico’s Environmental Improvement Board has approved updated air quality permit fees, and it’s a big deal for the communities living with the consequences of underfunded oversight.

For years, Earthworks and our partners have been documenting what happens when regulators lack the funding and staff to oversee a rapidly expanding industry. We’ve filmed uncontrolled pollution releases with optical gas imaging cameras. We’ve sat with families in the Permian and San Juan Basins who can smell oil and gas operations from their front porches. We’ve filed complaints that took too long to get investigated, not because the regulators don’t care, but because they didn’t have the staff or resources.

This may not have been the flashiest win, but it is one that decides whether rules on paper protect anyone in real life.

What happened and why it matters

New Mexico’s Environmental Improvement Board voted to approve updated air quality permit fees for both operating emissions and construction permits. This is the first substantial update since 2009. Meanwhile, the oil and gas industry exploded. General construction permits have increased by roughly 2,100 percent over the past 13 years. 

The Air Quality Bureau was heading towards a funding cliff: the Title V Special Revenue Fund was projected to run out by FY 2028. Without this update, the state was looking at fewer inspectors, longer permit backlogs, less monitoring, and slower enforcement when violations happen.

This is an environmental justice win. Underfunded oversight is a health problem and it lands the hardest on frontline communities.

An Associated Press analysis estimated that roughly 29,500 students across 74 New Mexico schools sit within potential exposure zones of oil and gas emissions. Researchers have found benzene levels near some schools spiking during class hours to nearly double the thresholds linked to chronic health effects. 

Counties like Lea and Eddy, home to thousands of active wells, compressor stations, and processing facilities, each had a single state ozone monitor. One monitor for an entire county spanning thousands of square miles. Roughly 70 percent of the new positions this funding is projected to create are in compliance and enforcement. 

This win didn’t happen in isolation. Earthworks joined a broad coalition of organizations, from the Native American Voters Alliance and TEWA Women United, to the Environmental Defense Fund, Sierra Club Rio Grande Chapter, San Juan Citizens Alliance, and many more, in submitting a joint comment letter urging the Board to approve the fee updates. We submitted technical testimony, helped advocates and every day New Mexicans participate and make our voices heard.

New Mexico legislators also showed up. More than two dozen other legislators submitted a letter to the Board. Their message was that every New Mexican deserves to breathe clean air, and the state needs adequate tools to actually deliver that.

Hundreds of New Mexico residents submitted their own voices, signing on to the community petition and showing up in person and virtually during the public hearings in Santa Fe. That kind of broad public engagement matters to a regulatory board.

Thank you for your support in making this happen!

The post New Mexico Just Made Polluters Pay for Clean Air appeared first on Earthworks.

Trump Administration Uses Ridiculous Excuse to Indefinitely Delay Black Lung Safeguards

Originally published by Appalachian Citizens Law Center

COAL COUNTRY – As the Trump Administration continues to tout that it is bringing back the coal industry, the safeguards that could prevent deadly silica dust exposure among coal miners have been sidelined by the Administration’s own actions with no resolution in sight. Just this week, E&E Greenwire reported that the Trump Administration’s Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) would “indefinitely delay” a standard to limit miners’ exposure to silica dust, the principal cause of the resurgence of deadly black lung disease, “pending judicial review.” Left unstated is the fact that any such judicial review is on pause because of MSHA’s own complex bureaucratic and legal maneuvers that only they can unravel.

Since 2009, miners and their allies have pushed the federal government to implement a silica dust standard  In April 2024, a rule was finally issued, with the coal industry given a year to comply. Instead, the Trump Administration and the industry took steps to halt the enforcement of the rule. In April of 2025, Trump’s MSHA announced it would halt enforcement of the rule, blaming uncertainty due to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., gutting the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health. Nearly simultaneously,  the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals put an indefinite stay on the rule after the mining industry took the rule to court and the administration failed to oppose the industry’s petition. Since then, parties in the case, including Trump’s MSHA, requested an abeyance on court action as MSHA agreed to weaken the rule to appease industry’s complaints. Now that MSHA and the industry are in agreement, MSHA claims they can’t advance even the watered down rule while the court’s stay is in place. However, that stay won’t  be removed while the case is held in abeyance, as MSHA requested. In other words, Trump’s MSHA won’t enforce the law until the stay is lifted, but the stay won’t be lifted until Trump’s MSHA acts – MSHA’s current lack of action is premised on constraints that are essentially self-imposed.

Advocates released the following statements in response:

Rebecca Shelton, Director of Policy for Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center:
“If the Trump Administration actually cared about protecting coal miners from black lung, we’d have a strong silica rule in place right now. Instead, they are hiding behind a ridiculous legal process to delay action while miners get sick and die. Our message to Trump’s MSHA is simple: It is on you to stop the delays. Put a strong rule in place and fight to enforce it before any other miners get black lung. Every day of delay is another death sentence for our communities.”

Background:

The silica dust standard had not been updated in nearly 40years before the Biden Administration took action in 2024. In that period of inaction, mining methods changed as larger, more accessible coal seams have been exhausted. Miners now must cut through more rock, leading to more exposure to silica dust that is 20 times more toxic than coal dust and causes the most severe forms of black lung even after fewer years of exposure. Based on scientific evidence, health experts and government agencies have repeatedly concluded that this silica dust exposure is a major cause of the black lung epidemic and that the outdated MSHA silica standard was woefully ineffective at protecting miners from this threat. Now, in Central Appalachia, 1 in 5 tenured miners has black lung disease and 1 in 20 has the most severe and totally disabling form of black lung. This led to an urgent push for an updated silica dust standard.

Over 15 years ago, in 2009, Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center petitioned MSHA to establish a dust standard for respirable crystalline silica. While MSHA responded and stated an intention to publish a proposed standard by April 2011, the rule was never promulgated and a decade of inaction followed. In 2016, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration established a reduced silica standard for other occupations, but because MSHA oversees mining regulations, the change meant miners had less protection from silica than any other group of workers. In 2021, ACLC again petitioned for a silica dust rule and the rule was reportedly drafted and submitted to the Office of Management and Budget in January of 2023 before being finalized in April 2024.

Trump Administration Uses Ridiculous Excuse to Indefinitely Delay Black Lung Safeguards

Originally published by Appalachian Citizens Law Center

COAL COUNTRY – As the Trump Administration continues to tout that it is bringing back the coal industry, the safeguards that could prevent deadly silica dust exposure among coal miners have been sidelined by the Administration’s own actions with no resolution in sight. Just this week, E&E Greenwire reported that the Trump Administration’s Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) would “indefinitely delay” a standard to limit miners’ exposure to silica dust, the principal cause of the resurgence of deadly black lung disease, “pending judicial review.” Left unstated is the fact that any such judicial review is on pause because of MSHA’s own complex bureaucratic and legal maneuvers that only they can unravel.

Since 2009, miners and their allies have pushed the federal government to implement a silica dust standard  In April 2024, a rule was finally issued, with the coal industry given a year to comply. Instead, the Trump Administration and the industry took steps to halt the enforcement of the rule. In April of 2025, Trump’s MSHA announced it would halt enforcement of the rule, blaming uncertainty due to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., gutting the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health. Nearly simultaneously,  the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals put an indefinite stay on the rule after the mining industry took the rule to court and the administration failed to oppose the industry’s petition. Since then, parties in the case, including Trump’s MSHA, requested an abeyance on court action as MSHA agreed to weaken the rule to appease industry’s complaints. Now that MSHA and the industry are in agreement, MSHA claims they can’t advance even the watered down rule while the court’s stay is in place. However, that stay won’t  be removed while the case is held in abeyance, as MSHA requested. In other words, Trump’s MSHA won’t enforce the law until the stay is lifted, but the stay won’t be lifted until Trump’s MSHA acts – MSHA’s current lack of action is premised on constraints that are essentially self-imposed.

Advocates released the following statements in response:

Rebecca Shelton, Director of Policy for Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center:
“If the Trump Administration actually cared about protecting coal miners from black lung, we’d have a strong silica rule in place right now. Instead, they are hiding behind a ridiculous legal process to delay action while miners get sick and die. Our message to Trump’s MSHA is simple: It is on you to stop the delays. Put a strong rule in place and fight to enforce it before any other miners get black lung. Every day of delay is another death sentence for our communities.”

Background:

The silica dust standard had not been updated in nearly 40years before the Biden Administration took action in 2024. In that period of inaction, mining methods changed as larger, more accessible coal seams have been exhausted. Miners now must cut through more rock, leading to more exposure to silica dust that is 20 times more toxic than coal dust and causes the most severe forms of black lung even after fewer years of exposure. Based on scientific evidence, health experts and government agencies have repeatedly concluded that this silica dust exposure is a major cause of the black lung epidemic and that the outdated MSHA silica standard was woefully ineffective at protecting miners from this threat. Now, in Central Appalachia, 1 in 5 tenured miners has black lung disease and 1 in 20 has the most severe and totally disabling form of black lung. This led to an urgent push for an updated silica dust standard.

Over 15 years ago, in 2009, Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center petitioned MSHA to establish a dust standard for respirable crystalline silica. While MSHA responded and stated an intention to publish a proposed standard by April 2011, the rule was never promulgated and a decade of inaction followed. In 2016, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration established a reduced silica standard for other occupations, but because MSHA oversees mining regulations, the change meant miners had less protection from silica than any other group of workers. In 2021, ACLC again petitioned for a silica dust rule and the rule was reportedly drafted and submitted to the Office of Management and Budget in January of 2023 before being finalized in April 2024.

This blog is part of a series covering methane regulations at the federal and state level.

Read our first blog, “Methane gas is different“

In February, the Trump administration announced an unprecedented attack to sabotage the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to do its job. The scientific “Endangerment Finding” is the legal foundation underlying many climate pollution rules; voiding it is among one of the greatest attacks on the ability of the federal government to tackle the climate crisis to date.

But not for methane. Oil and gas methane methane rules are different.

National rules to cut methane are still on the books. It’s time for states to step up and act.

Colorado Models Action

In February, the state of Colorado did just that.

Colorado’s Air Quality Control Commission passed new rules that align state-level air quality regulations with the framework created by the EPA’s requirements. This positions Colorado as one of the first major oil and gas producing states to take concrete action to implement the EPA methane rules. 

This step also strengthens Colorado’s existing rules by directly requiring certain best practices for emissions reductions at transmission and storage facilities. This includes facilities such as compressor stations (facilities that compress gas to keep it moving through pipelines) and storage terminals (facilities with large tanks for storing oil, gas, and other petrochemical products) that are significant polluters. 

Requiring operators to adopt practices that protect public health and the environment is a necessary outcome of air quality regulations. This outcome should never depend on an operator volunteering good behavior.

