News Feeds

Urbanising cities in the Global South have a multitude of challenges—rapid demographic changes placing pressure on environmental resources, services, and infrastructure unable to keep pace with unplanned urbanisation, and urban sprawl creating a dystopian peri-urban landscape. Often, urbanisation is accompanied by loss of urban green and blue spaces, as built-up infrastructure replaces urban ecosystems. While […]

China has said that hydrogen is a key “future industry”, important to both its energy transition and its industrial policy.

Hydrogen frequently goes through hype cycles, most recently driven by rising oil and gas prices due to the conflict in the Middle East.

Yet, even in China, the world’s largest producer and consumer of the fuel, hydrogen remains expensive and inefficient to produce.

This is especially the case for “green” hydrogen derived from renewables.

Moreover, there is limited supporting infrastructure and there is little incentive to use hydrogen over other energy sources.

As a result, uptake in China of hydrogen as an alternative fuel remains low.

Nevertheless, these challenges echo the early circumstances of another key clean-energy technology – electric vehicles (EVs).

In China, EVs benefited from a policy environment that included consistent signals of support, financial aid and the development of supporting infrastructure.

Many similar policies are now being deployed – and in some cases improved upon – to support the development of China’s hydrogen industry.

This article examines China’s approach to developing hydrogen and how its evolving industrial policy could make the fuel viable.

How is China using hydrogen and where does it come from?

Electrification and rising installations of solar and wind power have been the biggest drivers of China’s decarbonisation story so far. However, how China will address the more energy-intensive, hard-to-electrify segments of its economy remains an open question.

Hydrogen is seen by some in China as a potential solution for reducing emissions in a range of “hard-to-abate” industries, from steel and chemicals to aviation and shipping.

The country is the world’s foremost producer and consumer of hydrogen. It produced 36.5m tonnes of the gas in 2024, with maximum production capacity standing at 50m tonnes that year.

It also consumed nearly a third of the world’s hydrogen in 2024, as shown below.

Share of global hydrogen consumption in select regions in 2024, %. Source: IEA.

Most of China’s production capacity is in regions with potential for high demand, such as Shandong, Inner Mongolia, Shaanxi, Ningxia, Shanxi and other provinces with significant heavy industry.

In 2024, the vast majority of China’s hydrogen – around 78% – was produced using fossil fuels, predominantly coal and gas, as shown in the figure below.

Another 21% was produced as an industrial by-product, while only 1% – just 320,000 tonnes – was derived from renewable-powered electrolysis of water. 

Production of hydrogen in China by energy source in 2024, %. Source: National Energy Administration.

One study found that, for every kilogram of hydrogen produced, 38.6kg of carbon dioxide (CO2) is emitted if the hydrogen is produced using coal-fired power. Hydrogen made through coal gasification results in 28.5kg of CO2 for every kilogram of hydrogen, while gas-based hydrogen creates 13kg of emissions. 

By contrast, one kilogram of renewables-based hydrogen results in 0.5kg of CO2.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) calculates that hydrogen and hydrogen-based fuels could help China avoid close to 16bn tonnes of CO2 cumulatively by 2060 – but only if it comes from low-carbon sources. 

The biggest reductions, it adds, would come from heavy industry, particularly chemicals and steel, with the maritime and shipping sectors also seeing some benefit. 

Currently, around half of the hydrogen produced in China is used in synthetic ammonia and methanol production. 

Ammonia is primarily used to manufacture fertiliser and is seen as a possible fuel technology for shipping. Methanol is used as a fuel for the transport industry, as well as for heating. 

Another quarter of China’s current hydrogen usage is consumed by the oil refining and coal-to-chemical sectors. The remaining amount is used in other industries, including transport, heating and metallurgy.

What are the barriers to scaling up hydrogen?

Although China is the largest producer and consumer of hydrogen globally, the industry faces several barriers to becoming a viable clean-energy technology.

Agora Energiewende, a thinktank focused on the energy sector, says that, in order to make hydrogen a practical clean-energy solution, China would need to expand the scale and range of its application, as well as improving the conversion efficiency of production and use.

Both BloombergNEF and the IEA highlight the importance of China creating demand for hydrogen, such as through quotas for industrial usage.

Hydrogen “suffers from a relatively large efficiency loss during various conversion processes”, adds Agora. For example, it notes that only around 22% of the energy put into hydrogen fuel-cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) is converted into motion, compared to 73% for battery electric vehicles. Producing hydrogen with renewable energy is also less efficient than coal-to-hydrogen processes.

Cui Chuansheng, technical director at East China Engineering Science and Technology, tells state news agency Xinhua that the variability of wind and solar power often leads to low utilisation of electrolysers, resulting in “efficiency losses”.

Meanwhile, the cost of producing hydrogen – particularly green hydrogen – remains high.

One study placed the cost of hydrogen produced through alkaline water electrolysis (AWE), the most common method for producing green hydrogen in China, at $4-6 per kilogram, compared with $1.20-2.50/kg for steam methane reforming and $1.30-2 for coal gasification.

In some specific cases, such as blending hydrogen with gas, researchers find that hydrogen prices would need to fall to one-third of gas prices to incentivise uptake. 

These constraints are all “interdependent”, Kevin Tu, managing director of Agora Energy China, tells Carbon Brief, with the need to ensure “bankable demand” while also reducing costs and developing infrastructure. He adds:

“Without credible offtake in the right sectors, costs will not fall; without lower costs and better logistics, downstream users will not commit.”

The IEA says that green hydrogen “could become cost-competitive by the end of this decade due to low technology costs and cost of capital”.

For now, however, the China Hydrogen Bulletin Substack reports that China’s four listed hydrogen equipment manufacturers all reported significant losses in 2025.

Meanwhile, a senior executive at a Chinese hydrogen company told economic news outlet Jiemian that he expected 40% of companies in the sector to have closed down by the end of 2026, with surviving companies only turning a profit in 2029 at the earliest.

The industry also lacks refueling and pipeline infrastructure. China’s development of a pipeline network for hydrogen remains in its early stages, with around 400km of pipelines currently in operation. By contrast, its long-distance gas network stands at 128,000km. Similarly, storage remains expensive and inefficient, creating a further obstacle to wider uptake. 

How is China supporting hydrogen development?

China began considering the use of hydrogen as an energy source in earnest in the early 2000s, to address concerns around pollution and dependence on imported oil for the transport sector. 

A clearer signal of its importance came in 2015, when the State Council included the technology in a 10-year national industrial strategy known as the “Made in China” initiative. This pitched hydrogen as a way to contribute to electrification of China’s road-transport system through the development of FCEVs. 

Yuki Yu, founder of research firm Energy Iceberg, tells Carbon Brief that, from 2018-2021, hydrogen was treated as a “FCEV and manufacturing technology challenge”. 

This has since evolved, she says, given that battery electric vehicles have emerged as the more popular technology. 

Shen Xinyi, senior advisor at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), agrees, telling Carbon Brief that recent policy documents suggest the aim is now for hydrogen to be targeted at areas where direct electrification is harder, such as hydrogen-based chemicals, hydrogen metallurgy and some heavy-duty transport applications.

