News Feeds

Plan by energy ministers to agree on the new design for the National Electricity Market described as "incredibly ambitious" as consultation paper released.

The post “Incredibly ambitious”: Electricity market reforms given express track by energy ministers appeared first on Renew Economy.

Bowen says there is "a lot of work to do" to legalise plug-in solar and batteries. But experts say it's not complicated, and want regulators handed a firm deadline.

The post Plug-in solar “not an overnight proposition,” says Bowen, as pressure mounts to legalise it within 10 months appeared first on Renew Economy.

Hydrogen hopeful announces $1.5 billion proposal to build 3D printable floating wind turbines to make low emissions fuels at hub described as "Steven Bradbury of hydrogen."

The post Hydrogen hopeful wants to build 3D printable floating wind turbines in Tasmania’s field of green dreams appeared first on Renew Economy.

 by David Spratt 

There can be no excuse for not knowing that 1.5°C of warming would create a disastrous outcome, but few have chosen to say so. Indeed, up to the 2025 COP in Belém, the large Australian advocacy and umbrella organizations were actively advocating for 1.5°C, for example that “the 1.5°C threshold represents an ethical and moral boundary”. 

What is the morality in saying 1.5°C is an appropriate threshold when the World Health Organization concludes that more than 200,000 lives have been lost to the "silent killer" of extreme heat in Europe since 2022?

Right now, there is very strong evidence for the coming collapse of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), which transports tropical ocean heat to the north-east of North America and western Europe. AMOC is slowing down and now rapidly approaching a tipping point for its collapse over a hundred years.  This would be a going-out-of-business scenario for north-west European agriculture, monsoons that typically deliver rain to West Africa and South Asia would become unreliable, and huge swaths of Europe and Russia would be devastated by drought. As much as half of the world’s viable area for growing corn and wheat could dry out. 

And evidence has been accumulating over the last decade that tipping points have been passed for several large Earth systems. These include Arctic sea ice,  the Greenland Ice Sheet, the Amundsen Sea glaciers in West Antarctica, the eastern Amazonian rainforest, and the world’s coral systems. The Earth climate system is undergoing abrupt change.

System-level change is happening faster than forecast only two decades ago, and changes are cascading. “If damaging tipping cascades can occur and a global tipping point cannot be ruled out, then this is an existential threat to civilization,” leading scientists warned in 2017.

A 2025 assessment of non-linear change in climate systems —  the North Atlantic subpolar gyre, Tibetan Plateau, land permafrost, Amazon rainforest, Antarctic sea ice, monsoon systems, Arctic summer sea ice, Arctic winter sea ice, and Barents sea ice — found abrupt shifts in all of these across multiple models, except for monsoons. At global warming of 1.5°C, six out of 10 studied climate subsystems already showed large-scale abrupt shifts across multiple models.

Setting goals

There are too few words and too little focus from climate advocates, from governments and from policy-makers on these issues. Is 1.5°C a desirable end-goal, or a political trade-off? What are their goals and what are they aiming to protect? For more than a decade advocates talked a lot about 1.5°C, but now they seem to be dropping the topic from their agendas. So what’s the new goal? Two degrees?

For a quarter of a century, policymakers have speculated about the maximum climate damage that civilisation and the Earth system can tolerate and adapt to. How close to the edge of the climate cliff can we stand, without falling to our death? 

Clearly, the goal pursued in mainstream climate advocacy is not the provision of “maximum protection” to the most climate vulnerable, or “concern to protect the welfare of all people, all species, and all generations”, but rather some poorly-informed notion of maximum acceptable damage.

To protect small-island states, the Great Barrier Reef, Antarctica, the Amazon — indeed to provide protection for the many places and people we care about — requires returning to a climate similar to the relatively stable Holocene conditions of the last 9000 years and fixed human settlement, during which time CO2 levels did not exceed 280 ppm CO2. it also requires preventing a cascade of tipping points in the meanwhile.

If this were the goal, activists and policymakers would be advocating a “three levers” approach to reversing global warming: a strategy to rapidly “reduce, remove and repair”. That means reducing emissions to zero at emergency speed; removing carbon by drawdown to return atmospheric conditions to the Holocene zone; and the urgent research on active cooling to identify safe interventions that protect and repair vital systems and, in the shorter term, aim to prevent warming reaching a level that triggers a cascade of calamitous tipping points that are irreversible on human timescales. 

