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Copper Canyon, Chihuahua, northwestern Mexico. Stock image.

Escalating security risks and a legacy of lengthy project approvals are increasing investor scrutiny of mining exposure to Mexico, TD Cowen says.

Recent incidents linked to cartel activity — such as the late January abduction of 10 Vizsla Silver (TSX, NYSE: VZLA) workers and subsequent killing of some of them — underscore the strategic importance of Mexico’s mining industry, particularly for silver, TD Cowen mining analysts led by Wayne Lam said in a report published Wednesday.

Mexico accounts for about 28% of global mine-site silver supply and nearly half of all output from primary silver mines worldwide, data compiled by TD show. That’s in addition to about 4% of gold output and 3% of copper production.

“While recent incidents appear contained to states with less impact on overall production, we view risk if activity increases in surrounding areas, which may cause investors to reassess Mexican exposure,” Lam and his colleagues wrote in the report.

Kidnappers kill Vizsla mine workers in Mexico Rising violence

Sunday’s killing by the Mexican army of Jalisco New Generation Cartel (JNGC) leader Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes – known as “El Mencho” – triggered retaliatory violence, infrastructure damage and heightened security force activity across the western and central parts of the country.

At least 22 Mexican states have seen unrest in the wake of Oseguera’s death, British security risk management firm MS Risk said in a note dated Tuesday. While relative calm has since returned, with soldiers and National Guard members deployed to restore order, tensions remain elevated, the firm said.

Cartel capacity for violence, trafficking and corruption is likely to persist despite Oseguera’s death, MS Risk added.

His death “creates a high-volatility security environment,” the firm wrote in its report. “For businesses operating in Mexico, the primary risks stem from cartel fragmentation, reprisal violence and opportunistic criminal activity during the transitional power struggle.”

As a result, the risk profile “effectively shifts from centralized cartel dominance to decentralized instability and localized unpredictability, with the short-term risks [in the next three months] being elevated. The medium-term risk will be dependent on whether JNGC consolidates or fractures.”

Cartel presence

Security concerns for mining investors have recently centred around Sinaloa and Jalisco states, where cartel presence has intensified. Yet those states together account for only about 1.5% of Mexico’s annual mining output, which limits near-term effects on national production.

Besides Vizsla, companies with properties in Sinaloa include Americas Gold and Silver (TKTK: USA), whose Cosala mine will contribute about half of output this year; Torex Gold Resources (TSX: TXG), the developer of the Los Reyes project; and McEwen Mining (TSX: MUX; NYSE: MUX), which is advancing the Fenix project.

Miners active in Jalisco include Endeavour Silver (NYSE: EXK; TSX: EDR), whose Terronera mine accounts for about one-third of projected 2026 production, and GoGold Resources (TSX: GGD; US-OTC: GLGDF), which is developing the Los Ricos property.

Serious implications

An expansion of unrest into Zacatecas and Chihuahua — two of the country’s most important mining regions — would have far more serious implications, the TD analysts warn. Zacatecas alone accounts for about one-third of Mexico’s mine production, while Chihuahua contributes about 12%.

Companies with notable exposure to Zacatecas include Pan American Silver (TSX, NYSE: PAAS), which operates the La Colorada mine; Fresnillo (LSE: FRES), which owns stakes in three Mexican mines; Orla Mining (TSX: OLA; NYSE: ORLA), which runs the Camino Rojo property; Newmont (NYSE: NEM), which owns the Penasquito open-pit operation; and Capstone Copper (TSX: CS; ASX: CSC), the operator of the Cozamin underground mine.

Miners operating in Chihuahua include First Majestic Silver (NYSE, TSX: AG), the majority owner of the Los Gatos mine, and Coeur Mining (NYSE: CDE), which owns the Palmarejo gold-silver complex.

Higher duties

The latest security issues compound policy headwinds that have weighed on the sector in recent years. Higher mining duties introduced in late 2024 and permitting challenges under the previous Andrés Manuel López Obrador administration are still being felt today under his successor, President Claudia Sheinbaum, TD argues.

Mexico has taken back 1,126 mining concessions since late 2024, official says

“While permitting and project advancement appear to be improving under the Sheinbaum administration, we view a lack of development in the 2022-24 period resulting in a dearth of advanced stage projects today,” Lam and his colleagues wrote. “Recent security risks have highlighted regions of heightened cartel activity, which could further impact ability to accelerate new projects.”

A worsening security environment could shift investor preferences toward companies operating in Tier I jurisdictions with lower geopolitical risk such as Canada or the US, TD also said. Such a trend would likely support higher valuation multiples for producers with more diversified or safer geographic footprints.

Torex is the North American miner with the biggest overall Mexico exposure in TD’s coverage universe, at 95% of net asset value. This compares with 91% for First Majestic, 72% for Endeavour, 37% for Orla and 27% for Pan American Silver. Fresnillo, which isn’t covered by the TD analysts, also has significant operations in Mexico.

Barrick Mining (NYSE: B)(TSX: ABX) has strengthened its leadership team with the appointment of two new members to its executive committee.

On Wednesday, the Toronto-based miner announced the appointment of James J. McGuire as its chief legal and policy officer and Woo Lee as chief global affairs officer.

The appointments, said Barrick, reflect its increased focus on government engagement and public policy as core capabilities that support the company’s strategy, license to operate and long-term value creation.

McGuire has over 30 years of legal (civil and criminal) experience representing leading corporations, financial institutions, and individuals on a wide range of complex legal and policy matters. He joins from Greenspoon Marder LLP, where he was a litigation partner and managing partner of the firm’s New York office. Prior to private practice, he served as a federal criminal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York.

As part of the Barrick leadership team, McGuire will oversee the company’s legal, compliance, regulatory and public policy functions. Meanwhile, current chief legal officer Poupak Bahamin will become Barrick’s general counsel and chief compliance officer and will remain its the executive committee.

Lee has been with Barrick for over 11 years. He most recently served as senior vice president and head of government and corporate affairs, Asia Pacific, where he worked with government officials, business and community leaders to advance the company’s strategic objectives.

In his new role, Lee will lead Barrick’s global government affairs strategy in all markets as well as manage government and sovereign relationships, leveraging over 30 years of experience working in Washington, China and East Asia, including a stint as a US diplomat in the State Department across the APAC region.

Both McGuire and Lee will report to Barrick’s new CEO Mark Hill, whose appointment was confirmed earlier this month.

Newmont-Barrick rift over Nevada heats up

Gold advanced on Wednesday as investors continue to gauge the impact of new US tariffs and monitor ongoing frictions in the Middle East.

Spot gold climbed as much as 1.3% to above $5,200 an ounce, before easing back to around $5,180 per ounce. Silver also rose 3% to reach the $90-an-ounce level.

Live Gold Price Chart and Real-Time Updates

Amid a lack of clarify over US trade policy, investors have piled back into precious metals. While President Donald Trump’s broad-based 10% import levy came into effect this week, the threat of a rise to 15% still lingers.

As well, geopolitical risks have given safe-haven assets momentum as US-Iran tensions begin to build. The two sides are scheduled to hold a third round of nuclear talks on Thursday in Geneva.

Breakout in the making

Some analysts are predicting that gold maybe on the cusp of another breakout, driven by US President Donald Trump’s probe into additional tariffs and potential escalations in the Middle East.

“There’s an inflationary impact from tariffs and high oil prices, especially if an attack is imminent, and I think there’s also some hedging by investors, who may be turning to gold,” Bart Melek, global head of commodity strategy at TD Securities, told Reuters.

Bullion has found a footing above $5,000 an ounce in recent sessions, recovering more than half of the losses sustained during a historic rout at the end of January. Silver also found support above $80 an ounce.

“It seems a breakout to the upside is in the making,” said Yuxuan Tang, head of macro strategy for Asia at JP Morgan Private Bank. Tariff uncertainty and Iran risk are among the factors that “may prove sufficient to catalyze a more sustained shift,” she added.

“The resurgent tariff uncertainty may make the period of consolidation relatively short-lived,” Bank of America said in a note, adding that it expects prices to hit $6,000 an ounce over the next 12 months. Earlier, analysts at JPMorgan raised their long-term gold price forecast to $4,500 per ounce, while keeping the year-end target of $6,300 intact.

BNP backs gold price to hit $6,000 as rally ‘makes sense’

So far this year, gold has risen by over 18%, building on its best annual performance since 1979.

(With files from Bloomberg and Reuters)

Denison Mines (TSX: DML) plans to start constructing its Phoenix uranium mine in northern Saskatchewan in March, the country’s initial in-situ recovery (ISR) operation for the nuclear fuel.

The C$419 million capex Phoenix build decision and site preparation come just days after the federal regulator approved Denison’s environmental assessment and other licences. The Phoenix/Wheeler River project is in the southeast Athabasca basin, about 550 km north of Regina.

“With construction anticipated to take approximately two years, commencing construction in March is expected to allow us to maintain our objective to achieve first production from Phoenix by mid-2028,” Denison CEO David Cates said in a release on Tuesday.

Output will position Denison among the few uranium suppliers globally able to provide a significant new source of uranium before the end of the decade, Cates added. The ISR method, already widely used in the United States, cuts costs and lessens mining’s local impact as uranium demand is forecast to rise along with nuclear energy’s resurgence as a low-emission power source.