This is in line with the “hydrogen ladder”, an analysis of how likely different possibilities for applying hydrogen as a clean alternative are to become significant. The ladder sees significant future use of hydrogen in these hard-to-electrify areas as much more likely than for light vehicles. 

Notable policy moves are being made in “three layers”, says Agora’s Tu, which are combining to improve the technology’s chances of scaling up. These are: the “legal and institutional” layer; “application-oriented” policies; and targeted measures to address “practical bottlenecks” at the local level.

One of the documents underpinning this pivot was the “medium- and long-term plan for the development of the hydrogen energy industry (2021-2035)”, issued in March 2022.

According to a report by the National Energy Administration (NEA), the plan is an attempt to develop an “industrial ecosystem” for hydrogen that features “diverse stakeholders, coordinated innovation and clustered development”.

The plan was the first government document to “lay out a long-term vision for China’s hydrogen economy”, unifying a previously disparate policy push into one document, according to the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, a UK-based thinktank.

Following on from the 2022 plan, the importance of hydrogen as a broad clean-energy solution has been emphasised in a number of policies. These include its classification being changed from a hazardous chemical to an energy carrier in China’s Energy Law, a 2024 action plan to “accelerate” the use of low-carbon hydrogen in industry and a new pilot scheme offering subsidies for projects that achieve specific targets. 

The table below sets out the timeline and content of China’s hydrogen-related policies over the past 25 years.

PolicyYear publishedKey features 10th five-year plan (2001–2005)2001Calls for “actively developing” low-emission vehicles, understood to include hydrogen vehicles Made in China 20252015Pledges to “continue to support” development of fuel cell vehicles and “master core technologies” for low-carbon vehicles Notice on implementation of demonstration projects for fuel cell vehicles2020Creates a dedicated subsidy programme for finding breakthroughs in FCEV core technologies and industrial applications 14th five-year plan (2021-2025)2021Hydrogen listed as a future industry Medium- and long-term plan for the development of the hydrogen energy industry (2021–2035)2022Aims to reach 100,000-200,000 tonnes of green hydrogen production [this target has been met]. Also aims to get 50,000 FCEVs on the road by 2025, leading to a “diversified” hydrogen industry by 2035 Opinions on accelerating the comprehensive green transformation of economic and social development2024Promotes further development of hydrogen production, transport, storage and applications Implementation plan for accelerating the application of clean and low-carbon hydrogen in the industrial sector2025Outlines tasks to promote use of low-carbon hydrogen to reduce emissions in heavy industries, such as steel and chemicals Energy law2025Sees hydrogen included in national legislation for the first time, re-classifies it from a hazardous chemical to an energy carrier 15th five-year plan (2026-2030)2026Again lists as a future industry, and calls for the development of green fuels derived from green hydrogen Notice on the implementation of pilot projects for the comprehensive application of hydrogen energy2026Provides subsidies to projects to reduce hydrogen costs to 15-25 yuan/kilogram ($2.20-3.67/kg) and help develop a fleet of 100,000 FCEVs Key policies in the development of China’s hydrogen sector.

In addition, the NEA said in 2025 that local governments across China had issued more than 560 hydrogen-related energy policies by the end of 2024. 

Tu notes that these local policies cover everything from permitting reforms and pipeline planning to exempting FCEVs from paying road toll.

Different provinces across China adopt distinct strategies for developing hydrogen industries, based on local conditions, says the US-based Center on Global Energy Policy, such as energy mix, availability of coal and industrial needs.

However, these local policies and targets are frequently more ambitious than the “conservative” national-level targets, it adds.

Could a new pilot programme boost hydrogen’s prospects?

A new pilot programme, announced in March 2026, aims to commercialise the country’s hydrogen industry by funding projects to reduce the cost of the fuel to 15-25 yuan/kilogram ($2.20-3.67/kg) by 2030, as well as other targets.

Unlike the 2020 subsidies, which focused on FCEVs, the new programme reaffirms China’s interest in a broader series of sectoral applications for hydrogen, including in clean heating, production of low-carbon iron and steel, and production of “green fuels” and other chemicals.

This new pilot is the “strongest financial instrument ever released for China’s green hydrogen application” in terms of creating a comprehensive hydrogen policy that covers a broad swathe of the economy, supporting it with financial backing and targeting application scenarios, Yu says.

However, she argues that strict grant caps – 240m yuan ($35m) per project and 1.6bn yuan ($235m) per selected region across only five regions – limited the overall funding scale available to the industry.

Energy Iceberg has calculated that only around 60-70 projects nationally could receive funding under the current rules, out of more than 670 active green hydrogen proposals in China.  

Shen agrees that the pilot programme is significant and that it will expand the use of hydrogen in China’s climate strategy, particularly green hydrogen.

She notes a provision that “explicitly states that coal-based ammonia and methanol projects cannot be labelled as ‘green’ ammonia or methanol”, suggesting that policymakers are increasingly paying attention to the “integrity” of definitions for hydrogen and hydrogen-derived fuel. 

The “real value” of the pilot scheme, says Tu, is that it focuses on developing “integrated city-cluster ecosystems linking supply, transport, infrastructure and end-use demand”, rather than only supporting individual projects.

This “should help identify viable business models, accelerate cost discovery and concentrate support on applications with stronger scale potential”, as well as boost investor confidence, adds Tu. 

However, he continues that the broader effect it will have on boosting production of hydrogen will “depend on how quickly the selected clusters can translate the programme into real offtake and lower delivered hydrogen prices”.

How does this compare to China’s EV policy push?

The debate around the viability of hydrogen is reminiscent of critiques of EVs.

Until recently, EVs were seen as too expensive for consumers, inefficient and challenging to use without supporting infrastructure. As a result, many western automakers chose to temper their focus on EVs, while continuing to develop internal combustion engines.

However, China has managed to develop a competitive EV industry with products that top global sales.

Part of the playbook that spurred China’s success on EVs included consistent policy signalling in favour of the technology, including mentions in high-level documents and committing resources to building charging infrastructure.

“The defining features of China’s industrial-policy success are its persistence and adaptability,” says Kyle Chan, fellow at the Brookings Institution, adding that “long before the technology and economics of EVs and batteries were proven, China was making long-term investments and policy bets [in the sectors]”.

More tangible measures included direct and indirect subsidies and policy support in the shape of favourable loan rates and low-cost land. One estimate by US-based thinktank the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) pegs the amount of support allocated to the EV industry between 2009-2023 at $230.9bn.

This coupled with the success of private Chinese manufacturers in creating innovative, nimble companies that “forc[ed] policymakers to adapt”, as well as growing links between the automotive and information technology industries, according to a separate CSIS report.

But this progress on EVs also reportedly came with significant fraud. In 2016, one investigation found that 33 companies were involved in subsidy fraud totalling 9.2bn yuan ($1.3bn).

(It should also be noted that profitability in the industry lags far behind the average for downstream industrial sectors, according to the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post, which says that “only a handful” of nearly 50 EV makers have reported profits.)

Being the subject of an industrial policy push alone does not guarantee success, states CSIS. It says the strength of the EV industry “was neither inevitable nor the result of a single master plan” and that China’s aims to develop globally-competitive industries in areas such as commercial aviation remain unaccomplished.

