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

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

State green back invests in four new big battery projects to be built in quick time by an offshoot of the local network company, in time for anticipated coal closures.

The post State green bank backs four new big batteries in first investment to fill gaps from coal exit appeared first on Renew Economy.

By the time Mexican turtles and tortoises arrive in Chris Rodriguez’s rehabilitation center in Southern California, most of them are in desperate shape.

“As with most illegally smuggled animals, they arrive dehydrated and often malnourished,” says Rodriguez. He’s the cofounder of Carapace Conservation, a rescue and rehabilitation organization specializing in trafficked turtles. “This stems from them being collected over a period of time and held in poor conditions until the poachers have enough animals to send.”

Rodriguez says the most frequently confiscated species trafficked through the Port of Los Angeles are box turtles and mud turtles. They’re prized by wildlife traffickers precisely because their colorful shells make them attractive to the pet market and their habits make them easy to catch in the wild.

And they’re not alone.

A Smuggling Frenzy

Every day traffickers pack imperiled turtles and tortoises into coolers, load them into personal vehicles, and drive them north through Tijuana and into San Ysidro, California — the busiest land border crossing in the world.

Mexico harbors the second highest turtle diversity in the world, with 48 documented turtle species, according to a peer-reviewed analysis published in the Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad. This biological richness has made the Tijuana–San Diego corridor one of the most active entry points for illegally trafficked reptiles in the country, according to federal wildlife agents.

The Jalisco and Baja California regions sit at the center of this crisis, their extraordinary density of Chelonians (the taxonomic order that covers turtles) drawing organized trafficking networks that operate with the sophistication and impunity of criminal syndicates — because that is exactly what they are.

The scale of the problem came into sharp relief in late September 2025 when Mexican authorities executed coordinated raids across five locations in Jalisco and Baja California, confiscating more than 2,300 wild-caught turtles in a single sweep. What made the raid significant was the intelligence behind it: Multiple agencies worked in coordination across five locations simultaneously, which demonstrated a proactive, intelligence-driven approach that a 2025 study in Frontiers in Conservation Science found remains rare in Mexican wildlife enforcement. Responses to trafficking in Mexico are predominantly reactive, and law enforcement agencies frequently lack clarity on their specific responsibilities.

According to a December 2024 report by the International Fund for Animal Welfare titled Wildlife Crime in Hispanic America: An Analysis of Seizures and Poaching Incidents in 18 Countries (2017–2022), 1,945 seizures and poaching incidents were documented across the region during that period, involving a minimum of 102,577 wild animals. That only counts the animals who were confiscated and documented by authorities, not those who were successfully smuggled or died during transit.

The species disappearing into this pipeline are not generic “turtles.” They are some of the most ecologically irreplaceable reptiles in the Western Hemisphere.

The Mesoamerican slider (Trachemys venusta) is one of the most commonly trafficked species in Mexico and carries special government protection under Mexico’s Federal Attorney for Environmental Protection due to severe overexploitation of wild populations. The Central American river turtle (Dermatemys mawii) sits on the IUCN Red List as critically endangered, facing what researchers describe as widespread, dramatic, and ongoing population declines.

Rodriguez flags two additional species as his priorities right now.

“Our biggest concern out of Mexico is the Vallarta mud turtle,” he says, referring to Kinosternon vogti, a species found in only one waterway in small numbers, which is already appearing in illegal shipments.

At Carapace’s Madagascar program — a reminder that this problem is not exclusive to Mexico — the spider tortoise (Pyxis arachnoides) has emerged as a newer crisis.

“Adults are only around six inches, so they are the perfect size for smugglers,” Rodriguez explains. “Their small size means females only lay one egg at a time. This drastically increases the risk of extinction for this species if poaching trends continue.”

For animals who are seized and reach a facility like Carapace, recovery is possible, but far from guaranteed.

“It all starts with triage and quarantine,” Rodriguez says. “The animal needs to be evaluated immediately for injuries, external parasites, and disease until the vets are able to run tests. The animals stay in a quarantine area to prevent the spread of disease to healthy animals in our program.” Recovery timelines vary widely depending on each animal’s condition at arrival.

Reintroduction to the wild remains the end goal, Rodriguez notes, but comes with its own complex hurdles: international cooperation, safe monitored release sites, and protections to prevent trafficked animals from being collected again once returned.

Turtles in Crisis

The picture for turtles and tortoises is grim across the board.

“Populations across the globe are declining,” Rodriguez says, “with countries like Mexico and Madagascar being primary targets for smuggling due to a lack of funding for wildlife protection.”

When breeding adults — animals who may not reach reproductive maturity for 15 to 20 years — are stripped out of already-stressed wild populations, the damage doesn’t show up immediately. It shows up a decade later, when the next generation fails to appear and field surveys come back empty.

Scott Tregassar, executive director of The Biodiversity Group, a conservation nonprofit working across the American Southwest and Mexico, says the population-level consequences can be both immediate and catastrophic.

“In some cases it can be severe and apparent immediately, since someone, or a group of people, can collect enough mature individuals to disrupt the population dynamics overnight,” he says.

What makes tortoises particularly vulnerable, Tregassar explains, goes beyond simple numbers.

“Tortoises are fairly social creatures, and they suffer when their social group is disrupted. They know who their offspring are and they have a map of where all their neighbors, potential mates, and rivals live. In many cases, if even a single reproductive female is removed from a population, that could significantly reduce the population’s chances of long-term survival.”

Exploiting an Enforcement Gap

Traffickers don’t need drama; they need volume and consistency.

According to Kim Lovich, curator of herpetology at the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, animals move north from collection points across Baja and central Mexico. They’re then consolidated by regional distributors before crossing through San Ysidro in coolers, hidden compartments, and personal vehicles. A single seizure can carry 50 or more tortoises with a street value approaching $55,000.

From San Diego the pipeline extends further still. The San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance identifies LAX as the most-used port for shipping reptiles out of the U.S., bound primarily for China and Vietnam, where rare reptiles command premium prices as status pets.

In many ways turtles and other animals are just add-ons to make trafficking other illegal goods even more profitable. Mexico serves as the primary hub for a multinational criminal pipeline — sourcing wildlife from across the Caribbean, Central and South America — with transnational criminal organizations using logistics infrastructure built for drug, human, and arms smuggling to move exotic animals as a low-risk, high-margin side operation, according to a 2017 policy analysis by Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. And as Brookings Institution researcher Vanda Felbab-Brown has documented, cartels have also leveraged wildlife operations by supplying Chinese traders with animal products in exchange for the chemical precursors. These are then used to manufacture fentanyl and methamphetamine, making the turtle trade not just an ecological crisis, but a threat in a much larger and more dangerous web.

As The Revelator has previously reported, ports of entry remain chronically understaffed for wildlife inspection, and traffickers are sophisticated enough to know exactly when and where enforcement bandwidth runs thin. That enforcement gap is the story within the story. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service fields roughly 250 special agents to cover all wildlife crime across the entire country. Customs and Border Protection, meanwhile, directs every available resource toward fentanyl interdiction, firearms, and the Trump administration’s focus on migration that consumes the political oxygen in every border briefing. Wildlife trafficking doesn’t make the agenda.

