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Renters will be saddled with higher power bills if minimum energy efficiency standards stop at ceiling insulation and air conditioning, new modelling warns.

The post Weak rental energy efficiency standards could leave tenants saddled with higher power bills appeared first on Renew Economy.

Governments need to start addressing climate change impacts and nature loss as a threat to national security and manage shocks before they hit rather than picking up the pieces afterwards, Britain’s foreign minister and other leaders told the opening of Climate Week NYC on Monday.

Ed Miliband – who was until July the UK’s energy minister – said the growing urgency and severity of extreme weather and related disasters require a shift in thinking, calling on governments to put the issues “front and centre”.

“Climate breakdown, in my view, must be an issue for foreign ministers and prime ministers, as well as energy and climate ministers – the security community, not just the activist community, the generals, not just the green campaigner,” he told an audience of policy and business leaders.

There is a need to assess risk differently, he added, by embedding climate and nature in national security systems, threat assessments and contingency planning. He also urged countries to pool information because climate shocks can travel fast through supply chains as well as influencing financial markets and migration patterns. 

The framing of climate change as a threat to countries’ security and stability is not new, but it has gained greater emphasis as the impacts of global warming are biting harder in places like Europe, which is struggling with more intense heatwaves, drought and forest fires.

In mid-August, Miliband said in a social media post, reflecting on the UK’s hot and dry summer, that he would convene foreign ministers attending the UN General Assembly in late September to discuss how to respond to “this new national security threat” and build a coalition for action. But he did not give further details of that initiative on Monday. 

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Australia calls for unified response

Other leaders in New York also reflected on the growing threat to their societies and economies from climate change impacts and exposure to volatile fossil fuel markets.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said his country “understands the dangers of global warming and the urgency of climate action as well as any nation”.

“We have seen it up close – from increasingly intense bushfires and floods, to the damage warming oceans are wreaking on our vulnerable coastlines,” he said in a speech, adding that with a record-breaking El Nino forecast, Australia and Pacific nations are preparing for a potential summer of extreme heat, bushfires and floods.

With scientific forecasts of worsening impacts now coming to pass, “this means the global community cannot afford to be frozen in time as the world warms around us”, he added. People cannot be left to cope alone, he said, emphasising that as leaders, “we need to come together, to meet the problem head on”. 

Australia will lead the negotiations at the upcoming COP31 climate summit, and has brought the existential threat to Pacific countries from sea level rise into the diplomatic limelight. The pre-COP gathering next month will be hosted in Fiji, with a visit by leaders to Tuvalu.

Speaking to Climate Home News in New York, Panama’s environment minister Juan Carlos Navarro said the small Central American country faces hundreds of millions of dollars in losses from drought in the Panama Canal due to El Niño.

The Panama Canal Authority estimates income could be reduced by between $225 million and $400 million due to slower maritime traffic passing through the strait.

“What a great irony,” Navarro said. “Panama being a small, carbon-negative country pays the price for the big carbon-emitting countries.”

UK foreign secretary Ed Miliband speaking at New York Climate Week. (Photo: The Climate Group) Climate investment “critical” to stability

Amina J. Mohammed, deputy secretary-general of the United Nations, said there was a need for countries to stick with multilateral approaches to problems including climate change, despite the difficult geopolitical times the world is going through. She added, however, that it “does require your voices. It won’t happen by itself. We have to lean into it.” 

The rest of the high-level UNGA week in New York will show the extent to which multilateral efforts to resolve the world’s problems – from climate change to poverty – have top-level support as leaders give their speeches, including the Brazilian and US presidents on Tuesday.

Kaysie Brown, associate director for climate diplomacy and geopolitics with think-tank E3G, said the statements by Miliband and other leaders at Climate Week NYC had underlined the political and government case to integrate climate considerations into security thinking and institutions at the highest level.  

“In a world of escalating climate impacts and the record El Niño expected to heighten risks worldwide alongside energy volatility and geopolitical tensions, investing in global climate resilience and the clean energy transition are critical to credible strategies to enhance stability and national security,” she added in a statement.

Suneeta Kaimal from the Natural Resource Governance Initiative (NRGI) said that, while in previous years governments heavily focused their speeches on climate action, this year’s focus on energy security does not change the underlying challenge. 

“The fact that the framing has changed from energy transition to energy security doesn’t change the reality that this transition needs to occur in energy systems. It’s just a different framework. It’s a more transactional framework, but it all points to the need for resilience,” she said.

Speaking at the opening session of Climate Week, Iceland’s Prime Minister Kristrún Frostadóttir described how her country had reacted to the spiralling costs it faced from the 1970s oil price crisis by investing in a large-scale district heating system fuelled instead by its abundant geothermal energy.

“Resilience wasn’t built while the crisis was happening. It was built in the years after – deliberately, patiently, as a national mission – so that the next shock wouldn’t hit as hard, if at all,” she said.

New COP goal on electrification

Speaking at a separate event on Monday, UN climate chief Simon Stiell pointed to a new voluntary target expected to be adopted at COP31 for 35% of global energy use to come from electricity by 2035 as a strategy that can help cushion countries, families and businesses from fossil fuel supply shocks and rising costs.

At the United Nations, the Turkish COP presidency gave more details of the electrification goal it first announced at the Bonn climate talks in June, including sharing with governments a final text of the pledge it wants them to get behind.

The pledge sets out a global ambition to advance electrification, highlighting the importance of supporting developing countries to identify their grid investment needs and access finance for electrification. 

“It is a development strategy, an industrial strategy, a health strategy, and a security strategy,” Stiell said.

The post Climate change and energy transition rise up national security agenda appeared first on Climate Home News.

Plants are a beautiful way to connect to our environment while supporting birds, pollinators, and other wildlife. When your outdoor space is limited to a small patio or balcony, it can...

Kate and Aaron talk to Nick Holshouser, a data analyst with Wandering Nature, LLC, who is analyzing the public comments coming in on the Trump administration’s proposal to repeal the 2001 roadless rule in real-time at roadless.org, and Blaine Miller-McFeeley, a senior legislative representative at Earthjustice, about public comment periods under the Trump administration. We cover why you should still submit public comments (even though the Trump administration probably isn’t interested in your opinion) and how to write a comment that requires an agency response and helps build the legal record against bad agency actions.

News

• Trump is considering more data centers on public lands than previously known – The Washington Sun
• Forest Service adds comment period for PitCo’s Maroon Bells operations takeover – Aspen Journalism

Resources

• Roadless Rule repeal live comment analysis
• Submit a comment on the proposed Roadless Rule repeal
• Watch this episode on YouTube (coming soon)

Produced by Aaron Weiss, Lauren Bogard, Kate Groetzinger, and Lilly Bock-Brownstein
Feedback: podcast@westernpriorities.org
Music: Purple Planet
Featured image: Stand of Ponderosa Pines in Grassy Valley by Deer Creek on the Malheur National Forest in North Eastern Oregon; Source: USFS/Flickr

The post Why submitting a public comment still matters—and how to write a good one appeared first on Center for Western Priorities.

In a move that has left the entire public relations industry gasping for air (and possibly a stiff drink), Shell has once again turned to the wizards of spin at MSQ Partners. The London-based group, which joined Shell’s global agency roster back in 2022 and has been gamely polishing the oil major’s image ever since, now faces what industry insiders are calling “the Mount Everest of reputation management – if Everest were made of crude oil, blood, and decades of awkward court documents.”

MSQ’s own Stephen Maher once declared the firm “absolutely thrilled” to work with the “truly world class brand that is Shell.” One can only assume the thrill has since curdled into a low, constant humming of existential dread.

Because let’s be honest: this is not a rebrand. This is an exorcism. And the demons have resumes longer than a tanker of Nigerian crude.

A Brief, Highly Incomplete History of Why This Job Is a Nightmare

Start with the Nazi past. Sir Henri Deterding, the Dutch founder often called the “Napoleon of oil,” developed a soft spot for Hitler in the 1930s. He met the Führer, funneled support, and Shell’s German subsidiary Rhenania-Ossag obligingly purged Jewish board members and played ball with the regime. Shell fuel helped power both sides of the war in the finest “we’re just a neutral energy company” tradition. Modern Shell prefers not to dwell on this chapter. MSQ’s brief: “Make the 1930s look like a charming period of energetic European collaboration.”

Then came the 2004 reserves scandal – the corporate equivalent of claiming you had a full tank when you were actually running on fumes and lies. Shell overstated proved reserves by roughly 4.5 billion barrels (about 20–23%). Top executives exited stage left. Regulators handed out record fines. Shareholders sued. The company’s dual-board structure collapsed under the weight of its own creative accounting. MSQ’s challenge: “Position this as an early example of radical transparency and bold leadership.”