Additionally, these rules require operators of facilities consisting of only a single wellhead to comply with Colorado’s existing Leak Detection and Repair (LDAR) framework, which requires frequent LDAR using approved technologies designed to detect hydrocarbon pollutants like the OGI cameras employed by Earthworks. Our extensive field experience in Colorado and across the US demonstrates that leaks from wellheads are a common occurrence. These facilities account for only a portion of domestic production but can have an outsized impact on the climate when leaks are not detected and repaired effectively.

(Top) Compressor station in Colorado. (Bottom) Optical gas imaging (OGI) video showing significant hydrocarbon emissions including methane and other harmful volatile organic compounds from a leak at the compressor station. More state action to come

Later this year, Colorado will adopt another set of rules that will fully align the state’s regulations with the EPA requirements. 

Importantly, Colorado has additional opportunities to exceed these requirements and achieve even more emissions reductions from oil and gas. Colorado is currently considering new air toxics rules that would require polluting facilities to reduce certain priority air toxics including benzene, hydrogen sulfide, and formaldehyde, which are all common, dangerous pollutants from oil and gas activities. Colorado has also passed legislation that prioritizes environmental justice and empowers the state to require more stringent emissions reductions from polluting facilities in communities that suffer disproportionate health impacts from harmful industries.

Some of our close grassroots partners like Cultivando, The Greenhouse Connection Center, and Black Parents United Foundation are on the frontlines pushing for Colorado to take these opportunities seriously and to truly meet this critical moment, both for impacted Coloradans and for community members everywhere looking for climate leadership.

Consider signing up for updates from Cultivando, The GHCC, and BPUF to stay informed and learn all the ways you can support these important organizations and the communities they represent.

Colorado is making important progress but must continue to model action at a time when action at the state-level to protect human health and the environment is more vital and urgent than ever before.

The post Colorado State Action to #CutMethane appeared first on Earthworks.

This blog is part of a series covering methane regulations at the federal and state level.

Read our first blog, “Methane gas is different“

The Clean Air Act, one of our bedrock environmental laws, depends heavily on states for implementation. Under the law, EPA sets baseline requirements, but it is left up to the states to develop and enforce the programs that reduce emissions on the ground. The Biden-era rule to cut methane was designed to ensure that each state implements a minimum standard, setting a floor. This allows states to go further to do more to reduce air pollution from oil and gas. 

This structure of setting pollution rules creates a silver lining in the current moment. 

While the Trump administration continues to prioritize oil industry profits over clean air, every oil and gas state still retains the authority to regulate oil and gas pollution – and to go beyond federal minimums to protect air quality, public health, and the climate. That means meaningful methane reductions can continue even amid federal uncertainty or failure. 

States like New Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Colorado have a real opportunity to step up and build strong methane controls. With the new and emerging methane detection technologies, like methane satellites, state regulatory agencies can innovate and reduce even more pollution to the benefit of the people of their states and the world. 

The Trump administration continues to play politics with the future of our children, communities, and homes, with major attacks on climate action that mean more pollution in our air, water, and our bodies. 

Local communities and states can step up and lead. Now is still the time to act to cut methane.

Interested in getting involved at the local level? Sign up for our newsletter to get the latest news about our work and opportunities to engage.

The post How to Cut Methane when the federal government puts profits before health appeared first on Earthworks.

Oil and methane gas are different.

In February, the Trump administration announced an unprecedented attack to sabotage the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to do its job. At the center of that effort is the science-based “Endangerment Finding”, which found greenhouse gases “may be reasonably anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.” This finding resulted in the regulation of greenhouse gases from cars and other vehicles under the part of the Clean Air Act that addresses mobile sources. It also preceded similar, but separate, scientific findings and legal determinations under other sections of the Clean Air Act that stationary sources are covered under.  Voiding the Endangerment Finding is one of the greatest attacks on the ability of the federal government to tackle the climate crisis to date.

But national rules to cut methane pollution from the oil and gas industry remain intact. The administration’s assault on the Endangerment Finding does not, in and of itself, jeopardize these rules.

Here’s why and what comes next. 

The first reason is a simple yet slightly technical one. 

The Trump administration has primarily focused on undermining rules that cut pollution from cars. The EPA’s power to regulate car pollution comes from  a specific section of the Clean Air Act (section 202). It was for this section alone that the 2009 Endangerment finding was made. It is this section alone that the Trump administration’s action attacks.

Methane and other ‘stationary sources’ of pollution, such as factories, refineries, and power plants are regulated under a different section of the Clean Air Act – section 111.

The second reason is a big one!

Another key argument made by the Trump administration to attack the Endangerment Finding is that Congress never explicitly passed a law ordering the EPA to regulate climate pollution. It is a bold argument from an administration that ignores Congress on everything else, including the decision to go to war. It is also an argument that has been lost in court before, as the seminal case Massachusetts v. EPA held that the Clean Air Act is “unambiguous” that greenhouses gases are “air pollutants” under that law But, both of those points aside, Congress has explicitly recognized EPA’s authority to cut methane emissions in the way that it has. And, Congress did so on two occasions: once in 2021 through a Congressional Review Act resolution disapproving of a 2020 attempt to deregulate methane and again through the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act via the Methane Emissions Reduction Program, and amendment to the Clean Air Act.

This is fantastic news at a time in desperate need of some. 

Methane is an incredibly dangerous climate change accelerant. In the short-term (~20 years), it is 80x more powerful at warming the planet than CO2, and responsible for a third of the warming that has already happened. It leaks at every step of the supply chain – from the hole drilled in the oil and gas fields to the stove top in your kitchen. When it leaks, it is often released with other pollutants, including cancer-causing toxics. 

Now is still the time to act.

Let’s be clear – revoking any part of the ‘Endangerment Finding’ or EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases from any sector is awful and harmful, no doubt. Even if the attack is ultimately defeated in courts or Congress, the delay or suspension of rules to cut pollution hurts families and sets the U.S. on a reverse course on climate than the rest of the world. Lee Zeldin, the EPA Administrator, and Donald Trump continue to play politics with public health and the nation’s economy for the sake of ideology, and to the boon of profits to some donors and supporters. We must fight back against these attacks to ensure clean air and healthy, vibrant communities. 

But for now, national methane rules are still on the books, and oil and gas states like New Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Colorado must keep working to build strong methane controls, including using new technologies like methane satellites to detect and reduce even more pollution.

Activists, communities, scientists, and policymakers fought for years to cut methane gas and slow the climate crisis. Now is the time to keep up demands that our elected officials do their part. 

Interested in getting involved at the local level? Sign up for our newsletter to get the latest news about our work and opportunities to engage.

The post Methane Gas Is Different: How Trump’s Attack on EPA Power Does Not Affect #CutMethane Rules appeared first on Earthworks.

Baca versi bahasa Indonesia dari postingan ini. / Read the Indonesian version of this post.

In Indonesia, a rapid increase in nickel mining for electric-vehicle batteries is producing large amounts of mine waste that threaten local residents and the environment—according to research we’re publishing today. 

Our report finds that government regulations and enforcement have not kept up with the rapid scale-up—resulting in worker deaths, unsafe conditions for communities and water pollution, halts in production, and conditions ripe for further catastrophic infrastructure failures. Indonesia needs to pause the creation of new waste at nickel facilities until adequate protections are in place.

Heavy machinery is buried by a landslide at a mine waste storage facility at Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park, February 2026. Photo by a worker at IMIP.

“These tailings facilities are a disaster by design. The risks created by the huge and growing amount of toxic waste are borne by workers, local communities, and the environment. Since 2015, over 40 workers have died due to unsafe working conditions at one industrial nickel park alone.” – Richard Labiro, Director of Yayasan Tanah Merdeka

Skyrocketing nickel production leads to more toxic waste

Over the past decade, Indonesian nickel production has skyrocketed. In 2015, annual production was 130,000 tons. In 2024, it was 2,310,000 tons—making the country responsible for more than 60 percent of global production.

Most of Indonesia’s increased nickel production comes from high-pressure acid leaching (HPAL) facilities. HPAL uses high pressure, extreme heat, and sulphuric acid to extract the metal. For every ton of nickel, HPAL processing makes 133 tons of waste, also called tailings. The sulfuric acid from HPAL makes the tailings highly corrosive, toxic, and difficult to manage.

Alternate disposal methods also cause harm

Some methods of tailings disposal, including building large dams to hold waste or cutting down huge amounts of forest to spread the waste more thinly, would have significant negative impacts on communities and the environment. Some Indonesian mines dump waste into the ocean or a river, which also has severe consequences for people and aquatic environments. The government committed to no longer issue new permits for ocean dumping. 

Rains and earthquakes increase the risk

The waste from mining and processing have to go somewhere, and nickel processing companies turned to filtered tailings, a method in which some of the water is taken out. This can be a safer method of storing mine waste, but in countries like Indonesia that experience heavy rains and earthquakes, it presents significant risks. 

Last month, one worker died and production halted temporarily after a filtered tailings storage facility collapsed at Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park. In March 2025, a tailings facility failed after heavy rains at the same industrial park, killing three mine workers. Satellite imagery and videos suggest there have been other, unreported failures at the industrial park. 

Villagers and mineworkers need immediate protection measures

The report shows that other Indonesian tailings dams, particularly on Obi Island, are already dangerously tall, unstable, and overfilled. This puts them at risk of imminent collapse. In the event of a dam collapse on Obi Island, the tailings would most likely flow into a nearby river and from there to the Molucca Sea, threatening the safety of mineworkers and residents of the coastal village of Kawasi. The report also finds evidence that seepage from an Obi Island tailings facility contaminated groundwater with boron, chromium-6, and nickel.

“In Kawasi Village, nickel mining and processing have contaminated clean drinking water, and sediment pond failure has flooded the village. Instead of the company stopping activities or at least being forced to improve by the government, the residents’ village is being forcibly removed to a so-called “Eco Village” provided by the company.” – Astuti N. Kilwouw, executive director of WALHI North Maluku

The HPAL nickel operation on Obi Island, a relatively small island of only 3,048 square km, lies next to Kawasi Village. The village would be threatened if the tailings storage facility failed. Photo by Earthworks.

“The communities in Kawasi Village and Soligi Village have to suffer the impact of flooding, river pollution, a clean water crisis due to contaminated drinking water sources, and the impact of air pollution. The failure of the mine waste treatment facility will threaten communities in the two villages.”  – Faizal Walhimalut, WALHI National campaigner

Immediate measures must be taken to protect those downstream of the Obi Island filtered tailings facility. And our report shows the safety risk is present at other sites as well. A facility at the Indonesia Weda Bay Industrial Park is also operating under dangerous conditions that far exceed what has been built anywhere else in the world, and the deaths at Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park demonstrate the need for urgent action. 

Report calls for a moratorium until dangers are addressed

We’re calling for a moratorium on adding more tailings to existing filtered tailings facilities and on permits for new facilities until the Indonesian government establishes improved safety guidelines. These guidelines should meet the standard set by Safety First: Guidelines for Responsible Mine Tailings Management, a framework for tailings dams approved by 164 NGOs, technical experts, and Indigenous frontline communities. 

