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THE SHELL LEAKS FILES: 5 OCTOBER 2026 SLF-2007-078 The Sakhalin Papers LXVIII: From Siberia to the Arctic — Shell Takes the Gazprom Partnership Into Russia’s New Frontier Forty days after Shell announced that it would pause its Alaskan Arctic drilling programme following the troubled 2012 season, Royal Dutch Shell chairman Jorma Ollila sat in Amsterdam with Gazprom chief Alexey Miller and signed a memorandum for cooperation on Russia’s Arctic shelf. Vladimir Putin and Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte were present. A parallel Shell–Gazprom Neft agreement targeted liquids-rich shale in Western Siberia. Shell had not abandoned its Arctic strategy after the grounding of the Kulluk. It had begun pursuing another Arctic frontier — this time through the Russian state company that had taken control of Sakhalin II.

Archive reference: SLF-2007-078
Collection: The Sakhalin Papers
Principal authenticated records: Royal Dutch Shell plc Annual Report and Form 20-F 2013; Gazprom corporate chronology and April 2013 corporate record; US Department of the Interior assessment of Shell’s 2012 Arctic operations; National Transportation Safety Board investigation of the Kulluk grounding
Court record: Shell Offshore, Inc. v. Greenpeace, Inc., 709 F.3d 1281 (9th Cir. 2013)
Contemporaneous reporting: UPI; RIA Novosti reporting; Daily Telegraph reporting preserved in the Donovan archive
Evidence standard: The Alaska pause, Kulluk grounding, US government review, April 2013 Gazprom–Shell memorandum and parallel shale agreement are established documentary facts. The Russian agreement is treated as a framework for potential cooperation, not as evidence that specific Arctic fields were awarded to Shell or that production was authorised. The proximity in time between the Alaska setbacks and the Russian agreement is established; any proposition that the Russian Arctic was a direct replacement for Alaska remains commentary rather than documented Shell policy.

Introduction

The sequence is remarkable.

On 31 December 2012, Shell’s Arctic drilling unit Kulluk grounded on the coast of Sitkalidak Island, Alaska, after a tow encountered severe weather.

On 27 February 2013, Shell announced that it would pause exploration drilling in Alaska’s Beaufort and Chukchi seas for the 2013 season.

On 14 March, the US Department of the Interior published a high-level review identifying shortcomings in Shell’s planning, management and contractor oversight.

Then, on:

8 April 2013

Shell and Gazprom signed a memorandum concerning hydrocarbon exploration and development on:

Russia’s Arctic shelf.

The interval between Shell announcing its Alaska pause and signing the Russian Arctic memorandum was just:

40 days.

That does not establish that one decision caused the other.

But it establishes something almost as important.

Shell’s troubled Alaskan campaign had not destroyed its strategic appetite for the Arctic.

It had changed the geography.

And in Russia, access would depend upon partnership with Gazprom. U.S. Department of the Interior

1. The Kulluk had ended 2012 on the rocks

Shell’s 2012 Alaska campaign had already encountered difficulties before the Kulluk grounding.

Its oil-spill containment system had not been certified in time for drilling into hydrocarbon-bearing zones.

A containment dome was damaged during testing.

The Noble Discoverer, Shell’s other drilling vessel, experienced maritime problems.

Then came the most visible event of all.

While being towed south after the drilling season, the Kulluk encountered worsening weather. Towlines failed. The towing vessel Aiviq lost engine power. The Kulluk crew was eventually evacuated.

On the evening of 31 December 2012, the drilling unit grounded near Ocean Bay on Sitkalidak Island. NTSB

The grounding became the defining image of Shell’s first modern Alaskan Arctic drilling season.

2. Shell itself later acknowledged the difficulties

Shell’s authenticated Annual Report and Form 20-F 2013 is particularly useful because it gives the company’s own account.

Shell said that the 2012 top-hole drilling operations themselves had been conducted safely and that they had prepared the ground for further drilling.

But it also acknowledged:

“there were challenges.”

Shell specifically identified difficulty consistently meeting US Environmental Protection Agency air-permit requirements and problems associated with moving the Kulluk out of Alaska after the drilling season.

The company then recorded that it had paused exploration drilling in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas during 2013 in order to prepare its equipment and plans for a resumption. Shell

That is Shell’s own SEC-filed account.

3. The US government was less restrained

The Department of the Interior published its review on 14 March 2013.

The review examined Shell’s preparations, maritime operations and emergency-response arrangements.

It highlighted:

the delayed certification of the Arctic Challenger containment vessel;

difficulty deploying the containment dome;

serious marine-transport problems involving both drilling units;

and the Kulluk grounding.

The Department concluded that Arctic work required unusually rigorous preparation, contractor supervision and management attention.

Its assessment was blunt:

Shell had performed well in some areas —

but not in others.

The Department recommended that Shell produce a comprehensive integrated operations plan before returning and undergo a full independent third-party audit of its management systems. U.S. Department of the Interior

This was not an environmental campaign assessment.

It was the United States Department of the Interior.

4. The Department identified contractor management as a weakness

The official review also went beyond the individual incidents.

It identified shortcomings in Shell’s management of contractors involved in containment systems, emissions and maritime operations.

That distinction matters.

Shell sometimes characterised its 2012 difficulties as maritime or logistical rather than drilling failures.

That was not entirely wrong: the Kulluk grounded while under tow after the drilling season.

But the government review treated the incidents as relevant to the wider management system necessary for Arctic operations.

The question was not simply whether a drill bit had malfunctioned.

The question was whether the entire system required to operate safely in an exceptionally hostile environment was robust enough. U.S. Department of the Interior

5. A court victory for Shell came two days before the government report

There was another development in March 2013.

On 12 March, the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit decided:

Shell Offshore, Inc. v. Greenpeace, Inc.

Greenpeace had challenged a preliminary injunction restricting activists from approaching Shell vessels or engaging in unlawful interference with the company’s Arctic fleet.

The Ninth Circuit upheld the injunction.

It accepted that interference with the vessels could create risks to people, property and the environment and concluded that the district court had not abused its discretion. Justia Law

But the judicial finding must be stated accurately.

The court did not decide that Shell’s Arctic drilling programme was environmentally safe.

It did not approve Shell’s drilling plans.

It did not adjudicate the Kulluk grounding.

And it did not reject Greenpeace’s environmental criticism of Arctic oil exploration.

The case concerned an injunction against interference with Shell’s vessels.

That is its proper evidential boundary.

6. Then came 8 April

Less than a month after the Interior Department report, the Shell-Gazprom relationship moved into the Arctic.

Gazprom’s own corporate chronology records that in April 2013 it signed with Royal Dutch Shell:

a memorandum setting out principles for cooperation in hydrocarbon exploration and development on Russia’s Arctic shelf

and on a deep-water offshore area outside Russia. Gazprom

Contemporaneous reporting fixes the date:

8 April 2013.

Alexey Miller, chairman of Gazprom’s Management Committee, and Jorma Ollila, chairman of Royal Dutch Shell, signed the memorandum in Amsterdam.

Present were:

Russian President Vladimir Putin

and

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte. UPI

This was not a minor technical meeting.

The political symbolism was unmistakable.

7. The agreement was broader than one Arctic field

Contemporary reporting quoted Miller explaining that the agreement covered Arctic cooperation generally rather than a single identified deposit.

UPI similarly described it as a framework for exploration of the Russian Arctic without naming a particular reserve basin. Hürriyet Daily News

That is an important qualification.

Some contemporary Russian reporting identified prospective fields and discussed possible Shell equity percentages.

But the memorandum itself should not be converted into a completed field award.

The authenticated Gazprom record says that principles of cooperation were agreed.

It does not establish that Shell received title to a specified Arctic licence on 8 April.