China’s approach to hydrogen has been markedly different.

Instead of offering blanket subsidies, the fuel cell demonstration programme it established in 2020 focused on performance-based rewards.

To avoid the subsidy issues seen in the solar and EV industries, the ministry of finance deliberately chose this indirect funding model, says Yu.

However, Yu argues, the programme did not work as well as hoped, due to the funding ceiling and the siloed attempts made by different regional governments to develop hydrogen ecosystems . 

But Chinese policy thinking is becoming more selective and pragmatic for hydrogen compared with EVs, says Shen. She says:

“Electrification remains the primary decarbonisation pathway [for road transport], while hydrogen is increasingly positioned for applications where direct electrification is more difficult.”

Tu echoes this, adding that China is “clearly moving toward a more supportive policy environment for hydrogen”. 

But its approach is “unlikely to replicate the EV story one-for-one”, he adds.

China’s concerted hydrogen push is also unlikely to echo the EV story at a global level, according to the IEA.

In terms of green hydrogen, around 60% of global electrolyser manufacturing capacity is currently in China, prompting concerns from the EU about a repeat of China’s global dominance in the solar and EV sectors.

However, the IEA says, electrolysers made in China “might not supply other markets at scale in the short term”, due to difficulties transporting the bulky technology globally, expectations that costs will only fall gradually, uncertainty around global demand and questions over how well Chinese electrolysers perform against global alternatives.

China’s industrial focus on hydrogen is centred more on domestic use, Shen argues. “It is less about near-term export competitiveness and more about building domestic industrial ecosystems,” she says.

Analysis: China’s new carbon metric leaves Germany-sized gap in its emissions

China energy

|

26.05.26

Q&A: China’s leadership calls for ‘strict control’ of fossil fuels

China Policy

|

24.04.26

Analysis: How Chinese media is covering the Iran energy crisis

China Policy

|

07.04.26

Guest post: How changes to coal mining have affected China’s methane emissions

China energy

|

19.03.26

jQuery(document).ready(function() { jQuery('.block-related-articles-slider-block_c2d7c0447ddcbccc0a2f1c7eccf27097 .mh').matchHeight({ byRow: false }); });

The post Q&A: Can China turn hydrogen into its next clean-energy industry? appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Advocacy Day is just around the corner! On June 3, Audubon members will flock to Raleigh to meet with lawmakers and advocate for conservation funding.Registration has ended. Contact Community...

This article is part of Food Tank’s primer series, “Food Tank Explains.” Each installment unpacks the ideas, innovations, and challenges shaping today’s food and agriculture systems, offering clear insights into complex topics. To explore more articles in the series, click here.

Food traceability is the ability to track food products and ingredients through every stage of the supply chain—from production and processing to distribution and retail. As global food and agriculture supply chains grow more complex, with ingredients often traveling thousands of miles and passing through multiple hands, traceability systems can help document and connect information about where food comes from and how it was produced.

“Food systems are only as strong as the trust and transparency behind them,” Mark Kaplan, Co-Founder and Chief Sustainability Officer at Wholechain, tells Food Tank. “Traceability and data standards are the foundation that allows food to move fairly, safely, and sustainably across the globe.”

Food traceability plays a central role in managing food safety risks. Unsafe food causes 600 million cases of foodborne illness and 420,000 deaths each year globally, according to the World Health Organization. The burden falls disproportionately on low-income countries, conflict-affected populations, migrants, and women, and children under 5 account for 40 percent of cases and 125,000 deaths annually.

By linking data across production, processing, and distribution, traceability systems allow investigators to rapidly detect potential risks and trace hazardous products back to their source, reducing the spread of contamination. According to the World Bank Group, a food safety management system cannot be truly effective unless it includes a well-established traceability component.

Traceability systems provide greater visibility across the food supply chain, supporting oversight of labor practices and accountability for environmental marketing claims.

The agricultural and seafood production industries rank among the world’s most dangerous occupations due to the use of heavy machinery, exposure to chemicals and the elements, and long hours. Meanwhile, agricultural workers receive limited occupational health protection and investigations have linked seafood supply chains to forced labor, slavery at sea, wage theft, deceptive or coercive recruitment, and physical abuse aboard distant-water fishing vessels.

Evidence of human trafficking aboard distant water vessels has grown exponentially in the past few years. Unethical activity plagues the seafood industry, Kaplan says. Food traceability can help increase visibility into labor exploitation and abuse hidden within supply chains, enabling regulators to track unfair labor practices and consumers to make more informed purchases.

Traceability also supports greater accountability for sustainability-related claims. Consumers are increasingly interested in sustainably sourced and produced products, but weak oversight and opaque supply chains have facilitated the rise of greenwashing, the practice of using deceptive environmental advertising to boost product sales.

According to Changing Markets’ research, greenwashing in the food sector is rampant, with many environmental claims like ‘carbon neutral’, ‘climate positive’ and ‘net zero’ lacking substantiation. By helping verify sustainability claims, traceability helps reduce opportunities for food companies to capitalize on consumers’ environmental concerns without taking any positive environmental action.

Traceability systems can also create operational benefits for businesses. Research suggests that digital traceability systems can improve efficiency, optimize resource allocation and use, and reduce costs across supply chains.

And the market for products backed by traceability claims continues to grow, providing an opportunity for businesses. “The potential for traceability can unlock so much more value for businesses,” says Alex Golub, Sustainability Director at Acme Smoked Fish and Chair of Sea Pact. “If consumers know where their food is coming from, harvesters can really have those assurances, and that transparency can ripple through.”

Food traceability adoption varies widely, with governments and private companies implementing different standards, technologies, and regulatory frameworks. The European Union has established some of the world’s most comprehensive requirements, mandating that food businesses track products across all stages of production, processing, and distribution.

Japan, Australia, Finland, France, Italy, and South Korea have also adopted digital systems ranging from electronic livestock databases to blockchain-enabled QR codes and cloud-based supply chain platforms.

Adoption also differs by industry, with seafood emerging as one of the most advanced sectors for traceability. “No other commodity has advanced as far along the digital traceability journey as seafood,” Huw Thomas, Executive Director of the Global Dialogue on Seafood Traceability, tells Food Tank. To explain the sector’s early investment in digital tracking systems, Thomas points to the industry’s complex international supply chains and growing regulatory pressure.

As governments and companies expand digital traceability systems, the World Bank and research published in the Journal of Foods argue that technology alone will not solve the food system’s transparency challenges. Standardization across industries and supply chains is essential, Thomas explains.

Organizations like the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Economic Forum emphasize that regulatory frameworks, global standards, and cross-sector cooperation will play a central role in determining how and whether traceability systems are adopted and enforced.

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

Photo courtesy of Norbert Buduczki

The post Food Tank Explains: Food Traceability appeared first on Food Tank.