ISR trail blazer

ISR mining injects a solution into underground wells, separates uranium from the ore and pumps it to the surface for extraction. It’s less expensive than hard rock mining, doesn’t require the digging of large pits and leaves fewer tailings.  Construction is shorter than conventional mines because ISR doesn’t require ore handling, crushing and grinding infrastructure.

Company shares gained about 1% to C$5.92 apiece on Wednesday morning in Toronto, valuing Denison at C$5.3 billion ($3.9 billion).

Low-cost, high value

Wheeler River is relatively low cost for a uranium project. It has a post-tax net present value of C$1.16 billion and an internal rate of return of 90%, according to a 2023 feasibility study. Its mine life is estimated at 10 years.  

Phoenix hosts proven reserves of 6,300 tonnes grading 24.5% uranium oxide (U3O8) for 3.4 million lb. of U3O8, and probable reserves of 212,700 tonnes at 11.4% U3O8 for 53.3 million lb. U3O8. 

Denison owns 90% of the project and serves as the operator, with JCU (Canada) Exploration holding the remaining 10%. JCU is a private subsidiary jointly owned by Denison and UEX Corporation (TSX: UEX).

Wheeler River also comprises the adjacent Gryphon project, which is intended as a conventional underground mine.

Athabasca basin catalysts

Denison’s progress coincides with other developments for uranium players in Saskatchewan over the past few weeks. Paladin Energy (TSX, ASX: PDN) received environmental impact statement approval from the province for its Patterson Lake South project on Friday.

NexGen Energy (TSX, NYSE: NXE; ASX: NXG) advanced to the second part of its CNSC hearing for federal approval of its Rook I project earlier in February, the same step Denison successfully completed last week.

If all three projects become producing mines, they would rank in the top five largest operations in the Athabasca basin by reserve size.

On Tuesday night, President Donald Trump touted his energy dominance agenda in his State of the Union address to Congress, but the rosy picture that Trump painted of rapidly falling energy costs doesn’t match the data.

In his speech, President Trump bragged about lowering energy costs for consumers, but according to factcheck.org, the index for household energy rose 6.6% over the last 12 months. The Guardian also released a fact check following Trump’s address, noting that the president’s attacks on renewable energy are expected to increase electricity rates by up to 18% by 2035.

One of the ways Trump is seeking to bring energy costs down is by bolstering coal, but a 2023 report found that 99 percent of all U.S. coal plants (209 out of 210) are now more expensive to run than replacement by new solar, wind, or energy storage. Consumer costs have yet to see a dip from coal—in fact, the Trump administration is spending $350 million to recommission old coal plants, which is only a portion of the $625 million the administration has allocated to reinvigorate the coal industry.

Moreover, according to the latest Conservation in the West Poll results from Colorado College, a mere seven percent of Western voters ranked coal as their first or second preferred energy source.

The administration also spoke misleadingly about who is really benefitting from Trump’s energy and public lands policies. In response to President Trump’s mention of America’s upcoming 250th anniversary, Interior Secretary Burgum tweeted that Trump has “restored our nation and secured a brighter future for ALL Americans!” Yet recent reporting from the Center for American Progress shows that Trump’s public lands directives are erasing Black History and disproportionately decreasing access to nature for communities of color and those with low incomes.

Unpacking the 2026 Conservation in the West Poll

In a new episode of The Landscape podcast, Aaron welcomes pollsters Lori Weigel from New Bridge Strategy and Miranda Everitt from FM3 to discuss the 16th annual Colorado College Conservation in the West Poll. The bipartisan polling team breaks down voter attitudes across eight Western states on public lands, conservation priorities, and the Trump administration’s funding cuts and policy rollbacks. The poll reveals consensus across party lines—including among MAGA voters—on protecting public lands, opposing sell-offs, and prioritizing renewable energy over fossil fuel extraction.

Quick hits Hunters and veterans are fighting Trump’s pick to oversee public lands

New York Times

Interior scales back environmental regulations for public lands

The Hill

How Trump’s big climate finding repeal could actually hurt big oil

The Guardian

Interior official granted ethics waiver just before family’s lithium mine deal

E&E News

Opinions: Steve Pearce is not fit to run the BLM

Outdoor Life | Wyoming Tribune Eagle

Colorado fines Chevron subsidiary $1.7 million over 2025 well blowout in Weld County

Colorado Sun | CPR News

The story of Ganado Mucho, a Navajo folk hero whose exhibit may be removed by Trump administration

KSUT

Opinion: What’s behind the push to erase Black History

The Preamble

Quote of the day

Pearce’s chapter of the BLM will ensure that our stories we share with future generations are just that—stories of a once-wild place.”

—Jennie Mans, BLM wildlands director for the Wyoming Wilderness Association, Wyoming Tribune Eagle

Picture This @usfws

Summer tanagers aren’t just flashy in their feathers, they’re also insect connoisseurs with specialized diets: bees and wasps. These scarlet-hued hotshots catch bees and wasps on the wing, then rub them against a branch to remove the stinger, before enjoying their snack.

Photo: William Radke/USFWS

The post Trump’s energy claims don’t add up appeared first on Center for Western Priorities.

The Alberta electricity company Capital Power, which is developing a large new AI data centre in the province powered by natural gas, lobbied the federal Mark Carney government dozens of times last year to eliminate clean energy regulations, DeSmog has learned.

These regulations were subsequently dropped from a fossil fuel accord that the prime minister signed with the government of Alberta last November, allowing large new data centres fuelled by gas turbines to proceed.

“We’ve got a new paradigm that allows us to look at growth capital” for Canadian gas-powered AI projects, Capital Power CEO Avik Dey said in reaction to the Carney government announcing it would suspend the regulations.

The Edmonton-based power company communicated with the government of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney close to 40 times between the time Carney was elected in April 2025, and the signing of the Canada-Alberta Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), in November 2025, according to federal lobbying records analyzed by DeSmog.

The MOU is an agreement between Canada’s federal government and that of the Province of Alberta wherein the federal government agreed in principle to support a new oil pipeline to the Pacific Coast, as well as special treatment for the province on a range of federal government climate policies.

The MOU lists increasing oil production in Alberta as its first objective, while also suspending Alberta’s Clean Electricity Regulations and eliminating the Oil and Gas Emissions Cap. The same agreement also proposed the development of AI data centres in Alberta, a potential new use for the province’s considerable gas resources.

That agreement has been widely criticized by environmentalists and Indigenous communities.

The term ‘data centre’ appears at least 25 times in notes from Capital Power’s interactions with the federal government, while the term ‘emissions’ appears 17 times, and ‘clean energy regulations’ and ‘net zero’ appear each at least 14 times.

Records show the company has advocated specifically for the development of gas-fired power plants, policies and programs related to the development of AI data centres, and “the energy source(s) required for those data centres to be successful.”

Environment and Climate Change Canada press secretary Keean Nembhard wrote in an emailed statement to DeSmog that the government’s clean energy regulations continue “to apply in all provinces and territories and will require electricity-generating units to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.”

However, Nembhard added, “data centres with their own power generation, not connected to the commercial grid, would not be covered by the [regulation].”  

Capital Power didn’t respond to a request for comment.

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Federal clean energy regulations, which aimed to kickstart the energy transition by mandating a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel power generation by 2035, were developed under the previous Liberal government of Justin Trudeau. Nembhard confirmed that Capital Power Corporation, one of Alberta’s largest energy generators, was included in that process.

“Over a two-year period from 2022-2024, our government undertook extensive engagement with provincial and territorial governments, industry, such as Capital Power, utilities and others,” Nembhard explained.

But Capital Power wasn’t necessarily happy with the regulations. In November 2023, the company blamed the Trudeau government’s environmental regulations for why it wasn’t pursuing any new gas-fired power plants. At the time, Capital Power’s CEO said Trudeau’s then-proposed clean electricity regulations had made investments in gas plants “unviable”. As a result, Dey later explained, Capital Power turned its attention towards expansion in the United States.

Lobbying records show that Capital Power communicated twelve times on record with the federal government in the last year of former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s term in office.

But after Carney took office, the company’s lobbying seemed to accelerate. In total, Capital Power communicated with the Carney government 37 times from when Carney took office until the time the MOU was announced.

Duff Conacher, director of Democracy Watch, a Canadian corporate responsibility watchdog group, notes that because of Canada’s lax lobbying laws, it’s possible the actual number of times Capital Power lobbied the Carney government was much higher.

“Many lobbyists are not required to disclose their lobbying,” said Conacher in a statement to DeSmog. “At the federal level, disclosure is not required if a company is lobbying about the enforcement of a law or regulation, or if the lobbyist is working as an employee for a business and lobbying less than 20 percent of their work time, or if the lobbyist is not paid for the lobbying.

“Other loopholes in the requirements mean that letters, emails, texts and other communications are not required to be disclosed,” he added.

The company’s lobbying of the Carney government, including multiple instances of communication between Dey and Environment Minister Julie Dabrusin, focused on developing new gas-fired power plants, federal climate policies, the Clean Electricity Regulations, and the development of large data centres in Canada. In addition, Capital Power’s lobbying effort focused on the federal ministries that regulate resource development, data centres, and emissions. Environment and Climate Change Canada was lobbied nine times while Natural Resources Canada was lobbied eight times.