Sakhalin-2 deserves its own chapter in the “How Not to Do International Business” handbook. Shell poured years and billions into the Russian LNG project, only to watch Moscow gradually strong-arm it out of majority control. After the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Shell announced a dramatic exit… and walked away with essentially nothing as Putin’s decree transferred the asset to a new Russian operator. Gazprom eventually scooped up the former Shell stake. MSQ’s task: “Frame the multi-billion-dollar write-down as a principled stand for democracy, preferably with soft lighting and a hopeful piano soundtrack.”

Nigeria remains the gift that keeps on litigating. Decades of oil spills in the Niger Delta, the Ogoni struggle, the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni Nine, ongoing English High Court cases over pollution in communities like Bille and Ogale, settlements, denials, and more spills. Shell has paid out, fought jurisdiction battles all the way to the UK Supreme Court, and still faces fresh claims. Recent internal documents disclosed in litigation have not exactly helped the “we’re responsible operators” narrative. MSQ’s mission: “Turn chronic environmental catastrophe and human rights controversies into a heartwarming story of community partnership and continuous improvement.”

Worker safety? Shell reports Goal Zero ambitions while contractors keep dying or getting crushed, burned, or maimed. Fines for crushed feet on North Sea gangways, propane releases causing severe burns, explosions at facilities, and ongoing process safety events form a steady drumbeat. MSQ’s creative brief: “Safety is our highest priority – please ignore the body count and the HSE prosecution records.”

And then there is the spying. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Shell (alongside BP) used private intelligence firm Hakluyt – staffed with former MI6 types – to infiltrate and monitor Greenpeace and other campaigners. Agents posed as filmmakers and left-wing sympathisers. The goal: neutralise inconvenient activism. More recently, Shell has reached for SLAPP-style lawsuits against Greenpeace over peaceful platform occupations, demanding millions and permanent protest bans before eventually settling. MSQ’s assignment: “Portray rigorous competitive intelligence and robust legal defence of critical energy infrastructure. Soft focus. Preferably no trench coats.”

The MSQ Challenge, Ranked by Difficulty

1. Convince the public that a company with this track record is suddenly the face of the energy transition.
2. Make “we’re investing in lower-carbon solutions while still maximising oil and gas returns” sound coherent.
3. Produce campaigns that survive five minutes of fact-checking by anyone with internet access and a functioning memory.
4. Keep the account without the entire creative team developing stress-related facial tics.

Industry observers note that MSQ already has experience with fossil clients (including BP). Experience, however, is not the same as a miracle.

One anonymous PR veteran put it best: “This isn’t reputation management. This is reputation archaeology – carefully excavating layer after layer of scandal while trying to convince everyone the skeleton underneath is actually a green hydrogen pioneer.”

### Suggested Headlines for the Coming Campaigns

– “Shell: Powering Progress Since the 1930s (Some Chapters May Contain Historical Inaccuracies)”
– “From Reserves Overstatement to Net-Zero Ambition: A Journey of Continuous Learning”
– “Nigeria: Where Every Spill Is an Opportunity for Dialogue”
– “Sakhalin-2: The Exit Strategy That Wrote Itself”
– “We Used to Spy on Greenpeace. Now We Just Sue Them. Progress!”
– “Safety First (Results May Vary by Contractor Status and Geography)”
– “MSQ + Shell: Because Even the Most Toxic Brands Deserve a Second, Third, and Twenty-Seventh Chance”

In the end, one almost feels sorry for the creatives at MSQ. Almost. They signed up to sell the idea that one of the world’s most historically compromised oil majors is a force for good. That is not a communications brief. That is a dare.

Good luck, MSQ. You’re going to need every ounce of joined-up thinking, every influencer, every carefully worded press release, and possibly a time machine.

Shell, meanwhile, continues to produce oil, gas, profits, and – with any luck – slightly better headlines than the ones history keeps writing for it.

The satire writes itself. The PR, unfortunately, does not.

Shell Hires MSQ: The PR Firm That Promised the Impossible – “Make Us Look Nice, or at Least Not Actively Evil” was first posted on September 21, 2026 at 11:15 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

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: LONDON Agency’s newly created “Cosmic Eraser & Vibe Realignment” department promises to reframe a century of corporate blunders into modern lifestyle aesthetics. LONDON — In what industry insiders are calling “the ultimate test of human optimism vs. historical reality,” global marketing group MSQ has formally accepted the monumental task of polishing the reputation of oil giant Shell. The landmark appointment—following a grueling six-month pitch process codenamed Operation Febreze—will see MSQ agencies tackle what experts describe as the advertising equivalent of vacuuming an active volcano. “We know what the skeptics are saying,” said an MSQ spokesperson while frantically adjusting an industrial air scrubber. “They look at Shell’s history and see ‘unmitigated disaster.’ We look at it and see an untapped goldmine of narrative reframing! The past isn’t a liability; it’s just content that hasn’t been properly filtered yet.” The Strategy: Bucket-by-Bucket Modernization According to leaked strategy decks, MSQ plans to tackle Shell’s most notorious corporate friction points using cutting-edge TikTok trends, soothing sepia tones, and high-frequency corporate doublespeak:

• The 1930s Nazi Germany Chapter: Rather than dwelling on former chief Sir Henri Deterding’s enthusiastic support for the Third Reich, creative teams are developing a retro “Extreme Longevity & Heritage Logistics” campaign. Soft-focus reels will celebrate “pioneering cross-border supply chains,” gently blurring the distinction between Allied and Axis fuel lines under a warm, vintage Instagram filter.
• The 2004 Reserves Scandal: When executive Walter van de Vijver famously emailed that he was “sick and tired of lying” after Shell artificially inflated its proven oil reserves by 3.9 billion barrels, it was viewed as a major fraud. MSQ is re-launching this on LinkedIn as an “Early Corporate Wellness & Radical Executive Vulnerability” milestone. The missing 3.9 billion barrels will be rebranded as a pioneer project in “Virtual Asset Architecture.”
• The Sakhalin-II Siberian Debacle: Environmental protests and endangered whale disruptions in the Russian Far East will be transformed into a calm, ASMR-infused eco-travel series titled “Siberian Whispers.” The series will focus exclusively on digitally rendered cranes nesting near deactivated drill bits to a lo-fi beats soundtrack.
• The Nigerian Conduct & Ogoniland Litigation: Decades of devastating oil spills, human rights controversies, and ongoing litigation in Ogoniland will be addressed through an ambitious “Earth-Element Synergy & Local Hydration” narrative, accompanied by limited-edition artisanal mud masks packaged in recycled Shell-branded canisters.
• Worker Safety & Offshore Records: High-risk offshore operations and safety infractions will be gamified via branded VR headsets for rig workers. The headsets will overlay serene tropical rainforests and singing birds directly onto heavy drilling machinery, ensuring workers enjoy a tranquil sensory environment during manual turbine startups.

Hazard Pay and On-Site Support Acknowledging the extreme mental strain on account managers required to pitch “carbon-neutral crude” with a straight face, MSQ has reportedly updated its workplace benefits. Account managers assigned to the Shell account will receive mandatory hazard pay, complimentary burn cream, and unlimited sessions with corporate-sponsored spiritual healers. “When you’re hired to perform PR for a house fire while the fire department is still arguing over who brings the hose, you need a strong team,” noted one senior strategist. “We aren’t just shifting paradigms—we’re bending reality.” (Disclaimer: No historical facts were harmed in the making of this campaign, though several were heavily re-edited for vibe optimization.) MSQ Launches ‘Project Extreme Gloss’ After Winning Shell PR Account was first posted on September 21, 2026 at 11:03 pm.
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In our latest, we talk with journalist Adam Federman about Arctic politics as the Trump administration moves to fast track drilling. Listen in: Guest Bio// Adam Federman (@adamfederman) is a…

The following is understood to be an internal document circulated to new starters on MSQ’s Shell business. We cannot verify its authenticity, but we also cannot stop laughing.

In a move surprising absolutely no one who has watched the energy giant cycle through PR partners the way other companies cycle through printer ink, Shell has confirmed — or at least not denied loudly enough — that MSQ is now steering the wheel of its global reputation management. It is, by any honest measure, one of the more ambitious contracts in modern advertising history, roughly equivalent to being hired to do the PR for a house fire while the fire department is still deciding whether to show up.