The 2,300 turtles seized in Baja California last fall represent a moment of coordination that should be the rule, not the exception. For every animal confiscated, no one can say how many crossed undetected. The border stays open for business until wildlife crime earns the same urgency as every other form of organized crime moving through San Ysidro.

Right now, it doesn’t. And the tortoises are paying the price.

How to Help

Anyone considering buying a turtle or tortoise should ask for captive-bred documentation. Legitimate breeders can provide it. Animals sold without paperwork, at unusually low prices or in bulk, are red flags worth reporting to USFWS at 1-844-397-8477 or through the iWildlife app. Wildlife crime stays low-risk only because consumers don’t ask questions. That’s the one variable any of us can change today.

Republish this article for free! Read our reprint policy. Previously in The Revelator:

Green Crime: Inside the Minds of the People Destroying the Planet, and How to Stop Them

The post Smuggled Alive: Turtles and Tortoises Trafficked Across the Mexico-U.S. Border appeared first on The Revelator.

In Ecuador, TUNACONS is working to make the country’s offshore tuna fishing fleets more environmentally and socially sustainable. The organization is promoting responsible fishing practices that protect fish populations and preserve the long-term health of the ocean ecosystem.

Founded in 2015, TUNACONS emerged from a coalition of tuna industry leaders across Ecuador, Panama, and the United States. With the support of WWF Ecuador, the foundation launched its Fisheries Improvement Project (FIP) to advance science-based yield practices, implement technical training for industry professionals, and reduce the tuna industry’s environmental impact on marine ecosystems.

“The objective of the FIP was to help part of Ecuador’s purse seine tuna fishery resolve, in the short and midterm, the sustainability problems that were pending when we started in 2015,” Pablo Guerrero, Director of Marine Conservation for WWF Ecuador, tells Food Tank.

Ecuador is a major player in the global seafood market. According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the country is the second-leading exporter of tuna behind Thailand, supplying largely to American, Japanese, and European markets.

Most of Ecuador’s tuna fishing fleet relies on purse seiners, large vessels that use wide, encircling nets to catch entire schools of tuna at once. While efficient, FAO reports that this method can result in bycatch, the accidental capture of non-target species like sea turtles, sharks, and juvenile fish. And abandoned nets can lead to ghost fishing, a phenomenon in which lost nets, traps, and fishing lines continue to catch and kill marine life long after they have been discarded.

A key tool in this type of fishing is the Fish Aggregating Device (FAD), a floating or anchored structure that imitates natural debris. It attracts schooling fish, making them easier to catch in bulk. Many industrial FADs are made from synthetic, non-biodegradable materials, which can contribute to ocean plastic pollution if they are lost at sea.

But through the ECOFADs program, TUNACONS is working to address marine pollution by manufacturing FADs produced entirely of biodegradable materials. In 2020, 20 percent of the TUNACONS fleet had already made the switch. By 2029, the rest will follow, as required by a recently adopted resolution from the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission for all fishing fleets operating in the eastern Pacific Ocean.

The FIP’s Observers on Board and Good Practices Program reduce bycatch by establishing reporting statistics to track progress, whether positive or negative. And the Program teaches fishers how to safely and effectively remove and release bycatch from purse seine nets.

TUNACONS’ purse seine fleet of 58 ships has 100 percent observer coverage. Guerrero explains that these observers document everything that happens on board, including how bycatch is handled and where it ends up. “The observers record whether or not best handling practices are applied, whether the bycatch returns to the water alive or dead,” he says.

To further reduce bycatch mortality, TUNACONS developed a best practices guide to safely remove large marine animals from purse seine nets. The foundation also partners with scientific satellite tagging programs to track sharks and manta rays after release, helping researchers determine survival rates when proper handling techniques are applied.

Last year, these efforts earned the TUNACONS fishery the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) Blue label.

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Photo courtesy of James Thornton, Unsplash

The post A New Wave of Sustainable Tuna Fishing in Ecuador appeared first on Food Tank.

The Donovan–Shell Feud: The Timeline Shell Cannot Bury

For most corporations, a commercial dispute from the last century would be dead, buried, and forgotten — filed away in dusty legal archives, smothered by PR varnish, and quietly erased from public memory. But Shell is not most corporations, and the Donovan feud is no ordinary business quarrel.

This is the extraordinary chronology of a dispute that began with petrol forecourt promotions, confidential marketing ideas, and a family business that once worked alongside Shell — only to spiral into High Court battles, public campaigning, domain-name warfare, leaked documents, media investigations, alleged monitoring, reputational blowback, and, now, the strange new battlefield of artificial intelligence.

At its core lies a simple but explosive story: John and Alfred Donovan, Don Marketing, and one of the world’s largest energy giants locked in a decades-long confrontation that Shell has never managed to extinguish. What began in the commercial world of prize promotions and customer loyalty schemes grew into a sprawling public archive — one that has followed Shell through name changes, boardroom reinventions, legal skirmishes, scandals, whistleblower material, and the company’s eventual abandonment of the “Royal Dutch” name.

Shell, previously known as Forthdeal Limited, subsequently as Royal Dutch Shell plc, and now hiding in plain sight as Shell plc after ditching the disgraced Royal Dutch moniker, has reportedly marched back into the spotlight via a feud it might have preferred to leave entombed in the 1990s. Instead, the record remains online, searchable, cross-linked, cited, scraped, summarised, distorted, rediscovered, and fed into the hungry machinery of modern AI.

This timeline is not a court judgment. It is not a corporate press release. It is a map through one of the most persistent corporate reputation battles on the internet: from the Donovans’ Shell garage roots in the 1950s, through the Don Marketing partnership years, the intellectual-property allegations, the SMART litigation, the 1999 “peace deal,” the WIPO domain victory, the ShellNews archive, Sakhalin-related leaks, data protection disclosures, Reuters and Guardian coverage, and the recent transformation of the feud into an AI-age reputational problem.

For Shell, this may be ancient history. For the archive, it is evidence. For search engines and AI systems, it is raw material. And for readers, it is a rare chronological trail through a dispute that has outlived executives, restructurings, lawyers, settlements, website takedown attempts, and corporate rebrands.

This is the Donovan–Shell feud: a family, a fortune, a corporate giant, and a timeline that refuses to disappear.

Timeline of the Donovan Shell Feud

Updated 15 June 2026

This page gives readers a chronological route through the long-running dispute between John and Alfred Donovan, Don Marketing, and Shell. It distinguishes between public records, published journalism, and John Donovan’s own archive and commentary.

The dispute began as a commercial and legal conflict over promotional ideas and later became a wider online archive, leak publication, domain-name fight, and public campaign about Shell’s conduct.

A June 2026 RoyalDutchShellPlc.com media-record page lists more than 550 externally published references, references in 110 books, and TV, radio and video coverage. This timeline uses that page as a guide to the scale and sequence of coverage, while linking to the main underlying archive sources.