Twelve days after Carney signed the MOU, Dey was interviewed by Bloomberg saying that because Carney relaxed environmental regulations, it was now possible to build new gas-fired power plants to support AI data centres.

The next day — December 10, 2025 — the Globe and Mail reported Capital Power had signed its own binding memorandum of understanding to supply an unnamed AI data centre developer with 250 megawatts of electricity. The Canada-Alberta MOU “paved the way” to lock in long-term contracts for AI- data centre related gas-generation, the paper reported.

Cashing In On An AI Gas Boom

Prior to his appointment as chief executive of Capital Power, Dey worked for the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), where he served as Managing Director, Head of Energy & Resources. As previously reported by DeSmog, the CPPIB is heavily invested in the development of fossil fuels in the United States, particularly as new power sources to power new AI infrastructure.

The AI boom is itself driving a massive development of gas power generation: over 1,000 gigawatts worldwide, a quarter of which is in the United States. Though AI data centres can be powered by any form of electricity, the gas industry has marketed gas power as cheap, efficient, and reliable.

The environmental and public health consequences of the gas-powered AI data centre build-out are enormous, however. A recent Cornell University study reveals that, at the current rate of growth, AI will add 24 to 44 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, the equivalent of adding between 5 and 10 million cars to U.S. roadways.

Experts have been warning for some time that the AI build-out — supported by U.S. President Donald Trump as much as Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith — will severely compromise climate change goals and entrench fossil fuel use for another generation.

Yet Nembhard insisted that the Carney government is still committed to achieving “a net-zero electricity grid by 2050” in Alberta and across the country. Federal policymakers will only suspend the application of clean energy regulations in Alberta

“Upon completion of a new carbon pricing agreement and factoring all other measures to the satisfaction of both parties, including on net zero electricity and pursuant to an equivalency agreement.”

Yet this isn’t the first time that the Carney government has taken policy cues from the fossil fuel and AI sectors. Last October, the prime minister directly referenced in a speech the organization Build Canada, which is led by and associated with tech and oil and gas billionaires.

“It’s great to see ideas shared by the Build Canada community get taken up by government,” a spokesperson explained to DeSmog at the time. 

The post Carney Allowed Gas-powered AI Data Centres After Lobbying From Alberta Energy Company appeared first on DeSmog.

Chefs in the Schools (CITS) recently released a new report on its three-year program bringing sustainable nutrition to New York City Public Schools, during which they fed nearly 1 million children daily. They hope their takeaways can serve as a blueprint to scale sustainable school meals nationally. 

Wellness in the Schools (WITS), a national nonprofit educating children on healthy habits, launched CITS in partnership with the Mayor’s Office of Food Policy, the New York City Department of Education, and the Office of Food and Nutrition Services. The program aims to increase the quantity of plant-based, scratch-made, and culturally inclusive meals served in NYC schools, while decreasing the amount of processed food. They did this through developing menus, training school cooks on best practices for healthful meals, and providing nutrition and culinary education to children.

The new report shows that CITS established 44 recipes fitting their desired criteria. Food education and side-by-side training reached 1,035 public schools, hundreds of school cooks, and more than 850,000 students. Multiple training methods including side-by-side training and an off-site CookCamp training, teaching staff new skills and providing a higher level of support, collaboration with the city of New York, and student engagement, all contributed to the program’s success.

Alexina Cather, Director of Policy and Special Projects for WITS, tells Food Tank, “Our findings make clear that transforming school food requires more than swapping ingredients. It requires investing in people, training, and systems. Through Chefs in the Schools, we’ve demonstrated that when schools are supported with culinary expertise and professional development, scratch cooking becomes scalable and sustainable.”

The pilot also faced challenges. Both the high cost of fresh produce and assumptions that produce will be expensive even when it’s not created difficulties. Additionally, school cafeteria staff shortages and inadequate kitchen equipment were setbacks the program faced. Difficulty measuring and quantifying outcomes was another factor CITS needed to contend with

According to the report, these issues are not unique to New York City. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that most of the calories consumed by youth nationwide are from ultra-processed foods (UPFs). These products, prevalent in both school and packaged meals, are associated with health concerns including obesity, type 2 diabetes, and heart disease. The CDC also reports that children who eat nutrient-poor diets are at increased risk of hindered cognitive development, more school days missed, academic delays, and behavioral and emotional challenges.

Food insecurity is also a justice issue. Black, Latinx, and Indigenous communities are more impacted by the health concerns caused by lack of access to sufficient nutrition, experiencing diabetes at a 1.5 times greater rate than white populations. 

But WITS sees schools as uniquely situated to transform the systemic challenges facing food and agriculture systems into an opportunity for societal change. Their report provides a series of policy recommendations with the aim of scaling nutritious, culturally-relevant, and sustainable school meals.

 One recommendation is to eliminate ultra-processed food from school menus. California, for example, made progress towards this through its passing of Assembly Bill 1264, known as the Real Food, Healthy Kids Act. This law will phase-out ultra-processed food from school meals, eliminating them entirely by 2035.

WITS also advocates for the alignment of federal policy with public health goals. They argue that subsidies for fruits and vegetables would create greater incentive for schools to use them in their meals.

Additionally, the report advocates for reform in school food procurement, encouraging schools to invest in local supply chains that can provide healthy and whole ingredients. They also stress the importance of kitchen infrastructure that is well-suited to scratch-cooking, and the importance of opportunities for professional development for school food workers.

True-cost accounting, healthy school meals for all legislation, and higher federal reimbursement rates for school lunches are amongst the other policy avenues the report recommends.

Cather tells Food Tank, “This report is both a celebration of what’s possible and a call to policymakers and funders to prioritize school food as a cornerstone of health equity.”

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 Wellness in the Schools 

The post Chefs in the Schools: Equitable Meals Across New York City appeared first on Food Tank.

While artificial intelligence has ushered in a new era of more accurate weather forecasting, A.I. models may still struggle to predict freak storms. This week a historic blizzard blanketed the Northeast in snow, dumping more than 2 feet on parts of New York and Massachusetts, and a conventional weather model outperformed A.I. models in accurately predicting the storm.

Read more on E360 →

Every critical mineral project, from mine to processing plant, is a clean energy project. And every worker on those projects is part of Canada’s clean energy workforce.Canada has all the pieces to become a global leader in critical minerals, the...

Tropical rainforests get that name because it rains a lot in these places. But they deserve it for another reason as well: They make rain.

By absorbing water and then transpiring it into the atmosphere, a single hectare of tropical rainforest in the Brazilian Amazon can generate approximately 2.4 million liters of rain per year, enough to fill an Olympic-size swimming pool, according to new research in the journal Communications Earth & Environment.

While not everyone cares about filling swimming pools, a vastly more important and economically valuable metric is the crops this rain could water. In Brazil alone, the Amazon rainforest generates rainfall worth approximately $20 billion dollars per year if it went to agricultural activities, the scientists reported.

“Tropical deforestation is increasing, despite international efforts to halt forest loss. Our work highlights the vital role of tropical forests in producing rain,” said Jess Baker, a climate scientist at the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom and an author of the new paper.

It’s not news that rainforests produce rain. A paper last year found that deforestation caused almost 75% of the decline in rainfall during the Amazonian dry season in the last four decades. But estimates for the economic toll have been all over the place. One study put it at up to $1 billion per year in agricultural losses. A report submitted to the Brazilian Supreme Court found that agricultural earnings in the most rain-dependent regions totaled more than $60 billion per year.

To come up with more precise estimates for just how much rain comes from rainforests, and how much it’s worth, Baker teamed up with colleagues at Leeds, Brazil’s University of Amazonas, and the carbon finance program at Dutch banking giant Rabobank.

The work involved running massive computer models that underpin much of what scientists understand about how the atmosphere and the earth interact to shape such basic forces as precipitation and temperature. The researchers looked at how rainfall in tropical regions changed as trees were replaced by grassland in the models, a common fate with deforestation. The models both looked at reconstructions of historical patterns and simulated scenarios of different levels of forest loss. The scientists compared the results from those models to estimates derived from satellite observations.

 

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The researchers concluded that around the world, every percentage point of tropical forest that disappeared equaled a loss of 2.4 millimeters (mm) per year in rainfall. In the Amazon, the effect was even more pronounced, at 3 mm per year.

While that might not sound like much, it adds up quickly. In Brazil, it amounts to around 300 liters of water each year for every square meter of Amazon forest, a place with 3.3 trillion square meters of rainforest. That’s a lot of swimming pools.

To put a dollar figure on how much all this water is worth, the researchers multiplied the forest-generated rainfall by an estimated cost of water for Brazilian agriculture, which a Brazilian agency reported as around 2 cents per cubic meter. Do the math, and you end up with the rainforest generating rain worth around $20 billion per year to farmers, give or take $7 billion based on model uncertainties. Looking at deforestation rates, the scientists estimate the region has already lost nearly $5 billion worth of rainfall in recent decades. And none of this counts the other benefits of all this rain – driving hydropower turbines, providing drinking water, filling rivers used by wildlife and cargo ships, etc.

Still, “this is the most comprehensive and robust evidence to date of the value of tropical forests’ rainfall provision,” Baker said.