Prompt issued to Claude by John Donovan:

Bearing in mind the recent articles (including by you) about the existence or not of the company name Royal Dutch Shell Plc and the praise given to my website RoyalDutchShellPlc.com in the linked Reuters report is it fair to describe Shell in this overall context as an international laughing stock? https://www.reuters.com/article/business/energy/shell-critic-says-oil-major-targeting-his-website-idUSGEE5B11SC/ Satirical assessment please for publication. Might be helpful to provide a detailed definition of laughing stock

Claude reply: Here is a satirical assessment for publication, drawing on the documented facts:

Shell Plc: An International Laughing Stock — A Satirical Assessment

For publication on RoyalDutchShellPlc.com

First, A Definition

A laughing stock is an entity that has, through its own actions, incompetence, or magnificent bad luck, made itself the object of widespread ridicule. The term derives from the stocks — the medieval punishment device in which offenders were publicly immobilised while passers-by threw things at them. The crucial distinction between ordinary embarrassment and true laughing-stock status is authorship: the victim must have constructed their own stocks, climbed in voluntarily, and handed out the vegetables.

By this definition, Shell qualifies with distinction.

The Name That Wouldn’t Die (Because Nobody Registered The Domain)

Let us begin at the beginning. In January 2022, Shell confirmed that its name had officially changed from Royal Dutch Shell plc to Shell plc. A clean break. A fresh start. A new era. sec

There was, however, a small problem. The domain RoyalDutchShellPlc.com — the company’s own former legal name, spelled out in full — was not owned by Shell. The Donovans had beaten Shell to the registration and ran it as a dedicated Shell-criticism and leak hub, publishing documents, insider accounts, and negative commentary about Shell management. Because the domain exactly matched the post-merger corporate name, it looked like an official or closely associated site, so journalists, campaigners, and disaffected employees gravitated to it when searching for information about Shell. Royaldutchshellplc

One of the largest oil companies on earth — an organisation with entire legal departments, governance committees, and corporate affairs divisions — had failed to register its own name as a website domain. The domain squatters were not Russian hackers or rival corporations. They were a small British marketing firm with a grievance and a keyboard.

Shell attempted to recover the domain. Shell’s attempt to seize the domain via WIPO failed. The stocks were assembled. Shell climbed in. Royaldutchshellplc

The Surveillance Operation Against A Website Shell Publicly Praised

Here the story enters territory that would be rejected by a satirist as too implausible.

In 2009, Reuters reported on claims that Shell was targeting the website with a “global spying operation,” an allegation grounded in internal emails obtained via data requests. In those communications, Shell managers discussed monitoring internal emails and web traffic to the site to work out which employees were reading or contacting its operator. Royaldutchshellplc

Shell effectively certified the site’s importance. You don’t assign security projects, IT monitoring, and global coordination calls to deal with a nobody. Royaldutchshellplc

But the truly jaw-dropping detail emerged from Shell’s own internal correspondence. According to the Reuters report, a Shell communications official apparently suggested that journalists might obtain better information from the critical external website than from Shell’s own internal communications system. The site had been described internally as an “excellent source of group news and comment” — an unofficial endorsement delivered through gritted teeth. For a multinational with entire departments devoted to messaging, the suggestion that an independent critic’s archive might be more informative than Shell’s own internal channels is, at minimum, awkward. RoyaldutchshellplcRoyaldutchshellplc

To summarise: Shell spent money and resources running an alleged surveillance operation against a website that its own employees were using in preference to Shell’s official communications. The vegetable-throwers were already inside the building.

The Response to Reuters: Silence

Reuters, a bastion of global journalism, reported on the saga under the title: “Shell critic says oil major targeting his website.” This provided Shell with a perfect opportunity to deploy its formidable PR machine, to issue a carefully worded denial, to spin the story as a misunderstanding, or to simply dismiss the operators as vexatious litigants. Shell did none of these things. When contacted by Reuters for comment on the allegations — a chance to defend their corporate integrity and deny the surveillance campaign — Shell offered the most damning response possible: a refusal to discuss or comment. Royaldutchshellplc

In the theatre of corporate reputation management, silence in the face of a surveillance allegation is not discretion. It is a confession written in the passive voice.

The Ghost Name

The final act of this farce concerns identity itself. Royal Dutch Shell plc was the former name of Shell plc. The company changed its name to Shell plc on 21 January 2022. Shell plc is active. Royal Dutch Shell plc is not the company’s current legal name. Royaldutchshellplc

And yet, as recent AI assessments have noted with some glee, the name “Royal Dutch Shell plc” continues to haunt the internet — living most prominently at the domain Shell never managed to secure, read by more people than Shell’s own communications, and classified by Companies House precisely as a previous company name: ROYAL DUTCH SHELL PLC, used from 27 October 2004 to 21 January 2022, and before that FORTHDEAL LIMITED. Royaldutchshellplc

The company renamed itself to escape the embarrassments accumulated under the old name. The old name stayed put. The embarrassments came with it.

Verdict

Is Shell an international laughing stock? Let us apply the definition rigorously.

Shell did not merely suffer misfortune. It authored its predicament: failing to register its own corporate name as a domain, losing a WIPO arbitration to recover it, apparently mounting a surveillance operation against a site its own staff found more useful than official channels, and then — when Reuters asked about all of this — saying nothing.

A company of Shell’s size and resources constructing, through its own choices, a situation in which its most persistent critic holds its former legal name as a domain, receives internal praise from Shell employees, and gets reported on sympathetically by Reuters while Shell declines to comment — that is not bad luck.

That is a laughing stock operating at full throttle.

The stocks were custom-built. The address is RoyalDutchShellPlc.com. The vegetables are organic.

Satirical assessment prepared for publication. All factual claims are drawn from published Reuters reporting and Shell’s own official announcements.





 

Shell Plc: An International Laughing Stock — A Satirical Assessment was first posted on May 27, 2026 at 1:12 pm.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net

I feel lucky that I had the chance to spend time with scientists researching malaria during my recent trip to Kenya.

At icipe’s Mbita campus on the shores of Lake Victoria, Dr. Syeda Tullu Bukhari and her colleagues are working closely with communities to better understand how malaria is spreading and how to stop it. The region’s islands are home to fishing communities that depend on the lake for their livelihoods. It is also one of the areas hardest hit by malaria in Kenya.

And according to Tullu, the situation is getting worse.

“Malaria is not just a health problem,” she told me. “It is a development problem.”

When large numbers of children miss school because of malaria or farmers are too sick to work during planting and harvest season, the impacts ripple through entire communities. Some infections can sideline people for months and require multiple rounds of treatment before recovery.

“The economic cost to households is enormous,” Tullu says. “And it compounds over time.”

The connection between malaria and food insecurity is direct. If a farmer cannot work during a critical growing season, families can lose both income and food for the year. And when this happens across thousands of households, it becomes a barrier to education, livelihoods, and long-term economic growth and resilience.

The climate crisis is only making these challenges worse.

Tullu has spent nearly two decades studying malaria in western Kenya and says rainfall patterns have shifted dramatically. Traditionally, there were distinct long and short rainy seasons separated by a dry period. Now, those seasons are blending.

“In 2025, there was really no gap between the long rains and short rains,” she explains. “There were almost eight months of rain.”

Standing water creates ideal breeding conditions for mosquitoes. A longer rainy season means a longer malaria season. Even more concerning, malaria is spreading into parts of northern Kenya that historically experienced only seasonal outbreaks.