Anyone drafting MSQ’s onboarding deck faces an unusual challenge: where, precisely, does one begin a “brand journey” for a company whose corporate lineage runs through Nazi-era Germany, a 2004 reserves scandal so severe it triggered boardroom resignations and regulatory fines, the multi-billion-dollar fiasco of Sakhalin-2, decades of litigation over oil spills and human rights abuses in the Niger Delta, and a worker safety record that has, at various points, made headlines for exactly the wrong reasons? A normal rebrand starts with a mood board. This one might need a legal disclaimer.

Industry sources — by which we mean anyone who has read a newspaper since 1998 — note that Shell’s approach to reputational crisis has traditionally followed a reliable four-step formula: acknowledge nothing, commission a sustainability report, sponsor something green-sounding, and wait for the news cycle to move on. MSQ, to its credit, appears to specialize in precisely this kind of narrative alchemy — the agency’s own promotional materials speak fondly of helping brands “celebrate who they really are.” Whether Shell’s marketing team has fully thought through the implications of that phrase remains, charitably, unclear.

A satirical read of the pitch deck might go something like this: Slide one — “Shell: Powering Progress.” Slide two, in much smaller font — “Progress Toward What, Exactly, Is Still Under Discussion.” Slide three is presumably several hundred pages of historical footnotes, delivered separately, under embargo, by courier.

One imagines the MSQ creative team’s first internal meeting went something like: “So they want warmth, trust, and an emotional connection with the customer.” “Right. And the Ogoni Nine litigation?” “We were told not to bring that up unless someone else does first.” “And Sakhalin?” “Reframe as ‘ambitious international expansion.'” “And the Nazi thing?” “…We’re going to need a bigger meeting.”

To be fair to MSQ, this is not their first rodeo with a controversial energy client, and PR agencies have never been shy about taking on difficult accounts — that’s rather the point of the profession. But there’s difficult, and then there’s “decades-deep archive of primary-source documents maintained by aggrieved former business partners who have made it their life’s work to fact-check every press release in real time.” Shell’s critics didn’t get the memo that the rebrand was supposed to make this easier.

Welcome to the team.

Congratulations on joining the Shell account. You were selected for this role because you either (a) have a strong stomach, (b) have never used a search engine, or (c) both. This document will help you get up to speed quickly.

Section 1: Things you are not to Google on your first day

We know the instinct. Don’t. HR has asked us to remind you that “just doing some background reading” is not covered by your onboarding budget and may result in a mandatory wellness session.

Section 2: A brief, upbeat history of the brand

Founded in the early 20th century, Shell has weathered — and we cannot stress this enough, weathered — a series of what we internally call “legacy narrative opportunities.” These include a period of historical fuel-supply diversification during a regrettable European conflict, a 2004 accounting recalibration involving several billion barrels that were there and then, through no fault of anyone in particular, weren’t, an ambitious Siberian infrastructure project that came in only mildly over budget (four times, but who’s counting), and multiple decades of what affected communities have unhelpfully insisted on calling “litigation” rather than “engaged stakeholder dialogue.”

Section 3: Key talking points to memorize

• If asked about worker safety, pivot to “our unwavering commitment to continuous improvement.”
• If asked about Nigeria, pivot to “our unwavering commitment to continuous improvement.”
• If asked about literally anything else, also pivot to “our unwavering commitment to continuous improvement.” It is, our research shows, remarkably weatherproof.

Section 4: Creative do’s and don’ts

DO lean into resilience, heritage, and “energy for a changing world.”
DON’T use the word “changing” near the word “climate” without three rounds of legal sign-off.
DO use soft lighting.
DON’T use soft lighting anywhere near an actual drilling platform, a courtroom, or a 1930s photograph.

Section 5: A note on morale

Some colleagues have asked whether it’s ethically complicated to build a “trust and warmth” campaign for a client with this particular back catalogue. We’d remind the team that MSQ has a long and proud history of finding the emotional truth in difficult briefs — oat milk, budget airlines, the occasional bank. This is simply the next one. A slightly bigger one. With its own Wikipedia category tree.

Welcome aboard. Your NDA is attached separately and is, we’re told, considerably longer than this document.

MSQ Takes the Shell Account: A Job Description That Should Have Come With Hazard Pay was first posted on September 21, 2026 at 10:37 pm.
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LONDON — In a move hailed by branding experts as “the ultimate stress test for human optimism,” marketing and technology group MSQ has successfully landed a spot on Shell’s global agency roster. The agency group will reportedly deploy its finest minds to tackle the oil titan’s latest and most elusive challenge: convincing the public that decades of corporate controversies are actually just a vintage, artisanal mist. The appointment, which followed a grueling six-month competitive pitch process handled by the intermediary Booster, will see MSQ agencies like The Gate and MBAstack handling everything from digital marketing to influencer campaigns. Insiders report that the agency won the business after presenting a pitch deck codenamed “Project Chameleon.” The core strategy? Deploying high-frequency AI algorithms and TikTok lifestyle trends to ensure that if the future is rendered in a shiny enough gloss, the past becomes visually inaccessible. The PR Roadblocks: A Scannable Overview To construct its new global campaign, MSQ is reportedly dividing Shell’s brand liabilities into discrete narrative buckets, matching historical corporate friction points with modern marketing buzzwords:

• The Nazi Germany Chapter (1930s): Rather than ignoring the reality that former long-serving Shell chief Sir Henri Deterding backed the Third Reich, creative teams are mapping out an “Extreme Longevity” campaign. The angle focuses exclusively on “early pioneering transport logistics,” using soft sepia filters to gently blur the distinction between Allied and Axis fuel supply chains.
• The 2004 Reserves Scandal: When investigative reports from The Independent exposed a three-year plan to deceive shareholders by deliberately overstating proven oil and gas reserves by 3.9 billion barrels, exploration chief Walter van de Vijver famously emailed that he was “sick and tired of lying.” MSQ plans to reframe this via LinkedIn thought leadership as a pioneering corporate wellness moment where an executive felt safe expressing vulnerability. The missing oil will be rebranded as an early experiment in “Virtual Asset Architecture” and “Proactive Asset Manifestation.”
• The Sakhalin-II Siberian Debacle: The massive liquefied natural gas project, which was heavily mired in environmental protests regarding whale populations before Shell ceded control, will be transformed into a luxury eco-influencer travel series titled “Siberian Whispers.” The content will focus entirely on beautifully rendered, digitally generated Siberian cranes nesting near deactivated drill bits.
• The Worker Safety Record: Decades of friction with unions and watchdogs over high-risk offshore operations and community health impacts in regions like Ogoniland will be addressed via a high-concept employee wellness initiative. Branded VR headsets will overlay virtual tropical forests onto heavy industrial drilling platforms.

“Ethical Agility” in the Creative Department According to an anonymous copywriter at The Gate, the biggest win was reframing the massive executive payouts during historical corporate crises. Sir Philip Watts’ multi-million-pound exit package is being pitched to the market not as a “fat cat reward,” but as the ultimate masterclass in setting personal boundaries and corporate self-care. When questioned by trade journalists on whether the strategy is growing too grim for consumer advertising, an executive close to the pitch defended the tone. “Look, ad-land loves a challenge,” he said, requesting anonymity while adjusting a lapel pin featuring a stylized, carbon-neutral scallop shell. “Anyone can market a trendy oat milk. But it takes true, unadulterated marketing genius to take a corporate entity that fueled both sides of the Blitz, fabricated a quarter of its global assets, and then turn it into a curated lifestyle brand for people who drive hybrid SUVs. It’s not dark—it’s narrative transformation.” When asked how the agency plans to balance its own sustainability pledges with its new client, an internal memo leaked from MSQ offered a comforting reminder to staff: “Remember, carbon offsetting is a state of mind. For every heavy-industrial oil campaign we print in real life, a digital tree is planted in our corporate metaverse. We’re doing our part.” At press time, MSQ teams were seen reviewing an AI-generated script for a corporate apology video, searching for a synonym for “systemic deception” that sounds like “an unexpected journey toward sustainability.” MSQ Unveils Brand New ‘Industrial-Strength Air Freshener’ Division Following Shell Appointment was first posted on September 21, 2026 at 10:09 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

Who's Kenn? Simply put, Kenn is a national treasure. A renowned birder, author, and conservationist, Kenn Kaufman has spent his life dedicated to observing birds, reading about birds, writing...

Just west of the Houston metropolis, the Katy Prairie Preserve hosts more than 300 native bird species. Among the 20,000 acres of Texas grassland, wetland, and working land is an unusual site, called...