“People on Sorowako, including women, farmers, and fishers, have been speaking up about the harm that mining causes them, their communities, and their land and water. It is time for local and national governments, companies and investors to take these concerns seriously and put in place safeguards for people and the environment.” – Muhammad Al Amien, executive director of WALHI South Sulawesi

Independent safety inspections should be carried out at all tailings facilities in order to re-open. No new waste should go into these facilities until they’ve been deemed safe by a credible independent expert accountable to the Indonesian government.

Companies should actively engage all communities and workers who are at risk to co-design emergency management and response plans that keep people safe while also respecting residents’ rights to choose to stay in their homes and on their land.

Action now could save lives and build a more just and sustainable future 

The minerals needed to power the transition to cleaner energy must be sourced in safe, sustainable ways that safeguard people’s lives and rights and protect the environment. Workers and communities in Indonesia should not be forced to sacrifice their lives, safety, and rights to supply minerals to the world. A just and stable transition to cleaner energy requires governments, mining companies, buyers, and investors to address the serious risks and harms associated with this growing industry.

The company and the government must be held accountable for their mining management policies that destroy the local ecological system by ignoring the voice and participation of the community! – Astuti N. Kilwouw, executive director of WALHI North Maluku

You can read the full report here. It is endorsed by WALHI Southeast Sulawesi, WALHI South Sulawesi, WALHI North Maluku, Yayasan Tanah Merdeka (YTM), PUSPAHAM, Satya Bumi, and Aksi Ekologi & Emansipasi Rakyat (AEER).

The post New Report: Indonesia’s Nickel Boom Puts People in Harm’s Way appeared first on Earthworks.

Read the English version of this post. / Baca versi bahasa Inggris dari postingan ini.

Di Indonesia, peningkatan pesat penambangan nikel untuk baterai kendaraan listrik menghasilkan limbah tambang dalam jumlah sangat besar yang mengancam masyarakat setempat dan lingkungan—menurut penelitian yang kami publikasikan pada hari ini.

Laporan kami menemukan bahwa peraturan perundang-undangan dan penegakan hukum pemerintah belum mampu mengikuti laju ekspansi industri yang sangat cepat, sehingga mengakibatkan kematian pekerja, kondisi yang tidak aman bagi masyarakat, pencemaran air, penghentian produksi, serta terciptanya kondisi yang berpotensi memicu kegagalan infrastruktur secara katastrofik di masa mendatang. Indonesia perlu menghentikan sementara produksi limbah baru dari fasilitas nikel sampai perlindungan yang memadai benar-benar diterapkan.

Alat berat tertimbun tanah longsor di fasilitas penyimpanan limbah tambang di Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park, Februari 2026. Foto oleh pekerja IMIP.

“Di Indonesia saat ini, fasilitas tailing itu pada dasarnya adalah bencana yang sudah ‘dirancang’. Risiko maupun volume limbah beracun ini besar sekali dan terus meningkat. Bencana ini yang menanggung adalah para pekerja, masyarakat setempat, dan lingkungan hidup. Sejak tahun 2015, lebih dari 40 pekerja telah meninggal karena kondisi kerja yang tidak aman – dan ini hanya dari satu kawasan industri nikel saja. Sudah saatnya perusahaan dan pemerintah mengatur dan mengelola tailing dengan baik untuk mengatasi risiko bencana ini.” – Richard Labiro, Direktur Yayasan Tanah Merdeka

Lonjakan produksi nikel menghasilkan lebih banyak limbah beracun

Dalam satu dekade terakhir, produksi nikel Indonesia meningkat sangat pesat. Pada 2015, produksi tahunan mencapai 130.000 ton. Pada 2024, angka tersebut meningkat menjadi 2.310.000 ton, menjadikan Indonesia bertanggung jawab atas lebih dari 60 persen produksi nikel dunia.

Sebagian besar peningkatan produksi nikel Indonesia berasal dari fasilitas High-Pressure Acid Leaching (pelindian asam bertekanan tinggi – HPAL). Teknologi HPAL ini menggunakan tekanan tinggi, suhu sangat tinggi, dan asam sulfat untuk mengekstraksi logam tersebut. Untuk setiap satu ton nikel yang dihasilkan, proses HPAL menghasilkan sekitar 133 ton limbah, yang juga disebut tailing. Kandungan asam sulfat dari proses HPAL membuat tailing tersebut sangat korosif, beracun, dan sulit dikelola.

Metode pembuangan alternatif juga menimbulkan kerugian

Beberapa metode pembuangan tailing, termasuk membangun bendungan besar untuk menampung limbah atau menebang hutan dalam jumlah besar untuk menyebarkan limbah secara lebih luas, dapat menimbulkan dampak negatif yang signifikan bagi masyarakat dan lingkungan. Beberapa tambang di Indonesia juga membuang limbah ke laut atau ke sungai, yang menimbulkan konsekuensi serius bagi masyarakat dan ekosistem perairan. Pemerintah telah berkomitmen untuk tidak lagi menerbitkan izin baru bagi pembuangan limbah ke laut.

Curah hujan dan gempa meningkatkan risiko

Limbah dari kegiatan penambangan dan pengolahan mau tidak mau harus disimpan di suatu tempat, dan perusahaan pengolahan nikel kemudian beralih menggunakan tailing yang difilter. Metode ini mengurangi sebagian kandungan air dalam tailing sehingga dapat menjadi cara yang lebih aman untuk menyimpan limbah tambang. Namun, di negara seperti Indonesia yang mengalami curah hujan tinggi dan aktivitas gempa, metode ini tetap menghadirkan risiko yang signifikan.

Bulan lalu, satu pekerja meninggal dunia dan operasi produksi sempat dihentikan sementara setelah fasilitas penyimpanan tailing yang difilter runtuh di Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park (IMIP). Pada Maret 2025, fasilitas tailing lain di kawasan industri yang sama gagal setelah hujan lebat, menewaskan tiga pekerja tambang. Citra satelit dan rekaman video menunjukkan kemungkinan telah terjadi kegagalan lain yang tidak dilaporkan di kawasan industri tersebut.

Penduduk desa dan pekerja tambang membutuhkan perlindungan segera

Laporan tersebut menunjukkan bahwa bendungan tailing lain di Indonesia, khususnya di Pulau Obi, sudah memiliki ketinggian yang berbahaya, tidak stabil, dan terisi tailing melebihi kapasitasnya. Kondisi ini menempatkan fasilitas-fasilitas tersebut pada risiko keruntuhan yang dapat terjadi sewaktu-waktu.Jika bendungan tailing di Pulau Obi runtuh, tailing tersebut kemungkinan besar akan mengalir ke sungai terdekat dan kemudian menuju Laut Maluku, sehingga mengancam keselamatan pekerja tambang serta penduduk Desa Kawasi di wilayah pesisir. Laporan tersebut juga menemukan bukti bahwa rembesan dari fasilitas tailing di Pulau Obi telah mencemari air tanah dengan boron, kromium-6, dan nikel.

“Desa Kawasi, misalnya, aktivitas pertambangan dan pengolahan nikel telah mencemari sumber air bersih. Selain itu, kegagalan kolam sedimen menyebabkan banjir di desa. Alih-alih kegiatannya dihentikan atau setidaknya pemerintah memaksa mereka melakukan perbaikan, ini justru warganya yang dipindahkan secara paksa ke tempat yang disebut “Eco Village” yang memang disediakan oleh perusahaan.” – Astuti N. Kilwouw, Direktur Eksekutif WALHI Maluku Utara

Operasi nikel HPAL di Pulau Obi berada tepat di sebelah Desa Kawasi, yang akan terancam apabila fasilitas penyimpanan tailing gagal. Foto oleh Earthworks.

“Masyarakat di Desa Kawasi dan Desa Soligi harus menanggung dampak banjir, pencemaran sungai, krisis air bersih karena sumber air minum mereka yang terkontaminasi, serta dampak polusi udara. Kemungkinan terjadinya kegagalan fasilitas pengolahan limbah tambang akan semakin mengancam keselamatan masyarakat di kedua desa tersebut.” – Faizal Walhimalut, Juru Kampanye Nasional WALHI

Langkah-langkah segera harus diambil untuk melindungi masyarakat yang berada di wilayah hilir dari fasilitas tailing yang difilter di Pulau Obi. Laporan kami juga menunjukkan bahwa risiko keselamatan serupa terdapat di lokasi lain. Sebuah fasilitas di Indonesia Weda Bay Industrial Park (IWIP) juga beroperasi dalam kondisi berbahaya yang jauh melampaui batas desain yang pernah dibangun di tempat lain di dunia, sementara kematian pekerja di Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park (IMIP) menunjukkan perlunya tindakan segera.

Laporan menyerukan moratorium hingga bahaya ditangani

Kami menyerukan moratorium terhadap penambahan tailing baru ke fasilitas tailing yang difilter yang sudah ada, serta moratorium terhadap penerbitan izin bagi fasilitas baru, sampai pemerintah Indonesia menetapkan pedoman keselamatan yang lebih kuat. Pedoman tersebut harus memenuhi standar yang ditetapkan dalam Safety First: Guidelines for Responsible Mine Tailings Management, yaitu kerangka pengelolaan bendungan tailing yang telah disetujui oleh 164 organisasi masyarakat sipil, pakar teknis, dan komunitas masyarakat adat di garis depan.

“Di Sorowako, masyarakat—para perempuan, petani, dan nelayan—sudah lama menyuarakan dampak buruk pertambangan terhadap kehidupan mereka, komunitas mereka, tanah serta sumber air yang mereka. Sudah saatnya, pemerintah daerah maupun nasional, perusahaan, serta para investor sungguh-sungguh mendengarkan dan menanggapi kekhawatiran ini. Mereka perlu memastikan adanya perlindungan yang memadai bagi masyarakat dan lingkungan.” Muhammad Al Amien, Direktur Eksekutif WALHI Sulawesi Selatan

Inspeksi keselamatan yang independen harus dilakukan pada seluruh fasilitas tailing sebelum fasilitas tersebut diizinkan beroperasi kembali. Tidak boleh ada limbah baru yang dimasukkan ke fasilitas-fasilitas tersebut sampai fasilitas tersebut dinyatakan aman oleh ahli independen yang kredibel dan bertanggung jawab kepada pemerintah Indonesia.

Perusahaan juga harus secara aktif melibatkan seluruh komunitas dan pekerja yang berisiko untuk merancang bersama rencana manajemen dan respons keadaan darurat yang memrioritaskan keselamatan masyarakat, sekaligus menghormati hak warga untuk memilih tetap tinggal di rumah dan di tanah mereka.