The value of all that forest-generated water dwarfs the amount being spent to keep those forests from disappearing. For example, the new calculations show that Brazil’s network of officially protected forest generates around $13 billion worth of rain each year. That’s more than 50 times the money the Brazilian Ministry of the Environment dedicates to managing these areas, according to the researchers.

The new calculations could help buttress the math behind efforts to attract money to keep forests standing.

“Tropical forests make it rain, supplying water that is essential for agriculture. Recognizing that crucial connection could ease tensions between agricultural and conservation interests while building broader support for protecting forests overall,” said Callum Smith, a Leed’s researcher and co-author who studies how forest loss affects climate.

There is growing attention to such efforts to pay for the benefits of standing forests, whether because rainforests suck greenhouse gases from the atmosphere, harbor vast biodiversity or generate rain. Last year, at the annual United Nations climate summit held in Belém, Brazil, Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva unveiled a project called the Tropical Forest Forever Facility. It aims to raise $125 billion that would pay countries or landowners to leave their forests intact.

When you consider the annual value just of rainfall in the Brazilian Amazon alone, that might seem like a bargain.

Baker, et. al. “Quantifying tropical forest rainfall generation.” Communications Earth & Environment. Feb. 17, 2026.

Image: ©Anthropocene Magazine

Botswana Diamonds (LON: BOD) will rebrand as Botswana Minerals and trade under the new ticker BMIN from February 27 as it expands into copper exploration to cut exposure to a prolonged downturn in the diamond market.

The name change follows a strategic review driven by an advanced artificial intelligence model applied to the company’s 95,000 sq km geological database, which includes 375,000 km of geophysical data. The analysis identified significant opportunities beyond diamonds, prompting the board to broaden its focus.

After initially assessing diamond prospectivity, the AI model highlighted additional highly prospective areas. The company secured new diamond licences and defined several drilling targets, with work programs under way to advance drill-ready prospects across the portfolio.

Chairperson John Teeling said Botswana remains one of the world’s premier mining jurisdictions. “Botswana is a top location for exploration, geologically, politically and economically. We have historically focused on diamonds, where we hold highly prospective exploration ground. However, the diamond industry is currently out of favour with investors,” he said.

The global diamond sector faces both technological disruption and a cyclical downturn. Lab-grown stones are expected to dominate the lower end of the market, while large, high-quality natural diamonds remain rare and in demand. Botswana is one of the world’s leading producers of large, rare diamonds, with the sector accounting for about one-third of national revenue and roughly 75% of foreign exchange earnings.

Copper push

After searching for diamonds, the AI team applied the model to other minerals and identified 11 copper target areas. The company applied for the most prospective ground and secured eight copper licences. Teeling said the analysis revealed “strong copper prospectivity, a metal with a very robust future.”

Botswana Minerals has launched a two-stage work program to define and prioritise drill targets across its copper portfolio. It said the newly granted licences have attracted significant third-party interest.

Diamond slump pushes Botswana to broaden mining base

Copper’s long-term outlook is supported by its central role in electrification and the global energy transition, as demand rises amid US and China efforts to secure supply chains for clean energy and high-tech industries. Botswana is positioning itself as an emerging copper producer and continues to promote its exploration-friendly credentials.

The company said the rebrand reflects its expanded strategy while maintaining exposure to both diamonds and copper in a country it considers strategically important for future mineral supply.

After the regrettable death of a young fascist, Quentin Deranque, in street fighting in Lyon, the Right is hoping to use the situation to destroy...

The post Fascist offensive across France and the need for a counter-attack first appeared on Spring.

For millions of consumers, the sustainability scheme stickers found on everything from bananas to chocolate bars and wooden furniture are a way to choose products that are greener and more ethical than some of the alternatives.

Inga Petersen, executive director of the Global Battery Alliance (GBA), is on a mission to create a similar scheme for one of the building blocks of the transition from fossil fuels to clean energy systems: batteries.

“Right now, it’s a race to the bottom for whoever makes the cheapest battery,” Petersen told Climate Home News in an interview.

The GBA is working with industry, international organisations, NGOs and governments to establish a sustainable and transparent battery value chain by 2030.

“One of the things we’re trying to do is to create a marketplace where products can compete on elements other than price,” Petersen said.

Under the GBA’s plan, digital product passports and traceability would be used to issue product-level sustainability certifications, similar to those commonplace in other sectors such as forestry, Petersen said.

Managing battery boom’s risks

Over the past decade, battery deployment has increased 20-fold, driven by record-breaking electric vehicle (EV) sales and a booming market for batteries to store intermittent renewable energy.

Falling prices have been instrumental to the rapid expansion of the battery market. But the breakneck pace of growth has exposed the potential environmental and social harms associated with unregulated battery production.

From South America to Zimbabwe and Indonesia, mineral extraction and refining has led to social conflict, environmental damage, human rights violations and deforestation. In Indonesia, the nickel industry is powered by coal while in Europe, production plants have been met with strong local opposition over pollution concerns.

“We cannot manage these risks if we don’t have transparency,” Petersen said.  

• Feb 9, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier China maximises battery recycling to shore up critical mineral supplies Beijing is bracing for a tsunami of spent EV batteries by taking steps to boost recycling – a strategy that could also cut its reliance on imports of clean energy minerals Read more
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The GBA was established in 2017 in response to concerns about the battery industry’s impact as demand was forecast to boom and reports of child labour in the cobalt mines of the Democratic Republic of the Congo made headlines.

The alliance’s initial 19 members recognised that the industry needed to scale rapidly but with “social, environmental and governance guardrails”, said Petersen, who previously worked with the UN Environment Programme to develop guiding principles to minimise the environmental impact of mining.

Inga Petersen, executive director of the Global Battery Alliance, speaking at a conference in Dalian, China, in June 2024 (Photo: World Economic Forum/Ciaran McCrickard)  Digital battery passport

Today, the alliance is working to develop a global certification scheme that will recognise batteries that meet minimum thresholds across a set of environmental, social and governance benchmarks it has defined along the entire value chain.

Participating mines, manufacturing plants and recycling facilities will have to provide data for their greenhouse gas emissions as well as how they perform against benchmarks for assessing biodiversity loss, pollution, child and forced labour, community impacts and respect for the rights of Indigenous peoples, for example.

The data will be independently verified, scored, aggregated and recorded on a battery passport – a digital record of the battery’s composition, which will include the origin of its raw materials and its performance against the GBA’s sustainability benchmarks. 

The scheme is due to launch in 2027. 

A carrot and a stick

Since the start of the year, some of the world’s largest battery companies have been voluntarily participating in the biggest pilot of the scheme to date.

More than 30 companies across the EV battery and stationary storage supply chains are involved, among them Chinese battery giants CATL and BYD subsidiary FinDreams Battery, miner Rio Tinto, battery producers Samsung SDI and Siemens, automotive supplier Denso and Tesla.

Petersen said she was “thrilled” about support for the scheme. Amid a growing pushback against sustainability rules and standards, “these companies are stepping up to send a public signal that they are still committed to a sustainable and responsible battery value chain,” she said. 

The companies taking part in the Global Battery Alliance’s latest battery passport pilot scheme (Credit: Global Battery Alliance)

There are other motivations for battery producers to know where components in their batteries have come from and whether they have been produced responsibly.

In 2023, the EU adopted a law regulating the batteries sold on its market.

From 2027, it mandates all batteries to meet environmental and safety criteria and to have a digital passport accessed via a QR code that contains information about the battery’s composition, its carbon footprint and its recycling content.

The GBA certification will support companies achieve compliance with the EU regulation and it will “add a carrot” by recognising manufacturers that go beyond meeting the bloc’s rules on nature and human rights, Petersen said.

Raising standards in complex supply chain

But challenges remain, in part due to the complexity of battery supply chains. 

In the case of timber, “you have a single input material but then you have a very complex range of end products. For batteries, it’s almost the reverse,” Petersen said. 

The GBA wants its certification scheme to cover all critical minerals present in batteries, covering dozens of different mining, processing and manufacturing processes and hundreds of facilities. 

“One of the biggest impacts will be rewarding the leading performers through preferential access to capital, for example, with investors choosing companies that are managing their risk responsibly and transparently,” Petersen said.

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It could help influence public procurement and how companies, such as EV makers, choose their suppliers, she added. End consumers will also be able to access a summary of the GBA’s scores when deciding which product to buy.

US, Europe rush to build battery supply chain

Today, the GBA has more than 150 members across the battery value chain, including more than 50 companies, of which over a dozen are Chinese firms.

China produces over three-quarters of batteries sold globally and it dominates the world’s battery recycling capacity, leaving the US and Europe scrambling to reduce their dependence on Beijing by building their own battery supply chains.

Petersen hopes the alliance’s work can help build trust in the sector amid heightened geopolitical tensions. “People want to know where the materials are coming from and which actors are involved,” she said.  

At the same time, companies increasingly recognise that failing to manage sustainability risks can threaten their operations. Protests over environmental concerns have shut down mines and battery factories across the world.  

 “Most companies know that and that’s why they’re making these efforts,” Petersen added.

The article was updated to reflect that the GBA’s battery passport will support companies to comply with the EU’s battery regulation.

The post Battery passport plan aims to clean up the industry powering clean energy appeared first on Climate Home News.