For Immediate Release:

September 21, 2026

Contact:
Ashley Castaneda, ashley@restorethedelta.org

SACRAMENTO — Today, the Delta Tribal Environmental Coalition (DTEC)—consisting of the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, Winnemem Wintu Tribe, Little Manila Rising, and Restore the Delta— submitted comments on the updated San Francisco Bay-Delta Water Quality Control Plan (“Bay-Delta Plan”), a critical policy guiding water quality, river flows, and ecosystem protections for the state’s largest and most fragile estuary. 

The updated plan drew immediate opposition from the coalition for failing to make meaningful changes to address longstanding Tribal, environmental justice, and ecological concerns. 

“Protection of Tribal sovereignty and beneficial water uses cannot be achieved through approval of voluntary agreements that excluded tribes. This is the Board’s final opportunity to reverse course and do the right thing,” said Vice Chair Malissa Tayaba, Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians.

Among DTEC’s central concerns is the plan’s reliance on Voluntary Agreements (VAs), privately negotiated deals allowing powerful water districts to offer limited flow commitments and funding in exchange for exemptions from stronger, enforceable regulatory requirements. 

Tribal, environmental justice, and conservation groups have raised concerns that the VA approach is not scientifically sound and does not provide enforceable protections needed to safeguard Delta ecosystems and communities. The framework has also faced growing uncertainty, with the Bureau of Reclamation and Westlands Water District threatening to withdraw.

“The update to the Bay-Delta Plan comes at one of the most crucial moments for our fragile Bay-Delta estuary, and yet the Plan once again fails to meet the moment. This latest iteration again seeks to move forward the inequitable and environmentally damaging voluntary agreements, which will only further ecosystem decline, harming communities, tribes, Delta economies, and fishing communities,” said Morgen Snyder, Director of Policy and Programs at Restore the Delta. “Swapping voluntary agreements for a regulatory backstop with minimum flow requirements misses the point – flows are habitat, and without adequate flows, fish populations will continue to decline, harmful algal blooms will proliferate, and our communities will suffer.” 

DTEC maintains that the State Water Board has failed to remedy deficiencies previously identified in the draft Plan. Among DTEC’s chief concerns are:

• Procedural violations, including advancing the updated plan while a federal Title VI investigation into discriminatory water management practices remains open.
• Discriminatory effects, including the omission of enforceable harmful algal bloom standards and meaningful instream flow requirements that could result in unlawful discriminatory effects on Tribes and communities of color.
• Failure to analyze the project as a whole and to base the environmental analysis on a stable project description, including how voluntary agreements would operate and the potential influence of major infrastructure operations that have not been accounted for.
• Failure to conduct government to government Tribal consultation required under AB 52.
• Public trust violations and unreasonable timelines that undermine meaningful public participation and effective protection of Delta resources. 

“After taking thirty years to update the Bay Delta Plan, the State Water Resources Control Board’s latest update will only further devastate fish populations, increase environmental damage, and cater to elite special interests through the Healthy Rivers and Landscapes (VAs) proposals. This is not a plan that protects beneficial uses for all Californians, it is a plan that kowtows to political pressure and elite special interests,” said Gary Mulcahy, Government Liaison with the Winnemem Wintu Tribe. 

“The final update to the Bay-Delta Plan is another opportunity for the water board to honor public trust and stand for the protection of our natural resources against the interest of private governing bodies,” said Gloria Alonso Cruz, Environmental Justice Advocacy Coordinator with Little Manila Rising. “The VAs perpetuate the systemic inequities manifested across our landscapes, inequities that those with the least access to clean and safe waterways are too familiar with. The public must urge the board to renounce the VAs and instead pursue science-based solutions that demonstrate a real commitment to environmental justice over private interests.”

The State Water Board is scheduled to consider adoption of the updated Bay-Delta Plan at a hearing on October 28-29. Learn how you can make a public comment.

###

 

THE SHELL LEAKS FILES: 21 SEPTEMBER 2026 SLF-2007-064 The Sakhalin Papers LIV: The Russian LNG Contract That Survived — Shell Announced Its Exit in 2022. Its 2025 Accounts Still List the Novatek Deal In March 2022, Shell announced that it intended to withdraw from all Russian hydrocarbons, including LNG. Yet a long-term contract signed with Novatek in 2015 survived the withdrawal from Sakhalin, survived the disposal of Shell’s Russian retail business, and was still being reported by Shell in its 2025 Form 20-F, published in March 2026. Shell confirmed in 2023 that it was continuing to receive Yamal LNG cargoes under the agreement. The latest accounts confirm that the contract still exists — but do not establish whether Shell is still physically taking cargoes today. New European and British restrictions now place a significant regulatory deadline at the beginning of 2027.

Archive reference: SLF-2007-064
Collection: The Sakhalin Papers
Principal authenticated records: NOVATEK contract announcement, 4 June 2015; Shell Russia statements, February–March 2022; Shell Annual Reports 2022–2025; UK sanctions regulations and guidance; EU REPowerEU gas regulation
Contemporaneous reporting: Reuters, Interfax and Argus
Evidence standard: The existence of Shell’s long-term Novatek contract is established by Shell’s latest SEC filing. Continued physical receipt of Yamal LNG was confirmed by Shell in February 2023. No public evidence located for this instalment establishes that Shell continues taking individual Yamal cargoes in September 2026. Those are separate propositions and are treated separately below.

Introduction

Yesterday’s file followed the Sakhalin LNG contract that disappeared.

Today’s concerns the Russian LNG contract that did not.

On 4 June 2015, Novatek announced that its trading subsidiary, Novatek Gas & Power, had signed a long-term LNG agreement with:

Shell International Trading Middle East.

The quantity was approximately:

900,000 tonnes a year

for:

more than 20 years.

The LNG would come from the Yamal LNG project in the Russian Arctic. (Novatek)

Seven years later, Russia invaded Ukraine.

Shell announced that it intended to withdraw from Russian hydrocarbons.

The Sakhalin LNG contract subsequently collapsed.

The Novatek contract did not.

And Shell’s most recent annual filing still lists it.

1. The contract was signed when Russia was “of great importance” to Shell

The original Novatek announcement remains online.

It records that Novatek Gas & Power, a wholly owned Novatek trading subsidiary, signed the agreement with Shell International Trading Middle East on 4 June 2015.

The annual volume was approximately 0.9 million tonnes of LNG and the duration was more than twenty years. (Novatek)

At the time, Shell Vice-President of LNG Trading David Wells described Russia as:

“a country of great importance for Shell.”

That statement belonged to an entirely different geopolitical period.

Yamal LNG had not yet started production.

Shell was positioning itself as a major customer of Russia’s emerging Arctic LNG industry.

Argus contemporaneously described the agreement as a 20-year supply contract for about 900,000 tonnes annually from the planned 16.5-million-tonne-per-year Yamal project. (Argus Media)

2. This was not a Shell-owned LNG project

The distinction from Sakhalin is fundamental.

At Sakhalin II, Shell had been a shareholder and project participant as well as an LNG purchaser.

At Yamal, Shell’s relationship was commercial.

The seller was Novatek Gas & Power.

Shell International Trading Middle East was the buyer.

The LNG originated from Yamal LNG.

Shell did not need an equity interest in the producing project to incorporate those cargoes into its global LNG trading portfolio.

That portfolio structure matters because Shell buys substantial volumes of LNG from third parties and trades them alongside LNG produced by projects in which it owns equity.

Shell’s 2022 Annual Report described exactly that model: term purchases, third-party supplies, shipping flexibility and the ability to redirect cargoes between customers and markets.

3. Then came 8 March 2022

Twelve days after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Shell issued a major public announcement.

On 8 March 2022, Shell said it intended to withdraw from involvement in:

all Russian hydrocarbons, including crude oil, petroleum products, gas and LNG.

But the announcement contained an important qualification.

The withdrawal would occur:

“in a phased manner.”

(Shell)

Shell’s immediate action was to stop spot purchases of Russian crude oil.

The company did not announce that every pre-existing long-term Russian supply agreement had been cancelled that day.

That distinction subsequently became central to the Novatek contract.

4. “Phased withdrawal” did not mean every contract vanished

The practical problem was contractual.

A corporate decision to withdraw from a country does not necessarily extinguish long-term commercial obligations.

Shell could dispose of an equity investment.

It could close a retail operation.

It could stop making spot purchases.

But long-term sales-and-purchase agreements may contain obligations extending for decades, together with termination provisions, force-majeure provisions, governing-law clauses and dispute-resolution mechanisms.