Tindakan sekarang dapat menyelamatkan nyawa dan membangun masa depan yang lebih adil dan berkelanjutan

Mineral yang dibutuhkan untuk mendukung transisi menuju energi yang lebih bersih harus diperoleh melalui cara yang aman dan berkelanjutan, yang melindungi kehidupan dan hak-hak manusia serta menjaga lingkungan. Para pekerja dan masyarakat di Indonesia tidak seharusnya dipaksa mengorbankan kehidupan, keselamatan, dan hak-hak mereka demi memasok mineral bagi dunia. Transisi yang adil dan stabil menuju energi yang lebih bersih menuntut pemerintah, perusahaan pertambangan, pembeli, dan investor untuk menangani secara serius berbagai risiko dan dampak yang ditimbulkan oleh industri yang berkembang pesat ini.

“Perusahaan dan pemerintah harusnya dimintai pertanggungjawaban atas kebijakan pengelolaan pertambangan yang merusak sistem ekologi setempat yang mengabaikan keluhan dan partisipasi masyarakat!” – Astuti N. Kilwouw, Direktur Eksekutif WALHI Maluku Utara

Laporan lengkap dapat dibaca melalui tautan berikut. Laporan ini didukung oleh WALHI Sultra, WALHI Sulawesi Selatan, WALHI Maluku Utara, Yayasan Tanah Merdeka (YTM), PUSPAHAM, Satya Bumi, dan Aksi Ekologi & Emansipasi Rakyat (AEER).

The post Laporan Baru: Perkembangan Pesat Industri Nikel Indonesia Membahayakan Masyarakat appeared first on Earthworks.

While oil grabs most of the headlines, Shell’s ambitions in Brazil extend far beyond offshore drilling rigs and deep-water crude.

This week, fresh news reports from Investing.com, Yahoo Finance and other financial outlets have highlighted renewed focus on Raízen, the giant Brazilian biofuels company jointly controlled by Shell and the Brazilian conglomerate Cosan.

The message from Shell appears clear: even as it expands oil production in Brazil’s offshore pre-salt fields, the company is also reinforcing its position in one of the world’s largest ethanol and bioenergy businesses.

In other words, Shell wants to sell you both the fossil fuel and the plant-based alternative.

A Biofuel Giant Few Outside Brazil Know

Raízen may not be a household name globally, but it is one of the largest energy companies in Latin America.

Formed in 2011 as a joint venture between Shell and Cosan, the company has grown into a massive integrated bioenergy operation.

Today Raízen operates:

• Dozens of ethanol production plants

• One of the largest sugar-cane processing networks in the world

• Thousands of Shell-branded service stations across Brazil

• Major bioenergy and electricity generation facilities.

Brazil’s unique agricultural and energy landscape — particularly its vast sugar-cane industry — makes the country the global leader in ethanol fuel production.

And Raízen sits right at the centre of that ecosystem.

Shell’s Strategic Bet on Biofuels

Recent reports from financial news platforms including Investing.com and Yahoo Finance highlight how Raízen remains a key part of Shell’s broader energy strategy in Brazil.

The company is heavily involved in second-generation ethanol (E2G) — a more advanced biofuel produced from agricultural waste such as sugar-cane straw and bagasse.

These fuels are often promoted as a lower-carbon alternative to conventional petrol because they utilise plant residues rather than food crops.

Shell has repeatedly presented biofuels as one of the pillars of its energy transition strategy, alongside LNG, hydrogen and renewable power.

Brazil — with its huge sugar-cane harvest — provides the perfect laboratory for that strategy.

A Tough Year for Raízen

But the Raízen story is not entirely sweet.

Recent financial coverage suggests the company has faced significant market pressure, including volatility in sugar prices, high debt levels and investor concerns about profitability.

Shares in Raízen have fallen sharply over the past year, prompting speculation about potential restructuring or strategic changes.

Shell, as a major shareholder in the joint venture, has reportedly been exploring ways to strengthen the company’s financial position and stabilise its operations.

Industry analysts say that could involve operational adjustments, new financing arrangements, or deeper strategic integration with Shell’s broader energy portfolio.

Sugar, Ethanol — and Global Energy Politics

The significance of Raízen goes beyond Brazil.

Biofuels are increasingly seen by governments as a way to reduce emissions from sectors that are difficult to electrify — such as aviation, shipping and heavy transport.

Shell has been investing heavily in biofuel supply chains, including sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

Brazil’s ethanol industry could therefore play an increasingly important role in the global energy system.

Yet critics argue that biofuels also raise difficult questions about land use, agriculture and environmental impact.

Large-scale sugar-cane cultivation can place pressure on ecosystems and water resources, while expanding biofuel production may compete with food supply or encourage deforestation.

As with many aspects of the energy transition, the reality is more complicated than the marketing slogans.

Investors Watching Closely

Shell’s involvement in Raízen is also closely watched by the company’s powerful investor base.

The oil major’s largest institutional shareholders — including BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street — hold enormous stakes across the global energy sector and have increasingly demanded credible transition strategies from oil companies.

Biofuels provide one way for companies like Shell to present a lower-carbon growth narrative while continuing to operate large fossil-fuel businesses.

It is, from a corporate strategy perspective, a rather elegant balancing act.

Brazil: Shell’s Energy Laboratory

Taken together with Shell’s booming offshore oil investments and its expanding ethanol empire, Brazil is becoming one of the most strategically important countries in the company’s global portfolio.

Few places offer the same combination of:

• giant offshore oil reserves

• a mature biofuels industry

• large domestic energy demand

• and a stable regulatory environment.

For Shell, Brazil increasingly looks like an energy laboratory for the 21st century.

One where crude oil, ethanol, LNG and renewable power all compete — and occasionally cooperate — in the same market.

Whether that ultimately leads to a cleaner energy system remains open to debate.

But one thing is certain.

Wherever energy markets evolve next, Shell intends to be involved.

DISCLAIMER

This article is commentary and analysis based on publicly available reporting, including recent financial news coverage from Investing.com, Yahoo Finance and other outlets. It is intended for journalistic discussion purposes only and does not constitute financial, legal or investment advice.

Shell Doubles Down on Brazil’s Sugar-Fuel Empire: Raízen Back in the Spotlight was first posted on March 6, 2026 at 8:56 pm.
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While politicians talk endlessly about climate targets and energy transitions, the oil industry tends to operate on a much simpler principle: follow the barrels.

And right now, Shell believes those barrels increasingly lie beneath the Atlantic waters off Brazil.

According to a Reuters report, Shell’s Brazilian chief has described the country’s oil sector as presenting an “enormous opportunity” for investment and expansion. (Sahm)

The comment came amid heightened geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, which have once again reminded energy companies of the advantages of producing oil in politically stable regions.

Brazil, it turns out, looks very attractive.

When Geopolitics Boosts Oil Investment

Speaking in Rio de Janeiro, Shell Brazil CEO Cristiano Pinto da Costa said global tensions — including conflict involving Iran — could push investors toward Brazil’s oil sector.

“The U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran presents Brazil with an ‘enormous opportunity’ to attract investments to develop its oil assets,” he said. (Sahm)

Brazil’s political stability and reputation as a reliable oil producer give it a competitive advantage compared with other major hydrocarbon regions, he added. (Sahm)

In other words, when the world’s most volatile oil region starts looking even more volatile than usual, oil companies start scanning the map for somewhere calmer to drill.

Brazil fits the bill.

Shell’s Brazilian Expansion Strategy

Shell has been quietly transforming Brazil into one of the pillars of its global oil portfolio.

The company has dramatically expanded its exploration footprint in recent years.

“We went from having 10 to 15 blocks in 2021 to having 50 exploratory blocks in our portfolio today. This was a conscious strategic decision,” Pinto da Costa said. (Sahm)

Last year alone, Shell invested 12.5 billion reais (about $2.4 billion) in Brazil — one of the largest investments the company has made in any single country. (Sahm)

Production has followed suit.

Shell said it reached a record output of about 496,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day in Brazil in February 2026. (Sahm)

For a company constantly searching for new reserves to replace declining production elsewhere, those numbers matter.

Quite a lot.

The Pre-Salt Jackpot

Much of the excitement revolves around Brazil’s deep-water “pre-salt” oil fields, vast reservoirs trapped beneath thick layers of salt beneath the seabed.

These discoveries over the past two decades have transformed Brazil into one of the world’s fastest-growing offshore oil provinces.

The fields are technologically challenging and enormously expensive to develop — but they can also produce huge volumes of oil for decades.

Shell is already heavily involved in several of these projects alongside Brazil’s state oil company Petrobras and other partners.

The company is also developing new assets such as the Orca field, part of its broader effort to expand deep-water production in the region. (Sahm)

In practical terms, Brazil has become one of the most important engines of Shell’s global oil production.

Investors Love Deepwater Oil

There is another reason why Brazil is attracting so much attention from oil majors.

Deepwater projects, once operational, tend to produce large volumes of oil at relatively low operating costs — making them extremely profitable when global oil prices rise.

That profitability matters to Shell’s biggest shareholders.

The company’s investor base includes giant asset managers such as BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street, whose funds depend heavily on the steady dividend streams produced by global oil and gas projects.

And despite years of climate rhetoric, Shell continues to return tens of billions of dollars to shareholders through dividends and share buybacks.

Oil fields like those off Brazil’s coast help make that possible.

Climate Promises vs Fossil Fuel Reality

All of this raises an obvious question.

Shell, like most major oil companies, says it supports the transition to lower-carbon energy.

Yet it is simultaneously expanding investments in long-life fossil fuel projects — projects that could produce oil well into the 2040s or even 2050s.

Brazil’s offshore oil boom is a prime example of this contradiction.

On one hand, governments and corporations promise decarbonisation.

On the other, they continue developing some of the largest new oil provinces on the planet.

For the oil industry, however, the logic is straightforward: global demand for oil remains enormous.

And as long as that demand exists, companies will compete aggressively to supply it.

Brazil: The Next Oil Superpower?

With its vast offshore resources, political stability, and growing technical expertise, Brazil is increasingly viewed by the industry as one of the most important oil frontiers of the 21st century.

Shell clearly intends to be at the centre of that story.

Whether the world actually needs more oil from deep beneath the Atlantic is another question entirely.

But from Shell’s perspective, the opportunity — as its own executive put it — is “enormous.”

DISCLAIMER

This article is commentary and analysis based on publicly available reporting and historical information, including reporting by Reuters. It is intended for journalistic discussion purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or legal advice.

Crisis in the Middle East, Opportunity in Brazil: Shell Eyes a Fossil Fuel Bonanza was first posted on March 6, 2026 at 8:31 pm.
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For years, Venezuela was the oil industry’s forbidden zone — a country with the largest proven oil reserves on Earth but locked behind layers of sanctions, political turmoil and diplomatic brinkmanship.

Now the door is creaking open again.