8. Russia’s legal structure made Gazprom crucial

Contemporaneous RIA Novosti reporting, carried internationally at the time, explained another important point.

Russian rules then restricted development of the country’s continental shelf to companies meeting state-ownership and offshore-experience requirements.

Gazprom and Rosneft were the companies that satisfied those conditions.

An international oil company such as Shell could therefore not simply acquire a Russian Arctic licence and proceed independently.

It needed a qualifying Russian state-controlled partner. Hürriyet Daily News

That made the Shell-Gazprom relationship strategically valuable in a way extending far beyond Sakhalin.

Gazprom did not merely possess resources.

It possessed access.

9. Sakhalin II had provided the operating precedent

The April memorandum did not emerge from an entirely new relationship.

Shell and Gazprom had spent years learning to operate together at Sakhalin II.

By 2013, Shell still owned:

27.5 per cent

of the project.

Shell’s Annual Report says Sakhalin II produced approximately:

320,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day

and more than:

10 million tonnes of LNG

during 2013. Shell

Shell’s equity LNG sales from Sakhalin amounted to approximately:

2.9 million tonnes

that year. Shell

This was the commercial foundation beneath the Arctic diplomacy.

The Shell-Gazprom partnership was not theoretical.

It was already operating one of the world’s largest integrated oil and gas projects.

10. Western Siberia supplied another precedent

Shell also retained its 50 per cent interest in the Salym oilfields.

Its 2013 annual report records production of approximately:

145,000 boe per day

from Salym that year. Shell

Salym was jointly owned with Gazprom Neft.

So by April 2013 Shell’s Russian partnership architecture contained two important models.

At Sakhalin II:

Shell was the minority partner of Gazprom.

At Salym:

Shell and Gazprom Neft were equal partners.

The new Arctic and shale agreements drew directly upon that experience.

11. The same Amsterdam meeting produced a second agreement

The Arctic memorandum was only half the story.

Gazprom Neft chief Alexander Dyukov and Shell Upstream International director Andy Brown also signed a memorandum concerning:

liquids-rich shale development in Western Siberia.

The Gazprom Neft corporate account said this confirmed the companies’ partnership arrangements for exploration and development of shale resources.

The proposed structure envisaged equal participation and built upon the companies’ existing Salym relationship. Euro-Petrole

The April agreements therefore pushed Shell and the Gazprom group in two frontier directions simultaneously:

offshore Arctic hydrocarbons;

and unconventional onshore oil.

12. Shell’s chief executive said the partnership had reached “a new level”

Peter Voser’s public explanation is important.

The Gazprom Neft account quoted him saying that the agreements brought the partnership:

“to a new level”.

Voser specifically invoked the companies’ long experience together at:

Sakhalin II

and

Salym,

and said Shell welcomed the opportunity to apply that experience and its technology to Arctic operations and shale-oil development. Euro-Petrole

The connection to this archive could hardly be clearer.

Sakhalin II was no longer merely an asset whose control Shell had lost.

Shell itself was presenting the partnership developed there as a foundation for future Russian expansion.

13. The timing was noticed immediately

The contrast with Alaska was obvious to contemporary journalists.

On 4 April 2013, before the Amsterdam signing, Daily Telegraph reporting preserved in this archive noted that Shell was preparing a fresh Arctic initiative with Gazprom only weeks after delaying its Alaskan campaign following the setbacks of 2012. Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

That contemporaneous observation matters because it removes hindsight from the comparison.

The juxtaposition was evident at the time.

Shell was pausing in one Arctic jurisdiction.

It was simultaneously preparing to expand into another.

14. But “Shell switched from Alaska to Russia” would go too far

There is no document examined for this instalment in which Shell says:

Because Alaska went badly, we will replace it with Russia.

There is no evidence that the Russian negotiations began only after the Kulluk grounded.

Large international energy agreements normally develop over substantial periods.

And Shell continued to describe Alaska as a prospective long-term opportunity.

It would therefore be misleading to suggest that the April agreement represented an immediate geographical substitution.

What the chronology does establish is narrower and more defensible:

the Alaska problems did not cause Shell to abandon Arctic oil as a strategic objective.

Forty days after announcing its Alaska drilling pause, Shell signed a framework to examine Russian Arctic development with Gazprom.

15. Shell’s own annual report confirms that the Arctic remained strategic

The 2013 Form 20-F settles this point.

In its strategy discussion, Shell identified longer-term opportunities including:

tight oil and shale;

heavy oil;

and:

the Arctic.

It said large reserve positions might become available in those areas, with development paced by market conditions, local operating circumstances and regulation. Shell

In other words, the Arctic remained within Shell’s long-term portfolio strategy even after the events of 2012.

Alaska had been paused.

The strategic thesis had not.

16. Shell simultaneously warned shareholders how dangerous the Arctic could be

The same authenticated document contains the necessary counterweight.

Shell’s risk section specifically identified operations in difficult geographical and climatic areas, including the Arctic and maritime environments.

It warned that major HSSE events could lead to:

injuries;

loss of life;

environmental damage;

business disruption;

reputational damage;

and potentially:

loss of licence to operate. Shell

This was generic corporate risk disclosure.

It was not a statement about the Gazprom memorandum specifically.

But once again the juxtaposition is striking.

Shell was identifying the Arctic as both:

a long-term resource opportunity;

and

an environment carrying exceptional operational and reputational risk.

17. Access to reserves also depended on governments

Shell’s same risk disclosure contains another sentence that bears directly upon Russia.

The company said future oil and gas production depended partly upon gaining access to new reserves through:

negotiations with governments and other resource owners. Shell

That observation was global.

It was not written specifically about Gazprom.

But the Russian Arctic was an unusually clear example of the principle.

Shell possessed capital and technology.

It did not control the Russian state’s offshore licence system.

Partnership with Gazprom supplied something Shell could not manufacture for itself:

political and legal access to the resource base.

18. The Kulluk story subsequently became even more serious

The April 2013 Russian agreement preceded the final US investigation of the Kulluk casualty.

The later National Transportation Safety Board finding is therefore included here as a retrospective official record, not as information available to Shell when it signed in Amsterdam.

The NTSB ultimately determined that the probable cause of the grounding was:

Shell’s inadequate assessment of the risks of the planned tow,

which resulted in a tow plan insufficient to mitigate those risks. NTSB

That finding is significant because responsibility was not confined to bad weather or an unfortunate contractor mishap.

The federal accident investigator placed the central deficiency in Shell’s risk assessment and tow planning.

19. That does not establish anything about Russian Arctic operations

The NTSB finding must not be stretched beyond its jurisdiction.

It concerned one tow involving the Kulluk in Alaska.

It did not assess Gazprom.

It did not assess Russian Arctic drilling plans.

It did not determine that Shell was incapable of safely operating elsewhere in the Arctic.

It did not examine the April 2013 memorandum.

The legitimate historical point is therefore comparative, not legal:

Shell was pursuing another Arctic opportunity while the consequences of its first Alaskan campaign were still being investigated.

20. Nor was Shell already drilling with Gazprom in the Russian Arctic

Another distinction is essential.

The April memorandum expressed an intention to cooperate.

It did not mean that Shell immediately began drilling a Russian Arctic well.

Indeed, later in 2013 Shell itself told Dutch media, during controversy over Gazprom and Greenpeace, that it was not then conducting joint Arctic operations with Gazprom.

The framework and the operating project must not be confused. NOS

The April agreement established direction.

Implementation remained ahead.

21. Nevertheless, the direction could hardly have been clearer

By this stage the documentary sequence had become remarkable.

2006

Shell agrees to surrender control of Sakhalin II.

2007

Gazprom becomes controlling shareholder.

2009

Sakhalin LNG begins production.

2010

Shell and Gazprom sign a Protocol on Strategic Global Cooperation.