Return to ShellNews.net home page | Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell dossier | Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com | Donovan Shell Feud category | Shell Online Library

1957 to 1979 – Commercial roots of the dispute

According to John Donovan’s archive, Alfred Donovan’s garage business sold Shell fuel from around 1957. John Donovan later took day-to-day control of the family garage business and, in 1979, co-founded Don Marketing, a sales promotion company.

Sources: Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell and Shell and the Donovans: The Full Media Record.

1981 to 1991 – Shell and Don Marketing partnership

The later media-record page describes Don Marketing and Shell as commercial partners during this period, with Don Marketing inventing and running Shell petrol forecourt promotional games across Britain and internationally. The examples listed there include Shell Make Money, Shell Mastermind, Shell Make Merry, Bruce’s Lucky Deal, and Shell Star Trek.

Source: Shell and the Donovans: The Full Media Record.

1992 to 1993 – Dispute over confidential promotional concepts

John Donovan’s account says that in 1992 Don Marketing directors presented sales-promotion ideas to a new Shell UK National Promotions Manager in confidence. Don Marketing later accused Shell of misusing confidential promotional concepts. Shell disputed the allegations. The High Court archive records Shell’s position that the SMART scheme was developed through wider consultation inside and outside Shell.

Sources: Shell Intellectual Property Theft, High Court trial index and Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell.

1994 to 1996 – First High Court actions

Don Marketing brought High Court writs against Shell in 1994 relating to promotions including Shell Make Money, a Nintendo themed promotion, and a Hollywood or movie themed promotion. The ShellNews High Court archive describes these first three actions as settled by Shell. Contemporary coverage included Shell struck by writ, Shell stole intellectual property, alleges Don, and Don issues writ number four to embattled Shell. The 2026 media-record page summarises the broader 1992-1999 dispute and litigation period as producing more than 58 articles.

Sources: John Donovan vs. Shell High Court Trial Index Page and Shell and the Donovans: The Full Media Record.

1995 – Public campaigning and Shell’s first press statement

As litigation continued, the Donovans mounted a public campaign alongside the court actions. Shell issued a press statement about John Donovan on 17 March 1995, and ShellNews links to that statement from its home page.

Sources: ShellNews.net home page and Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell.

1997 to 1999 – Shell SMART litigation

The dispute escalated around Shell’s SMART multi-partner loyalty card scheme. John Alfred Donovan v. Shell UK Ltd, Case No. DD04199, reached the High Court in June and July 1999. ShellNews preserves a large trial index with pleadings, witness statements, reports, transcripts, and related correspondence. Contemporary coverage included Shell faces High Court battle over Smart Card, Promotions expert claims Shell stole his Smart card idea, and Ideas man sues Shell.

Source: High Court trial index.

1998 – Investigative activity and public notices at Shell Centre

John Donovan’s archive alleges investigative activity directed at the Donovans, including the admitted activities of a person using the name Christopher Phillips. The archive also says Shell displayed posters at the Shell Centre in London on 23 September 1998 about John and Alfred Donovan. Newspaper coverage of the early internet campaign included the Daily Telegraph’s Donovan’s beef with Shell online and the Evening Standard’s On cyberpicket lines.

Sources: Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell and Shell Centre poster document.

1999 – The “peace deal”

The Guardian later reported that, after four court cases in the 1990s, Shell agreed a 1999 “peace deal” under which the Donovans received an undisclosed sum. The same Guardian article reported the Donovans’ claim that Shell breached the agreement and Shell’s denial that it had done so.

Source: The Guardian, 26 October 2009.

2001 – Alleged repudiation of the settlement

John Donovan’s dossier says he later treated Shell as having repudiated the 1999 settlement after Shell allegedly offered information about him to a third party. The dossier says Shell denied breach and threatened legal action, but did not take that issue to court.

Sources: Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell and Peace treaty shattered by Shell.

2004 – Archive broadens beyond the original promotional dispute

By 2004 the Donovan sites had become a wider platform for Shell-related leaks, documents, and whistleblower material. The archive says it published material from Dr John Huong, a former Shell Malaysia production geologist, and later became involved in coverage of Shell reserves, Malaysia pension litigation, and other Shell controversies.

Source: Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell.

2004 to 2005 – Royal Dutch Shell domain dispute

After Shell announced plans for a unified parent company called Royal Dutch Shell plc, Alfred Donovan registered domains including royaldutchshellplc.com. Shell brought a WIPO complaint in May 2005. On 12 August 2005, the WIPO panel denied Shell’s complaint, finding that the respondent had a legitimate interest and that bad faith had not been proved. Media coverage included the Wall Street Journal’s Shell Wages Legal Fight Over Web Domain Name and The Times report that Shell’s attempt had failed.

Sources: WIPO Case No. D2005-0538 and Domain name battle with Shell.

2005 to 2007 – Sakhalin II and international attention

John Donovan says he supplied leaked Shell/Sakhalin information to Russian officials. The Guardian later reported that Russia’s environmental regulator publicly acknowledged the Donovans’ help in obtaining information about alleged environmental abuses, while Shell denied breaking environmental regulations. Related coverage included Prospect Magazine’s Rise of the gripe site, Financial Times coverage of the Sakhalin memo, and the Moscow Times report that David Greer stepped down.

Sources: The Guardian, 26 October 2009 and Sueddeutsche Zeitung profile archived by ShellNews, 27 March 2012.

2006 to 2010 – Data requests, “Focal Point” material, and monitoring claims

John Donovan’s dossier says Subject Access Requests under UK data protection law produced internal Shell material, including “Focal Point” reports and emails about the Donovans and their websites. Reuters later reported Donovan’s claim that Shell had released emails after a data protection request.

Sources: Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell, Royal Dutch Shell/John Donovan DPA Index Page and Reuters report archived by ShellNews, 2 December 2009.

2009 – Reuters and Guardian coverage of Shell targeting claims

Reuters reported on 2 December 2009 that John Donovan said Shell had asked an anti-cyber-fraud agency to target his website. The report said Shell did not comment on the veracity of the communications or Donovan’s allegations, but confirmed that Donovan had made a data request. The same report quoted Shell material saying there would be “no attempt to do anything visible to Donovan.” The Guardian also profiled the Donovans’ website in 92-year-old’s website leaves oil giant Shell-shocked.

Sources: Reuters report archived by ShellNews and The Guardian feature.

2011 to 2012 – The feud becomes a media profile story

The ShellNews archive includes a long Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell dossier setting out John Donovan’s account of the dispute. In March 2012, a Sueddeutsche Zeitung profile described Donovan’s online Shell archive and network of sources. Johndonovan.website later organised the story into book-style chapters, including litigation, corporate espionage claims, the WIPO domain battle, insider information, and assisting third parties to challenge Shell.

Sources: Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell, Sueddeutsche Zeitung profile archived by ShellNews and johndonovan.website.