Recent reporting by Upstream Online and other energy news outlets indicates that Shell has confirmed it is preparing to move forward with Venezuelan energy opportunities, following major shifts in U.S. sanctions policy that now allow international oil companies to negotiate deals with the country’s state oil company, PDVSA. (upstreamonline.com)

For Shell, this signals something remarkable: a return to a country that once epitomised geopolitical risk — but also offers one of the most enticing hydrocarbon prizes on the planet.

Washington Opens the Door

The catalyst for Shell’s renewed interest is a dramatic change in U.S. policy.

Earlier in 2026, the U.S. Treasury issued licences allowing companies such as Shell, BP, Chevron, Eni and Repsol to negotiate contracts and investments in Venezuela’s oil and gas sector. (upstreamonline.com)

These licences allow the companies to explore, develop and produce hydrocarbons in partnership with PDVSA, although transactions must remain subject to U.S. legal oversight and compliance rules.

For the oil industry, the message from Washington was unmistakable: Venezuela — long isolated by sanctions — may once again be open for business.

The Dragon Gas Prize

At the centre of Shell’s Venezuelan ambitions sits the Dragon offshore gas field, located near the maritime border with Trinidad and Tobago.

The project has been discussed for years but repeatedly stalled by sanctions and political uncertainty. If revived, Dragon could provide a crucial new gas supply for Trinidad’s LNG and petrochemical industry, which has been struggling with declining domestic production.

Shell has previously targeted first gas from the Dragon field around 2026, with production intended to flow to Trinidad’s energy infrastructure. (offshore-technology.com)

For Trinidad, the project could stabilise a key export sector.

For Shell, it represents a potentially lucrative foothold in a country that contains vast untapped energy resources.

The World’s Biggest Oil Reserves — Still Waiting

Venezuela holds an estimated 300 billion barrels of proven oil reserves, the largest in the world. (World Oil)

Yet years of sanctions, underinvestment, and economic collapse have left much of the country’s oil infrastructure deteriorating or idle.

Industry analysts say rebuilding the sector could require tens of billions of dollars in new investment, alongside years of technical work to restore fields, pipelines and refineries. (woodmac.com)

In other words: the opportunity is enormous — but so are the risks.

Shell’s Strategic Calculation

Shell has not yet announced final investment decisions for Venezuelan projects, but CEO Wael Sawan has publicly acknowledged the company is evaluating multibillion-dollar offshore gas investments in the country. (OilPrice.com)

If approvals fall into place, these projects could move quickly.

“These are opportunities that could potentially be activated within months,” Sawan said when discussing potential Venezuelan developments. (The Guardian)

That kind of timeline is unusually brisk for an industry known for decade-long project cycles.

Investors, Dividends — and Fossil Fuel Expansion

Shell’s renewed interest in Venezuela comes as the company continues to prioritise shareholder returns.

Despite falling profits in recent years, the company has maintained large payouts, including billions in share buybacks and increased dividends. (The Guardian)

Large institutional investors — including BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street — remain among Shell’s biggest shareholders, and their funds depend heavily on the steady cash flows generated by global oil and gas production.

The result is a familiar tension.

While Shell and other oil majors publicly support the energy transition, they are simultaneously exploring new hydrocarbon opportunities — including some of the most politically complex oil provinces in the world.

A Return to a Complicated Country

Even with sanctions easing, Venezuela remains a challenging environment for international oil companies.

The country’s political stability, legal frameworks and infrastructure remain uncertain after years of economic crisis.

And the broader geopolitical context continues to shift rapidly.

Still, the prize is difficult for oil majors to ignore.

If the licences remain in place and negotiations proceed, Shell’s Venezuelan comeback could become one of the most consequential energy developments of the decade.

Or — given Venezuela’s history — the latest chapter in a project that never quite manages to happen.

Shell’s Venezuelan Comeback: Big Oil Returns to the World’s Most Sanctioned Oil Patch was first posted on March 6, 2026 at 8:13 pm.
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Drought and heatwaves occurring together – known as “compound” events – have “surged” across the world since the early 2000s, a new study shows. 

Compound drought and heat events (CDHEs) can have devastating effects, creating the ideal conditions for intense wildfires, such as Australia’s “Black Summer” of 2019-20 where bushfires burned 24m hectares and killed 33 people.

The research, published in Science Advances, finds that the increase in CDHEs is predominantly being driven by events that start with a heatwave.

The global area affected by such “heatwave-led” compound events has more than doubled between 1980-2001 and 2002-23, the study says. 

The rapid increase in these events over the last 23 years cannot be explained solely by global warming, the authors note. 

Since the late 1990s, feedbacks between the land and the atmosphere have become stronger, making heatwaves more likely to trigger drought conditions, they explain.

One of the study authors tells Carbon Brief that societies must pay greater attention to compound events, which can “cause severe impacts on ecosystems, agriculture and society”.

Compound events

CDHEs are extreme weather events where drought and heatwave conditions occur simultaneously – or shortly after each other – in the same region.

These events are often triggered by large-scale weather patterns, such as “blocking” highs, which can produce “prolonged” hot and dry conditions, according to the study.

Prof Sang-Wook Yeh is one of the study authors and a professor at the Ewha Womans University in South Korea. He tells Carbon Brief:

“When heatwaves and droughts occur together, the two hazards reinforce each other through land-atmosphere interactions. This amplifies surface heating and soil moisture deficits, making compound events more intense and damaging than single hazards.”

CDHEs can begin with either a heatwave or a drought.

The sequence of these extremes is important, the study says, as they have different drivers and impacts.

For example, in a CDHE where the heatwave was the precursor, increased direct sunshine causes more moisture loss from soils and plants, leading to a drought. 

Conversely, in an event where the drought was the precursor, the lack of soil moisture means that less of the sun’s energy goes into evaporation and more goes into warming the Earth’s surface. This produces favourable conditions for heatwaves.

The study shows that the majority of CDHEs globally start out as a drought.

In recent years, there has been increasing focus on these events due to the devastating impact they have on agriculture, ecosystems and public health.

In Russia in the summer of 2010, a compound drought-heatwave event – and the associated wildfires – caused the death of nearly 55,000 people, the study notes.

Saint Basil’s Cathedral, on Red Square, in Moscow, was affected by smog during the fires in Russia in the summer of 2010. Credit: ZUMA Press, Inc. / Alamy Stock Photo

The record-breaking Pacific north-west “heat dome” in 2021 triggered extreme drought conditions that caused “significant declines” in wheat yields, as well as in barley, canola and fruit production in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada, says the study.

Increasing events

To assess how CDHEs are changing, the researchers use daily reanalysis data to identify droughts and heatwaves events. (Reanalysis data combines past observations with climate models to create a historical climate record.) Then, using an algorithm, they analyse how these events overlap in both time and space.

The study covers the period from 1980 to 2023 and the world’s land surface, excluding polar regions where CDHEs are rare.

The research finds that the area of land affected by CDHEs has “increased substantially” since the early 2000s.

Heatwave-led events have been the main contributor to this increase, the study says, with their spatial extent rising 110% between 1980-2001 and 2002-23, compared to a 59% increase for drought-led events.

The map below shows the global distribution of CDHEs over 1980-2023. The charts show the percentage of the land surface affected by a heatwave-led CDHE (red) or a drought-led CDHE (yellow) in a given year (left) and relative increase in each CDHE type (right).

The study finds that CDHEs have occurred most frequently in northern South America, the southern US, eastern Europe, central Africa and south Asia.

Spatial and temporal occurrence of compound drought and heatwave events over the study period from 1980 to 2023. The map (top) shows CDHEs around the world, with darker colours indicating higher frequency of occurrence. The chart in the bottom left shows how much land surface was affected by a compound event in a given year, where red accounts for heatwave-led events, and yellow, drought-led events. The chart in the bottom right shows the relative increase of each CDHE type in 2002-23 compared with 1980-2001. Source: Kim et al. (2026) Threshold passed

The authors explain that the increase in heatwave-led CDHEs is related to rising global temperatures, but that this does not tell the whole story.

In the earlier 22-year period of 1980-2001, the study finds that the spatial extent of heatwave-led CDHEs rises by 1.6% per 1C of global temperature rise. For the more-recent period of 2022-23, this increases “nearly eightfold” to 13.1%.

The change suggests that the rapid increase in the heatwave-led CDHEs occurred after the global average temperature “surpasse[d] a certain temperature threshold”, the paper says.

This threshold is an absolute global average temperature of 14.3C, the authors estimate (based on an 11-year average), which the world passed around the year 2000.

Investigating the recent surge in heatwave-leading CDHEs further, the researchers find a “regime shift” in land-atmosphere dynamics “toward a persistently intensified state after the late 1990s”.

In other words, the way that drier soils drive higher surface temperatures, and vice versa, is becoming stronger, resulting in more heatwave-led compound events.

Daily data

The research has some advantages over other previous studies, Yeh says. For instance, the new work uses daily estimations of CDHEs, compared to monthly data used in past research. This is “important for capturing the detailed occurrence” of these events, says Yeh. 

He adds that another advantage of their study is that it distinguishes the sequence of droughts and heatwaves, which allows them to “better understand the differences” in the characteristics of CDHEs.

Dr Meryem Tanarhte is a climate scientist at the University Hassan II in Morocco, and Dr Ruth Cerezo Mota is a climatologist and a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Both scientists, who were not involved in the study, agree that the daily estimations give a clearer picture of how CDHEs are changing.

Cerezo-Mota adds that another major contribution of the study is its global focus. She tells Carbon Brief that in some regions, such as Mexico and Africa, there is a lack of studies on CDHEs:

“Not because the events do not occur, but perhaps because [these regions] do not have all the data or the expertise to do so.”

However, she notes that the reanalysis data used by the study does have limitations with how it represents rainfall in some parts of the world.

Compound impacts

The study notes that if CDHEs continue to intensify – particularly events where heatwaves are the precursors – they could drive declining crop productivity, increased wildfire frequency and severe public health crises.

These impacts could be “much more rapid and severe as global warming continues”, Yeh tells Carbon Brief.

Tanarhte notes that these events can be forecasted up to 10 days ahead in many regions. Furthermore, she says, the strongest impacts can be prevented “through preparedness and adaptation”, including through “water management for agriculture, heatwave mitigation measures and wildfire mitigation”.

The study recommends reassessing current risk management strategies for these compound events. It also suggests incorporating the sequences of drought and heatwaves into compound event analysis frameworks “to enhance climate risk management”.

Cerezo-Mota says that it is clear that the world needs to be prepared for the increased occurrence of these events. She tells Carbon Brief:

“These [risk assessments and strategies] need to be carried out at the local level to understand the complexities of each region.”

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The post Heatwaves driving recent ‘surge’ in compound drought and heat extremes appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Just when you thought one of the oil industry’s most notorious corruption sagas might finally fade into history, Nigeria has decided to give it a fresh coat of paint and a new corporate structure.