Those contractual terms are not publicly available for the Shell-Novatek agreement.

Accordingly, this archive cannot state that Shell was free simply to walk away from it in March 2022.

Nor can it state that Shell was legally compelled to continue indefinitely.

The contract itself has not been published.

5. Shell stopped buying Russian LNG on the spot market

Shell’s later reporting makes an important distinction.

After its March 2022 announcement, Shell ceased spot purchases of Russian LNG.

It also allowed various oil, oil-product and pipeline-gas arrangements to expire.

But two long-term Russian LNG contracts remained at the end of 2022.

One concerned Sakhalin.

The other concerned Novatek and Yamal LNG. (Interfax)

This distinction between spot transactions and long-term contractual purchases explains much of what otherwise appears contradictory.

Shell was withdrawing.

But some legacy contracts continued to exist.

6. In February 2023 Shell confirmed that Yamal cargoes were still arriving

This is the strongest public evidence that the Novatek contract was not merely an accounting relic.

On 2 February 2023, a Shell spokesperson told Reuters that Shell was:

still receiving Russian LNG cargoes under its long-term Novatek contract.

Reuters identified the arrangement as the more-than-20-year agreement for approximately 900,000 tonnes annually from Yamal LNG. (Pipeline and Gas Journal)

Interfax reported the same contractual distinction.

Shell was no longer receiving cargoes from Sakhalin.

But the Novatek/Yamal agreement remained. (Interfax)

This was therefore not simply a dormant contract sitting on Shell’s books in early 2023.

Shell publicly acknowledged continuing performance.

7. The contrast with Sakhalin could hardly be clearer

By February 2023, Shell had two very different Russian LNG stories.

Sakhalin

Cargoes had stopped.

Shell was examining its legal position.

Shell subsequently concluded that the old Sakhalin Energy company had renounced the contract through non-performance and that the agreement stood terminated.

Yamal

Cargoes were still being received.

The Novatek contract remained in force.

That divergent treatment is documented in Shell’s own subsequent filings. (SEC)

Whatever the broader political policy of withdrawing from Russian hydrocarbons, the two long-term LNG contracts followed completely different legal paths.

8. Shell continued disclosing the Novatek contract

The annual-report trail is unusually revealing.

Shell’s 2023 Form 20-F said:

“Shell still holds one long-term LNG purchase contract with a Novatek entity.” (SEC)

Shell’s 2024 Form 20-F repeated the disclosure. (SEC)

Then came the 2025 Form 20-F, filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission on 12 March 2026.

Again Shell stated that in 2022 it had announced its intention to withdraw in a phased manner from all Russian hydrocarbons.

Again it recorded its residual Sakhalin shareholding.

And again it stated:

“Shell still holds one long-term LNG purchase contract with a Novatek entity.”

(SEC)

Four years after the withdrawal announcement, the contract remained sufficiently relevant to be disclosed in Shell’s principal annual regulatory filing.

9. What the 2025 filing does — and does not — establish

The wording needs to be read precisely.

Shell says it holds the contract.

That establishes the continuing contractual relationship.

But the filing does not say:

how many Yamal cargoes Shell received in 2025;

whether it received any in early 2026;

where any cargoes were delivered;

what Shell paid for them;

what profits or losses arose;

whether the contract has been amended;

or whether Shell and Novatek are negotiating its termination.

No such conclusions should be inserted into the evidential gap.

The latest authenticated Shell record establishes the existence of the contract.

The latest explicit confirmation located that Shell was physically receiving cargoes dates from February 2023. (Pipeline and Gas Journal)

That distinction matters.

10. The UK had already banned Russian LNG from entering Britain

The continuation of Shell’s contract should not be confused with continued importation of Russian LNG into the United Kingdom.

The UK government introduced a prohibition on Russian LNG imports taking effect on:

1 January 2023.

The measure prohibited Russian-origin or Russian-consigned LNG from entering the UK and covered acquisition where the intention was to bring the LNG into Britain. (GOV.UK)

By May 2023, the UK government said Britain had gone a full year without importing Russian gas. (GOV.UK)

Thus a Shell group company holding a Russian LNG purchase contract did not mean those cargoes were entering Britain.

Shell is a global LNG trader.

Cargoes can be marketed internationally.

11. Europe initially took a different route

For several years after the invasion, Russian LNG continued flowing into European markets even while Russian oil and coal faced much broader prohibitions.

That explains why the Novatek contract could remain commercially relevant after February 2022.

The legal position has since changed substantially.

In January 2026, the European Union formally adopted rules providing for a stepwise prohibition on imports of Russian pipeline gas and LNG.

For long-term Russian LNG contracts, the EU prohibition takes effect on:

1 January 2027.

(Council of the European Union)

The regulation specifically provides transitional treatment for existing contracts rather than treating them as though they had ceased to exist retrospectively.

That is particularly relevant to an agreement signed as far back as 2015.

12. Britain has also tightened the LNG transport regime

The United Kingdom has since moved beyond the original prohibition on LNG entering Britain.

In May 2026, the government published a general trade licence concerning new prohibitions on the maritime transportation of Russian LNG and associated services.

The licence expires on:

1 January 2027.

The government also states that an exception exists until that date for certain obligations arising under contracts concluded before 17 June 2025, subject to the regulatory conditions. (GOV.UK)

Whether particular Shell activities fall within any prohibition, licence or exception would depend on the entities, vessels, services, destinations and contractual arrangements involved.

This archive makes no finding on that legal question.

What is established is that both British and EU policy now point toward 1 January 2027 as a major date for Russian LNG trading arrangements.

13. The contract may be much longer than the remaining regulatory window

The original agreement was for more than twenty years.

It was signed in 2015 for LNG from a project expected to start production in 2017.

The publicly available announcement does not provide an exact contractual expiry date.

It is therefore unsafe to manufacture one.

But a contract of more than twenty years was plainly intended to continue well beyond 2027 unless terminated or otherwise affected by law. (Novatek)

This creates the central tension now visible in the documentary record:

commercial contract duration versus sanctions and regulatory withdrawal deadlines.

A contract drafted to operate for decades is encountering a legal environment that changed fundamentally within a few years.

14. There is no identified public court battle over the Yamal agreement

The Sakhalin story has generated litigation.

The Gazprom Export pipeline-gas dispute has generated a pending Moscow claim of approximately €1.5 billion.

No comparable publicly identified court judgment or arbitral award concerning the Shell-Novatek Yamal LNG purchase contract has been located for this instalment.

That does not prove there has been no confidential negotiation or arbitration.

LNG contracts frequently provide for private dispute resolution.

What can be said is narrower:

Shell continues to report the contract rather than reporting it as terminated.

That makes the position markedly different from the Sakhalin contract.

15. Yamal LNG must not be confused with Arctic LNG 2

There is another important distinction.

The Shell contract discussed here concerns:

Yamal LNG.

It should not be confused with Novatek’s newer:

Arctic LNG 2.

The projects have different ownership structures, histories and sanctions exposure.

Yamal LNG entered production years before the invasion.

Arctic LNG 2 became a major target of subsequent Western sanctions.

Shell’s 2015 long-term contract specifically referred to LNG from Yamal LNG. (Novatek)

Conflating the two would distort both the contractual and sanctions history.

16. Why did this Russian contract survive when Sakhalin did not?

The public record supports several factual distinctions.

The Sakhalin operator was forcibly restructured by presidential decree.

The old Sakhalin counterparty stopped performing Shell’s LNG purchase agreement.

Shell consequently treated that contract as renounced and terminated.

No equivalent cessation of performance has been publicly established for the Novatek agreement.

Indeed, Shell expressly confirmed in February 2023 that Yamal cargoes were still being received. (Pipeline and Gas Journal)

The simplest documentary explanation is therefore also the safest:

Sakhalin stopped performing. Novatek did not — at least as of the last public confirmation of physical deliveries.

The later regulatory environment may ultimately determine what happens next.

Documentary Findings Established

On 4 June 2015, Novatek Gas & Power signed a long-term LNG supply contract with Shell International Trading Middle East. (Novatek)

The contract provided approximately 900,000 tonnes of Yamal LNG annually for more than twenty years. (Novatek)

On 8 March 2022, Shell announced its intention to withdraw in a phased manner from all Russian hydrocarbons, expressly including LNG. (Shell)

Shell ceased Russian LNG spot purchases but retained long-term contractual relationships. (Interfax)

In February 2023, a Shell spokesperson confirmed to Reuters that Shell was still receiving Russian LNG cargoes under the Novatek contract. (Pipeline and Gas Journal)

Shell’s Sakhalin LNG contract subsequently terminated following non-performance by its counterparty, while the Novatek contract remained.