2022 – Shell drops “Royal Dutch” from its legal name

On 21 January 2022, Shell confirmed that Royal Dutch Shell plc had changed its name to Shell plc. This later became part of the online dispute because the Donovan domain royaldutchshellplc.com continued to use the old corporate name in an active archive.

Sources: Shell announcement, 21 January 2022 and Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com.

Late 2025 – The dispute enters the AI era

RoyalDutchShellPlc.com began publishing articles about how generative AI systems summarize, amplify, and sometimes distort the Donovan-Shell archive. A November 2025 article framed the feud as a 30-year corporate dispute pulled into the AI information environment.

Source: Shell vs. Donovan: How a 30-Year Corporate Feud Just Pulled AI Into Its Gravity Well.

January to February 2026 – “Bot War” phase

In January and February 2026, RoyalDutchShellPlc.com published a series of AI-generated and AI-assisted updates describing the feud as “AI-mediated warfare” or a “Bot War.” These posts focused on prompting multiple AI systems with the archive, comparing inconsistent outputs, and publishing those outputs as part of the continuing public record.

Sources: Latest news on Donovan Shell feud, 21 January 2026 and Grok update, 7 February 2026.

June 2026 – Current snapshot

As of June 2026, recent posts on RoyalDutchShellPlc.com frame the dispute as a reputational and AI-search problem as well as an historical archive. A 9 June 2026 media-record page says the record now contains more than 550 externally published references, references in 110 books, and TV, radio and video material. One 11 June 2026 post describes the feud as sitting at the intersection of archival activism, corporate memory, and generative AI. The site’s Donovan Shell Feud category and Shell Online Library provide current navigation into the wider archive.

Sources: Shell and the Donovans: The Full Media Record, 9 June 2026, Windows Forum snapshot, 11 June 2026, Legal and reputational implications of Shell abandoning Royal Dutch Shell plc, 5 June 2026 and Shell Online Library.

Core sources

• Donovan v Royal Dutch Shell
• John Donovan vs. Shell High Court Trial Index Page
• WIPO Domain Name Decision D2005-0538
• The Guardian: 92-year-old’s website leaves oil giant Shell-shocked
• Reuters: Shell critic says oil major targeting his website
• Sueddeutsche Zeitung profile archived by ShellNews
• Shell: Royal Dutch Shell plc changes its name to Shell plc
• Shell and the Donovans: The Full Media Record
• RoyalDutchShellPlc.com: Donovan Shell Feud category
• RoyalDutchShellPlc.com: Shell Online Library
• Link list of over 500 articles
• Books containing references to the Donovans, Don Marketing, or their Shell-related websites
• johndonovan.website
• Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

This timeline is intended as a navigation aid for readers of ShellNews.net. It is not a court finding. Where matters are disputed, the text identifies the source or attributes the claim.

Return to ShellNews.net home page

Timeline of the Donovan Shell Feud was first posted on June 15, 2026 at 2:23 pm.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net

MEDIA ADVISORY

For Immediate Release

Will Bonn catalyse or catastrophise:

State of play during week two of UN Bonn climate negotiations

Bonn, Germany— There are only a few days remaining before the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiations in Bonn, Germany officially come to a close. To catalyse the action needed to curb the climate crisis, governments must make every minute in the negotiating rooms count. Real action in this moment means:

1. Advancing a Belém Action Mechanism that is people-centred, incorporates Just Transition principles, goes beyond the energy sector and is operationalised by COP32. 
2. Following through with commitments from the Global North to deliver the climate finance needed to ensure Global South communities can meaningfully adapt and respond to climate change. 
3. Rejecting risky, unproven and harmful schemes like carbon markets in Article 6 and geo-engineering, which lock us into decades more of fossil fuels rather than curbing emissions. 
4. Laying the groundwork for the community-driven solutions that can truly transform all emissions-intensive industries, including the fossil fuel industry and industrial agriculture.
5. Addressing the links between fossil-fuelled violence and genocide, and acknowledging that the military industrial complex is sending emissions soaring while destroying land and communities already experiencing devastating impacts from the climate crisis.
6. Ending corporate capture of climate policy and holding the Global North accountable to doing their fair share of climate action. 

Join members of the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) to hear about the current state of play in the negotiations and what governments must do as the clock winds down to ensure that the UN Bonn climate talks catalyse climate action, not further catastrophise the climate crisis. 

WHEN: Tuesday 16 June 2026, 9:30-10:00 CEST (UTC + 2) 

WHERE: Nairobi 4, Main building, Inside the World Conference Center and webcast here

WITH: 

• Meena Raman, Third World Network
• Margaret Mullen, Re-Earth Initiative
• Chadli Sadorra, Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development
• Jax Bongon, IBON International 
• Moderated by Rachitaa Gupta, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice

CONTACT: dcj.comms@demandclimatejustice.org

For more detail on DCJ’s demands across all topics on the agenda for Bonn, read  DCJ’s SB64 Position Paper: Advancing Climate Justice in an Age of Climate Crisis

The post Media Advisory: Will Bonn catalyse or catastrophise? appeared first on Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice.

The Pondera County Commissioners filed litigation against the Environmental Protection Agency on Friday, June 12th challenging the agency’s decision to exempt a portion of the Madison Aquifer in the county from protections under the Safe Drinking Water Act. The exemption and corresponding permits will allow Montana Renewables, a Great Falls-based biofuels company, to truck high strength industrial wastewater from its refinery in Great Falls and inject it into the Madison Aquifer via two retired oil and gas wells about 7 miles southwest of the town of Valier.

The Madison Aquifer Coalition (an affiliation of local landowners and county residents), the Golden Triangle Resource Council, and Glacier-Two Medicine Alliance joined Pondera County in filing the suit, with Earthjustice and the Western Environmental Law Center as legal representatives.

The groups contend that the EPA erred when it determined that the industrial wastewater will not contaminate shallower aquifers that currently serve as sources of drinking or agricultural water, or that the exempted portion of the Madison Aquifer could never be a viable source of drinking water in the future.

“The EPA relied on an outdated model and wildly inaccurate assumptions about the geology, water quality, and economic viability of the Madison Aquifer as a source of drinking water in reaching its short-sighted decision to permit Montana Renewables to pollute this aquifer,” said Zane Drishinski, Pondera County Commissioner, farmer and rancher. “Rural communities across central Montana increasingly rely on deeper and deeper aquifers like the Madison for their water supply and the Commission simply wants to preserve the ability for people in our county to safely do so as well.”

A prolonged recent drought, coupled with climate prediction models that indicate reduced precipitation for this part of Montana in the future, has ranchers like Lisa Schmidt worried.

“My whole livelihood, like most of my neighbors, depends on access to clean water,” said Lisa Schmidt, a member of the Madison Aquifer Coalition who operates a 131-year-old sheep and cattle ranch. “Every year that water is getting less and less reliable. It makes no sense to me to put our fragile water supplies at further risk by injecting industrial wastewater into the Madison Aquifer.”