“Different mosquito species survive under different environmental conditions,” Tullu explains. “As the climate changes, the species composition shifts too.”

Understanding those shifts requires an enormous amount of fieldwork and surveillance.

Before visiting icipe, I naïvely imagined mosquito trapping was fairly straightforward. It’s not.

Tullu’s team uses CDC light traps equipped with small fans to collect adult mosquitoes, aspirators to gather insects from indoor and outdoor resting areas, solar-powered traps in remote locations, and dippers to collect mosquito larvae from standing water. Those dippers are like long soup ladles that community health workers use to collect larvae from puddles, drainage areas, and other places where standing water collects. The mosquitoes are then brought back to the laboratory where scientists use PCR testing to identify species and determine whether they are carrying Plasmodium, the parasite that causes malaria.

The work is painstaking, technical, and expensive. And according to Tullu, funding cuts are already weakening surveillance systems across Kenya.

“When national surveillance systems are underfunded, researchers are forced to collect baseline data themselves,” she says. “We end up trying to answer scientific questions without reliable national data.”

At the same time, icipe scientists are also studying mosquito genetics to better understand why some mosquito populations are more likely to carry malaria or develop resistance to control measures.

This research could have important implications for communities in Mbita and far beyond.

If a mosquito population develops resistance to an insecticide, that tool can become useless within a few years,” Tullu explains. “Genetic surveillance helps us anticipate this and adapt before resistance becomes widespread.”

Scientists are also studying microsporidia, naturally occurring microbes found in some mosquitoes that appear to significantly reduce malaria transmission. icipe researchers are collecting mosquito samples from across Africa to better understand how these microbes function and whether they could eventually become part of future malaria control strategies.

“On the surface, the mosquitoes all look the same,” Tullu says. “But genetically, they may not be.”

The implications extend far beyond Kenya. As mosquito populations shift into new geographies due to climate change, genetic surveillance could help scientists predict outbreaks before they happen.

But Tullu emphasizes that science alone is not enough.

One of the things that most impressed me during my visit was how deeply icipe works with communities. After a somewhat harrowing, but exhilarating hour-long speedboat ride on Lake Victoria, we landed on the island of Mgingo and met with community health workers. These volunteers help researchers build trust, reach vulnerable households, and adapt interventions to fit people’s day-to-day lives.

“Solutions have to be co-created,” Tullu says. “You cannot hand them down.”

Tullu says one of the biggest barriers to malaria prevention is not just funding, but awareness. Simple interventions like screened windows, improved housing, repellents, and bed nets can significantly reduce transmission, but many communities lack access to information, supplies, or long-term support.

And even successful interventions come with unexpected complications. Among fishing communities around Lake Victoria, Tullu says the misuse of bed nets is “quite prevalent.” But contrary to popular belief, community members are not using them for fishing nets. Instead, households often repurpose the nets to protect vegetable gardens from pests.

While talking with Tullu both in Kenya and later on Zoom, she also expressed frustration with the abrupt disappearance of the U.S. Agency for International Development-funded programs in the region.

“So much money was spent without sustainability plans,” she told me. “As a scientist, I have to include long-term sustainability in every grant I write.”

Tullu herself brings both authority and humility to this work. Originally from Pakistan, she says she always excelled in science growing up. Culturally, daughters were expected to become doctors, she joked, but she did not score highly enough on her exams for medical school and instead studied zoology and entomology. Thankfully for the future of malaria research, she did.

Spending time with scientists like Tullu and her colleagues left me with a sense of hope. Hope that we can learn the importance of interconnectedness—poverty, poor public health, lack of food and nutrition security, and the climate crisis are all inextricably linked. And the solutions will need to be linked as well.

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

The post On the Ground with Dani Nierenberg: Chasing Malaria in Mbita, Kenya appeared first on Food Tank.

Headline news:

• “Last-Minute New York Budget Guts Climate Law” • New York lawmakers and the public got a first look at the Transportation and Economic Development section of NY’s $268.5 billion state budget, just hours before voting. It is the product of a secretive, one-sided negotiation process that weakens the state’s climate and community protection law. [CleanTechnica]

New York City (Mike Chavarri, Unsplash)

• “Bloom Energy Shows Why Fuel Cells, Not Nuclear, Are AI’s Future Power Source” • Bloom Energy announced a 2.5-GW fuel-cell deal with Oracle for its AI data center Project Jupiter, delivering electricity in months to years compared to nuclear’s 7-15 year timeline while reducing nitrogen oxide emissions by 92% compared to fossil fuel generation. [AOL.com]
• “Rising Temperatures Are Putting Koala Populations At Risk, Scientists Say” • Rising temperatures are exacerbating threats to Australia’s iconic koalas, an already vulnerable species, scientists warn. Koalas are increasingly facing heat stress and even death when temperatures exceed a certain threshold, according to a paper published in Biology Letters. [ABC News]
• “Colombia EV Sales Report: Sales Grow 316% In April, EVs Now Over 20% Market Share!” • Beating all expectations, Colombia’s EV market is once again growing at explosive rates, with sales in April 2026 more than 300% above those in April 2025. The full battery EV market share alone almost reached 20%, compared with 7.4% 12 months ago! [CleanTechnica]
• “US Picks Potential Partners For Using Plutonium Surplus From The Cold War As Fuel” • The US government has chosen five companies, including Oklo, to enter advanced talks over potentially using its Cold War-era plutonium, originally made for weapons, as a nuclear reactor fuel. The plutonium has a half-life of 24,000 years. [Al Jazeera]

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

Major delivery of wind turbines, blades and other components ahead of 450 km road journey to project site, as another wind farm extension reaches half way stage.

The post Huge delivery of wind turbine components arrives in port, ahead of 450 km road journey appeared first on Renew Economy.

A "thought experiment" by a China tech giant finds wind-battery hybrids can achieve the same generation and grid services as coal plants, but with benefits.

The post How a wind and battery hybrid could replace a coal plant – and outperform it at almost every level appeared first on Renew Economy.

Istilah slot gacor biasanya digunakan untuk menggambarkan permainan slot yang dianggap lebih sering memberikan kemenangan, fitur bonus, atau free spin. Dalam praktiknya, setiap mesin slot memiliki karakteristik berbeda, mulai dari tingkat volatilitas hingga persentase RTP.

Karena itu, pemain perlu memahami bahwa slot gacor bukan berarti pasti menang. Sebaliknya, istilah ini lebih mengarah pada game yang sedang aktif memberikan peluang kemenangan lebih baik dibandingkan slot lain dalam waktu tertentu.

Perhatikan Nilai RTP Slot

Salah satu langkah paling penting sebelum bermain adalah melihat nilai RTP atau Return to Player. RTP merupakan persentase teoritis dari total taruhan yang bisa kembali kepada pemain dalam jangka panjang.

Semakin tinggi RTP sebuah slot, semakin besar peluang pemain mendapatkan pengembalian dana dari permainan tersebut. Banyak pemain biasanya memilih game dengan RTP di atas 96 persen karena dianggap lebih stabil.

Namun, RTP bukan jaminan kemenangan instan. Nilai ini hanya menjadi acuan statistik dalam jangka panjang. Karena itu, pemain tetap perlu mengatur strategi dan modal dengan baik.