A Primer on Carbon Capture and Storage Pipelines

Slide courtesy of Andrew Boswell

By Ellen Robottom and Tahir Latif

The first of a two-part blog on the government’s controversial plans to invest over £21Bn in Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS)1, focusing on the dangers and hazards to local communities of the proposed UK pipeline implementations.

The GJA Steering Group meeting in February was given a presentation by Andrew Boswell, a leading technical and legal expert on matter relating to CCS, on the potential dangers of CO2 pipelines2.  The image above, taken from that presentation, shows the complexity of the arrangements and the plant required to take CO2 from capture to storage.  The full slide set of Andrew’s presentation needs to be seen by as many people as possible to grasp the full range of issues and can be found here.

Click to view presentation

The key point taken from the presentation is that while there will arguably be a need in the future for technology that removes and stores already-existing carbon3, that place does NOT include green-lighting the indefinitely continued use of fossil fuels, i.e. it does not provide a free pass for the fossil fuel companies to continue business as usual extractivism or negate the urgency of a rapid switch to renewables.  Where it is needed, it is to solve a problem, not to allow that problem to continue and become worse.

However, CCS is a key component of the government’s climate change strategy as outlined in the report Unlocking the benefits of the clean energy economy, published in October 2025. Where in the UK the proposed CCS facilities are to be sited can be clearly seen in Slide 13 of Andrew’s presentation, including all areas of the North Sea. 

One of then proposed sites is the ‘Peak Cluster’, aimed at carbon removal from cement and lime production4, in the East Irish Sea just off the coast near Liverpool, currently in its pre-planning consultation stage5.  This has prompted a Letter to Ed Miliband via local MP Matthew Patrick, sent by Mike Vaughn, Managing Director of Red Rocks Nursing Home but effectively on behalf of the whole community around the Wirral.

The letter notes that ‘CCS applied to cement and lime production is widely recognised as one of the highest cost abatement pathways per tonne of CO2 avoided’ and that ‘while the probability of [pipeline] rupture may be low, the consequences are potentially severe’.  This is underlined by the case studies shown in Andrew Boswell’s slide set, with Slide 3 graphically depicting what such consequences actually look like.

Mike’s letter also highlights the dangers of situating such projects in Labour’s preferred PFI/PPP nexus – government money to ‘catalyse’ private investment – which ‘ultimately socialises the long-term risk’ and ‘is difficult to reconcile with intergenerational equity.’

Unfortunately, Reform are jumping on this in certain locations (e.g. the Wirral) in the context of their ‘net stupid’ fake narrative.  This makes it very important that we frame our critique firmly in an understanding that we are in a really dire situation with accelerating climate change and that this is not going to be the solution we need.  More than that, the real solutions are things (good jobs in the renewables and other sectors) that help with cost of living rather than placing all the burden on already stretched households.

Part 2 of this blog will deal in more detail with then issue of jobs, with reference to a forthcoming article co-authored by GJA’s Ellen Robottom and Aled Dilwyn Fisher from Oil Change International titled ‘Jobswashing and Greenwashing: The dubious claims of Labour’s carbon capture gamble’ and to a survey of MPs that has been carried out by our friends at Platform on the role of CCS in the energy system and in employment strategy.

The introductory paragraph to the article states: ‘Beware government and corporate claims of a new industrial revolution and thousands of jobs being created by Labour’s carbon capture projects. It doesn’t take much to see that this jobswashing of a failed, extremely expensive technology favoured by the oil and gas industry is just as misleading as the greenwashing that comes with it.’  This is the essence of the false narrative around CCS, and we will return to the jobs aspects of the debate in the second blog.

Notes

1. Thus far, £9bn has already been given to specific projects, but the government announced in autumn 2024 that it was committing £21.7bn to CCS. However, a search of the various subsidy schemes suggests that in fact around £50bn of subsidies is being committed to CCS-related schemes.  The Climate Change Committee’s 7th carbon budget advice suggests CCS schemes would require public and private investment of £350bn – £408bn by 2050, with up to £136bn for power stations burning gas, and £128bn for burning biomass with CCS (BECCS).
2. CO2 pipelines are only one aspect of the problem. The key issue for climate is the huge upstream emissions from any application based on using gas, meaning that in effect only one third of the total emissions are available for capture – even if the capture and storage technology worked efficiently, which it never has before and is unlikely to now.
3. The focus needs to be on slashing the emissions now by a combination of avoiding anything that uses fossil fuels, and deep demand reduction measures (which we already largely have the technology to accomplish through electrification and structural changes reducing consumption) but that there will probably still be a need after that to remove residual excess CO2 from the atmosphere using direct capture methods, which will be more advanced by then anyway. Global storage capacity is likely to be quite limited, so we should not waste any of it on storing CO2 from unnecessary fossil fuel burning.
4. Cement and lime produce CO2 as inherent process emissions, the majority of which comes from the chemical reaction involved in production rather than the fuel burning to create the high temperatures needed. It is therefore the industry most cited by the government as needing CCS; however, many argue that alternative technologies are in development – alternative building materials, and methods of recycling cement from concrete, which is where the bulk of it is used – and that demand limitation must also be a key approach. It can be argued that retrofitting with carbon capture, building a major pipeline and storage facilities, locks in an inefficient technology and effectively prevents the move to cleaner technologies that could be accomplished within a similar timescale or less.
5. The Peak Cluster is in the High Peak area which spans parts of Derbyshire, Staffordshire and South Yorkshire, but the pipeline extends from there along the Wirral, where the main protests are occurring.

Further information

Document of background links provided by Andrew Boswell HERE. 

MP Watch | Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) Article, Climate Briefing by A Boswell and S Oldridge, June 2025

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The post A Primer on Carbon Capture and Storage Pipelines first appeared on Greener Jobs Alliance.

Regina is haunted by the specter of mold. 

She found the insidious spores in the closet, behind the refrigerator, and around the bathtub for two years after the dishwasher flooded her apartment in Asheville, North Carolina. 

The infestation only got worse after Hurricane Helene. Rainwater rushed into her son’s third-floor bedroom at the Evergreen Ridge Apartments through gaps in the window frame, warping and discoloring the wall. After the 2024 storm, faint brown spots dotted the panes, and the trim appeared loose. When the A/C went out last summer, she worried the mess would spread in the hot, humid air. Her son has had allergic reactions to mold before, including itchy eyes and coughing, and the threat of it happening again kept her up at night. She scrubbed the apartment weekly, only to watch the spores creep back. As a single mom who works long shifts as a nurse, she felt she couldn’t keep up with the creeping damage. 

“My cabinets are falling apart,” she said. Regina, who asked that her real name not be used for fear of repercussions, walked through her bathroom, pointing out where the damp persisted. “You can touch it,” she said. “It falls apart. And that’s from water damage, obviously.”

Signs of mold and water damage permeate the complex, which is nearly a century old and once housed a Department of Veterans Affairs hospital. Tenants attribute a lot of it to leaky pipes, but Helene made things worse. Though the complex was on ground high enough to avoid inundation, tenants said Helene’s more than 12 inches of rain poured through windowsills facing the west. The walls of a utility hallway were black and crumbling, a condition, tenants said, that predated Helene, but may have worsened since. Same with the ceiling in the lobby, which sagged under the weight of water damage. An overpowering, musty smell permeated the building and wafted into the apartments. There are three large buildings in the complex, where many apartments are rented by the elderly, those with disabilities, and families with young children. 

Regina’s apartment and floor show signs of leaky pipes and water intrusion – a common problem in aging rental housing throughout the Southeast.

Regina’s apartment and floor show signs of leaky pipes and water intrusion – a common problem in aging rental housing throughout the Southeast. Laura Hackett / Blue Ridge Public Radio

Regina’s apartment and floor show signs of leaky pipes and water intrusion – a common problem in aging rental housing throughout the Southeast. Laura Hackett / Blue Ridge Public Radio

Regina’s apartment and floor show signs of leaky pipes and water intrusion – a common problem in aging rental housing throughout the Southeast.

A property manager at the complex declined to comment, and its owner, Shadow Ridge Associates, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Mold is a type of fungi, which are moisture-loving in general and thrive in the kind of heat and lingering dampness residents of Evergreen Ridge describe. Outside, these organisms tend to be harmless. Black mold lives in the soil beneath our feet; spores float unnoticed through the air. But when mold infiltrates homes, it thrives in conditions many people find ideal — temperatures between 60 and 80 degrees Fahrenheit and relative humidity above 70 percent. 

In the wake of the rains and floods that have repeatedly inundated the Southeast, mold is growing harder to avoid and harder to eliminate. Climate change and the impacts it brings — heavier precipitation, frequent flooding, and increased heat and humidity — are creating the perfect petri dish for mold to thrive, exposing more people to its health impacts.

Despite its prevalence, mold receives shockingly little study. It is expensive to fix, largely untracked as a public health issue, and subjected to building codes and housing safety regulations that lag behind a problem that is no longer confined to the aftermath of disasters. As mold’s ideal conditions grow more prevalent, it remains a big gray area in public knowledge, and both state and federal policy.

Regina’s health concerns finally prompted her to break her lease in December. She’s spending more than she’d like on a new place, but said the peace of mind is worth it.