Shell’s 2023, 2024 and 2025 annual regulatory filings all continued to identify one long-term LNG purchase contract with a Novatek entity. (SEC)

Shell filed its 2025 Form 20-F on 12 March 2026. (Shell)

The UK prohibited Russian LNG imports into Britain from 1 January 2023. (GOV.UK)

The EU has adopted a prohibition on Russian LNG imports under long-term contracts taking effect from 1 January 2027. (Council of the European Union)

The UK has also introduced restrictions concerning maritime transport of Russian LNG, with transitional provisions and a general licence running until 1 January 2027. (GOV.UK)

Established only to February 2023

Shell was physically receiving Yamal LNG cargoes under the Novatek agreement.

The Reuters report attributes that information directly to a Shell spokesperson. (Pipeline and Gas Journal)

Not established

It is not established from the public material examined for this file that Shell is physically receiving Yamal LNG cargoes in September 2026.

It is not established how many cargoes Shell received after February 2023.

It is not established where any subsequent cargoes were delivered.

It is not established what revenue, profit or loss Shell derived from the contract after the invasion.

It is not established whether the contract has since been amended.

It is not established that Shell is in breach of British, European or other sanctions.

It is not established that Novatek is in breach of the contract.

It is not established that Shell has commenced arbitration or litigation concerning the agreement.

It is not established what will happen to the contract when the new European and British restrictions reach their January 2027 stage.

Commentary

The importance of this contract lies less in accusation than in chronology.

Shell’s public statement in March 2022 was easily understood as:

Shell is leaving Russian hydrocarbons.

But contracts operate differently from headlines.

Four years later, Shell’s own SEC filing still records a Russian LNG purchase agreement.

That does not demonstrate deception.

It demonstrates how complicated an actual corporate withdrawal can be.

Assets can be sold.

Joint ventures can be abandoned.

Retail businesses can change hands.

Spot purchases can stop immediately.

Long-term contracts are another matter.

They come with counterparties, governing law, contractual remedies and potentially enormous financial consequences if they are broken.

The Novatek agreement appears to be one of the clearest surviving examples of that reality.

The deeper significance

The documentary record now allows a more precise description of Shell’s Russian exit.

Shell did not move from:

Russia

to:

no Russia

on a single date.

Instead, different relationships unwound at different speeds.

Nord Stream 2 ended.

The retail business was sold.

Salym was exited.

Sakhalin operating participation disappeared.

The Sakhalin LNG contract ceased performing and was treated as terminated.

The Gazprom pipeline-gas relationship became litigation.

The old Sakhalin shareholding remained on Shell’s books.

And the Novatek LNG purchase contract survived.

That is the history the annual reports disclose.

The clock is now running toward 2027

There is also a new element that did not exist when this series began reconstructing the post-2022 story.

Governments have now imposed deadlines that may finally overtake the legacy commercial arrangements.

The EU’s date for long-term Russian LNG imports is:

1 January 2027.

British maritime LNG restrictions and current transitional provisions also focus on:

1 January 2027.

Shell’s next annual report should therefore be particularly important.

If the Novatek sentence disappears, changes wording or is accompanied by a termination disclosure, that will be documentary evidence of another stage in Shell’s Russian withdrawal.

Until then, the latest authenticated position is the one Shell itself filed with the SEC:

the long-term Novatek LNG contract still exists.

Source Record

NOVATEK’s original 4 June 2015 announcement records the counterparties, Yamal LNG source, annual volume of approximately 0.9 million tonnes and duration exceeding twenty years. (Novatek)

NOVATEK — Long-term LNG contract with Shell, 4 June 2015

Shell’s 8 March 2022 statement records its intention to withdraw from all Russian hydrocarbons, including LNG, in a phased manner. (Shell)

Shell — Statements concerning withdrawal from Russian oil and gas

Reuters reported on 2 February 2023, citing a Shell spokesperson, that Shell was still receiving cargoes under its long-term Novatek contract. (Pipeline and Gas Journal)

Reuters report — Shell still receiving LNG under Novatek contract

Interfax separately documented Shell’s two remaining Russian LNG contracts and the cessation of Sakhalin deliveries. (Interfax)

Interfax — Shell LNG contract position, 2 February 2023

Shell’s 2025 Form 20-F contains the latest authenticated disclosure located for this file: Shell still holds one long-term LNG purchase contract with a Novatek entity. (SEC)

SEC — Shell Form 20-F 2025

Shell confirmed that the 2025 Form 20-F was filed on 12 March 2026. (Shell)

Shell — 2025 Form 20-F filing announcement

The UK’s 2022 sanctions notice records the prohibition on Russian LNG imports entering into force on 1 January 2023. (GOV.UK)

UK Government — Russian LNG import prohibition

The Council of the European Union records the new transition timetable under which long-term Russian LNG imports are prohibited from 1 January 2027. (Council of the European Union)

Council of the EU — Ending Russian energy imports

The UK government’s May 2026 guidance records maritime-transport restrictions, the general licence expiring on 1 January 2027, and the separate transitional exception for qualifying pre-17 June 2025 contracts. (GOV.UK)

UK Government — Maritime transportation of Russian LNG

Archive disclaimer: This instalment distinguishes between the continuing existence of a contract and evidence of continuing physical deliveries. Shell’s latest SEC filing establishes the former. The latest explicit public confirmation located of Shell receiving Yamal cargoes dates from February 2023. No allegation of sanctions violation is made. Questions concerning the application of sanctions to individual entities, cargoes or services would require transaction-specific legal analysis.

Site-wide disclaimer applies.

Next instalment The Sakhalin Papers LV: The Scientist Who Walked Away — Rick Steiner, the Independent Review and the Warnings Shell Faced Before Sakhalin II Became a Global Controversy

The modern Russian legal aftermath has now taken us from:

Shell’s 2022 withdrawal

through:

the confiscated Sakhalin operating interest,

the 94-billion-rouble compensation,

the €1.5-billion Gazprom lawsuit,

the vanished Sakhalin LNG contract,

and finally:

the Novatek agreement that survived.

The next file returns to an earlier part of the chronology.

Long before Putin’s 2022 restructuring, an independent scientist examining Sakhalin II was warning about environmental risk, project governance and what he believed the review process was failing adequately to confront.

His name was:

Rick Steiner.

In January 2005, Steiner supplied additional proposed text to the Independent Scientific Review Panel examining Sakhalin II.

Later that year, after the PA-B tow-out episode, he resigned.

His contemporaneous papers have survived.

Some were recently supplied directly to this archive.

The next instalment asks a different question:

What exactly was Rick Steiner warning about in 2004–2005 — what did the independent review ultimately say, what did it leave out, and how did subsequent events compare with those warnings?

THE SHELL LEAKS FILES: 21 SEPTEMBER 2026 was first posted on September 21, 2026 at 8:57 pm.
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This is a re-post from World Weather Attribution

A catastrophic rock-ice avalanche that transitioned into a debris flood in the Himalayas along the Nepal–China border on 26 August 2026 has caused widespread destruction across Nepal and neighbouring regions. In Nepal, at the time of writing (14 September 2026) the disaster has resulted in over 1,300 confirmed deaths, with only a small fraction of victims identified and returned to their families. Over 5,000 people remain missing, around 13,700 people  have been rescued and more than 8,600 people have received medical treatment (NDRRMA, 2026e). About 3,400 people are currently sheltering in holding centres (NDRRMA, 2026a) and an estimated 84,270 people across 17 local levels in the six districts of Rasuwa, Nuwakot, Dhading, Gorkha, Chitwan and Tanahu are affected, with the government declaring 15 municipalities as disaster crisis-hit areas for three months (UNDP, 2026a; MOHA, 2026).

While initial reports suggested that the event may have been caused by an earthquake, later evidence indicates that the recorded seismic activity was actually linked to the rapid collapse of  roughly 2 square kilometers of  rock wall and glacier ice (US Geological Society Earthquake Hazards Program, August 26, 2026; Center for Hydrology and Water Resources Research, 2026). The collapsing material fell approximately 1,400 m, from around 5,150 m above sea level to the valley floor at about 3,750 m. This released a huge amount of energy and produced seismic waves that were initially detected as an earthquake-like signal.

The rock-ice avalanche then triggered a series of processes. As the ice, rock and debris moved rapidly down the mountain, friction and mechanical energy probably caused some of the glacier ice to melt, producing large amounts of meltwater (Le Page, 26 August 2026 [NewScientist]). When the avalanche reached the valley floor, it also hit buried ice, which probably melted and added more water to the debris flood.