2011

Shell and Gazprom Neft investigate a wider joint venture.

2013

Shell and Gazprom agree principles for cooperation on the Russian Arctic shelf.

This was not merely the continuation of an inherited investment.

The relationship was expanding geographically and technologically.

22. The partner that took control had become the gateway to the next frontier

This is where documentary fact ends and interpretation begins.

The public record does not establish that Shell trusted Gazprom politically.

It does not establish that Shell had forgotten the events of 2006.

It does not establish that Shell regarded the Russian investment climate as low risk.

Indeed, Shell’s own SEC filings routinely warned about political risk, expropriation and contractual renegotiation.

But Shell’s behaviour demonstrates something important.

Gazprom had become useful to Shell not simply because it controlled Sakhalin Energy.

It controlled access to opportunities that Shell wanted.

The Arctic sharpened that dependency.

A foreign company could possess enormous technical capability and still require a Russian state company to reach the resource.

23. The Alaska experience should have made the Arctic risks impossible to romanticise

By April 2013 Shell had already learned that Arctic exploration involved much more than geological promise.

It required:

specialised vessels;

spill-response capability;

containment systems;

weather forecasting;

marine logistics;

contractor management;

environmental approvals;

regulatory coordination;

and the ability to recover from failures far from conventional infrastructure.

The Interior Department review had made precisely that point.

The Arctic was not merely a large reserve map coloured white.

It was an integrated risk system. U.S. Department of the Interior

The Russian Arctic would not repeal those physical realities.

It would add a different political and legal environment to them.

24. Yet Shell still saw the prize

This is perhaps the central conclusion of the file.

The events of 2012 had demonstrated how badly Arctic logistics could go.

The 2013 government review had demonstrated how closely Shell’s management systems would be scrutinised.

Shell’s own annual report acknowledged environmental and operational risks.

And yet Shell still listed the Arctic among its long-term growth opportunities.

Then it signed with Gazprom.

That combination tells us more about the scale Shell attributed to the potential prize than any corporate slogan could.

For Shell, the Arctic remained worth pursuing.

Documentary Findings Established

The Shell-owned Kulluk grounded near Sitkalidak Island, Alaska, on 31 December 2012 while under tow. NTSB

Shell announced on 27 February 2013 that it would pause offshore Alaska exploration drilling for the 2013 season. The US Department of the Interior subsequently recorded that decision in its official review. U.S. Department of the Interior

On 14 March 2013, the Department of the Interior published an assessment identifying difficulties involving Shell’s containment system, marine transport and contractor management and recommended an integrated operating plan and independent audit. U.S. Department of the Interior

On 8 April 2013, Alexey Miller and Jorma Ollila signed a memorandum setting out principles for Gazprom-Shell cooperation in hydrocarbon exploration and development on Russia’s Arctic shelf and a deep-water offshore project outside Russia. Putin and Rutte were present. Gazprom

Shell and Gazprom Neft simultaneously advanced cooperation concerning liquids-rich shale resources in Western Siberia. Euro-Petrole

Shell’s 2013 Annual Report recorded a 27.5 per cent Sakhalin II interest, with the project producing approximately 320,000 boe/d and more than 10 million tonnes of LNG that year. Shell

The same filing recorded Shell’s 50 per cent Salym interest, with production of approximately 145,000 boe/d. Shell

Shell continued to identify the Arctic and unconventional resources among its longer-term strategic opportunities. Shell

Established court record

On 12 March 2013, the Ninth Circuit affirmed a preliminary injunction restricting Greenpeace interference with Shell’s Arctic vessels.

The litigation concerned vessel interference and safety zones.

It was not a judicial endorsement of the environmental safety of Shell’s Arctic drilling programme. Justia Law

Later official finding

The National Transportation Safety Board subsequently determined that the probable cause of the Kulluk grounding was Shell’s inadequate assessment of tow risk and an insufficient tow plan. NTSB

That later finding concerns the Alaska casualty and should not be treated as a finding about Gazprom or Russian Arctic operations.

Not established

The documentary record examined here does not establish that the April 2013 Russian Arctic agreement was a direct replacement for Shell’s Alaskan programme.

It does not establish that Gazprom promised Shell a particular Russian Arctic field in exchange for any earlier Sakhalin concession.

It does not establish that the April memorandum itself transferred an Arctic production licence to Shell.

It does not establish that any field percentages discussed in contemporary press reports became completed Shell ownership interests.

It does not establish that Shell had begun joint Arctic drilling with Gazprom in April 2013.

And it does not establish that the difficulties in Alaska caused Shell’s decision to deepen cooperation with Gazprom.

Commentary

There is an important difference between retreat and redeployment.

Shell retreated operationally from Alaska in 2013.

It did not retreat strategically from the Arctic.

That distinction is written into the documents.

The Kulluk was grounded on New Year’s Eve.

Shell paused Alaska drilling in February.

The United States government issued its critical review in March.

Then Shell signed the Russian Arctic memorandum in April.

The temptation is to describe that as an extraordinary act of corporate stubbornness.

A more useful interpretation is that Shell still believed the underlying resource opportunity outweighed the difficulties it had encountered.

What changed was the structure through which that opportunity might be pursued.

In Alaska, Shell had acquired leases and was trying to operate its own campaign within the American regulatory system.

In Russia, the starting point was different.

Access passed through a state-controlled partner.

And that partner was Gazprom.

The same company that had acquired control of Sakhalin II during the crisis of 2006 was now potentially opening the door to an even more formidable frontier.

There is a historical symmetry here.

Sakhalin taught Shell that geology alone did not determine access to Russian hydrocarbons.

Political power mattered.

Licensing mattered.

The state company mattered.

By 2013 Shell was no longer trying to work around that reality.

It was building its strategy through it.

And Gazprom, for its part, wanted what Shell could supply:

capital;

technology;

project experience;

and international offshore capability.

That is why the April 2013 agreement belongs in the Sakhalin Papers.

It shows what Sakhalin II eventually became.

Not merely an LNG plant.

Not merely a disputed ownership history.

But the institutional foundation of a much wider Shell relationship with the Russian state energy system.

The irony is difficult to avoid.

Shell had lost control at Sakhalin.

Seven years later it was taking the resulting partnership north —

towards the Arctic.

Source Record

Royal Dutch Shell plc’s authenticated Annual Report and Form 20-F 2013 records the company’s Alaska pause, the difficulties involving the Kulluk, its continuing Sakhalin II and Salym interests, and its classification of the Arctic as a longer-term strategic opportunity. The report states that it also served as Shell’s Form 20-F filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Shell

Royal Dutch Shell plc — Annual Report and Form 20-F 2013

Gazprom’s official 2013 corporate chronicle records the April memorandum with Royal Dutch Shell covering exploration and development on Russia’s Arctic shelf and a deep-water offshore area abroad. Gazprom

Gazprom — Chronicle of Gazprom for 2013

The contemporaneous Gazprom Neft account records the parallel Arctic and Western Siberian shale agreements and the companies’ statements concerning the use of their Sakhalin II and Salym experience. Euro-Petrole

Gazprom Neft corporate account — Arctic offshore and Western Siberian shale cooperation, April 2013

UPI contemporaneously reported the 8 April 2013 Amsterdam signing, the presence of Vladimir Putin and Mark Rutte and the framework nature of the Arctic agreement. UPI

UPI — Shell signals intent for Russian Arctic, 9 April 2013

The US Department of the Interior’s 14 March 2013 assessment is the principal governmental record concerning the problems encountered during Shell’s 2012 Alaska programme and the reforms demanded before further operations. U.S. Department of the Interior

US Department of the Interior — Assessment of Shell’s 2012 Arctic Operations

The relevant US judicial record is Shell Offshore, Inc. v. Greenpeace, Inc., 709 F.3d 1281 (9th Cir. 2013), decided on 12 March 2013. Justia Law

US Court of Appeals record — Shell Offshore v. Greenpeace

The National Transportation Safety Board’s completed investigation records the later official probable-cause finding concerning the Kulluk grounding. NTSB

NTSB — Grounding of Mobile Offshore Drilling Unit Kulluk

The Daily Telegraph report of 4 April 2013, preserved in the Donovan archive, provides contemporaneous evidence that the timing of Shell’s renewed Russian Arctic initiative immediately after its Alaska setbacks was already being remarked upon before the agreement was signed. Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

Donovan archive — Daily Telegraph: Shell to sign Russian Arctic deal, 4 April 2013

Archive disclaimer: A memorandum setting principles for future cooperation is not treated as a completed field development, licence award or final investment decision. Later investigative findings are clearly separated from information available at the time. Judicial findings are confined to the matters actually decided by the courts. Commentary concerning strategic motives is identified as interpretation rather than documentary fact.