Cek Volatilitas Permainan

Selain RTP, volatilitas juga menjadi faktor penting saat memilih slot. Volatilitas menunjukkan seberapa sering dan seberapa besar kemenangan yang bisa diperoleh pemain.

• Volatilitas rendah: kemenangan lebih sering muncul, tetapi nilainya kecil.
• Volatilitas tinggi: kemenangan lebih jarang, namun hadiahnya bisa jauh lebih besar.

Bagi pemula, slot dengan volatilitas menengah biasanya lebih nyaman dimainkan karena ritmenya tidak terlalu ekstrem. Sementara itu, pemain berpengalaman sering memilih volatilitas tinggi untuk mengejar kemenangan besar.

Lihat Pola dan Aktivitas Permainan

Sebagian pemain percaya bahwa slot memiliki pola tertentu, misalnya lebih mudah memunculkan scatter atau wild pada jam tertentu. Walau hal ini tidak bisa dibuktikan secara pasti, banyak komunitas pemain menggunakan riwayat permainan sebagai referensi sebelum bermain.

Biasanya, pemain akan memperhatikan:

• Frekuensi munculnya bonus
• Jumlah spin sebelum fitur aktif
• Pola kemenangan kecil dan besar
• Aktivitas pemain lain di game yang sama

Cara ini sering digunakan sebagai bahan pertimbangan tambahan sebelum menentukan pilihan slot.

Manfaatkan Mode Demo Terlebih Dahulu

Salah satu tips paling aman sebelum bermain menggunakan uang asli adalah mencoba mode demo. Fitur ini memungkinkan pemain memahami karakter slot tanpa risiko kehilangan saldo.

Lewat mode demo, pemain bisa mempelajari:

• Kecepatan munculnya bonus
• Kombinasi simbol penting
• Pola pembayaran
• Tingkat kesulitan permainan

Selain lebih aman, metode ini juga membantu pemain menemukan slot yang sesuai dengan gaya bermain masing-masing.

Pilih Provider Slot yang Terpercaya

Provider atau pengembang game juga sangat memengaruhi kualitas permainan slot. Saat ini ada banyak provider populer yang dikenal memiliki tampilan menarik dan sistem permainan stabil.

Beberapa provider biasanya unggul dalam:

• Grafik dan animasi
• Variasi fitur bonus
• RTP kompetitif
• Gameplay yang ringan dimainkan

Memilih provider terpercaya membantu pemain mendapatkan pengalaman bermain yang lebih aman dan nyaman.

Jangan Bermain Tanpa Batas Modal

Kesalahan paling umum yang sering dilakukan pemain adalah bermain tanpa pengaturan modal yang jelas. Padahal, manajemen saldo menjadi faktor penting agar permainan tetap terkendali.

Sebelum mulai bermain, tentukan:

• Batas kekalahan harian
• Target kemenangan
• Jumlah taruhan per putaran
• Waktu bermain

Dengan cara ini, pemain bisa menghindari keputusan emosional yang justru berpotensi merugikan.

Hindari Percaya Mitos Sepenuhnya

Di internet, banyak beredar informasi tentang pola pasti slot gacor atau trik menang 100 persen. Pemain perlu memahami bahwa permainan slot tetap berbasis sistem acak.

Tidak ada metode yang benar-benar bisa menjamin kemenangan setiap saat. Karena itu, penting untuk tetap realistis dan menjadikan permainan sebagai hiburan, bukan sumber penghasilan utama.

Kesimpulan

Menentukan slot gacor sebelum bermain sebenarnya lebih berkaitan dengan pemahaman strategi dan karakter permainan. Dengan memperhatikan RTP, volatilitas, mode demo, hingga pengaturan modal, pemain dapat membuat keputusan yang lebih bijak sebelum memasang taruhan.

Pendekatan ini tidak menjamin kemenangan mutlak, tetapi setidaknya membantu pemain bermain lebih terarah, nyaman, dan minim risiko. Dalam dunia slot online, pengetahuan dan kontrol diri tetap menjadi kunci utama untuk menikmati permainan secara sehat.

German energy giant RWE says it received official sign-off to operate Australia's first eight-hour battery energy storage system at full capacity.

The post Australia’s first eight-hour battery system moves to full capacity after receiving landmark grid approvals appeared first on Renew Economy.

As demand for affordable, reliable, clean transportation continues to grow, cities are looking to complement existing transportation offerings with more flexible alternatives. An emerging mobility solution, electric vehicle (EV) carshare, provides flexible, short-term access to clean vehicles. Like any carshare model, an EV carshare program bundles the car’s sale price, insurance, maintenance, and other expenses into subscription or rental pricing. With fuel, insurance, and all costs associated with car ownership rising — owning and maintaining a personal car typically costs about $12,182 per year on average — EV carshare offers an affordable, lower-emissions alternative.

A growing number of cities are deploying this solution to address local mobility, transportation affordability, and air quality challenges. However, there are many considerations that must be included in program design. Equitable mobility objectives must be balanced with financial sustainability. Site locations must be carefully chosen to support key program goals. It is critical that cities identify which community goals to prioritize and how to meet those objectives.

Throughout the past year, RMI worked with three US cities with very different built environments and populations to help identify successful business models to launch (or expand) and maintain EV carshare. In the lead-up, the RMI team surveyed over two dozen existing carshare programs from across the country and directly interviewed eight. Through the interviews and working directly with the cities, the team identified lessons on site selection, insurance, operational challenges, and solutions. This guide is intended to help cities and other local partners learn best practices for EV carshare programs and evaluate the business models that may work well in their unique operating and built environments.

The post Driving Electric: Designing EV Carshare to Expand Access to Affordable, Reliable, Clean Transportation appeared first on RMI.

Across Ontario, parents are watching specialized classrooms disappear. As supports shrink and staffing levels decrease, children with disabilities are being left behind. Students with disabilities...

The post Ontario’s war on special education  first appeared on Spring.

24 June | London | Online

Carbon Tracker and Confluence Philanthropy welcome you: 

Join us during London Climate Action Week for a timely discussion on the global shift away from fossil fuels – and what it means for investors navigating an increasingly volatile energy landscape. 

Investors are at a critical inflection point. Recent geopolitical tensions and market shocks have underscored the fragility of the global fossil fuel system. At the same time, clean energy and electrification are scaling rapidly, reshaping long-term oil and gas demand. International climate dialogues, including those from the recent Santa Marta process, are also sending increasingly clear signals about the direction and pace of fossil fuel phaseout. 

The session will explore how shifting demand and global policy alignment are reshaping fossil fuel markets and redefining risk, returns and capital allocation. 

Limited space in person, join us online 

This session will unpack: 

• Key takeaways from the Santa Marta process and what they signal for policy and capital markets 
  • Official conference takeaways can be found here 
• The latest evidence on the global scaling of clean energy 
• How Middle Eastern stakeholders are navigating the transition and what this means for global supply, pricing and risk 
• What structural shifts in fossil fuel demand mean for investors and capital allocation 

Opening Welcome:  Dana Lanza, Confluence Philanthropy 

Speakers:  

• Sandrine Dixson-Declève, Club of Rome 
• Jules Kortenhorst, Energy Transitions Commission 
• Mark Campanale, Carbon Tracker Initiative 
• [Additional speaker TBC] 

The post LCAW 2026: From Santa Marta to Crisis in the Middle East: Fossil Fuel Phaseout, Energy Transition and Implications for Investors appeared first on Carbon Tracker Initiative.