The controversial offshore oil licence OPL 245—long associated with bribery allegations, court battles across continents, and enough legal paperwork to deforest half the Niger Delta—has now been split into four new blocks under an arrangement involving Shell plc and Italy’s Eni, according to a report by Reuters. (MarketScreener)

The restructuring is designed to finally unlock production from one of Nigeria’s richest untapped oil reserves, bringing an end—at least in theory—to a saga that has embarrassed governments, prosecutors, and oil majors for nearly three decades.

Or, to put it less politely: the industry’s most infamous oil deal is getting a reboot.

The Deal That Would Not Die

According to Reuters, Nigeria has broken up the OPL 245 oil block into four new assets to be operated by Eni and Shell, potentially clearing the way for development of the massive deepwater field. (MarketScreener)

The move could finally enable production from a field estimated to contain billions of barrels of oil, which has sat idle for almost 30 years due to lawsuits, criminal investigations and political disputes. (TheCable)

In other words: one of Africa’s most valuable oil discoveries has spent nearly three decades in legal purgatory while lawyers, prosecutors, activists and oil executives argued about what exactly happened to the money.

A Brief History of a Very Expensive Mess

The story begins in 1998, when the Nigerian government awarded the OPL 245 licence to Malabu Oil & Gas, a company secretly controlled by the country’s then petroleum minister Dan Etete. (Wikipedia)

Yes—Nigeria’s oil minister awarded one of the country’s most valuable oil blocks to a company he effectively owned.

Things only became more surreal from there.

After years of disputes, Shell and Eni struck a deal in 2011 to acquire the licence for roughly $1.3 billion. (Wikipedia)

Investigators later alleged that around $1.1 billion of that payment was diverted to politicians and intermediaries. (Wikipedia)

The allegations triggered one of the largest international corruption investigations in the history of the oil industry, spanning Italy, Nigeria, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Shell and Eni consistently denied wrongdoing.

After years of court proceedings, an Italian court acquitted both companies and their executives in 2021, concluding there was no case to answer. (Wikipedia)

Legally speaking, the companies walked away.

Reputationally? The stain never quite washed off.

Nigeria’s Latest Attempt to Move On

The Nigerian government now appears determined to finally monetise the field.

Splitting OPL 245 into four blocks is intended to simplify development and remove the legal knots that have kept the oil underground for nearly three decades. (leadership.ng)

Final agreements for the restructured assets are expected to be signed as the country seeks to boost crude production and attract investment into its offshore sector. (TheCable)

For Shell and Eni, the prize is obvious: access to one of the largest undeveloped deepwater oil resources in West Africa.

For Nigeria’s government, the motivation is equally clear: oil revenue.

For critics, however, the optics are… complicated.

Climate Promises Meet Nine Billion Barrels

The timing of the deal is awkward.

Shell, like many oil majors, has spent the past few years promising a “transition to net zero” while simultaneously expanding its portfolio of long-life fossil fuel projects.

OPL 245—believed to contain around nine billion barrels of oil equivalent—would hardly qualify as a minor side project. (Wikipedia)

Developing the field would lock in decades of oil production at precisely the moment governments claim to be accelerating the global energy transition.

In fairness, Shell has never suggested it intends to stop producing oil anytime soon.

That would be bad for business—and even worse for the institutional investors that dominate its shareholder base.

Among the company’s largest investors are BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street, asset-management giants whose funds hold vast positions across the global fossil-fuel sector.

When the world’s largest money managers depend on oil dividends, the energy transition tends to proceed at a pace best described as… leisurely.

The Niger Delta: Still Waiting

Meanwhile, communities in the Niger Delta—home to decades of oil spills, pollution disputes and environmental litigation—may view the resurrection of OPL 245 with a degree of scepticism.

Shell has faced repeated legal actions over pollution claims in the region, including lawsuits brought by thousands of Nigerian residents seeking compensation and environmental cleanup. (Wikipedia)

Those cases are ongoing.

And while corporate press releases tend to emphasise “economic development,” locals often remember something slightly different: oil spills, flaring gas, and rivers that occasionally resemble motor oil.

Divide by Four, Carry the Controversy

So here we are.

A deal that once triggered global corruption investigations is now being reassembled—this time split into four convenient pieces.

Perhaps that makes it easier to develop.

Or perhaps it simply spreads the controversy around more evenly.

Either way, OPL 245 remains a reminder that in the oil industry, scandals rarely die.

They just get restructured.

DISCLAIMER

This article is commentary and opinion based on publicly available reporting and historical information. It is intended for journalistic and satirical discussion purposes only and does not constitute financial, legal, or investment advice.

OPL 245 Returns: The $1.3 Billion Scandal That Refuses to Stay Buried was first posted on March 6, 2026 at 7:53 pm.
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This article Remembering civil rights icon Bernard LaFayette was originally published by Waging Nonviolence.

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Everyone lovingly called him “Doc.”

Today is my last morning waking up in Japan after an incredible 20-day trip through Taiwan and my homeland. This morning, I woke up to a flood of text messages telling me that Dr. Bernard LaFayette, who everyone lovingly called “Doc” had passed away.

Doc, in addition to being one of the most important teachers I have ever had, was a legend of the civil rights era — the first organizer to go to Selma, Alabama, co-founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, or SNCC, national coordinator of the original Poor People’s Campaign — as well as the co-author of the Kingian Nonviolence Conflict Reconciliation training philosophy and author of his personal memoir, “In Peace and Freedom: My Journey in Selma.”

Being on the other side of the world, moving through long days of travel and family schedules, I thought I would not have much time to process it. But today, on our last day here, we decided to let our daughter nap at home instead of going out. Suddenly I found myself with a couple of quiet hours to myself. In the stillness, memories of Doc began flowing, and I felt the urge to sit and share a few stories about the man so many of us loved.

Like so many wise elders like Desmond Tutu or the Dalai Lama, Doc had a childlike quality to him. He was always joyful and playful, almost carrying an innocent, naïve presence despite the violence he had lived through, experienced, and fought against — having been beaten and arrested dozens of times and surviving an assassination attempt. He had an unwavering hopefulness about him, a lightness that somehow coexisted with the immense history he carried.

After my first ever Kingian Nonviolence training, I was so inspired that I called him on the phone. I told him right then and there: “this is what I want to do for the rest of my life.”

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A few months later, I found myself attending the Kingian Nonviolence summer institute in Rhode Island, studying to become a certified trainer. This was where I first met Doc in person. Now, almost 17 years later, it is still what I am doing — pursuing a deeper understanding of the word nonviolence and what it means to become a better practitioner of it.

Each evening during the summer institute, he gave a lecture where I felt like I was trying to write down every word that came out of his mouth. Not only did that experience deeply ground me in a principled approach to nonviolence, but I was also blown away by how strategic he, and the leaders of the civil rights movement, were. It felt like all of the organizing I had done up to that point was being put to shame.

I remember him telling me that he and his colleagues would often plan to engage in civil disobedience on Friday afternoons, so that by the time they were getting booked in jail, the courts would be closed and the city would have to keep them over the weekend. This put additional pressure on them, since they would now have to house and feed dozens of students over the weekend.

He shared that when they held marches and they did not have a large number of participants, they would march two-by-two with a little bit of space between each pair to make the march look longer than it actually was.

I was clinging to every word, realizing that this tradition carried a depth of discipline and strategy that I had barely begun to understand.

Kazu Haga with Bernard LaFayette and David Jehnsen, the co-authors of the Kingian Nonviolence curriculum.

It was such an honor to hear his stories. Doc loved to tell stories. Once, he casually told us about eating ribs and playing pool with Dr. King — “Martin” he called him. Stories that collapsed the distance between the historical figures we read about in books and the real human relationships that shaped the movement.

I also had the honor of co-facilitating multiple workshops with him, including one in Santa Cruz, California. After the first day of that training, I found myself in his hotel room listening to stories late into the night. At some point, it was getting pretty late and his wife Kate had fallen asleep on his shoulders. I was also getting tired, so I remember looking over at my friends and saying something like, “It looks like Kate’s tired, so maybe we should get going.”

Doc immediately stopped me and said, “Oh no, it’s fine, it’s fine…” and just kept talking. For hours.

Elders can talk forever. But I loved that about him.

It was also sweet to witness his relationship with Kate, herself a civil rights icon. After all those years together, he still opened the door for her every time. They always held hands. She would tease him about the sweets he’s not supposed to be eating. There was such tenderness between them. It was a quiet, beautiful expression of the love that sustained them through a lifetime of struggle.

Many of his stories stayed with me, but one in particular always moved me deeply. On his first day organizing in Selma, he was beaten bloody. His white T-shirt was stained with blood, and he wore that same shirt for days afterward so people in Selma could see how serious his commitment was.

I remember him telling me of practicing the teachings of Rev. James Lawson, the original trainer of the movement, and trying to look compassionately into the eyes of his assailant even as he was being beaten.

That kind of courage is hard to comprehend.

I had the honor of being with him in Selma once. Doc was the first organizer from SNCC who wanted to try to organize the city where, as he always liked to remind us, “the white folks were too mean and the Black folks were too scared.”

Despite the fact that Selma was considered a “no-go zone” by national organizers, Doc went and set the stage for what would become Bloody Sunday and eventually the Voting Rights Act. Walking around Selma with him, I felt like I was in the presence of living history (people often referred to him as a national treasure). Every time we walked into a restaurant, people would recognize him and stand up to greet him. You could feel the weight and gravity of the history he carried with him.

And yet he never seemed heavy with it.

I also remember a meeting once with the executive committee of an organization I was part of. The committee, made up mostly of people my age, had gotten into a conflict. Doc happened to be sitting in on the meeting. He didn’t interrupt or intervene. He just sat there, watching and smiling quietly as the heated conversation unfolded.

At the end, we asked him if he had any thoughts.

He said that watching us reminded him of how he and his colleagues in the civil rights movement used to argue with each other all the time. He told us that movements spend about 40 percent of their time in conflict with each other, and that we shouldn’t worry about it too much.

It was grounding hear that sort of perspective from someone who’d lived through it all. Even the elders of the civil rights movement fought with each other. Conflict wasn’t a sign that something had gone wrong, it was simply part of the work of being human together while trying to change the world.

Doc carried history in his bones. He had lived through brutality and transformation, through moments that reshaped the course of a nation. And yet what I remember most about him is not just the history, it’s the spirit.

His joy.
His stories.
His hope.

His undying commitment to his golf game. For a period of his life, he refused to travel for workshops and speaking engagements unless he could fit in a round of golf. The only time I ever played a full round of golf was with him. And, to be completely honest and candid here, his game probably should have been better than it was given how much he played. But he still kept at it, with that ever-present smile.

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This morning in Japan, as messages kept arriving on my phone, I felt the loss of someone who shaped my life in ways I am still discovering. I am still clinging to the wisdom that came from listening to Doc. Sitting here in the quiet while my daughter naps in the next room, I am reminded that the work Doc gave his life to was never just about one generation.