Site-wide disclaimer applies.

Next instalment SLF-2007-079 — The Sakhalin Papers LXIX: “A Good and Reliable Partner” — The Arctic 30 Put Shell’s Gazprom Alliance to the Test

Only five months after the Amsterdam agreement, the Shell-Gazprom Arctic relationship collided with an international political controversy.

On 18 September 2013, Greenpeace activists attempted to protest at Gazprom’s Prirazlomnaya Arctic platform.

The following day Russian forces seized the Arctic Sunrise.

Its 28 activists and two freelance journalists — soon known internationally as the Arctic 30 — were detained.

Greenpeace then turned directly on Shell.

It called upon the company to break its Arctic cooperation with Gazprom and argued that Shell’s relationship gave it influence it should use on behalf of the prisoners. Shell rejected responsibility for the arrests. When asked about the relationship in October, a Shell spokesman described Gazprom as a:

“good and reliable partner.” RD.nl

Shell also stressed that it was not operating the Prirazlomnaya platform and had no joint Arctic operations with Gazprom underway at that moment. NOS

Then, on 20 December 2013, Gazprom announced that Prirazlomnoye had begun producing oil — the first producing hydrocarbon project on Russia’s Arctic shelf. Gazprom

The next file will examine the collision between Shell’s expanding commercial alliance with Gazprom, Greenpeace’s Arctic campaign, and Russian state power — carefully separating what Gazprom did, what the Russian authorities did, what Greenpeace alleged, and what Shell itself was actually responsible for.

THE SHELL LEAKS FILES: 5 OCTOBER 2026 was first posted on October 5, 2026 at 10:42 pm.
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This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections

A crisis is brewing for the U.S. electricity grid – one that could make your electric bill skyrocket and thwart efforts to address climate change.

To understand the problem, think of transmission lines – the poles and wires that transport electricity from power plants to homes and businesses – as an interstate highway system for electrons. Like too many cars on the road, too many electrons traveling across power lines can cause traffic jams.

These sorts of jams haven’t been a problem until just recently, as power-hungry data centers proliferate and demand from electric vehicles, heat pumps, and air conditioning grows.

As a result, Americans’ electricity rates, which already spiked by more than one-third over the past five years, are poised to keep rising.

Read: Home electricity bills are skyrocketing. For data centers, not so much.

What’s more, when rising demand meets inadequate grid capacity, that slows efforts to address climate pollution. When new clean power sources are stymied by too much traffic on power lines, existing fossil fuel power plants are forced to remain in service and burn gas and coal more often. And when data centers are unable to connect to the grid, they often build dirty on-site natural gas power generation instead.

Adding more transmission lines to the grid would ease congestion, but on average, permitting and building a new transmission line in the U.S. takes a decade. Some big multistate transmission lines have taken over three decades to complete. And the Trump administration recently axed Congress’ attempts to accelerate the process.

A bipartisan group of senators just released a bill that would reform permitting for transmission lines and other large projects, speeding up the process for constructing new lines. But time is running short in this session of Congress, and the stakes of inaction are high.

"Failing to pass permitting reforms would have real consequences for all of us,” said Zach Zimmerman, director of research and policy for Grid Strategies, a power sector consulting firm, in an email. “Every year that major transmission projects are delayed means higher system costs and less ability to move power where it is needed during extreme weather. Without reform, we will continue to pay more for the grid.”

The U.S. has struggled to modernize its grid

The demand for electrons on the U.S. power grid remained relatively flat for decades, increasing by a mere 5% between 2005 and 2023.

Now that’s changed: Analysts at the consulting firm ICF forecast that U.S. residential electricity rates could rise another 15% to 40% over the next five years and double by 2050, with power grid traffic jams being a root problem.

U.S. electricity demand from 2000 to 2025 (blue) in terawatt-hours (TWh) and the range of forecasts (green) by various groups. (Image credit: created by Dana Nuccitelli with data from Ember, Princeton REPEAT, American Clean Power, Bank of America Institute, Enverus Intelligence Research, and McKinsey & Company)

In 2024, the Department of Energy concluded that the U.S. would need between a doubling and quadrupling of its transmission capacity by 2050 in order to affordably meet growing power demand and maintain grid reliability.

To create that capacity would require a build-out of roughly 5,000 miles per year of high-capacity regional transmission, plus additional miles of interregional transmission, according to Grid Strategies. But it took the U.S. nine years, from 2017 through 2025, to build the last 5,000 miles of transmission lines, Grid Strategies estimated.

The only recent year that came close to the 5,000-mile target was 2013, when Texas built close to 3,000 miles of transmission lines. That was the result of a 2005 Texas state law that encouraged building transmission lines in areas with high potential for wind power, known as “competitive renewable energy zones.”

U.S. transmission build-out has since stagnated, averaging just 600 new miles per year since 2017.

Read: How blue California and red Texas became green powerhouses

Miles of new high-voltage transmission lines built in the U.S. per year between 2010 and 2025, compared to the Grid Strategies estimated need of 5,000 new miles per year. (Image credit: Created by Dana Nuccitelli with data from Grid Strategies and Americans for a Clean Energy Grid)

For comparison, China has been building over 1,000 miles of ultrahigh voltage power lines per year. Ultrahigh voltage transmission lines are like the high-speed rail of transmission. They can carry more electrons more efficiently than America’s high-voltage transmission lines.

Congress has failed to speed up transmission line permitting

Like Texas, Congress passed a law in 2005 in an effort to spur more transmission lines, but with far less success.

One challenge transmission projects face is obtaining permits in every state and local jurisdiction along their proposed path. That can be an onerous and time-consuming process with many potential veto points. In contrast, Congress in the 1938 Natural Gas Act gave the entity now known as the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission the authority to act as a one-stop shop for interstate natural gas pipeline permits.

Lawmakers tried to establish a similar process for interstate transmission lines in the 2005 Energy Policy Act. That law instructed the Department of Energy to establish “National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors.” These are areas where it would be in the nation's interest to build electrical transmission lines relatively quickly, for example, to relieve traffic jams on the grid. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would then have the authority to permit transmission lines along these corridors in consultation with states.

But for over 15 years, the Department of Energy was unable to designate any such corridors due to a series of court decisions in favor of states, landowners, and environmental groups, ruling that the bill’s language was insufficiently clear. Congress subsequently tried to clarify its intent in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

And that effort seemed to succeed. In December 2024, the Department of Energy finally advanced three proposed National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors in the areas identified as having the greatest need for additional transmission capacity.

The Department of Energy’s “rough approximation for illustrative purposes” of its three retained proposed National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors in December 2024. (Image credit: U.S. Department of Energy)

But in August 2026, Trump’s Energy Secretary Chris Wright announced that he was canceling these three proposed corridors. Despite acknowledging the importance of building new transmission lines, Wright characterized these proposals as part of “a climate-alarmist agenda” intended by the Biden administration “to advance their Green New Scam agenda and accelerate decarbonization.”