Figure 1: Climate-sensitive processes potentially contributing to failure. Conceptual representation of the main mechanisms through which climate variability and climate change may have influenced the stability of the Rasuwa rock wall.  

The resulting debris flood was therefore likely caused by several sources of water, including melting glacier ice, water stored beneath the glacier and in permafrost, ice and water carried within the debris (see fig. 1), and river water pushed ahead of the flow. A wall of water, ice, rock and sediment reached the Rasuwagadhi border, 22 km downstream, within seven minutes, moving at an average speed of 188 km per hour, and wiped out the border facilities, the town of Timure and the Syabrubesi market town within the next quarter of an hour, catching pilgrims, border staff and hydropower workers (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). Within a further half hour it was in the Trishuli valley at Betrawati, and still moving boulders and pulling multi-storey buildings into the river in Betrawati and Trishuli Bazaar far downstream (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). The flood travelled 200 km to Devghat in under seven hours, where river flow more than doubled to about 5,850 cubic metres per second, and an estimated 20 million cubic meters of excess water passed in under four hours before the flood continued into India (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). The water deposited 30.5 million cubic meters of sediment and debris along the corridor, burying agricultural fields, settlements and hydropower plants (NDRRMA, 2026d).

This mixture of water, ice, rock and sediment created a highly destructive debris flood that swept away families, homes, settlements, roads, bridges and other infrastructure along the corridor, leaving survivors stranded and cut off, many having also lost family members and everything they owned more than 35 km downstream while the water travelled much further, at Glachi, 88 km downstream the water level of the river Trishuli rose by 8.5m (Center for Land Surface Hazards, 2026). The extent of the humanitarian catastrophe is still being assessed. 

Researchers from Nepal, Pakistan, the UK, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, the US, New Zealand and the Netherlands, including experts in glaciology, mountain hydrology, climate science, humanitarian aid, seismology and social science, have come together to examine the range of factors that may have contributed to this event. While the underlying geological structure controlled where and how the slope failed, longer-term warming and changing precipitation phase from snow to rain may have reduced its stability by weakening ice-filled fractures and rock–ice contacts and increasing water pressure. Climate change is thus best understood as a destabilising factor acting on a pre-existing geological predisposition, rather than the fundamental cause of the failure. Therefore, rather than conducting a conventional attribution study which is typically focused on a single, well-defined weather event, we are bringing together the available scientific knowledge on known and potential drivers, while also investigating how these drivers have changed in a warming climate.

Main Findings 

• Nepal has established early warning systems and adaptation measures that can help reduce impacts from more conventional and forecastable riverine floods, and have demonstrably helped save lives, including among communities downstream. However, the event was fundamentally different in its magnitude, speed and complexity. It was beyond the design and predictive limits of existing risk reduction measures, and no existing early warning system could have provided sufficient lead time or prevented the scale of impacts observed in the worst-affected areas, highlighting the limits of adaptation. In a rapidly warming Himalaya, increasingly extreme and complex hazards are exceeding adaptation capacity, resulting in loss and damage. This is occurring against a baseline of a high frequency of large earthquakes, which both destabilises slopes and hampers recovery from successive disasters.

• The immediate impacts of this cascading hazard were almost entirely dependent on exposure to hazard, whereas longer-term impacts (e.g. related to recovery, long-term health effects) are likely to vary based on socioeconomic vulnerability characteristics of the populations affected. In a high mountain context where habitable land is constrained, population is increasing, and economic activity is dependent on rivers, it would be very socially, economically and politically difficult to eliminate or even substantially reduce exposure in riverine valleys, representing a soft limit to adaptation.  

• The 26 August 2026 Rasuwa disaster was triggered by a large rock wall collapse from the Langtang Lirung mountain at 5,150 m asl., which also caused part of the overlying glacier to collapse. The resulting rock–ice avalanche rapidly transformed into a debris flood and then a water-dominated flash flood that traveled downstream at average speeds of 188 km/hr, causing extensive erosion and sediment deposition. The failure involved an exceptionally large volume of rock and ice that on impact with the ground released energy equivalent to a M5.5 earthquake. There are several possible contributing causes, as outlined in the following points.

• In 2015 an earthquake of magnitude 7.8 triggered a catastrophic rock–ice avalanche at Langtang Lirung and caused widespread damage across the region. Subsequent monitoring shows persistently elevated and, at high elevations, increased landslide activity, suggesting that earthquake shaking may have weakened the underlying rock mass over the long term. Although its specific contribution to the 2026 failure cannot yet be confirmed, the earthquake may have preconditioned the slope for failure, alongside geological and climatic factors.

• Warming and permafrost degradation likely weakened the source rock wall by increasing bedrock temperatures and thawing ice within fractures. Loss of ice bonding reduces fracture strength, while meltwater can increase water pressure and further destabilise pre-existing geological weaknesses. Thus, permafrost degradation may have acted as an additional climate-related factor preconditioning the slope for failure.

• Glaciers in the region have been losing mass for decades at a rate equivalent to more than half a metre of thinning per year. Since 2010 the rate of recession of the Langtang-Lirung glacier extent has accelerated, increasing from 0.5% per annum over the previous two centuries to 1-2.3% per annum in the past 16 years. Glacier thinning and retreat can reduce buttressing and alter stresses within adjacent rock walls, potentially weakening existing fractures and increasing slope instability. Combined with increased meltwater, these processes may have interacted to amplify the compound event. 

• Precipitation can provide an additional short-timescale forcing. As temperatures rise, the rain–snow transition moves upward, increasing the fraction of rain falling as snow at higher elevations. Rain produces an immediate liquid-water input to the slope, whereas snowfall temporarily stores water at the surface. Intense or prolonged rainfall can therefore rapidly increase water supply to fractures and potentially increase fracture-water pressure. At the rock-ice-avalanche location,  stations recorded exceptionally high precipitation during October 2025, which combined with subsequent warmth may have been a source for meltwater during the following spring and monsoon seasons. There is also a tendency of the greater fraction of precipitation falling as rain than snow in recent years. This means there can be an increase in the amount of water stored in the land under the avalanche site, even in the absence of anomalously high total precipitation. 

• Observations show unusually warm conditions before the failure, supporting enhanced snow and ice melt and more precipitation falling as rain rather than snow. The slope failure on August 26th occurred against the backdrop of a warm 12 month period from September 2025-August 2026, with the warmest two months of the year (July and August) directly preceding the event also substantially warmer than the climatological average. These conditions were anomalous at the location of the slope failure itself and across the wider Himalayan region.

• We also analysed the height of the 0°C isotherm, finding that it has shifted to higher elevations consistent with global warming, with particularly strong trends observed during the Monsoon and Postmonsoon seasons. This progressive upward retreat of the freezing threshold is on the order of 100m/decade in recent decades in the Monsoon and Postmonsoon season. This is highly relevant as it can contribute to the degradation of high-elevation permafrost, glacial thinning and retreat, the snowfall-rainfall transition, and associated slope instability.

• When analysing how these conditions were different in a 1.4°C cooler preindustrial climate, using the standard WWA attribution framework that compares possible weather in today’s climate with possible weather in a 1.4°C cooler preindustrial climate using climate models and statistical models based on weather observations. We find in all datasets a significant increase in the likelihood and intensity of the very warm July-August temperatures at the gridcell nearest to the slope failure as well as in the wider region with an increase in temperature attributable to human-caused climate change during July and August of about 1.5°C, comparable to the level of global warming. Annually, the attributable increase is larger than global warming, at about 2°C. In individual winter months, the observed increase is as high as 3°C.

• We have not assessed whether this specific rock-ice avalanche would have occurred in the absence of human-induced climate change. Such a direct attribution requires additional evidence linking atmospheric conditions to subsurface temperatures, fracture-water pressures and the mechanical evolution of the slope. However, rapidly rising temperatures at a rate beyond the global mean as a result of fossil fuel emissions increase the likelihood and severity of such hazards in the Himalayas.

• Significant progress in adaptation is needed, particularly through strengthened high Himalaya earth observation, hazard monitoring, risk communication  and transboundary data and knowledge sharing. But events of this magnitude ultimately exceed the limits of adaptation. Addressing unfolding and imminent loss and damage, through recovery and reconstruction support in impacted communities, has now become an unavoidable part of climate response. 