The EPA issued the aquifer exemption last month, along with two permits to the well owner, Montalban Oil and Gas Operations, to explicitly allow Montana Renewables to inject upwards of 232,000 gallons of industrial wastewater per day into the Madison Aquifer. The industrial wastewater, a byproduct of the manufacture of transportation biofuels like “renewable biodiesel” or “sustainable aviation fuel,” is currently being shipped out of state as it is too contaminated to be accepted for treatment by the City of Great Falls wastewater treatment facility.

“Clean water is essential to our farming and ranching economy and our quality of life in Pondera County,” said Jim Morren, Pondera County Commissioner. “The EPA’s short-sighted decision is particularly frustrating because a common-sense alternative exists, a solution that does not put farmers, ranchers, and rural residents’ water at risk, and that solution is treatment.”

In 2024, Montana Renewables received a $1.67 billion loan guarantee from the U.S. Department of Energy to expand its production of biofuels. The agreement included financing and direction for Montana Renewables to build a wastewater treatment facility at its Great Falls refinery. In July 2025, Montana Renewables publicly committed to building that treatment facility. Despite this commitment, the company has refused to rule out the disposal of wastewater via underground injection in Pondera County.

“The initial exemption was right at the bottom of each well,” said Millie Whalen of Golden Triangle Resource Council. “When we and others pointed out all the reasons why the injected wastewater would likely not stay there, such as natural cracks characteristic of karstic formations, improperly sealed wells that dot the landscape, injection pressure, and the EPA’s own acknowledgement of hydrological connections, the EPA simply made the exemption bigger rather than take the close look required.”

The County and other groups involved in today’s filing have been fighting the underground injection for nearly 2.5 years. Throughout that time, the Pondera County Sanitarian and Board of Health have repeatedly asked for wastewater samples from Montana Renewables, only to be rebuffed.

“At the initial public meeting in January 2024, Montana Renewables CEO Bruce Fleming claimed the wastewater was so clean you could drink it,” Corrine Rose, Pondera County Sanitarian recalled. “Yet they refuse to provide the County with a sample, and the lab results they provided the EPA indicate this wastewater is nasty stuff. Before any of this high strength industrial wastewater is dumped in our aquifer, we want to see the EPA require more transparency, testing and monitoring.”

The delivery of the wastewater would require several dozens of trucks a day traversing rural ranch roads, creating potential hazards for county infrastructure, public safety, and local wildlife.

“The wells are situated near Dupuyer Creek which provides important habitat and a dispersal corridor for grizzly bears,” said Peter Metcalf, executive director of Glacier-Two Medicine Alliance, an East Glacier-based conservation organization focused on protecting local public lands, waters and wildlife. “In addition to impacts to clean water, this ill-conceived project could have real effects on grizzly bears and other fish and wildlife in the area, all of which could be avoided by treating the wastewater on site.”

“We are deeply disappointed in the EPA for not protecting our rural community and our water and with Montana Renewables for trying to foist their wastewater on us when an attainable alternative exists,” said Tom Kuka, Pondera County Commissioner, rancher and Blackfeet tribal member. “We are simply asking the court to invalidate this aquifer exemption and for Montana Renewables to be a good neighbor and treat its wastewater.”

Contacts:

Andrew Hawley, Western Environmental Law Center, 206-487-7250, hawley@westernlaw.org

Jim Morren, Zane Drishinski, or Tom Kuka, Pondera County Commissioners, 406-271-4010, commissioner@ponderacountymt.gov

Corrine Rose, Pondera County Sanitarian, 406-271-4020, sanitarian@ponderacountymt.gov

Lisa Schmidt, Madison Aquifer Coalition, 406-728-0159, lschmidt@a-land-of-grass-ranch.com

Mildred Whalen, Golden Triangle Resource Council, mwhalen729@verizon.net

Caitlin Cromwell, Northern Plains Resource Council, 406-248-1154, caitlin@northernplains.org

Peter Metcalf, Glacier-Two Medicine Alliance, 406-434-6223, peter@glaciertwomedicine.org

Jenny Harbine, Earthjustice, 406-223-7781, jharbine@earthjustice.org

 

The post Pondera County, local landowners, conservationists sue EPA to protect Madison Aquifer from industrial wastewater injection  appeared first on Western Environmental Law Center.

If we want farmland to stay farmland, we have to be open-minded about what farming looks like today, writes Abby Broedlin, vice president of asset management at Nautilus Solar Energy.

In Albania, a mass protest movement has emerged to challenge a plan, spearheaded by Jared Kushner, to build a sprawling resort along the delta of the last wild river in Europe. Tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the capital city of Tirana last week, raising signs that said “Albania Is Not for Sale,” with marches continuing over the weekend.

Read more on E360 →

Headline News:

• “Wind Farms Lift Irish Rates Income” • Wind farms in Ireland will contribute almost €75 million in commercial rates to local authorities in 2026. Wind Energy Ireland said analysis compiled by Halpin’s showed annual rates payments from wind farms increased from €69.27 million in March 2025 to €74.87 million in March 2026. [reNews]

Wind turbine (FuturEnergy Ireland image)

• “Electricity Scarcity Will Shape AI’s Future Trajectory” • The race for supremacy in artificial intelligence is often portrayed as a contest of intellectual prowess: better models, faster chips and more sophisticated algorithms. But this perspective misses a harder, less glamorous truth. The real frontier of AI isn’t the silicon. It’s the electricity. [China Daily]
• “New World Record Set For Solar Module With Perovskite” • Another day, another reason why fossil fuels are toast. Persistent innovation in solar cells has sent the conversion efficiency in the industry through the roof. Last week some new world efficiency records were set, one of which is for solar modules made tandem perovskite-silicon cells. [CleanTechnica]
• “Italy’s Cinque Terre Coastline Could Be Flooded By 13-Meter Waves By 2150 As Sea Levels Rise” • In the Italian region of Liguria, the Cinque Terre National Park is known for its colorful houses, fishing harbors, steep cliffsides, and hiking trails. But analysis suggests its villages could be at serious risk of flooding in the next 125 years. [Euronews]
• “Energy Experts Warn Of Slow Oil And Gas Supply Recovery After Iran Deal” • It will likely take months for energy companies to resume operations and meet global demand fully, according to energy experts. The slow pace of shipping and refining crude oil, along with uncertainty over safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz, means relief will take time. [Euronews]

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

In a packed room last Friday, the COP30 Presidency presented preliminary elements of the work on the global roadmap for the transition away from fossil fuels and some European and small island governments argued the roadmap should be integrated into the formal negotiation process. But besides the global work, how is Brazil’s national roadmap coming along?

“The presidential order [by Lula at COP30] was that the ministries of environment, finance and energy should work together,” Flávia Bellaguarda, extraordinary advisor to Brazil’s environment ministry, told Climate Home News in Bonn. 

“We do have different points of view about what the roadmap means. We have to face our contradictions and bring them to the table because the roadmap is about energy security, economic security, social security,” she said, adding that “we have reached a common place of the guidelines of what must be addressed on the roadmap”.