What’s next?

Zimmerman of Grid Strategies identified several measures that could speed up domestic transmission permitting and development.

For example, Congress could allow important transmission projects to move directly to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for permitting, rather than waiting for the Department of Energy to first define national interest corridors. That would also depoliticize the process, because the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission operates more independently from the White House than the Department of Energy.

Zimmerman also pointed to a 2024 Federal Energy Regulatory Commission rule called Order 1920. That rule, among other things, requires utilities and regional grid operators to consider the next 20 years of power demand forecasts in their transmission planning rather than simply considering short-term needs.

There’s also “a need for Congress to improve permitting for large-scale transmission and address interregional transmission. And establishing a transmission investment tax credit would be helpful,” Zimmerman said by email.

In order to avoid prolonged fights over who pays for how much of a proposed transmission line, Congress could also establish a formula for fairly allocating its costs among the beneficiaries and define the types of benefits that should be included in that cost allocation.

Congress narrowly failed to pass the Energy Permitting Reform Act in 2024, which would have implemented many of Zimmerman’s recommendations. An analysis by energy systems experts at the nonpartisan think tank RMI estimated that the transmission permitting reform provisions in that bill could have allowed enough clean energy to connect to the U.S. grid to reduce the country’s climate pollution by billions of tons.

This week, a group of senators introduced the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act, which also includes many of Zimmerman’s recommendations. A preliminary analysis of some of the transmission provisions in the bill from the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions estimated that they would cut climate pollution by billions of tons in the next 15 years while reducing Americans’ electricity bills by $19 billion and lessening the risks of widespread power outages.

“This analysis shows that practical reforms to transmission planning and interconnection processes can unlock more clean energy, reduce our reliance on natural gas, lower costs for consumers, and help build a cleaner, more reliable electric grid,” said Nat Keohane, president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions. “These benefits are within reach if we move quickly to modernize the systems that power our nation.”

This article first appeared on Yale Climate Connections and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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This blog was originally posted on the Great Salt Lake Watershed Enhancement Trust website on October 5, 2026. The Trust is co-managed by National Audubon Society and The Nature Conservancy.Despite...

By Peter Massie (Director, Geothermal Energy Office, Cascade Institute)

Peter Massie

Two weeks ago, I attended Geothermal Rising’s annual conference in Houston to meet with geothermal advocates, company leaders, and experts to discuss ways to accelerate development of the geothermal industry and de-risk projects.

It was phenomenal to chat with and learn from so many people advancing geothermal energy in North America, and it’s gratifying to see how much energy is being put towards geothermal development. What’s most remarkable is how unified industry participants are in getting this industry up and flourishing.

There’s much going on behind the scenes in the geothermal industry. But here are five themes that stood out to me and reflect the state of the geothermal industry today:

One: Canadians were not only present, but were a substantial component of the conference cohort.

Though the conference was in Houston, Canadians figured among the largest group of attendees. There were Canadian innovators like TerraFerno Geothermal Solutions, who are developing advanced technology to improve flow control. Others are leaders like Calgary-based Rochelle Longval, VP of Innovation at Hephae Energy Technology. Adding to the Canadian presence were geothermal developers like Kirsten Marcia, President & CEO of DEEP Earth Energy Production, and Neil Ethier, leading commercial development at Eavor Technologies Inc.

Canadian geothermal researchers were also in attendance, including leading researcher at FORGE John McLennan (FORGE is catalyzing the current moment in geothermal development). Meanwhile, Canadian companies like RBC are leading the way on investment, which will support this industry as it becomes more prominent and produces more megawatts.

Two: There is widespread recognition that government has a vital role to play.

The U.S. government is playing a catalytic role in advancing geothermal. Lauren Boyd, who heads the Department of Energy’s Office of Geothermal, outlined how her office is unlocking private investment by supporting R&D, addressing exploration, and bridging the gap to commercialization. During the conference, the U.S. Department of Energy announced approximately $100M in funding for over 20 projects. A week later, a bipartisan congressional geothermal caucus was launched to advance the industry.

There is a clear takeaway for Canada: The U.S. geothermal industry is able to move forward due to public-private collaboration and strategic, industrial policy – not just passive, market-led funding. Let’s apply those lessons here.

Three: Geothermal is moving forward, but we still have a long road ahead.

Technologies to advance geothermal projects have seen major breakthroughs and led to progress. Just last month, Fervo Energy announced they’ve achieved first power.

But the industry still has a long way to go. Investors are interested, but a single mistake could shatter the fragile trust that they’ve started to build with the industry. Geothermal developers need to show that emerging technologies can deliver across geologies, and over time. There is still much work to be done to make sure this industry is adequately prepped for investment.

Four: Investors are taking notice

It was encouraging to see so many investors from across the capital stack in attendance at this geothermal conference – it shows they’re paying attention, and they are ready to consider geothermal as a worthwhile investment opportunity.

From venture capital firms like Underground Ventures, which focuses primarily on investing in geothermal energy technologies, to large-scale RBC Capital Partners, the investor appetite is there. Different investors have different risk tolerances and will not be looking for similar prospects. But they all share one thing in common: geothermal energy has captured their attention, and they are looking for opportunities.

Five: There’s a real sense that this is geothermal’s moment.

I’ve been following geothermal for over a decade, but I only jumped in with both feet a few years ago. Talking to industry veterans, they all agree that major progress has been made in the last few years.

The window is open for geothermal, and Canada can be a leader in this industry. But Canada – and particularly the Canadian government – need to take a deliberate and strategic approach to encourage projects in Canada, and to develop the technologies that will supply geothermal projects across the world.

The post Notes from Geothermal Rising 2026 in Texas appeared first on Cascade Institute.

Registered nurses at Kaiser Permanente hospitals across California are celebrating a historic victory against wage theft committed by their employer. California Nurses Association successfully won an arbitration agreement that mandates Kaiser pay stolen wages dating back to at least 2021, potentially totalling a sum in the tens of millions of dollars to be paid out to more than 1,000 nurses.

Dominion said it wasn’t relevant to its merger with NextEra Energy, but Clean Virginia, a customer advocacy group, said it spoke to the governance “fitness” of the potential combined company.

The tech giant and energy producer are backing improvements and renovations at the 1,790-MW Calvert Cliffs Clean Energy Center, the state’s largest source of clean energy.

Mohamed Adow is the founder and director of Power Shift Africa.

What does it mean to ask a continent to adapt to a crisis it did little to create? For Africa, that question has stopped being philosophical as it is answered every day in flooded communities, failed harvests, disappearing livelihoods and public budgets stretched by disasters they cannot afford. 

Africa produces a negligible share of global emissions, but between 1970 and 2021 it accounted for around 35% of climate-related deaths worldwide. The continent is therefore confronting a brutal contradiction that is exemplified by the fact that those who have contributed least to the climate crisis are carrying some of its heaviest costs. 

And that explains why, for us, it is worrying that much of the climate debate treats adaptation as a technical exercise. Build better infrastructure, they say. Improve early-warning systems, they urge. Develop drought-resistant crops, they preach. Strengthen disaster preparedness, they yell. All of these things matter, but they do not answer the harder question of why some people and countries are so much more vulnerable in the first place.

At pre-COP, UN climate chief warns of heat threat to mothers and babies

That is the question we have spent the last couple of years trying to answer, and it culminates in our recently launched thought-provoking report that shows how Africa’s vulnerability is not an accident of geography, but has instead been shaped by history, economics and power.

Colonial extraction, unequal development, debt dependency, global economic asymmetries and exclusion from international decision-making have all constrained the resources and choices available to African countries, and climate change is intensifying those existing inequalities, shows the report, titled “A Just Transition for Adaptation: A Framework and Vision for Africa”.  