IIn the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, Duke University scientists saw a chance to fill some of the gaps in what we know about mold. The team, calling itself the Duke Climate and Fungi Research Group, or CLIF, went through flooded buildings in Black Mountain, North Carolina, a small town outside of Asheville, collecting air samples and scraping residue from walls. Floodwaters had reached 27 feet and left a mist that settled into homes and workplaces when they receded. Residents soon began reporting headaches, coughing, and respiratory problems.

Researchers often encounter common indoor molds like penicillium or aspergillus after a flood, but there are innumerable species, and their impacts on human health vary widely. The organisms produce a variety of chemicals. Some, called mycotoxins, remain stable in the environment, while others, known as volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, disappear quickly. Both can affect the human body, including the lungs, liver, and kidneys, but VOCs have been the subject of less study.

How mold affects people depends on more than just the species. It also varies with how much is present and how well-ventilated the space is. Someone’s preexisting conditions also shape their response. For most healthy adults, mold may cause mild symptoms, but for children, older adults, and those with respiratory issues or compromised immune systems, mold-related irritation and infection can be serious and persistent.

“For people with chronic respiratory illnesses or conditions like asthma, substances produced by fungi may worsen their symptoms. That’s what we’re trying to understand,” said Asiya Gusa, a microbiologist at Duke University studying the problem with CLIF.

A 1963 Center for Disease Control and Prevention radiograph shows a fungus ball in the upper lobe of the right lung — a fungal infection caused by the fungus Aspergillus.
Smith Collection / Gado / Getty Images

Environmental factors beyond temperature also play a major role. It’s not just heat that aggravates mold — it’s flooding itself, according to Gusa. What once grew on riverbanks, in trees, and other outdoor locations can now be found indoors.

In addition to her work with Helene, Gusa is also studying long-running accounts of conditions like “Katrina cough,” a suite of respiratory symptoms that include a runny nose and dry cough that Louisiana residents began reporting after Hurricane Katrina.

Understanding the full, moldy picture requires more than expertise in microbiology. It also takes engineers and architects to understand how mold affects structures and test mold-resistant building materials while others analyze fungal DNA and chemical emissions. That’s why the CLIF team takes a multidisciplinary approach and includes engineers and architectural experts. “For scientists,” Gusa said, “we have, like, tunnel vision.” By working together, the team can connect the dots between flooding, building conditions, fungal growth, and human health — an approach that a single-discipline study could easily miss.

Gusa said the team is still studying the fungi the CLIF team found in Black Mountain. So far they’ve identified 65 species, from common varieties often found in water-damaged environments like aspergillus to more mycotoxic examples like ​​Penicillium citrinum. The next step, she said, is to determine if the species are in fact as dangerous to human health when they grow on different building materials. “We plan to test whether these ‘opportunistic fungi’ are resistant to antifungal drugs used to treat disease,” she added in a follow-up email.

The results of those tests could provide a better idea of the threats mold poses to human health and the role climate change might play in its propagation. When Gusa studied cryptococcus — which can infect the brains of the severely immunocompromised — in the past, she found that the heat threshold for the fungus was rising. “Their ability to change their DNA to adapt was much higher when they encountered higher temperature,” Gusa said.
Translating these findings into public health guidance will be the next challenge. Agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency acknowledge general risks, but questions about which molds cause which health effects — and under what conditions — remain difficult to answer.

Mud and mildew cover the walls of a house damaged by Hurricane Helene in Swannanoa, North Carolina, as seen on September 21, 2024. Marvin Joseph / The Washington Post via Getty Images

Part of the problem is that mold’s health impacts are difficult to track. Fungi aggravate preexisting conditions and cause what are known as nonspecific symptoms like itching, sneezing, and coughing that can be hard to pinpoint and monitor. In other words, mold doesn’t cause a specific disease that health departments can easily track, said Virginia Guidry of the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services. People like her can only watch for increases in the respiratory ailments, infections, allergies, and other ailments that mold can exacerbate.

“We don’t actually have a great way to track mold cases because those symptoms are fairly non-specific, and it doesn’t often send people to either the doctor or to the emergency department,” Guidry said. A study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that mold-related symptoms show up most often in people who already have breathing problems. Among those studied, about 3.5 out of every 10,000 people with private insurance and 8.5 out of every 10,000 people on Medicaid reported mold-related symptoms.

Some residents of Evergreen Ridge Apartments report persistent sinus problems and other respiratory symptoms. Those who can afford to move have. But in a state like North Carolina, where legal protections for renters are limited and affordable housing is scarce, many people have nowhere else to go. One Evergreen resident, Dana, said she wakes up every morning with congestion, something she began experiencing after moving in three years ago. It started occurring nightly after Helene, and she regularly coughs up mucus each morning.

“I don’t want to have to wake up every day like that,” said Dana, who asked that her real name not be used for fear of repercussions from her landlord.

Asheville remediation expert Dylan Hunt, who works for a company called Green Home Solutions, has seen extreme weather cause an explosion of household mold. After Helene, he saw black mold appear in places it hadn’t before. Even minor flooding can trigger growth within 24 to 48 hours if it isn’t cleaned up immediately — and when water damage goes unnoticed, mold can continue spreading for months. Depending on how much water a home takes on and how humid it stays inside, spores can spread throughout an entire house within weeks, turning what might have been a small cleanup into a much larger problem.

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The crisis grew worse over the summer. The region saw a long stretch of hot, humid weather, including Asheville’s hottest July on record (tied with the summer of 1993). Homes that hadn’t experienced flooding started smelling musty, and Hunt’s phone began ringing with complaints of damaged furniture, headaches, and coughs. Drainage pathways shifted after Helene, changing how water moves through the area. Now even light rain can cause water intrusion in some homes.

“Water’s hitting homes in places where it hasn’t hit before,” Hunt said. “A lot of homes, especially the lower levels of homes, will just erupt in a coating of white, fuzzy mold.” Because the damage isn’t always immediate or visible, some people wait months to respond. By then, what might have been a $5,000 cleanup might have grown into a $30,000 remediation project — a frightful amount of money, especially when insurance isn’t always an option. Most companies won’t cover the problem unless it’s the result of a “covered peril” like a burst pipe. 

Despite mounting costs and health concerns, mold remains largely unregulated. The EPA does not have an exposure limit, so there’s no federal support for mold testing. Instead, states are left to decide how seriously to take the problem — with about 15 setting their own standards. 

That lack of oversight can leave renters with few options. For some, it can even mean starting over. When Helene flooded the three-bedroom house they rented near the French Broad River, Ginger and Amanda Simmons packed up and left. More than a year later, their search for a home has become a frustrating cycle of hope followed by doubt. Many of the rentals they have toured show signs of water damage — a particular concern because their 8-year-old daughter is sensitive to mold and has a history of respiratory problems. In several cases, a place smelled musty or affected their breathing within 20 minutes of being inside.

“I’m nervous to get a rental out here because at this point so many of these houses have had water damage,” Ginger said. “I just don’t know if the owners will disclose it, or fix it, or even know about it.”

When remediation is delayed, incomplete, or simply does not occur, tenants are often left with few options. In North Carolina, the main recourse is to request, in writing, that the property owner address the problem. Turning that into a repair is often an uphill battle, said David Bartholomew, an attorney with Pisgah Legal Services in Asheville.

Because of the high cost, property owners are sometimes reluctant to address the problem, especially in the absence of enforcement. 

For renters, requesting a repair means asking a landlord to incur serious expense — and because there’s no federal mold exposure standard, not every state or municipality is ready to back renters up when that happens.

An old utility hallway in an Asheville apartment complex shows mold growth pre-dating Hurricane Helene. Laura Hackett / Blue Ridge Public Radio

Bartholomew guessed that there are “easily thousands of people” in Western North Carolina who have had mold issues exacerbated by Helene. Since last spring, he’s seen a 35 percent increase in mold-related legal cases from residents throughout the region. The lack of state and city laws overseeing mold places a heavier burden on tenants seeking remediation, he said.

Tenants must show that a landlord has a duty to rectify the problem, and prove who is at fault, he said. They must also document harm, often with expert testimony about the type of mold involved and medical records showing health impacts and costs. “That can be difficult,” he said.

For tenants living in moldy homes, the risk has become a worry somewhere between bills, work, and life’s other demands, one that grows insidiously with time. As heavier rains and longer stretches of hot, humid weather settle into the South, that mold is becoming less an isolated household problem and more a predictable consequence of a changing climate — one advancing faster than the protections meant to keep pace with it.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline A hotter, wetter South is becoming a breeding ground for mold on Feb 25, 2026.

The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments on Tuesday about whether state or federal court will have the final say on the future of the controversial Line 5 pipeline, which carries crude oil and natural gas liquids across the Straits of Mackinac in Michigan.

The case dates to a 2019 lawsuit by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, who moved to shut down the pipeline by revoking the easement that allows it to cross the Straits, citing risks to the Great Lakes. (Over its 73-year lifetime, Line 5 has spilled over a million gallons of oil along its inland route.) A shutdown is supported by all 12 federally recognized tribes in Michigan, though they are not involved in the suit. Many tribal nations say the pipeline threatens their waters, treaty rights, and ways of life.

On Tuesday, the justices asked tough questions of both the attorney general’s team as well as lawyers representing the Canadian pipeline company, Enbridge Energy, on the opposing side. Though the question before the Supreme Court is a procedural one — whether courts can excuse Enbridge from missing the deadline to request moving the case to federal court — the justices recognized that the decision could have far-reaching ripples, including for U.S.-Canada relations. (The Canadian government opposes the pipeline’s shutdown, as Line 5 provides half of the oil supply for Ontario and Quebec.)