• Minimising future risk requires a rapid transition away from fossil fuel use and delivering on climate finance commitments for adaptation. This is particularly important in the Himalaya and other high mountains, where glacier decline and permafrost degradation are expected to continue even without further warming, meaning that some of the impacts of past warming have yet to fully emerge.

Legacy spills and leaks analyzed in this year’s report raise new questions about decades of undetected pollution

The following release was updated on 9/22/26 to correct these two errors:

In the Wyoming section, the release stated that Merit Energy reported seven spills in 2025. Merit Energy actually reported 30 spills and ranked seventh among Wyoming operators in total spill count in 2025. Merit spilled the most volume of any operator. 

In the Colorado section, the release referenced “a single spill of 445,284 gallons in the Piceance Basin by QB Energy Operating.” The largest single spill was approximately 352,800 gallons of produced water, spilled by QB Energy in the Piceance Basin on December 2, 2025. QB Energy’s total reported spill volume across 46 incidents in 2025 was 445,284 gallons.

DENVER—Each year, the Center for Western Priorities analyzes oil and gas spills reported by companies to state regulators in Colorado, Wyoming, and New Mexico—the top oil and gas producers in the Intermountain West. This year, companies in these states reported over 2,400 liquid spills in 2025, releasing at least 5.8 million gallons of oil, produced water, and other toxic, drilling-related fluids.

This year’s report also reveals a problem regulators are only beginning to understand. In Colorado, the number of spills discovered at well sites during decommissioning has grown sharply over the past several years, from 125 in 2020 to 1,948 in 2025, a more than fifteen-fold increase. Since 2016, operators and regulators have identified 6,084 of these legacy contamination sites. These are spills that were missed by operators for years before a well was plugged. Weld County alone accounts for 87 percent of the total, and three companies, Noble Energy, Kerr-McGee, and PDC Energy, are tied to more than three-quarters of these historical spills. Fewer than one percent of these spills and leaks were caught by routine state inspections; the rest surfaced only when a well was being decommissioned.

The magnitude of these historical spills dwarfs what shows up in the state’s annual spill reporting: the 6,084 legacy spills uncovered since 2016 already outnumber the 3,642 spills Colorado has logged through its standard annual reporting system since 2017, revealing that most spills go unreported despite the state’s strong reporting requirements. This implies the actual scale of spills and leaks is much bigger than this report captures, not just for Colorado, but in all three states.

The Center for Western Priorities released the following statement from report co-author and Communications Director Kate Groetzinger:

“Across all three states, a pattern is consistent: spill counts can rise or fall year to year, but the volume of oil, produced water, and methane released into the region’s air, soil, and waterways remains substantial, and thanks to the Colorado historical spill data, decades of contamination is only now coming to light.

“While increased regulations seem to have had some effect in curbing methane waste in New Mexico, oil and gas production still generates significant air pollution that Westerners shouldn’t be forced to live with. With the Trump administration pushing even more oil and gas drilling on public lands, this problem is set to increase rather than improve. We could be building out clean energy. Instead, we’re doubling down on dirty oil and gas production.”

In New Mexico, oil and gas companies reported 1,277 liquid spills in 2025, up 13 percent from 1,133 the year before, totaling 3.56 million gallons, a 75 percent jump from 2024. Nearly half of that volume, 1.66 million gallons, came from a single incident: an OXY USA produced-water storage tank failure. Removing that spill brings New Mexico’s 2025 volume below 2024’s. Oil and gas companies in New Mexico also reported 37,207 gas releases, wasting 9.8 billion cubic feet of methane, enough to heat roughly 127,000 average American homes for an entire year.

In Wyoming, companies reported 786 spills in 2025, down from 825 in 2024. The total volume spilled in Wyoming fell 21 percent, from 1.81 million to 1.43 million gallons, driven mostly by a drop in produced water releases. Converse and Campbell counties, both in the Powder River Basin, accounted for 39 percent of the state’s incidents. Crowheart Energy reported the most spills of any operator, at 102, while Merit Energy spilled the most volume, at 303,565 gallons.

In Colorado, oil and gas companies reported 338 spills in 2025, the fewest since the state began tracking in 2017 and down 11 percent from 378 in 2024. But the volume spilled nearly doubled from 2024 to 2025, from 436,000 to 794,000 gallons, largely because of a single spill of 352,800 gallons in the Piceance Basin by QB Energy Operating—almost half of the total volume spilled in Colorado in 2025. As in past years, roughly half of all spills statewide occurred in Weld County.

The full report, including state-by-state data on operators, counties, and fluid types, is available at the following links:

• Overview 2025

• Colorado 2025

• Colorado Historical Spills

• New Mexico 2025

• Wyoming 2025

The post ANALYSIS: Annual report finds at least 2,400 oil and gas spills occurred across Colorado, Wyoming, and New Mexico in 2025 appeared first on Center for Western Priorities.

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A panel of judges today sided with the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation (Yakama Nation) and Columbia Riverkeeper, and the Western Environmental Law Center, ordering the Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) to rewrite a portion of a controversial water quality certification, effectively delaying construction of the proposed Goldendale Energy Pumped Storage Hydroelectric Project at Pushpum, a sacred site known to the Yakama Nation as “mother of all roots.”

Rye Development, backed by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, proposes to permanently destroy Pushpum, part of the Columbia Hills located along the Columbia River near the John Day Dam, by building the Goldendale Pumped Storage development, the largest such development proposal in the Pacific Northwest.

“As the court found, the Washington Department of Ecology failed to protect the Columbia River,“ said Andrew Hawley, senior attorney at the Western Environmental Law Center. “Now the agency has a second chance to right not only that wrong, but to also use its authority under the law to address the significant impacts this ill-conceived project will impose on the Columbia River, its tributaries, groundwater, the Yakama Nation, and other Tribes impacted by the development.”

The Goldendale Pumped Storage development threatens the sacred land, medicines, and traditions of Pushpum, a Yakama Nation sacred site for ceremonies, legends, and gathering of traditional roots and medicines. As a natural seed bank, this site contains rich biodiversity in plant and animal life that can never be fully restored once removed.

The project area is within ceded lands of Yakama Nation, and the area has historically been used by the Yakama Nation, Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Reservation, and the Nez Perce Tribe for hunting, traditional gathering, fishing, camping, and traditional ceremonies.

“Clean, renewable energy is essential to protecting our planet,” said Columbia Riverkeeper Senior Attorney Simone Anter. “Yet, state and federal governments are violating Treaty-reserved rights and ignoring Tribal sovereignty in order to license projects aimed at supporting energy-hungry data centers—not a just transition from fossil fuels.”

Opposition to the Goldendale Pumped Storage development has steadily increased since the project was proposed in 2017, with a growing coalition of climate and environmental groups and community activists voicing serious concerns. In Washington, 18 federally recognized Tribes have come out against this development. Both the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians (ATNI) and the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) have issued resolutions opposing the destruction of Pushpum.

Today’s ruling is a step toward correcting course and protecting Pushpum, and challenges to the project continue to mount. Despite the lack of comprehensive consultation and the trivialization of cultural resource destruction through inadequate proposed mitigation, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved the final hydroelectric license for the development in January 2026. Columbia Riverkeeper and Yakama Nation both filed petitions for judicial review at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Resources:

• Photos from May 8, 2026 Protect Pushpum Encampment event
• Columbia Riverkeeper’s backgrounder
• Yakama Nation’s public-facing site with written and video materials on the Yakama Nation Perspective on the pump storage development
• FERC Issues Decision to Permanently Destroy Sacred Tribal Cultural Properties, January 23, 2026
• Questions & Answers : Goldendale Pumped Storage, May 5, 2025
• Opposition to the Goldendale Pumped Storage Development Continues to Grow, August 15, 2024
• FERC Ignores Tribal, Environmental Concerns, February 8, 2024
• Ecology’s Previous 401 Denial, June 2021

Background:
In January, the State of Washington’s Pollution Control Hearings Board (PCHB) issued an order upholding Ecology’s water quality certification for the project. Columbia Riverkeeper, represented by Western Environmental Law Center, quickly challenged the order at the Washington State Court of Appeals. Oral arguments took place in February.

Despite receiving a license from FERC, the project still needs a final signed Historic Properties Management Plan and several permits, including from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, before it can break ground.

Contacts: 

Andrew Hawley, Western Environmental Law Center, 406-324-7569, hawley@westernlaw.org

Simone Anter, Columbia Riverkeeper, 541-399-5312, simone@columbiariverkeeper.org

The post Court orders changes to controversial water quality certification, delaying destruction of sacred Tribal resources appeared first on Western Environmental Law Center.