Widening adaptation finance gap

I say it is ‘thought-provoking’ because it asks us to rethink adaptation itself – not as a collection of projects designed to help people cope with climate impacts, but as a question of justice, power and structural change. 

That distinction might not sit well with some people, but for Africa it matters, because there is a danger in asking vulnerable countries simply to become more “resilient”. Resilient against what? How can you ask people to toughen up while letting them be strangled by a system that continues to reproduce the very inequalities that have made resilience so difficult? 

If you want to know where the problem is, see where the money is coming from and where it is going. That becomes quite stark when you consider the fact that Africa’s annual adaptation needs are close to $70 billion but its adaptation finance flows are only around $14 billion.

Editor’s Desk: Nepal’s disaster has laid bare the world’s adaptation accountability gap

At the same time, a growing proportion of climate finance is being delivered through commercial loans rather than grants. That means countries already under severe fiscal pressure are being asked to borrow to protect themselves from climate impacts they did little to cause. 

There is something deeply wrong with a system in which climate-vulnerable countries are spending more of their own public money on adaptation than they receive in international support, because that system turns climate injustice into a financial transaction, with those least responsible carrying more of the cost.

Members of civil society call for a tripling of adaptation finance. (Photo: IISD/ENB – Kiara Worth) Members of civil society call for a tripling of adaptation finance. (Photo: IISD/ENB – Kiara Worth) From extractivism to African ownership 

And, as the new report shows, the problem goes beyond finance. Africa’s land, minerals, forests and other resources have become central to the global transition towards lower-carbon economies. Markets and green industrial projects may offer genuine opportunities, but without African ownership, participation and accountability, there is a risk that old patterns of extraction will simply be repackaged in the language of the green economy, and that is why we argue that a transition can be low-carbon and still be unjust. 

It is precisely because of this risk that the report’s idea of a  just transition for adaptation becomes important as it expands the idea beyond the familiar focus on emissions and energy systems. It asks what justice looks like when the goal is not simply to reduce carbon, but to enable societies to withstand a changing climate without reproducing the inequalities that made them vulnerable. 

The report places four dimensions of justice at the centre: recognition, participation, distribution and restoration. 

From Belém to Antalya – gains, gaps and challenges for a new Just Transition Mechanism 

Recognition means taking African realities and knowledge seriously. Indigenous and local knowledge has too often been treated as peripheral to “real” climate expertise, even though communities possess generations of detailed understanding of ecosystems, rainfall, soils, water and livelihoods. That knowledge should inform adaptation policy from the beginning, rather than being added after decisions have already been made. 

Participation means giving affected communities a genuine voice in decisions about their land, resources and futures. Adaptation governance should be inclusive, democratic, rights-based and rooted in free, prior and informed consent. 

Climate justice must confront unequal development

Meanwhile, distribution asks who actually receives adaptation finance, technology and protection? Money that is announced internationally but fails to reach vulnerable communities does little to change their reality. 

And, finally, restoration recognises that present-day vulnerability has a history. Climate justice cannot begin and end with today’s emissions, but must also confront the structural conditions that have shaped unequal development and continue to limit African countries’ room to respond. 

This report, therefore, is an invitation to change the terms of the conversation on just transition. Africa definitely needs adaptation, but that should not mean endlessly adjusting to an unjust system. The real goal should be something more ambitious; a transition in which resilience, development and justice reinforce one another, shaped by African priorities and grounded in African realities. 

The post Africa should not have to adapt to an unjust climate system  appeared first on Climate Home News.

Mandates and long-term trends toward electrification are supporting demand for these HVAC technologies despite federal headwinds.

For utilities, keeping capital expenditures well-balanced is “going to be a little more challenging with [interest] rates going higher as quickly as they have,” said Tim Keller, managing director of U.S. Bank’s power and utilities group.

The Environment Agency (EA) has admitted mistakes in its official assessment of plans for gas drilling and fracking at Burniston in North Yorkshire, following widespread criticism.

But this has failed to satisfy critics, who have called on the EA to scrap the assessment and start again.

Photo: DrillOrDrop

In August 2026, the EA said it was minded to approve the permit application, by Europa Oil & Gas, for plans at Burniston. The environmental permit is considered separately from planning permission, which was refused by North Yorkshire Council earlier this year.

The EA set out its reasons for the minded to approve in a report, the draft decision document. It invited comments before making a final decision.

In past two months, the EA has been accused of errors in the draft decision document, as well as inconsistency and missing information.

The document was the subject of a formal complaint by one campaigner. There have also been numerous objections from organisations and individuals.

Update from EA website on Burniston permit application

In an online update, the EA has responded to some of the objections:

“There are a number of minor typographical errors and inconsistencies in use of terminology, within our published draft decision document.”

“While we acknowledge these drafting errors, we would like to reassure you that they do not affect the underlying technical assessment, evidence base or regulatory considerations. 

“Our assessment has been undertaken in accordance with the relevant legal and technical requirements and remains subject to scrutiny throughout the permitting process.

“We will upload our updated decision document onto this consultation page as soon as possible. The technical assessment remains unchanged.

“We will keep the consultation open during this time.”

The update followed an earlier announcement by the EA that the public consultation on the draft decision document, due to end on 26 September 2026, would close instead 25 days later on 21 October 2026. At the time, there was no explanation about why the consultation had been extended and the EA did not respond to our questions.

The EA’s update has already been criticised by local organisations and campaigners, including Burniston Parish Council and a community group.

“EA process and report discredited”

Richard Parsons, chair of Burniston Parish Council, said the EA’s description of “minor typographical errors and inconsistencies” seemed to be “a long way from the truth”.

He said in a statement to DrillOrDrop:

“At Burniston Parish Council we have been looking with great interest at the Environment Agency report into the Europa Oil and Gas proposed gas fracking site at Burniston.

“The EA held a public meeting at Burniston as part of the planning process and the EA report process. After the meeting there was concern from both Councillors and members of this community that the EA had little understanding of the effect that fracking for gas in this location would have on the environment, both locally and further afield.

“When the report was published alongside a public consultation process it was scrutinised in great detail. A series of errors and apparent lack of understanding from the EA were identified. Our Council responded in detail.

“To call the errors ‘minor typographical errors and inconsistencies in use of terminology’ seems to be a long way from the truth. It’s a mess!

“The public response time was extended from the 23rd of September until 21st October, based, it would appear, on the EA report being incorrect. The report is lengthy and requires a lot of time to scrutinise and respond to. For anyone to respond accurately on the latest version of the EA report, is not possible.

“We have asked for a further public open meeting based on the evidence that is now available. To date we have received no reply.

“It appears as though the EA process and report is now discredited. We request that the EA report is withdrawn and started again. Also a public open meeting arranged prior to the report being finalised.

“At Burniston Parish Council we would take the opportunity to remind the Environment Agency of the requirements to prepare and publish a report, that is based on all the evidence and is accurate in its conclusions. Anything less, including errors and inconsistences, is not acceptable.’

“EA assurance is disingenuous”

The campaign group, Frack Free Coastal Communities (FFCC), welcomed the EA’s acknowledgment of drafting problems in the draft decision document.

But it added:

“Their assurance that this does not affect the technical assessment and evidence base informing their decision is disingenuous.

“It is their misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the evidence base that has led to inconsistencies in terminology. This in turn derives from their reliance on language and interpretations of evidence provided by Europa in their permit application.

“We suspect that this partial mea culpa is a face-saving first step in a process of reviewing their assessment and decision making. Extending the consultation by four weeks simply to correct a few typos is not credible – a more fundamental review is surely (and rightly) under way. And when a revised decision document is published, we expect the Environment Agency to re-start the consultation so that the new documents can be subject to the same public scrutiny as the ones they now admit are flawed.”