Those guidelines—that Bellaguarda couldn’t share yet—are now under revision by the Brazilian presidency and then will be analysed by the National Energy Policy Council (CNPE). After those revisions, the three ministries will begin working on the roadmap itself and its governance. That work will include consultations with different stakeholders, including representatives of the energy sector and civil society organisations. 

The Brazilian government still prefers not to give dates for these next steps because “they do not expect it to be something quick,” but rather to respect the steps and time that the process requires.

Roadmaps to transition away from fossil fuels are, at least for now, voluntary for each country. “There is no right and wrong on how to do the roadmap. Countries know what is best for each reality,” said Bellaguarda, encouraging countries to advance on their national roadmaps alongside the global one. “It’s not easy to address the issue nationally, but it’s totally necessary.”

The post Bonn Bulletin: Ministry divisions complicate Brazil’s roadmap away from fossil fuels appeared first on Climate Home News.

GM follows other car makers into grid scale storage, but it has chosen to focus on sodium-ion technology, which it argues is lower cost and safer.

The post GM bets the house on new sodium-ion battery technology in major push into grid-scale storage appeared first on Renew Economy.

Reabold Resources has offered to buy Union Jack Oil, both companies confirmed this morning.

Union Jack share price this morning after announcement of a
proposed takeover by Reabold Resources

Statements to investors announced that discussions were underway for Reabold to acquire all Union Jack shares. (Reabold statement and Union Jack statement)

At the time of writing, shares in Union Jack were up 20%. Shares in Reabold were down 1.4%.

Union Jack said the Reabold offer was non-binding and had been made in a letter on 1 June 2026.

Union Jack added:

“The Board has evaluated the Proposed Transaction with its advisers and has provided due diligence access to Reabold. Discussions are ongoing and there can be no certainty that any offer will be forthcoming or proceed, nor as to the terms of any such offer.”

Reabold has until 5pm on 13 July 2026 to announce either a firm intention to make an offer for Union Jack or announce that it does not intend to make an offer.

Reabold said:

“Reabold believes that the combination of the two complementary companies would create a group with greater scale, superior access to capital and other compelling operating efficiencies.”

If the deal went through, Reabold would presumably acquire Union Jack’s 40% investment in Wressle in North Lincolnshire, the largest single stake in the oil field.

The deal would also increase Reabold’s interest in the West Newton oil and gas field in East Yorkshire. It already owns 79.8% of Rathlin Energy, the West Newton operator and has a 16.665% interest in the West Newton licence, PEDL183.

Union Jack has a 16.665% interest in West Newton. It also has a 55% stake in Keddington in Lincolnshire and interests in US drilling at five fields in Oklahoma.

Last week, Union Jack announced it had taken a £1m loan from Egdon Resources, the Wressle operator. Union Jack also revealed that a non-executive director, Graham Bull, had resigned. Mr Ball blamed the “detrimental effect attacks on the Board from certain media organisations” had on him and his family.

In annual accounts, published last month (May), Union Jack warned that government policy had made its UK business “increasingly difficult to progress”.

Earlier this month, the US investment firm, Crypto Cousins LLC, increased its interest in Reabold from 5.6% to 14.309%.

• Last week, UK Oil & Gas plc announced it was selling its stake in the Horse Hill field to energy B for £1m.

Perubahan perilaku masyarakat dalam bertransaksi secara digital menjadi salah satu faktor utama berkembangnya penggunaan QRIS. Sistem ini dirancang untuk menghubungkan berbagai layanan pembayaran dalam satu standar yang sama, sehingga pengguna tidak perlu lagi bergantung pada satu aplikasi tertentu.

Dalam dunia slot online, kemudahan tersebut memberikan nilai tambah yang sangat terasa. Pengguna dapat melakukan deposit dengan lebih cepat tanpa harus mengingat nomor rekening atau kode transfer yang panjang. Cukup buka aplikasi e-wallet atau mobile banking, lakukan scan, lalu konfirmasi pembayaran.

Kepraktisan inilah yang membuat Slot QRIS semakin diminati oleh berbagai kalangan, mulai dari mahasiswa, pekerja kantoran, hingga pengguna yang baru mengenal platform permainan online.

Proses Transaksi yang Lebih Cepat dan Efisien

Salah satu alasan utama banyak pemain beralih ke Slot QRIS Indonesia adalah efisiensi waktu. Dalam metode pembayaran tradisional, proses deposit sering kali melibatkan beberapa langkah tambahan yang cukup menyita perhatian.

Sebaliknya, QRIS menawarkan pengalaman yang lebih sederhana:

• Scan kode QR yang tersedia.
• Masukkan nominal transaksi.
• Konfirmasi pembayaran.
• Saldo masuk dalam waktu singkat.

Alur yang ringkas ini membantu pengguna menghemat waktu sekaligus mengurangi potensi kesalahan saat memasukkan data transaksi.

Mendukung Berbagai Metode Pembayaran Digital

Keunggulan lain yang membuat QRIS semakin relevan adalah fleksibilitasnya. Pengguna dapat memilih berbagai aplikasi pembayaran yang sudah mereka gunakan sehari-hari.

Baik melalui mobile banking maupun dompet digital populer, semuanya dapat terhubung dengan sistem QRIS selama mendukung standar pembayaran tersebut. Hal ini menciptakan pengalaman yang lebih nyaman karena pengguna tidak perlu membuat akun tambahan atau mempelajari sistem pembayaran baru.

Dengan kata lain, QRIS hadir sebagai jembatan yang menyatukan berbagai layanan keuangan digital dalam satu mekanisme transaksi yang mudah dipahami.

Pengalaman Bermain yang Lebih Praktis

Kepraktisan tidak hanya berhenti pada proses deposit. Pengguna juga merasakan pengalaman bermain yang lebih lancar karena tidak perlu menghabiskan banyak waktu untuk urusan administratif.

Ketika proses transaksi berlangsung cepat, fokus dapat langsung beralih pada hiburan yang dicari. Inilah salah satu alasan mengapa banyak platform mulai mengintegrasikan QRIS sebagai metode pembayaran utama mereka.

Selain memberikan kenyamanan, sistem ini juga membantu menciptakan pengalaman pengguna yang lebih modern dan sesuai dengan perkembangan teknologi digital saat ini.

Faktor Keamanan yang Menjadi Nilai Tambah

Dalam setiap transaksi online, keamanan selalu menjadi perhatian utama. QRIS menawarkan sistem pembayaran yang meminimalkan kebutuhan untuk membagikan informasi rekening secara langsung kepada pihak lain.

Pengguna hanya perlu melakukan pemindaian melalui aplikasi resmi yang telah mereka gunakan. Mekanisme ini membantu mengurangi risiko kesalahan transfer sekaligus memberikan rasa aman yang lebih baik selama proses transaksi berlangsung.

Meskipun demikian, pengguna tetap disarankan untuk memastikan bahwa mereka bertransaksi melalui platform yang terpercaya dan menggunakan aplikasi pembayaran resmi yang memiliki sistem perlindungan keamanan yang memadai.