“If this proceeds in state court, and the state court issues a preliminary injunction against continued operation of the pipeline, it could be a long time before this issue involving treaty rights, which is a federal question, could be reviewed here,” noted Justice Samuel Alito.

Since 1953, Line 5 has transported oil and natural gas liquids 645 miles from Superior, Wisconsin, to Sarnia, Ontario — with a critical 4 1/2-mile segment along the bottomlands in the Straits between Lakes Huron and Michigan. Enbridge wants to move the case to the federal court, which the company argues is better suited to weigh in on federal pipeline safety regulations and international agreements.

On the opposing side, Nessel argues that Line 5 belongs in state court because the pipeline concerns state laws around the use of natural resources for the good of the public. Nessel and anti-pipeline groups worry about the environmental, economic, and health consequences of an oil spill in the Great Lakes.

Ryan Duffy, a spokesperson for Enbridge, said in a statement before the oral arguments that there would be “significant implications for energy security and foreign affairs if the attorney general continues to pursue the lawsuit now in state court.”

Enbridge first argued that the case should be moved to federal court in 2021, sparking litigation around whether the company had missed the typical 30-day deadline to change venues. A federal district court judge in western Michigan ruled in favor of Enbridge due to “exceptional circumstances” around related lawsuits involving the pipeline. However, later the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court ruled in favor of the state.

Read Next The Supreme Court hears a Line 5 oil pipeline case with high stakes for treaty rights Anita Hofschneider

On Tuesday, Enbridge lawyer John Bursch compared the deadline to a statute of limitations and argued that exceptional circumstances could justify an extension.

“I don’t think it was clear to anyone that there was necessarily federal jurisdiction at the outset of the state court case,” Bursch said.

Ann Sherman, a lawyer representing the state attorney general, argued that the 30-day deadline is a firm rule on court venue, unlike the statute of limitations. “Enbridge seeks an atextual escape hatch,” she said.

A decision from the Supreme Court on Line 5’s jurisdiction is expected before the court term ends in summer. If the court rules in favor of Michigan, it would uphold the Sixth Circuit’s decision that Enbridge missed the deadline and make Line 5 an issue for state court, said Andy Buchsbaum, a lecturer at the University of Michigan Law School.

However, “if the court decides that there is wiggle room in the 30-day deadline, there’s lots of ways this could go,” he said. The justices would likely settle on a standard allowing the deadline to be excused. From there, they could ask the Sixth Circuit to reevaluate the facts of the case with the new standard in mind, as Enbridge’s lawyer argued before the Supreme Court. Or the justices could apply their own standard and come to a decision for or against the state.

“To know what’s at stake and hear the court considering that just on a procedural basis, gives me a lot of concerns,” said Whitney Gravelle, president of the Bay Mills Indian Community, after oral arguments. The tribal nation in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is involved in separate litigation against Line 5.

“Line 5 continues to remain a clear and present danger to the Great Lakes and every tribal nation in every community that relies on them,” Gravelle said.

While the Supreme Court case plays out, Enbridge is moving ahead with plans to replace the existing dual-pipeline infrastructure in the Straits with a tunnel that would house a new segment buried under the lakebed. The company is awaiting permits from federal and state agencies. Separately, next month the Michigan Supreme Court will consider a lawsuit from tribes and environmental groups seeking to overturn an existing state permit.

Enbridge insists that Line 5 is safe and the tunnel project would make the pipeline segment even safer. Line 5 opponents like Liz Kirkwood, executive director of the Michigan-based legal nonprofit For Love of Water, disagree.

“We should be thinking about the future and the transition away from fossil fuel. And move towards a future that is sustainable and more equitable,” Kirkwood said.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline A tough Supreme Court hearing brings little clarity on Line 5 pipeline’s fate on Feb 25, 2026.

The Indonesian Peasants' Union strongly condemns the latest expansion of the United States government's economic blockade against Cuba.

The post SPI Condemns Escalation of US Economic Blockade Against Cuba, Calls for International Solidarity appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.

In our era of relentless crises, politics is trapped in the present, and the future seems to be closing in. The collective act of imagining new possibilities – a core feature of modern democracy – has given way to a politics based on opinion polls, short-term market projections, and economic indicators. Can the EU, itself the expression of a technocratic project, revive a politics of community oriented towards the world to come? A conversation between Elena Polivtseva and Jonathan White, author of In the Long Run: The Future as a Political Idea.

Elena Polivtseva: In your book, you trace how political discourse has become increasingly driven by crises and emergencies – fuelling public anxiety and demanding more calculated, predictable, and reactive decision-making. A lot has happened since your book came out. How has this trend developed since then?

Jonathan White: Since 2024, the emergency mode in policymaking and political discourse has only intensified. We can even say there is an escalation of this sense of crisis, a bewilderment. A clear impulse for this is the re-election of Trump in the US, which has deepened anxiety and uncertainty about what the future holds, particularly around geopolitics, the old divides between West and East, and traditional security paradigms. Overall, these recent developments have widened the path for a politics obsessed with preparedness, predictability, clarity, and certainty. So, the trends described in the book have only gained more ground.

At the same time, it’s clear that people are turning away from viewing the future in purely calculated terms. For example, the green movement – which directly addresses real threats and offers precise targets – has been losing influence in Europe. These kinds of quantified appeals don’t seem to resonate. Instead, people are drawn to broad, emotionally charged slogans like “Make America Great Again”, which are very ambiguous but manage to invoke a sense of belonging and purpose.

Yes, these years have also been a kind of real-time experiment testing whether an alternative to the current pattern of systemic decay is possible. It comes back to the Trump vote, which signals a desire within society for the unpredictable. This embrace of uncertainty is a form of rebellion against the dominant policy-making impulse to calculate and control the future. People have shown they are eager to step outside the present trajectory, preferring unpredictability over the mere continuation of existing trends.

In this sense, we’re seeing signs of protest against the spirit of reducing the future to numbers and targets, which can be quite limiting because it assumes continuity and isolates one variable as the thing to change. When people rally behind slogans like “Make America Great Again”, they’re rejecting the idea that progress is just a matter of hitting specific decarbonisation figures or growth metrics. They are looking for a shared project that can’t be reduced to metrics – a more holistic vision of change.

There also seems to be an effort to reassert a sense of shared fate and collective future, pushing back against the idea that all we can hope for is incremental personal improvement. In this way, the constant appeals to emergency might actually reverse the ongoing individualisation of societies. Crises are, after all, moments of collectivity – times when your problems become everyone’s problems. 

We’re seeing signs of protest against the spirit of reducing the future to numbers and targets, which can be quite limiting because it assumes continuity and isolates one variable as the thing to change.

So, calculated and quantified visions from politicians do not seem to appeal to people. But power holders continue to demand quantifiable evidence from civil society and other public sectors in order to secure political trust and justify the allocation of public subsidies. We see this clearly in the field of cultural policy, where artists and cultural organisations are increasingly expected not only to prove their impact through clear metrics but also to predict this impact in tangible ways. If there is a natural human tendency to resist these calculated futures and measured dreams, wouldn’t it make sense for decision-makers to change how they engage with public sectors?

Indeed, the accountancy mindset, once born in the economic sector, has now crept into a whole range of other fields. Sometimes people refer to “new public management” as a way of organising institutions since the 1970s, where everything has to be shown to be measurable – the costs and benefits quantified, value for money demonstrated. You always have to be ready to convince someone looking over your shoulder, whether it’s an investor, an accountant, or any figure demanding tangible proof that what you’re doing is justifiable on those terms.

As you say, this probably doesn’t work very well in many sectors. It may not even work particularly well in its supposed core: the corporation or economic actor. Many decisions in business are more improvised than this model suggests. The companies that succeed – if profit is the measure – often do so less because of carefully crafted strategies and budgeted outlooks, and more because of luck, inspiration, or decisions of individual actors at the right moment.

But whether or not this mindset works in that quintessential setting, it certainly doesn’t translate well beyond it, because the essence of creativity is unpredictability. If you could predict exactly where creativity or originality would lead, it means your project would already have been done and even replicated by many people. It’s precisely because it is so hard to foresee – and requires a moment of looking beyond what you can plausibly extrapolate from the present – that it happens at all.

We in academia, of course, have something similar to the art sector in this respect. When you’re trying to secure funding for research projects, if you already know exactly what you want to achieve, then maybe it isn’t actually worth doing, because more or less you already know what it’s about. If the research is genuinely worth pursuing, you’ll probably struggle to justify precisely what you’re trying to do, how you’re going to do it, or what you expect to find, because its significance lies in its unpredictability.

So yes, this accountant’s mentality doesn’t travel well beyond the core components of capitalism – if it even works there. 

Do you think policymakers are also starting to realise that the quantification of public value ultimately reduces it?

Yes, I actually think that people in decision-making positions don’t really believe these modes of operation are relevant either. They aren’t convinced by the metrics; they understand that political change needs a value-driven appeal. Yet we all go along and continue playing the game by its rules. Everyone assumes they’ll be seen as crazy or reckless if they deviate from these established ways of operating.