“EA quality control depends on public”

The EA has also responded to the formal complaint by campaigner Dennis May.

He had accused the EA of multiple problems with its handling of the Burniston permit, including:

• Failing to act in the public interest
• Providing “inaccurate, inconsistent and contradictory information”
• Aligning itself with “misleading, confected, and conflated terminology” used by Europa Oil & Gas
• Failing to remain impartial
• Regarding the public consultation as “a mere formality, irrespective of evidence”.

The EA said in response:

“We have reviewed the points you raised and agree that there are a number of minor typographical errors and inconsistencies in the use of terminology, within the published draft decision document.

“We are taking steps to correct these, and to understand how they occurred, so that we can minimise the risk of similar issues arising in future.

“We appreciate that accuracy and attention to detail are important in maintaining public confidence in our regulatory processes. While we acknowledge these drafting errors, we would like to reassure you that they do not reflect our underlying technical assessment, evidence base or regulatory considerations that form part of our determination.

“Our assessment has been undertaken in accordance with all the relevant legal and technical requirements and remains subject to scrutiny throughout the permitting process.

“We will upload an updated draft decision document onto the Citizen Space consultation webpage as soon as possible. We will keep the consultation webpage open during this time. Our technical assessment remains unchanged.

“We will then allow an extra two weeks for the consultation to run in light of the changes made.”

On Mr May’s criticism of terminology, the EA said:

“The terms used by oil and gas operators to describe their activities are not always used consistently across the industry. Unless a term is defined in law, there is no single agreed definition. When we write permits and decision documents, we often use the same terminology as the operator’s application to help readers compare the documents more easily.”

Mr May said today:

“The EAs failings in this matter are strongly indicative of systemic shortfalls in the management of the permitting process.

“It is concerning that any semblance of quality control appears to be totally dependent upon intervention by members of the public.”

The 120-day study process would be available for loads larger than 200 MW and new generation that *are*>is* in the same local resource zone, which generally cover individual states.

A joint publication of The Revelator and Crucial Comix.

Sources:

• • 50 office spaces https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/energy-star-expands-efforts-improve-energy-efficiency-us-data-centers
  • 3-5 million gallons of water per day for cooling https://vcnva.org/bill-of-the-day-data-center-growth/
  • Heat nearby neighborhoods by as much as 4 degrees F https://news.asu.edu/20260518-environment-and-sustainability-turning-down-heat-data-centers
  • Constant, low-frequency noise https://www.sierraclub.org/ohio/blog/2026/02/data-centers-noise-pollution-ohio-communities-are-organizing-accountability
  • Size of 150 Walmart Supercenters https://www.pecva.org/work/energy-work/mitigating-data-center-developments-impacts/
  • $2.4 billion per month https://ourworldindata.org/how-much-is-the-us-spending-on-building-data-centers
  • do not bring many permanent jobs https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/do-data-centers-create-few-permanent-jobs
  • County administrator is tearing up https://virginiabusiness.com/google-botetourt-data-center-purchase/
  • 8th largest data center complex in the world https://cardinalnews.org/2026/07/09/by-water-use-googles-botetourt-site-would-be-its-8th-largest-data-center-complex-in-the-world/
  • 12 Olympic-sized swimming pools https://scienceline.org/2010/02/what-would-you-do-with-eight-million-gallons-of-water-every-day/
  • Government and companies have an insatiable need https://wtop.com/virginia/2026/07/how-virginia-became-the-worlds-data-center-capital-and-how-its-going/
  • 72% of Virginia voters oppose the state-wide tax exemption for data centers https://wjla.com/news/local/virginia-spanberger-popularity-vcu-poll-election-commonwealth-university-abigail-democrats-economy-data-centers-grocery-store-costs-of-living-impacts-business
  • 73% of Virginia voters blame data centers for rising energy bills https://ccanactionfund.org/media/New-Polling-on-Virginians-Views-of-Data-Centers-and-Rising-Energy-Costs.pdf
  • A map of the United States with data centers https://cleanview.co/data-centers/us

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

The Land Is an Ancestor We Refuse to Abandon: In the Shadows of the Hermosa Mine

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The post Virginia Is for Lovers … of Data Centers? appeared first on The Revelator.

On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court will open its new term with a major climate lawsuit brought by Boulder, Colorado as its first case. In 2018, the city and county of Boulder sued ExxonMobil and Suncor, alleging that the companies misled the public about their climate impacts, in violation of Colorado state law. The Supreme Court will hear a request from ExxonMobil and Suncor to block the case from being heard in Colorado district court; a ruling on jurisdiction over these types of cases would have implications for several other pending cases across the country.

“These big oil companies are really desperate to escape trial in these cases so they’re asking the Supreme Court to step in and save them from trial,” Corey Riday-White, legal director for The Center for Climate Integrity, told the Denver Post. “It’s clear the fossil fuel industry doesn’t want the damning evidence of their climate lies to be presented at trial.”

Lawmakers introduce bill to prevent future orphaned wells

On Friday, several Western members of Congress introduced the Stop Orphaned Wells Act, which seeks to prevent oil and gas companies from leaving behind orphaned wells on national public lands. In 2024 the Bureau of Land Management updated bonding requirements to better ensure that oil and gas companies can pay to clean up their own wells, but the Trump administration’s recent proposed Oil and Gas Rule would roll back these updated requirements. The Stop Orphaned Wells Act would codify and strengthen bonding requirements and other accountability measures.

Quick hits Judge blocks border wall construction in Big Bend in Texas

New York Times

Long-awaited Senate deal to speed permitting faces familiar hurdles

Inside Climate News

Massive nuclear plant/waste dump/data center complex planned for BLM land in Utah

The Land Desk

Nevada backcountry vulnerable to more off-roading, logging under federal rule changes

Nevada Independent

Effort to save California’s iconic Joshua trees scrapped after Trump administration blocks funding

Los Angeles Times

Tweak to Endangered Species Act could allow widespread development

Mountain Journal

Opinion: If Doug Burgum got a performance review

RE:PUBLIC

Baseball in a national park? We found 7 ball fields at Grand Teton and Yellowstone

WyoFile

Quote of the day

They said that the [baseball] field was a good place for employees to get outside and recreate. Cory and I both turned and gestured towards the Tetons at the same time and said something like ‘they have this right here.’ I think at that moment they understood that their proposal wouldn’t fly.”

—Brad Boner, Wyoming photographer, WyoFile

Picture This @usinterior

Fall has entered the chat.

Quaking aspens turn brilliant shades of yellow each fall, but what you see above ground is only part of the story.

An entire stand of aspens can be connected underground by a single root system, meaning what looks like hundreds of individual trees may actually be one genetically identical organism. The trunks can live for a century, while the roots beneath them can survive for thousands of years.

Photos by Jim Grindley | @chileno_hikertron and NPS

 

Featured image: Smoke from the Marshall Fire over Superior, Colorado; the destructive impacts of this fire are widely attributed to climate change driven by oil and gas production. Tristantech via Wikimedia Commons/CC BY-SA 4.0

The post Supreme Court to open term with Colorado climate lawsuit appeared first on Center for Western Priorities.

In a new documentary, The Vegan Poultry Farmer, filmmaker Kadir van Lohuizen follows Ruud Zanders as he grapples with a moral dilemma: raising animals for food while following a vegan diet. Zanders travels the globe, meeting with food systems experts, to determine if an animal-free food system is possible.

“Personally, I would say: stop exploiting farm animals,” Zanders says in the documentary.

Zanders opened the first Kipster farm in the Netherlands in 2017 after his large-scale poultry operation went bankrupt. He realized that large-scale farms are efficient and produce cheap eggs, but “something else is paying the price… biodiversity, the climate, the animal itself,” he tells Food Tank.