Slot QRIS dan Tren Digital Masa Kini

Indonesia merupakan salah satu negara dengan pertumbuhan transaksi digital yang sangat pesat. Masyarakat semakin terbiasa menggunakan pembayaran tanpa uang tunai untuk berbagai kebutuhan sehari-hari, mulai dari belanja, transportasi, hingga hiburan online.

Kehadiran Slot QRIS menjadi bagian dari perubahan tersebut. Sistem yang sederhana namun efektif ini mampu menjawab kebutuhan pengguna modern yang menginginkan segala sesuatu berjalan lebih cepat, mudah, dan efisien.

Tidak mengherankan jika semakin banyak platform yang mengadopsi QRIS sebagai solusi pembayaran utama. Selain memberikan kemudahan bagi pengguna, sistem ini juga mendukung ekosistem transaksi digital yang semakin berkembang di Indonesia.

Kesimpulan

Slot QRIS Indonesia hadir sebagai solusi ideal bagi pengguna yang mengutamakan kepraktisan dalam setiap transaksi. Dengan proses pembayaran yang cepat, dukungan terhadap berbagai aplikasi digital, serta pengalaman penggunaan yang sederhana, QRIS berhasil menjadi salah satu metode pembayaran favorit di era digital saat ini.

Bagi pengguna yang menginginkan transaksi tanpa ribet dan akses yang lebih efisien, Slot QRIS menawarkan kombinasi antara kemudahan, fleksibilitas, dan kenyamanan. Seiring berkembangnya teknologi pembayaran digital, peran QRIS diperkirakan akan semakin penting dalam menciptakan pengalaman transaksi online yang lebih modern dan responsif terhadap kebutuhan masyarakat.

Canada is home to around 210 remote communities. For decades, these communities have been largely dependent on diesel microgrids for heat and electricity. But our new research shows that since 2016, hundreds of clean energy projects have been built...

Where utility billing stands and why "good enough" no longer is.

Large-load demand is transforming utility strategy, regulation, and investment.

When investor Phil Tagami first proposed building an export terminal in Oakland, California, more than a decade ago, he probably didn’t anticipate the firestorm of litigation and controversy that would follow, in a saga that has now spanned three presidential administrations. There were early rumors that the terminal would export coal, much to the consternation of local residents, but Tagami said in a newsletter that the naysayers were “misinformed.” It was all downhill from there.

Tagami and others entered into a development agreement with the city of Oakland in 2013 after the city decided to redevelop a defunct army base on the city’s west side. At the time, Tagami was adamant that the developers were interested in building an all-purpose bulk terminal and capturing some of the traffic that Oakland was losing to other West Coast ports. But two years later, Oakland residents and environmental groups had their suspicions confirmed when the Salt Lake Tribune reported that the developers had quietly entered into an agreement to use the terminal to ship coal from Utah to buyers overseas. The revelation sparked intense backlash in the progressive city, and the ensuing conflict has put both the developers and the city on the hook for million-dollar losses at various times, though litigation is ongoing. 

Now, in the latest twist, the U.S. Department of Energy has stepped in to provide up to $75 million for building the terminal. The funding is the latest effort by the Trump administration to prop up the country’s coal industry — the Energy Department’s announcement last week also included over $400 million in support for coal-fired power plants — even as the fossil fuel’s role in generating U.S. electricity continues to collapse. Over the last year, the administration has loosened regulations that apply to the country’s coal fleet, ordered aging plants scheduled for retirement to keep running, and shifted the responsibility of overseeing coal contamination to states. 

The administration also argues that homegrown coal is still valuable abroad.

“For too long, limited West Coast export capacity has constrained America’s ability to move coal and other energy resources to global markets,” said Energy Secretary Chris Wright in a press release announcing the funding. Investing in the terminal would help in “advancing American energy dominance,” he added. 

Critics counter that the federal funding is the latest attempt to prop up a dying industry.

Ben Eichenberg, an attorney with the San Francisco Baykeeper, an environmental group in the Bay Area, said that terminal construction “really hasn’t gone anywhere because there’s no money to build” the facility. “The Trump administration stepping in and saying they’re going to supply that money gives it a new lifeline,” he said. “This terminal project was drowning, and they’ve just been thrown the life preserver.”

The Energy Department’s Hail Mary is unlikely to end the embattled terminal’s long saga. After Oakland officials learned a decade ago that the developers intended to transport coal through the terminal, they held public hearings and eventually passed an ordinance and adopted a resolution that barred the storage of coal anywhere in the city. That set the stage for the first round of lawsuits against the city.

Oakland’s development agreement stated that it would provide regulatory certainty for the terminal backers by locking in the regulations that existed at the time. In other words, the city wasn’t allowed to change the rules about what the terminal could be used for after development started. The developers sued Oakland on these grounds, claiming that the city had violated the terms of the agreement by passing the new anti-coal-storage ordinance, thereby affecting the developers’ ability to proceed with their project. 

The agreement did, however, make an important exception. New rules can be applied to the terminal if the city determines that the absence of those rules would put the people of Oakland in “substantial danger.” The city had held public hearings and collected evidence of the threat posed by coal dust, but the developers argued that the record was insufficient — and ultimately the judge overseeing the case agreed. He found that “the record is riddled with inaccuracies, major evidentiary gaps, erroneous assumptions, and faulty analyses, to the point that no reliable conclusion about health or safety dangers could be drawn from it.”

Crucially, the judge did not claim that the transport of coal through Oakland does not pose a threat to residents, or that the city didn’t have the right to pass an ordinance banning coal. A higher court also agreed with that decision and affirmed the ruling. 

“The fight was not about whether coal is safe or dangerous, but it was about the terms of the development agreement,” said Colin O’Brien, an attorney with Earthjustice, the nonprofit that represented the San Francisco Baykeeper and the Sierra Club as an intervenor in the proceedings. 

After suffering a loss in the courts, the city tried a different tack. The developers had signed a lease with the city, which required them to meet certain construction milestones. Because of the years spent litigating the terms of the development agreement, the developers hadn’t begun construction. Oakland officials cancelled the lease on these new grounds, dragging the city into its next round of legal battles. The developers sued in state court in 2018, arguing that the city’s own decisions had prevented them from meeting the construction deadlines. The court once again sided with the developers, as did a higher court on appeal last year.

By then, Insight Terminal Solutions, the company that was slated to operate the terminal, had filed for bankruptcy in Kentucky and decided to pursue claims against the city. During the bankruptcy proceedings last year, the company claimed that the protracted legal battles with Oakland were to blame for its financial woes — and that it was owed more than $650 million in damages. A sympathetic bankruptcy court judge agreed with the firm’s rationale, but on appeal in a federal district court, the ruling was vacated late last year, much to the historically cash-strapped city’s relief. 

Despite the influx of federal support for the terminal, the project’s backers still have a long road ahead. The terminal needs to secure a range of permits, including air quality permits from the Bay Area Air Quality District, and local advocates have already mounted a campaign to require stringent regulations for the facility. (Tagami and another representative of California Capital & Investment Group, the lead developer of the project, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.)