So, if this accountant mindset across all fields of policymaking is an ideological mechanism, I don’t think it’s about decision-makers losing touch with reality. It’s more about a felt need to adhere to certain practices, because to depart from them would be to expose the weakness of your position, the fragility of your authority, and the essentially arbitrary nature of making decisions under conditions of scarcity. That’s the interesting part: it’s not that decision-makers don’t see it. I think people in every corner of authority are perfectly aware that there’s something hollow about this constant emphasis on calculation. The problem is that we are short of alternative solutions and trapped within existing structures.

I think people in every corner of authority are perfectly aware that there’s something hollow about this constant emphasis on calculation. The problem is that we are short of alternative solutions and trapped within existing structures.

But this public servant trap yet again led to a rebellion in society and politics. Populism is obviously a word that conceals many things, but in shorthand, you might say that populism is a politics of volition – doing what you want to do rather than what you have to do. Much of the support for populist movements over the last 10 or 15 years has been exactly this kind of rebellion. People like Trump, Boris Johnson, or Milei in Argentina all present themselves as charismatic figures who simply refuse to bow to necessity. They don’t do what the economists say they have to do. They don’t follow what the strategists say is required to win elections. They do what they want to do. At least, that’s the public image: being yourself, being authentic, being undisguised in your intentions. So, I think that anyone drawn to those parties on these grounds is perhaps engaged in a form of rebellion.

As someone working in cultural policy and advocacy, I was pleased to see that whenever you described a major paradigm shift in history in your book, there was always some kind of creative element involved. Utopias were often shaped by writers and artists – though of course not always for good. The Futurist Manifesto, for example, was created by an artist and later embraced by fascists. In our sector, we believe that if today’s imagination crisis can be addressed at all, the solution lies partly in the arts. That’s where you can still imagine beyond what exists today – to think about the future in ways not limited by today’s problems. What role do you think arts and artists can play today in reviving “future as a political idea”? Can art help channel that rebellion in society against the status quo into something more meaningful than populism?

I believe art can play an important role here. But from my sense, art has increasingly come to understand itself – especially over the course of the 20th century – in a rather apolitical way: as something that demonstrates its quality precisely by standing apart from philosophical or political disputes. This actually weakens the capacity of art to be that space outside politics from which critical reflection can emerge – the kind of reflection that ultimately makes change possible. 

Yet, art is essential to overcoming today’s crisis of imagination in many ways. First of all, art can historicise the present – to remind us that the lives we are living are not unprecedented or beyond comparison. Art can convince us that we can still understand people in different centuries. Someone can tell the story of a 19th-century life, and it still resonates with us. We can recognise the emotions, hopes, and purposes people had in other eras.

Insofar as art cultivates that sense of cross-temporal understanding, it carries a very important political message. A lot of politics is about building projects that connect us with those who came before and those who will come after. That’s another crucial thing: the space of culture offers the capacity to place the present in context – and to link it to a longer human story. This can happen, for example, through a book that reflects on the past or offers a vision on a future.

As you suggest in your book, a creative idea alone cannot mobilise people. It needs to be given a political shape. So my question isn’t even about what messages artists or their individual works send, but rather: what practices do they offer? What modes of thinking or values do they convey that could be embraced in politics to help build a better future?

I think perhaps one distinction – though not a perfect one – between the Left and the Right is that right-wing politics often invokes ideas of community and shared experience, but rarely pairs this with any real participation in decision-making or control over organisations. For example, the US Republican Party isn’t in any meaningful sense a party in which ordinary people participate.

This politics of the community on the right is often more symbolic than substantive. Even movements like Trumpism keep the fundamentals of the economy intact. In that sense, they are fundamentally status-quo-oriented.

What other parties could potentially offer – but too often fail to – is something different: a politics of community grounded in actual involvement, self-determination, and real equality. You see this in certain ideas of movement politics or more participatory parties that have tried to foster hands-on engagement. Participatory budgeting in parts of South America in the 2000s was one attempt to do this.

Insofar as the cultural sphere can create spaces of sociality that feed into this kind of political organising, that’s one pathway to nurture a more genuinely participatory community politics. It all starts with local organising. It always has. Local concerns – like housing, public spaces, or simply having somewhere to gather – are the kinds of ultra-local causes that nonetheless carry wider political significance. That is because if you build habits of people getting together and seeing each other in a more favourable light, that can slowly change how society works. One challenge of contemporary life is that we often see each other at our worst: online, in moments of anger or confrontation; on the street, as rushed individuals just trying to get by. What we have fewer occasions for is seeing each other as thinkers, as people willing to talk, deliberate, or act out of something other than self-interest.

Creating spaces where strangers can encounter each other in a more generous light – whether it’s a reading group, a cultural street event, or a music festival – is, in a way, a form of proto-political action. These experiences can reveal the stranger as someone who shares emotions you recognise and value, someone who appears as you’d hope to see yourself, rather than as you fear you are seen in daily life. So, building spaces can spill over into community and participation out of which real change might grow.

Artistic and cultural practices and experiences can also demonstrate what the decommodification of time, relationships, and, essentially, wellbeing and the “good life” can look and feel like. This can be a backbone of sustainable living, and ultimately strengthen the greening agenda.

The EU should also see itself as more than an engine of economic growth – as a community of citizens who share values and a future. Somewhat paradoxically, the rise of the far right shows there is genuine appetite for this.

Today, Europe faces a choice between further developing the EU as – in your words – “an individual consumer project”, or building it as a shared future and a true community project. How do you think the EU can respond to this crossroads?

To generate real solidarity, the EU must become much more assertive in addressing economic inequality and pursuing an egalitarian agenda around wealth distribution. True solidarity requires policies that confront deep economic divides within countries, not just between them. Yet EU mechanisms still mostly operate on the principle of transfers between richer and poorer member states, which misses the fact that the major inequalities run through societies, not only between them.

The EU should also see itself as more than an engine of economic growth – as a community of citizens who share values and a future. Somewhat paradoxically, the rise of the far right shows there is genuine appetite for this. Increasingly, far-right parties aren’t simply anti-European nationalists but are promoting an alternative vision of Europe; one that rejects technocracy and calculation in favour of a rhetoric of belonging, sacrifice, and deeper purpose.

Of course, the far right grounds this in narratives of cultural threat and hostility to migration, which are dangerous. But their success demonstrates that many people want a politics motivated by more than material abundance. The idea that there are things worth sacrificing for – something larger than profit or consumption – resonates widely. The challenge for other political movements today is to tap into this desire for meaning and shared purpose without reproducing the exclusionary politics of the far right.

There is an appetite for a different vision of European politics. The task is how to meet that appetite with an inclusive, democratic alternative.

This interview originally appeared in Culture Policy Room in July 2025. It is republished here with permission.

Donald Trump’s long-time aggression against Iran–abrogating the nuclear treaty, assassination officials, ramping up sanctions, and last June’s prolonged attacks–is ramping up. Listen in: So, Bob talked to our good friend…

The news cycle is so relentless these days—but every now and then, good news comes through!

Such was the case this January, when CBC reported that the Discovery Islands appeal had been lost—by fish farming giant Mowi. This case has been dragging on since 2020, when Minister of Fisheries Bernadette Jordan announced a phase-out of open-net pens in the Discovery Islands. Those farms were never re-stocked…

Removing fish farms works!

The Discovery Islands are a maze of islands between Campbell River and the mainland coast. They create a series of narrow corridors which millions of Fraser River salmon use when migrating north in the spring. Studies showed that wild salmon were clean heading up the Salish Sea, but were covered in salmon lice by the time they got past the Discovery Islands fish farms.

Once those fish farms were removed from the ocean, migratory salmon numbers began to climb! This removal, in combination with the phase-out of most of the Broughton Area farms, has triggered a huge comeback of salmon. Government claims they don’t know why, and some scientists say it’s too early to say the removal caused the rebound. But it’s getting harder every year to deny the truth—removing fish farms works!

Precautionary principle upheld

The Norwegian companies who own the BC industry sued the Canadian government, not once, but several times. Each time they lost, but won on appeal. By the final round, it was only Mowi suing Canada. Their loss was decisive. The only way forward now would be for Mowi to take their appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada.

The Federal Court of Appeal has upheld the Minister’s right to use the precautionary principle when making decisions. This principle says that if the consequences of conclusively proving harm (say, from fish farms) are too high (say, extinction), then we need to be cautious moving forward. There is a large body of evidence of harm from salmon farms, and the Court noted the dire consequences that declining wild salmon stocks could have for First Nations rights, the economy, and the social fabric of British Columbia.

Industry on notice

Let’s give the last word to our friend and ally, independent scientist Alexandra Morton, who writes: “The Discovery Islands win provides certainty to the salmon farming industry, that the coming 2029 ban on marine salmon farms is on solid legal ground. The industry is now on notice to avoid sinking costs into breeding farmed salmon cohorts that won’t mature by June 30, 2029.

Congratulations to Ecojustice, and our colleagues at Watershed Watch Salmon Society, Living Oceans Society, David Suzuki Foundation, Georgia Strait Alliance, and independent biologist Alexandra Morton for seeing this win through!

Dan Lewis is Executive Director of Clayoquot Action.

The post BIG WIN FOR SALMON appeared first on Clayoquot Action.