It moves from hand to hand, story to story, teacher to student.

Doc helped pass that torch to so many of us. And now it is our responsibility to carry it forward — to keep studying, practicing, organizing and striving toward the Beloved Community he devoted his life to building.

One day, when my daughter is older, I hope I will be able to tell her stories about a man everyone called Doc. About his courage, his laughter, his hope, and the way he believed so deeply in the power of nonviolence.

What a gift it was to know and learn from him.

This article Remembering civil rights icon Bernard LaFayette was originally published by Waging Nonviolence.

A new analysislysis from the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) finds that this coming Monday (March 9) is the day that million-dollar earners stop contributing to Social Security – a milestone that serves as a reminder that the program’s finances could be greatly improved by lifting the cap on earnings.

While the vast majority of working people pay income and payroll taxes on all their earnings throughout the year, the Social Security payroll tax is capped at $184,500. Once a person’s wage and salary income reaches that taxable maximum, they stop paying into the program.

The amount of income above the cap has risen dramatically: in 1983, only 10 percent of income was above the cap, but today it is approaching 20 percent – another illustration of rising income inequality in the country.

Eliminating the cap on taxable earnings would go a long way towards affirming Social Security as a social insurance program, while also fortifying the program’s finances for current and future beneficiaries – an issue that has been a priority for many political leaders over several decades.

While there are always political discussions about how to strengthen Social Security’s finances, many of the prescriptions – like raising the retirement age – are regressive in nature, disproportionately harming working-class workers. Making all workers pay their fair share by eliminating the cap, though, would provide substantial additional revenue without harming workers or retirees.

“Allowing higher earners to stop contributing to Social Security early in the year is a policy choice that shortchanges the program,” said CEPR Labor and Disability Researcher Hayley Brown, who authored the new analysis. “The tax cap on earnings is at odds with the ethos of shared responsibility that underlies social insurance. Lawmakers should reinforce that sense of shared responsibility and the program’s solvency by eliminating the cap.”

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

This week Energy crisis

ENERGY SPIKE: US-Israeli attacks on Iran and subsequent counterattacks across the Middle East have sent energy prices “soaring”, according to Reuters. The newswire reported that the region “accounts for just under a third of global oil production and almost a fifth of gas”. The Guardian noted that shipping traffic through the strait of Hormuz, which normally ferries 20% of the world’s oil, “all but ground to a halt”. The Financial Times reported that attacks by Iran on Middle East energy facilities – notably in Qatar – triggered the “biggest rise in gas prices since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine”.

‘RISK’ AND ‘BENEFITS’: Bloomberg reported on increases in diesel prices in Europe and the US, speculating that rising fuel costs could be “a risk for president Donald Trump”. US gas producers are “poised to benefit from the big disruption in global supply”, according to CNBC. Indian government sources told the Economic Times that Russia is prepared to “fulfil India’s energy demands”. China Daily quoted experts who said “China’s energy security remains fundamentally unshaken”, thanks to “emergency stockpiles and a wide array of import channels”.

‘ESSENTIAL’ RENEWABLES: Energy analysts said governments should cut their fossil-fuel reliance by investing in renewables, “rather than just seeking non-Gulf oil and gas suppliers”, reported Climate Home News. This message was echoed by UK business secretary Peter Kyle, who said “doubling down on renewables” was “essential” amid “regional instability”, according to the Daily Telegraph.

China’s climate plan

PEAK COAL?: China has set out its next “five-year plan” at the annual “two sessions” meeting of the National People’s Congress, including its climate strategy out to 2030, according to the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post. The plan called for China to cut its carbon emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) by 17% from 2026 to 2030, which “may allow for continued increase in emissions given the rate of GDP growth”, reported Reuters. The newswire added that the plan also had targets to reach peak coal ​in the next five years and replace 30m tonnes per year of coal with renewables.

ACTIVE YET PRUDENT: Bloomberg described the new plan as “cautious”, stating that it “frustrat[es] hopes for tighter policy that would drive the nation to peak carbon emissions well before president Xi Jinping’s 2030 deadline”. Carbon Brief has just published an in-depth analysis of the plan. China Daily reported that the strategy “highlights measures to promote the climate targets of peaking carbon dioxide emissions before 2030”, which China said it would work towards “actively yet prudently”. 

Around the world

• EU RULES: The European Commission has proposed new “made in Europe” rules to support domestic low-carbon industries, “against fierce competition from China”, reported Agence France-Presse. Carbon Brief examined what it means for climate efforts.
• RECORD HEAT: The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has said there is a 50-60% chance that the El Niño weather pattern could return this year, amplifying the effect of global warming and potentially driving temperatures to “record highs”, according to Euronews.
• FLAGSHIP FUND: The African Development Bank’s “flagship clean energy fund” plans to more than double its financing to $2.5bn for African renewables over the next two years, reported the Associated Press.
• NO WITHDRAWAL: Vanuatu has defied US efforts to force the Pacific-island nation to drop a UN draft resolution calling on the world to implement a landmark International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on climate, according to the Guardian.

98

The number of nations that submitted their national reports on tackling nature loss to the UN on time – just half of the 196 countries that are part of the UN biodiversity treaty – according to analysis by Carbon Brief.

Latest climate research

• Sea levels are already “much higher than assumed” in most assessments of the threat posed by sea-level rise, due to “inadequate” modelling assumptions | Nature
• Accelerating human-caused global warming could see the Paris Agreement’s 1.5C limit crossed before 2030 | Geophysical Research Letters covered by Carbon Brief
• Future “super El Niño events” could “significantly lower” solar power generation due to a reduction in solar irradiance in key regions, such as California and east China | Communications Earth & Environment

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

Captured

UK greenhouse gas emissions in 2025 fell to 54% below 1990 levels, the baseline year for its legally binding climate goals, according to new Carbon Brief analysis. Over the same period, data from the World Bank shows that the UK’s economy has expanded by 95%, meaning that emissions have been decoupling from growth. 

Spotlight Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ community wind turbine 

Following the recent launch of the UK government’s local power plan, Carbon Brief visits one of the country’s community-energy success stories.

The Lawrence Weston housing estate is set apart from the main city of Bristol, wedged between the tree-lined grounds of a stately home and a sprawl of warehouses and waste incinerators. It is one of the most deprived areas in the city. 

Yet, just across the M5 motorway stands a structure that has brought the spoils of the energy transition directly to this historically forgotten estate – a 4.2 megawatt (MW) wind turbine.

The turbine is owned by local charity Ambition Lawrence Weston and all the profits from its electricity sales – around £100,000 a year – go to the community. In the UK’s local power plan, it was singled out by energy secretary Ed Miliband as a “pioneering” project.

‘Sustainable income’

On a recent visit to the estate by Carbon Brief, Ambition Lawrence Weston’s development manager, Mark Pepper, rattled off the story behind the wind turbine. 

In 2012, Pepper and his team were approached by the Bristol Energy Cooperative with a chance to get a slice of the income from a new solar farm. They jumped at the opportunity. 

“Austerity measures were kicking in at the time,” Pepper told Carbon Brief. “We needed to generate an income. Our own, sustainable income.”

With the solar farm proving to be a success, the team started to explore other opportunities. This began a decade-long process that saw them navigate the Conservative government’s “ban” on onshore wind, raise £5.5m in funding and, ultimately, erect the turbine in 2023. 

Today, the turbine generates electricity equivalent to Lawrence Weston’s 3,000 households and will save 87,600 tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) over its lifetime.

Ambition Lawrence Weston’s Mark Pepper and the wind turbine. Artwork: Josh Gabbatiss ‘Climate by stealth’

Ambition Lawrence Weston’s hub is at the heart of the estate and the list of activities on offer is seemingly endless: birthday parties, kickboxing, a library, woodworking, help with employment and even a pop-up veterinary clinic. All supported, Pepper said, with the help of a steady income from community-owned energy.

The centre itself is kitted out with solar panels, heat pumps and electric-vehicle charging points, making it a living advertisement for the net-zero transition. Pepper noted that the organisation has also helped people with energy costs amid surging global gas prices.

Gesturing to the England flags dangling limply on lamp posts visible from the kitchen window, he said:

“There’s a bit of resentment around immigration and scarcity of materials and provision, so we’re trying to do our bit around community cohesion.”

This includes supper clubs and an interfaith grand iftar during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Anti-immigration sentiment in the UK has often gone hand-in-hand with opposition to climate action. Right-wing politicians and media outlets promote the idea that net-zero policies will cost people a lot of money – and these ideas have cut through with the public. 

Pepper told Carbon Brief he is sympathetic to people’s worries about costs and stressed that community energy is the perfect way to win people over:

“I think the only way you can change that is if, instead of being passive consumers…communities are like us and they’re generating an income to offset that.”

From the outset, Pepper stressed that “we weren’t that concerned about climate because we had other, bigger pressures”, adding:

“But, in time, we’ve delivered climate by stealth.”

Watch, read, listen

OIL WATCH: The Guardian has published a “visual guide” with charts and videos showing how the “escalating Iran conflict is driving up oil and gas prices”.

MURDER IN HONDURAS: Ten years on from the murder of Indigenous environmental justice advocate Berta Cáceres, Drilled asked why Honduras is still so dangerous for environmental activists.

TALKING WEATHER: A new film, narrated by actor Michael Sheen and titled You Told Us To Talk About the Weather, aimed to promote conversation about climate change with a blend of “poetry, folk horror and climate storytelling”.

Coming up

• 8 March: Colombia parliamentary election
• 9-19 March: 31st Annual Session of the International Seabed Authority, Kingston, Jamaica
• 11 March: UN Environment Programme state of finance for nature 2026 report launch

Pick of the jobs

• London School of Economics and Political Science, fellow in the social science of sustainability | Salary: £43,277-£51,714. Location: London
• NORCAP, innovative climate finance expert | Salary: Unknown. Location: Kyiv, Ukraine
• WBHM, environmental reporter | Salary: $50,050-$81,330. Location: Birmingham, Alabama, US
• Climate Cabinet, data engineer | Salary: hourly rate of $60-$120 per hour. Location: Remote anywhere in the US

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 27 February 2026: Trump’s fossil-fuel talk | Modi-Lula rare-earth pact | Is there a UK ‘greenlash’? 

DeBriefed

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27.02.26

DeBriefed 20 February 2026: EU’s ‘3C’ warning | Endangerment repeal’s impact on US emissions | ‘Tree invasion’ fuelled South America’s fires

DeBriefed

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20.02.26

DeBriefed 13 February 2026: Trump repeals landmark ‘endangerment finding’ | China’s emissions flatlining | UK’s ‘relentless rain’

DeBriefed

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13.02.26

DeBriefed 6 February 2026: US secret climate panel ‘unlawful’ | China’s clean energy boon | Can humans reverse nature loss?