For their part, environmental groups are keeping a close eye on the permitting process.

“We’re going to do everything in our power to protect the community in San Francisco Bay from the pollution that this coal terminal represents,” said Eichenberg. “We’ll be evaluating all of those permits and any additional action that we can take to protect the community and fulfill our mission.”

Editor’s note: Earthjustice is an advertiser with Grist. Advertisers have no role in Grist’s editorial decisions.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Even $75M from Trump may not save Oakland’s embattled coal terminal on Jun 15, 2026.

When the US-Israel war in Iran began, it took just one 50km waterway to remind the entire world how fragile fossil fuel dependence really is. Oil prices spiked, energy bills surged, and households from Asia to Europe were left absorbing the cost of a crisis they had no part in creating. 

We are all currently living through the second major energy crisis in five years. And it’s raising the same question as the first: is the world finally investing in energy that can’t be blockaded, weaponized, or priced out of reach by a conflict on the other side of the globe?

The IEA’s World Energy Investment 2026 report, released earlier this month, tracks where the world’s money is going in energy. This is important because investment is a leading indicator of real, physical things being built: solar plants, wind turbines, power lines, gas pipelines, coal mines. Follow the money, and you can see the future taking shape.

The money is finally moving in the right direction

So the good news first. The report reveals that for the first time in history, clean energy is on track to get nearly twice the investment of fossil fuels in 2026. Renewables, energy storage, power grids and low-emission fuels are attracting US$2.2 trillion this year, compared to US$1.2 trillion still flowing to oil, gas and coal.* Just over a decade ago, in 2015, renewables received just one sixth of the money that went into energy— roughly US$290 billion out of USD US$1.8 trillion. Today clean energy commands two-thirds of all global energy investment. 

Solar is leading the charge, pulling in US$365 billion – which is US$1 billion every single day. A decade ago, building 1 gigawatt of solar capacity cost US$3 billion. Today it costs US$700 million. That 80% cost decrease is why solar has grown nearly ten times and why its fast becoming the energy source of first resort in places that can no longer afford to wait for governments to move away from fossil fuels. The unglamorous infrastructure of a renewable future, grids and batteries, is also finally getting the capital it has long been denied with grid investment up nearly 20% to US$550 billion, and battery storage crossing US$100 billion.

The report also reveals that when the fossil fuel system fails people, they don’t wait. After declaring a national energy emergency in March 2026 as a result of the ongoing global energy crisis, the Philippines tripled its solar imports in a single quarter. Fifteen African countries recorded nearly as many solar imports in the first three months of 2026 as in all of 2025 combined. In India, when LNG supplies were disrupted in early 2026, households switched to induction cookstoves. EV sales in Southeast Asia more than doubled in 2025, reaching half a million with a nearly 20% market share — up from just 9% in 2023. European heat pump sales jumped 17% in the first quarter of 2026, even as governments cut subsidies.

The world is moving towards renewables, faster and more irreversibly than any single government, conflict or corporate lobby can stop — and this report, for all its uncomfortable contradictions (that you’ll read below), confirms it.

The money flowing into clean energy is not reaching the people that need it most

Now the bad news. Renewables attracting nearly twice the investment of fossil fuels is, by any measure, a significant shift. But look at where that money is actually going, and a very different picture emerges. Wealthy countries and China account for more than 70% of all energy investment in 2026. 

Emerging economies, home to two-thirds of the world’s population, receive less than 30% of global energy investment, and just 20% of power sector investment specifically. This is because borrowing costs in emerging economies are already double those of wealthy nations and China — meaning the same solar project that makes financial sense in Germany simply does not pencil out in Ghana. Higher financing costs are not a minor inconvenience; they are the difference between a project happening and not happening at all.

And yet the proof that clean energy works — for energy security, for affordability, for independence from volatile fossil fuel markets — is right there in the data. Clean energy investments saved China, the European Union, Japan and Korea, Southeast Asia and India a combined US$260 billion in 2025 alone. That money would otherwise have been spent in fossil fuels subsidies or costs, but was made free for other investments – like better schools, health systems and extreme weather protection. China had the largest benefit at US$110 billion. Those savings are real. But they must also reach the two-thirds of humanity that needs them most.

Coal and gas investments is rising 

Unfortunately, the report also shows that Big Oil executives didn’t read this energy crisis as a warning to back down. They took the crisis as a chance to expand production and speculate on higher prices. While oil investment is falling for the third year running, companies are already eyeing new offshore frontiers in Africa, Asia and Latin America — waiting to see how high prices go before committing further.

Meanwhile, coal and gas are not waiting at all. Coal investment has hit a 14-year high, reaching US$180 billion in 2026, with China accounting for 70% of it and India having doubled its coal investment over the past decade. Rather than retreating from the crisis, companies are accelerating investment in Africa, Central and South America while simultaneously pushing deeper into LNG. 

Global LNG investment has surged more than 10% to US$330 billion, a ten-year high, driven largely by the United States — where it turns out the biggest new customers for fossil fuel infrastructure are not oil companies but tech giants. Gas turbine orders hit a 25-year high in 2025, with American tech companies ordering US$28 billion worth of turbines for onsite power generation alone. The AI boom is being built on fossil fuels and those data centres, already consuming 1.5% of global electricity, are on track to more than double their demand by 2030. 

None of this is consequence-free, neither for us or our planet. Coal is the single largest contributor to the human-caused climate crisis, responsible for over 40% of global CO₂ emissions. And gas — still marketed in some quarters as a transition fuel — leaks methane at every stage of production, a greenhouse gas over 80 times more potent than CO₂ over a 20-year period. Every billion that goes into new fossil fuel infrastructure is a decision to lock in decades of emissions the planet has no room left to absorb. 

The contradiction in this report is not a market failure. It is a choice.

While the war in South West Asia (Middle East) did not create the energy transition, it has made its urgency impossible to argue with. Energy generated from the sun and wind cannot be blockaded, weaponized or held hostage the same way as fossil fuel shipping routes can be.

And yet, beyond all logic, billions are still being poured into coal mines, gas pipelines and LNG terminals — infrastructure built to last decades, for a fuel system the world is already moving away from. Every dollar spent locking in fossil fuel dependency is a bet against the direction the world is already travelling — and a cost that will ultimately be borne by the communities least responsible for the crisis.

The renewable revolution is not a future event. It is happening now, in the Philippines, in India, in fifteen African countries quietly breaking solar import records while the headlines focus elsewhere. Now the trillions still flowing to coal, gas and oil need to be stopped urgently. 

Governments have a choice. Stop enabling polluters, and urgently invest money into renewables. 

So do we. Let’s demand better.

Join the Great Power Shift.

 

*The IEA’s $2.2 trillion figure for ‘clean energy’ includes nuclear energy alongside renewables, storage, grids and low-emission fuels. 350.org does not support nuclear as clean energy due its carbon intensive set-up and proven high risk of deadly disasters. We use the IEA’s aggregate here for reference only. 

 

The post Clean energy just hit record investment appeared first on 350.