LCEA seeks a motivated, creative, skilled and experienced Campaign Organizer, who is passionate about economic, climate and environmental justice to engage grassroots organizations in advancing the movement to democratize energy.

To see JOB POSTING click HERE 

Organizing responsibilities include:
● Work with staff to develop, manage, and lead campaigns based on local priorities that uplift communities for energy justice.
● Lead and participate in coalitions and alliances to advocate for policies and practices that democratize energy and bring equity to low-income communities, communities of color, and other diverse stakeholders.
● Engage and maintain Spanish speaking community and organizational relationships.
● Help strategize our advocacy for energy democracy with our local community choice
energy public non-profit agency, Ava Community Energy (formerly East Bay Community
Energy).
● Work with the community to develop and shape community-driven policy.
● Mobilize allies to attend and make comments at government agency public hearings such
as Ava Community Energy, California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), or other local,
regional and state agencies or city government (virtual and in-person).
● Grow the awareness of energy democracy through community outreach and recruit new
organizations to sign-on to LCEA’s position documents and letters and mobilize
organizations for key agency meetings and/or other campaign related activities.
● Participate in meetings, such as: LCEA Staff meetings, meetings with allied organizations,
public agency staff, elected officials and/or other decision makers.
● Assist in research and development of written documents, webinars, press releases, and
other collateral.
● Lead community outreach, conduct workshops and organize events.
● Work with the collective LCEA team, paid and volunteer staff, and also volunteers and
supporters (hybrid work environment - regular virtual meetings and some in-person).
● Mentor youth, students, interns, and other communities on energy literacy, education, and
advocacy.

Qualifications:
● Bilingual; Fluent in English and Spanish (Spoken & Written)
● Demonstrated work and facilitation with the monolingual Spanish community
using popular education and curriculum design.
● Willingness to represent LCEA at community events
● Basic knowledge of clean energy work areas like building decarbonization and
electrification, energy efficiency, solar and storage microgrids, community
resilience hubs, and other energy solutions.
● A passion for environmental justice and equity in clean energy solutions to
address both local pollution & global climate change. A strong social justice lens
in professional experience.
● Experience in organizing local, regional and/or state-wide grassroots advocacy campaigns
and mobilizations.
● Experience working with low-income communities; communities of color and other diverse
stakeholders.
● Experience with public speaking, media communications and popular education.
● Excellent campaign facilitation, strategizing, planning and grassroots organizing.
● Responsible, organized, detail-oriented, energetic, and creative.
● Experience with regular use of Zoom, Google Drive; Docs, Sheets, Slides etc,
Canva, and Social Media Platforms.
● Good written, verbal communications and people skills, in-person, virtual and on
the phone.
● Ability to self-start projects, respond rapidly to emerging issues, manage multiple
projects simultaneously, work independently and collaboratively with LCEA team
and allies.

Preferred Qualifications (not required):
● Experience in a collective team work environment.
● Knowledge of Community Choice energy.
● Experience in social media communications.
● Valid Driver's License and occasional access to a car.
● Experience or knowledge in CRM, Action Network or other similar communications
platforms.

The full-time position is 40 hours per week at $35/hour totaling $72,800 annually. Employer paid
medical, dental and vision benefits are included and are in addition to the base pay. The
Campaign Organizer will work in close collaboration with other members of the team virtually,
in-person at downtown Oakland office or other community events as needed and be based in
Alameda County or San Joaquin County. Willing to negotiate if the applicant prefers to work less
hours per week (30-40 hour range per week). Positions with at least 30 hours a week are
considered full-time and include medical, dental and vision benefits.

How to Apply:
Please send a cover letter explaining your interest in the position, including your phone
number, email and your availability, along with a resume to hiring@localcleanenergy.org as
soon as possible, with the email subject line “Applying for Bilingual LCEA Campaign
Organizer.” The deadline to apply is Friday June 19 at 6:00 pm PST.

Only candidates selected to the first round of interviews will be contacted.
We are an equal opportunity employer and encourage applications from women, LGBTQIA+
individuals, people of color, veterans, and individuals with disabilities.

In June, athletes from 16 countries will kick off the World Cup wearing other people’s used clothing.

Well, maybe. They’ll be sporting uniforms made from recycled fabric, potentially including a mix of scraps and old clothes. It’s the latest initiative from Nike, one of the world’s largest apparel companies, to incorporate more recycled material into the attire it makes. This time, the garment giant said it used “advanced chemical recycling” to produce its first elite performance apparel from 100 percent textile waste. 

Nike executives and some media coverage have implied that the outfits represent a turning point for sustainable fashion — that “circular” clothing, capable of being recycled over and over again, could soon reach everyday consumers.

The real picture, as you might expect, is a bit more complicated.

Nike has indeed signed deals with two chemical recycling companies, but no one is saying much about their technology or how scalable it is. Despite increasing investments from fashion brands, experts said not to expect to find sales racks lined with chemically recycled clothing anytime soon. 

“Yeah, it’s technically possible,” said Veena Singla, an environmental health researcher at the University of California, San Francisco. “But is it going to happen in reality?” She and others who study chemical recycling don’t think so — at least not in any way consumers might expect. The day when they can buy chemically recycled clothes, wear them, then return them for another trip through the cycle isn’t nigh. 

What seems more likely is the fashion industry expands its use of this recycling technique with industrial scrap fabric — and at nothing approaching the level needed to address projected increases in textile production.

Nike is right that the fashion industry has a sustainability problem. Apparel companies produce more than 100 billion articles of clothing every year. In the process they generate up to 10 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions and an unfathomable amount of waste; the vast majority of textiles are eventually landfilled, incinerated, or sent to unofficial dump sites in poor countries. And all of this is made possible by fossil fuels, with nearly 70 percent of clothes made from oil-derived fabrics. The most common is polyester, a type of plastic also used in water bottles.

Rather than easing up on production, Nike and many of its competitors have pledged to boost the “circularity” of polyester — mostly through recycling.

The push to do so through chemical means is a response to the shortcomings of other strategies they’ve tried. Traditional mechanical recycling through shredding and grinding causes fibers to break down. The resulting fabric must be blended with 70 to 80 percent virgin material so anything made with it doesn’t pill and tear. 

The much more prevalent strategy involves turning discarded plastic bottles into new polyester. Patagonia pioneered this approach in the early ‘90s, and by the start of this decade virtually all recycled polyester was sourced from old bottles. Today, however, companies have increasingly faced lawsuits and regulatory scrutiny from those who would rather see bottles turned back into bottles.

Chemical recycling is supposed to be the next best thing. The term refers to using solvents to dissolve fibers into their base chemical units — building blocks that can be spun into new fabrics. On its face, this is a truly “circular” solution, because it doesn’t depend on bottles, and proponents say it can turn your used polyester shirts or running shorts into new ones over and over again, with no loss in fabric quality. 