DeBriefed

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06.02.26

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The post DeBriefed 6 March 2026: Iran energy crisis | China climate plan | Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ wind turbine appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Between 2021 and 2024, I had the honor of being the co-director of Stop the Money Pipeline alongside Jackie Fielder. In July 2024, with the full-throated support of all of us here, Jackie left Stop the Money Pipeline to run for a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.

Four months later, Jackie not only won her election, she crushed it ― winning a whopping 59.7% of the vote in San Francisco’s District 9.

Now, I’m so excited to share that Supervisor Fielder is planning to introduce a ballot measure that would tax some of San Francisco’s largest financial institutions to create a municipal public bank in the city.

A San Francisco public bank would be great for San Francisco. By providing low or no cost loans for affordable housing, public transportation, and small businesses, a public bank would help the city hit its climate goals and become a more sustainable, affordable, and thriving city.

As Jackie put it in this video announcing the next stage of the SF public bank campaign:

“Right now, Wall Street is in charge of our billions and billions of dollars. But if the public bank were our own bank, we can be in charge of our own money and where it’s being invested. Then, our money wouldn’t be going to industries like fossil fuels, weapons of war, and ICE detention centers. Instead, it’d be going into our own economy and things we actually need like affordable housing and small businesses.”

Creating a public bank, however, is no small feat. First, the State of California had to pass legislation legalizing the creation of municipal public banks. After years of advocacy, that happened in 2019, when the state passed the California Public Banking Act of 2019.

Even with this law on the books, however, the process remains complex. As this article in Mission Local, Jackie’s local paper, explains, setting up a San Francisco public bank will require $400 million in seed funding – that’s where the ballot initiative and the tax on large financial institutions come in.

If the November ballot measure passes, the money raised from the tax, which will be leveraged on credit card companies and other large financial institutions, will be used to set up what’s known as a “municipal financial corporation,” a kind of midway point to a full public bank that can issue loans but cannot take deposits.

All being well, this “municipal financial corporation” will start getting loans out the door in 2029. Only after it’s operated successfully for a few years, will the “municipal financial corporation” be able to apply to regulators to become a fully-fledged public bank in 2032.

Before any of that though, in order to pass in November, the public bank ballot initiative must win two-thirds of the vote.

In short, winning a public bank is no quick solution, or easy organizing effort. But ever since I first worked with Jackie, back in 2016, when we were fighting the financiers of the Dakota Access pipeline, that’s what I’ve admired about her: her ambition, and commitment to bringing about long-term change on a systems level.

And if San Francisco is successful in winning a public bank, it could be nationally important, too.

Globally, there are 586 public banks, managing some $35 trillion in assets. In many parts of the world, public banks play a key role in driving the energy transition, by providing low or no cost loans for projects that benefit people and the planet, such as affordable housing and large-scale renewable energy and public transportation projects.

However, there’s only one public bank in the United States, the Bank of North Dakota which was founded in 1919. There hasn’t been a single new public bank created in the United States in the one hundred and eight years since then.

But a public bank in San Francisco would change that. And who’s to say that what starts in San Francisco will stay there? The Bay Area is known, after all, for exporting its innovation around the world.

Often what’s exported around the world from the Bay Area is of dubious value to society―whether it’s social media disinformation or AI slop―but if the Bay Area’s next big export to the rest of the country is a model for how to set up and run a successful public bank, that will be an unalloyed good.

So, if you’re in the San Francisco Bay Area you’ll be hearing more about this from us in the coming months. But if you want to make sure you don’t miss a thing, and if you’re in the Bay Area: sign up here for updates & opportunities to plug into the campaign.

In Solidarity,
– Alec Connon, Stop the Money Pipeline coalition director

News & Updates from the Coalition

– No War, No Kings

 

As the Trump Administration launches a reckless, illegal, and deeply immoral war on Iran, it’s more important than ever that we demonstrate – to the country and the rest of the world – just how deeply unpopular Trump and the MAGA agenda truly is.

Our next big opportunity to do that is on March 28th for No Kings Day #3. The first two No Kings Days were two of the largest single-day mobilizations in American history.

Let’s make the next one even larger. Join a No Kings Day event near you on March 28th.

 

– Costco Has No Excuse Now

In February, we released the Better Options report, a first-of-its-kind report assessing the climate performance of the 20 largest credit card issuers in the United States.

The key findings? Eight of the financial institutions analyzed did not provide large-scale financing to the fossil fuel industry in the time period analyzed. This means that companies like Costco have no excuse now: they need to find a better partner for their co-branded credit card than Citigroup, the world’s second-largest funder of fossil fuel expansion.

Join the campaign here. And read about the campaign in the news: “New climate-finance campaign targets Costco’s partnership with Citibank.”

– Shifting Politics Means Shifting Strategy

In 2024, our bank campaigns saw real progress. That year, Citigroup – our primary target – committed to end financing for new oil and gas projects in the Amazon and implemented a goal of reducing their oil and gas financing by 29% by 2030.

But when Trump was elected, major banks started backtracking on their climate commitments. That meant we had to change our strategy.

In a recent headline article in Bloomberg, I talked about what some of those strategy changes have and should look like. Read the full article here, “Wall Street’s Oil Deals Have Climate Activists Resorting to New Tactics.”

– Insure our Communities campaign gallops along

The Insure Our Communities Act is gaining momentum in New York.

After the bill’s prime sponsor left the legislature, we’re stoked that Senator Nathalia Fernandez has agreed to become the bill’s new prime sponsor in the Senate! As a member of the Senate Insurance Committee, Senator Fernandez is well-placed to help the bill advance.

If this bill passes, it would prohibit New York-licensed insurers from providing insurance to new coal, oil, and gas projects anywhere – an impact that would be felt globally.

So, if you’re in New York, check out the campaign website and get involved:

 www.InsureOurCommunitiesNY.com 

 

– Confronting Big Oil in Houston, TX.

 

Every year, fossil fuel corporations, Wall Street financiers, and government officials convene in Houston for CERA Week, where they plot out how they can keep profiting from fossil fuels, even as frontline communities face toxic air and the brunt of climate chaos.

This year, dozens of organizations are coming together for “Confronting CERA Week”. Over three days, there will be workshops and skillshares, art builds, community events, and actions.

Plug into the Confronting CERA Week organizing in Houston this March 21 – 23.

– Gulf South Communities file Human Right Grievance Against Major Insurer

Last week, frontline communities in Louisiana and Japan joined our partners at Rainforest Action Network and filed an official human rights grievance with the insurance company, Tokio Marine, regarding its coverage for Venture Global’s risky LNG operations. This is a major move to expose the human rights abuses that follow in the wake of the LNG buildout in the Gulf South, and elsewhere.

Read more about the Human Rights Grievance filed with Tokio Marine.

– First-of-its-kind Climate Risk Lawsuit Filed

This week, a landmark new class action lawsuit was filed against one of the world’s largest real estate corporations, Cushman & Wakefield, alleging that its retirement plan managers failed to properly manage climate risks to workers’ hard-earned savings. The legal challenge, filed by ClientEarth and Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll, is the first of its kind and, if successful, could set an important precedent for addressing climate risks to millions of American workers’ deferred wages.

Read about it in the Financial Times (if you hit a paywall, view the article here), or amplify the news using this toolkit from our partner at Stand.earth. Wanna learn more? Register for the legal briefing on March 25th.

– Federal Court Strikes Down Texas’ Anti-Climate Attacks on Banks

Good news out of Texas, where a judge has struck down Texas’s 2021 “anti-ESG” law that directed the state government to boycott financial institutions that took common sense steps to address the climate crisis.

The Texas law was the high-point of the so-called “anti-ESG movement” that punished banks and investors for taking action on fossil fuels. The court’s findings are a win for the climate, and for commonsense.

– Several Ways To Make Fossil Fuel Companies Pay

To kick off the state legislative session, our friends at the Make Polluters Pay coalition held a week of action. In all, there were 37 events across 14 states, advocating for bills to make the fossil fuel industry pay for the mess they have created, based on Vermont and New York’s climate superfund bills, which were passed in 2024.

Across the country, a second creative way to put the fossil fuel industry on the hook for paying for climate programs is also gaining steam. In California, New York, and Hawaii there are bills in play that would authorize state attorneys generals to sue fossil fuel companies on behalf of residents whose insurance premiums have soared amid climate disasters. The Guardian had an excellent piece about this strategy here.

– Pushing Democrats to Hold Firm on ICE Accountability

We’re now nearly three weeks into the government shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security. A shutdown like this is not something to take lightly. It means thousands of workers furloughed, including workers from critical agencies like FEMA.

But this is also the Democrats only leverage to win real changes from ICE, an increasingly paramilitary force accountable only to Donald Trump. Democrats must use this leverage.

Already, 6,000 of you on this list have sent emails to your Senators, and hundreds of you have made calls. If you haven’t done so yet, contact your Senator here and urge them: Hold the line and hold ICE accountable.

– Epstein and the World’s Largest Funder of Fossil Fuels

One thing I am pretty sure we haven’t talked about enough is the deep ties between sex trafficker and pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and JPMorgan Chase, the world’s largest funder of fossil fuels.

In 2023, JPMorgan CEO, Jamie Dimon, testified under oath that he’d never heard of Jeffrey Epstein until 2019. But one of his top lieutenants later claimed that he’d talked to Dimon years earlier about Epstein. And we now know that a top executive at the bank, Mary Erdoes, who is often touted as potential next CEO, was deeply involved in Epstein’s account, and long knew about his conviction for soliciting sex from fourteen-year-old girls.

In the UK, members of the Royal Family and senior politicians have been arrested in the wake of the release of the Epstein Files. In the US? Not so much. Read more about how the world’s largest funder of fossil fuels also enabled Epstein’s crimes in the Guardian, the New York Times, and Anand Giridharadas’s The Ink.

– and to close, a WIN in Davis, CA

After a months-long campaign waged by the intrepid Cath Posehn, the City of Davis, CA, voted to sever the city’s engagement with the Musk Empire — committing to do no business with Tesla, SpaceX, X, Neuralink, xAI, The Boring Company, and Tesla Robotaxis. No new contracts. No new purchases. No Musk platforms in official city communications.

We’ve been honored to support Cath in her work to achieve this win, and you can read all about how she did it here: One protestor got her city to divest from Elon Musk – here’s what she can teach the rest of us.

And to finish us off, here’s a photo of Cath, turning away from the lectern at Davis City Council, moments before the council voted to pass the resolution she wrote and spent months fighting for. This is what democracy looks like.

The post March Newsletter: Public banks? Oh yes. appeared first on Stop the Money Pipeline.

National Nurses United announced its endorsement of Daniel Biss for Illinois’ 9th Congressional District. Throughout his decades of service as an educator, activist, and elected leader, he has proven that he is ready to put in the work to move forward with transformative legislation that will unrig our economy, guarantee health care to everyone free at the point of service, and provide the tools for workers to organize without interference from their bosses.