His farming model, he says, is based on sustainability, animal welfare, and transparency. Zanders ultimately envisions an animal-free food system, but until that becomes a reality, he aims to provide the highest-welfare eggs possible. “It’s very complicated to produce eggs or other animal-based products in a really animal-friendly way,” Zanders says.

His farms house 24,000 chickens per barn, compared to industrial operations which can hold up to 350,000 per barn, according to the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). The chickens receive indoor and outdoor space, fresh air and sunlight, and an enrichment playground to exercise their natural instincts.

Kipster is working to produce carbon neutral eggs by giving their chickens feed made from waste streams, including stale pastries or other food no longer fit for human consumption. This feed model eliminates competition for food (corn, grains, soy) between people and farm animals. Zanders bases this model on the idea that growing crops directly for human consumption can decrease agricultural land usage and allow for more land to be restored to natural ecosystems.

He was inspired to do this by Imke de Boer, a Wageningen University professor of livestock and sustainable food systems, as well as environmental activist and writer George Monbiot, who Zanders visits in the film. Monbiot tells him that livestock farming is the single most destructive human activity to the environment.

The farm also uses solar panels and transforms chicken litter into fertilizer. They report that a Kipster egg’s carbon footprint is about 23 percent lower than that of a conventional egg.

The documentary examines behind the scenes of Kipster farms and other operations to reveal the industry’s reality. It shows chickens being shoved into crates to be transported to slaughter, limp carcasses dangling on a conveyor belt, and workers wearing blood-spattered aprons. Even under Kipster’s higher-welfare standards, the end result is still the same.

Zanders meets with various stakeholders to help him answer the film’s driving question: Is an animal-free food system possible?

Melanie Jaecques, co-owner of a farm animal sanctuary in Belgium, saves chickens predominantly from the egg industry. She talks to Zanders about the complexity of chickens’ behavior and personalities, and that even on his higher-welfare farm, they are not given the proper environment to thrive. To her, housing 24,000 chickens in one barn is “terribly wrong,” and that Kipster is “not a good system, but the least bad.”

To answer his logistical questions about fertilizing crops without animal manure and whether people can maintain proper health on a vegan diet, he visits a human waste fertilizer producer in Ghana and a plant-based hematologist, respectively. Together, these experts affirm his belief in an animal-free agriculture system—which only intensifies his internal struggle as a poultry farmer.

Although Zanders concludes that it is possible to have an animal-free food system, he knows that his vision is not shared by all. As long as there is a demand for animal products, Zanders hopes that Kipster can help bridge the gap between his ideal vision and the current industrial system. That’s why he believes that he can positively impact farm animals as a poultry farmer. “We have to do our utmost best to give them a life worth living.”

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

The post The Vegan Poultry Farmer: Rethinking Animal Agriculture appeared first on Food Tank.

Extreme heat poses a growing threat to pregnant women and their babies, both before and after birth, the UN climate chief said on Monday, calling it “a new faultline in the global climate crisis, and one which is potentially fatal”.

Speaking on the first day of the pre-COP31 meeting in Fiji, where new research was launched on the issue, Simon Stiell warned: “This faultline must not become another deep chasm of climate-driven suffering, inequality and injustice.”

Rather than being a time of hope, he added, pregnancy is becoming “a time of anxiety, as climate impacts fill everyday life with risk”, straining health systems and threatening essentials like food, water and power – especially in poorer countries where many women work outdoors and live in informal housing far from under-equipped clinics.

• Oct 1, 2026 News What’s on the climate calendar for October 2026? Brazilians are heading to the polls, diplomats are gathering in the Pacific for pre-COP, and it’s crunch time for the IPCC Read more
• Jun 11, 2026 Science WHO issues new guidance on heat-health action plans, as El Niño sets in Amid warnings of “unprecedented” weather extremes this year, the World Health Organization urges governments to strengthen protections for vulnerable groups Read more

In a new international survey of 1,000 maternal healthcare professionals in Australia, Brazil, India, the UK and Zimbabwe, around three-quarters reported an increase in heat-related cases or complications affecting pregnant women, as well as foetal and newborn health, over the past five years.

Nearly all respondents in the survey commissioned by Wellcome, a global charitable foundation, said they had cared for a pregnant woman or baby whose health they believed had been affected by extreme temperatures.

Researchers have linked heat exposure with preterm birth, low birth weight, stillbirth and maternal complications. For every 1 degree Celsius rise in heat exposure, the odds of preterm birth increase by around 5%, while exposure to heatwaves is associated with a 25% higher risk of obstetric complications.

“No woman should have to fear that extreme heat will harm the baby she is carrying,” said Julia Gillard, chair of Wellcome and former Australian prime minister, adding “pregnant women must not be invisible”.

Call to include mothers and midwives

Wellcome urged governments to include pregnant women, new mothers and babies in their national climate and health plans, with funded measures to protect them from extreme heat.

It also called on the World Health Organization to develop clinical guidance on heat, pregnancy and the postpartum period, alongside stronger data and surveillance on how heat exposure impacts maternal and newborn health.

The charity is backing a study in Zimbabwe and South Africa to test simple interventions such as handheld fans, reflective paint on health-facility roofs and community-led climate information systems.

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The International Confederation of Midwives, which represents over 2 million midwives, is also pushing for action, asking countries to include maternal healthcare professionals in their National Adaptation Plans, and provide finance to ensure clinics have access to reliable water, power and cooling.

Chief executive Anna af Ugglas told an event on adaptation at Climate Week NYC that midwives tire more easily when working in high heat, which can lead them to make errors. They are often first responders in a crisis – and yet “too many climate and emergency plans are still developed without them”, she added.

Pacific hosts Pre-COP

The campaign to put maternal health on the climate policy agenda kicked off the proceedings in Fiji, where ministers and other attendees from around 50 countries are gathering this week to advance discussions in the run-up to the COP31 climate summit in Antalya next month.

This year’s annual UN climate conference is taking place in Türkiye which holds the COP presidency, while Australia is in charge of the negotiations – a deal worked out after a long rivalry to host COP31.

Australia is using its role to spotlight the concerns of the Pacific region to which it belongs, where low-lying island nations are under threat from sea level rise.

On Tuesday, a group of 14 government leaders – mainly from the Pacific – plus heads of international organisations including the Green Climate Fund and the Asian Development Bank will visit climate resilience projects in neighbouring Tuvalu.

Leaders will visit a Green Climate Fund-backed coastal resilience project in Tuvalu during the Pre-COP31 meeting in the Pacific. (Photo courtesy of the Australia-Pacific Partnership for COP31) Leaders will visit a Green Climate Fund-backed coastal resilience project in Tuvalu during the Pre-COP31 meeting in the Pacific. (Photo courtesy of the Australia-Pacific Partnership for COP31)

Key themes for the pre-COP – a glitzier event than usual – are keeping the 1.5C global warming limit within reach despite a projected overshoot, protecting oceans and improving access to finance for small island nations and the least-developed countries.

At a press conference on Monday, Australia’s climate change and energy minister Chris Bowen flagged his country’s investments in renewables, both in Pacific nations such as Vanuatu and at home, saying this would help lower the use of diesel, fossil gas and coal in energy supplies.

Ahead of the pre-COP, Australia has been criticised by climate campaigners and some Pacific leaders for greenlighting expanded coal production on its territory.

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Asked about Australia’s ongoing support for fossil fuels, Fiji’s climate minister Lynda Tabuya said the issue had been raised by “certain countries” at a ministerial meeting on Monday.

“There will be things that we disagree on, but we can agree to disagree – and we’re just very grateful for the support of Australia and the commitment towards renewable energy, and I think that’s the direction that we need to take, especially in the Pacific,” she added.

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