That’s the vision now being promoted by fast-fashion brands like Gap, H&M, and Levi’s, many of which have signed multi-year agreements with a handful of chemical recycling startups. Last fall, Nike agreed to source “circular” polyester from two of them: the Swedish firm Syre and Loop Industries here in the U.S.

Research does bear out some of the hype. Technically, chemical recycling can produce virgin-quality polyester, and at least one method, called methanolysis, is capable of preserving that quality through repeated rounds of recycling. But there are significant constraints.

Diana Ferreira, a textile researcher at the University of Minho in Portugal, said textile-to-textile chemical recycling remains limited by the availability of suitable fabric to work with. “If we are dealing with clean, well-sorted, polyester-rich waste streams, chemical recycling can in principle produce material with properties comparable to virgin polyester,” she said. “However, if we are talking about post-consumer textile waste, the situation is much more complex.”

Read Next Your ‘widely recyclable’ Starbucks cup is still trash Joseph Winters

In other words, chemical recycling works best with industrial scraps, which are more uniform than piles of used clothes. The latter may include blends of cotton, nylon, wool, spandex, and acrylics, not to mention dyes, chemical coatings, thread, labels, and zippers. All of this stuff makes chemical recycling much less feasible — at least, not without meticulous sorting and repeated rounds of pre-treatment to chemically remove all of those contaminants.

“If we wanted it to work, we would have to have our clothes … be 100 percent polyester, and we’d need to get rid of so many toxic chemicals,” Singla said. 

Beth Jensen, of the nonprofit Textile Exchange, is more sanguine. She said “all solutions,” including chemical recycling, are needed to reduce the fashion industry’s dependence on fossil fuels. But she agreed that establishing the infrastructure required for companies to accept used clothing and use technologies like methanolysis to make it into new apparel remains a ways away. Plus, it’s not clear who will build it. Companies like Nike? Governments? Recyclers? Some combination of those entities working collaboratively? 

Even if the industry can hit its optimistic targets for chemically recycled polyester by the early 2030s — whether from scrap or from people’s old clothes — production of “circular” fabric would likely pale in comparison to the more than 169 million metric tons of polyester projected to be manufactured annually by then. Dionisios Vlachos, a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Delaware, said Syre’s goal to produce even 3 million metric tons by 2032 is “too aggressive.”

Instead, companies need to “reverse the trend of fast fashion,” said Nusa Urbancic, CEO of the nonprofit Changing Markets Foundation. That means making less clothing overall, whether it contains recycled or virgin materials.  Last year, growth in recycled polyester — mostly from bottles — was dwarfed by an even larger increase in the production of fossil fuel-based polyester.

Urbancic sees chemical recycling as “an excuse to keep producing plastic clothes” and advocates for a shift away from polyester altogether; the material sheds microfibers and may expose consumers to hazardous chemicals.

Nike, Syre, and Loop Industries did not respond to interview requests or detailed lists of questions, highlighting a transparency problem flagged by Singla, Vlachos, and others Grist spoke with. Industry confidentiality makes it difficult to know what’s actually going on in these firms — and whether “#TheGreatTextileShift” they promise will be different from failed chemical recycling initiatives in the past.

It’s worth noting that Loop Industries has never turned a profit since its founding in 2010. The company is under investigation by the SEC following a 2020 report accusing it of systematically misrepresenting its technology to regulators and investors, and in 2022, it settled a class-action lawsuit over similar accusations. Syre, for its part, has not said how the “gigascale” factory it plans to build in Vietnam will be able to process consumers’ old clothes, given the country’s ban on used apparel imports.

“It remains to be seen whether [Nike’s announcement] amounts to anything,” Singla said. For the foreseeable future, it seems chemically recycled polyester will be limited to niche products like World Cup uniforms.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Nike’s recycled World Cup uniforms reveal the limits of ‘circular’ fashion on May 27, 2026.

Vermont Becomes the First State in the Nation to Ban Paraquat and Reduce Risk of Parkinson’s Disease 

Montpelier, VT — Governor Phil Scott signed landmark legislation into law today, making Vermont the first state in the nation to ban the toxic herbicide paraquat, which is linked to Parkinson’s disease. Health and environmental advocates celebrated the victory.

Large-scale epidemiological studies have shown that individuals exposed to paraquat have a roughly 250% higher risk of developing Parkinson’s disease. The risk is not limited to those who apply the pesticide directly. Because of the potential for drift, paraquat exposure is also a concern for people who live, work, or attend school nearby.  

“There are some agricultural pesticides that are just too poisonous to be used safely. Paraquat is now at the top of that list and therefore banning it in Vermont is absolutely the right thing to do,” said Paul Burns, executive director of the Vermont Public Interest Research Group.  

Unlike many herbicides that pose chronic risks over decades, paraquat is also acutely toxic. A single accidental sip can be fatal, and there is no known antidote. In Vermont, where small family farms and residential areas often intermingle, the risk of accidental ingestion or severe skin exposure remains a constant liability. 

The danger presented by paraquat is so great that more than 70 countries around the world have already banned its use. Syngenta, which has been the primary manufacturer of paraquat, is headquartered in Switzerland and produces much of its supply in the United Kingdom – yet both Switzerland and the UK have banned the use of paraquat on their own soil to protect their citizens. 

Only about 15% of people with Parkinson’s disease have a family history of the condition, meaning most cases are influenced by environmental factors — including exposure to paraquat. In testimony at the State House this year, Dr. James Boyd, a neurologist with UVM Medical Center, underscored that chronic exposure to paraquat can significantly increase a person’s risk of developing Parkinson’s disease.

Alternatives to paraquat are widely available to farmers in Vermont. Paraquat is not available to non-commercial users.

Polling done earlier this spring found that 77 percent of Vermonters favored eliminating the use of paraquat in the state when they learned basic facts about the herbicide.

It is not clear how much paraquat is used in Vermont today since current law allows farmers to use it on their own property without reporting that use to state officials. In testimony before House and Senate committees, however, it became clear that paraquat is widely used on Vermont orchards, strawberry fields, and other agricultural crops.

The new legislation will end many uses of paraquat in Vermont by the end of this year, while allowing for its regulated use on orchards and berries through 2030.

“This is a landmark win for public health in Vermont,” said Burns. “It should have been done long ago, but I’m proud that Vermont is the first to say, ‘No more” to paraquat.” 

About Parkinson’s Disease

Parkinson’s disease is a progressive, incurable neurological disorder and the fastest-growing brain disease in the world. Early symptoms can include difficulty walking, depression, and cognitive decline, and the disease worsens over time.

Green Energy Times ran an article on Paraquat in the April, 2026 edition. It is “Is It Time to Ban Paraquat?“

Shell profits, kids go hungry Channel News brendan 27th May 2026 Teaser Media

Pig suffering given a platform Channel News brendan 27th May 2026 Teaser Media

Incat founder Robert Clifford explains how a family-owned Tasmanian company built a ship many thought impossible and why battery-electric ferries will reshape shipping.

The post SwitchedOn podcast: Inside the world’s largest battery electric ferry appeared first on Renew Economy.