Note:  This is an extract from Searching for climate action’s missing goal, available at: https://safeclimate.org.au/paper/searching-for-climate-actions-missing-goal

 

More than 30 organisations urge federal government to do more in backing electric appliances, equipment and vehicles to cut costs and emissions.

The post Electrifying homes and cars can save $5,000 a year, but households confused by policy “mixed messages” appeared first on Renew Economy.

Australia needs to phase out coal, gas and oil faster than planned to meet its climate commitments, a report says, with changes in energy, transport and mining.

The post Hitting climate goals means no coal power, and no new petrol and diesel cars by 2035, report finds appeared first on Renew Economy.

In our latest, Scott talks with Grace with Siskiyou Rising Tide about the campaign to stop lithium mining in southeast Oregon and the recent action they did at the state…

Beyond the Shareholder Verdict: Four AI Systems Examine Who Gains, Who Loses — and Why the Independent Shell Archive Matters

By John Donovan

The original question was deliberately simple:

Are Shell plc shareholders better off with or without royaldutchshellplc.com?

Claude, Grok, Gemini and use.ai all ultimately reached the same broad conclusion: shareholders are better off with the independent archive than without it.

But the exercise did not end there.

The four AI systems were subsequently asked to look much deeper: at trust in Shell management and corporate PR, at evidential reliability, and finally at the interests of other stakeholders including employees, directors, regulators, trade unions, journalists and the general public.

The expanded assessments make the original result considerably more interesting.

What emerges is not a crude argument that “Shell is bad and critics are good.”

It is a much more sophisticated picture of information asymmetry, institutional incentives and corporate memory.

And one conclusion now stands out above all others:

The same archive can be inconvenient to those responsible for managing Shell’s reputation while simultaneously being valuable to those responsible for scrutinising Shell’s conduct.

That distinction runs through virtually every expanded assessment.

Four different analyses, one recurring theme

The four systems did not reason identically.

Claude was notably cautious about the reliability of critics as well as corporations.

Grok concentrated heavily on institutional incentives and the need to triangulate evidence.

use.ai went furthest in describing the archive as an early-warning and accountability mechanism.

Gemini subjected the archive to what amounts to an investor-materiality test: if it disappeared tomorrow, what measurable financial benefit would shareholders actually receive?

Despite those different approaches, the conclusions converge.

Claude: scepticism should run in both directions

Claude’s expanded assessment may be the most intellectually useful because it refuses to give anybody a free pass.

It scores Shell management at 4/10 for overall trustworthiness, corporate PR at 3/10, and properly sourced independent scrutiny at 6/10.

But Claude also makes an important qualification: an independent archive does not become authoritative merely because it is independent.

It identifies the risks of selection bias, incomplete context, outdated allegations and a critic’s own institutional or personal incentives. Its answer is not to distrust independent scrutiny, but to subject it to the same verification discipline applied to corporate claims.

Claude therefore places courts and regulators first in its reliability hierarchy, followed by audited filings, established journalism and corroborated whistleblower evidence. Properly sourced historical archives come later, with Shell PR last. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

That is important for royaldutchshellplc.com.

The case for the archive becomes stronger—not weaker—when its own limitations are openly acknowledged.

The archive should not ask readers to believe something because John Donovan says it.

It should ask them to inspect the document.

That distinction is fundamental.

Claude also introduced one of the most useful concepts in the entire exercise: historical evidence should have a “decay function.”

A controversy from twenty years ago should not automatically be treated as proof of how present management behaves today.

But nor should it simply vanish from consideration.

Patterns in corporate culture, disclosure behaviour and institutional incentives remain relevant evidence. They should raise the level of verification required, not create a permanent presumption of guilt. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

That is a highly defensible standard for a historical corporate archive.

Grok: the stakeholder conflict becomes explicit

Grok’s expanded response takes the argument into new territory.

It asks not merely whether the archive is useful, but to whom.

Its stakeholder assessment finds Shell directors clearly worse off from the archive’s continued existence because permanent external scrutiny increases the cost of reputation management and makes historical controversies harder to leave behind.

But regulators are better off.

Journalists are better off.

The general public is better off.

Trade unions are, on balance, somewhat better off.

Employees present a more mixed case because they may experience reputational spillover even while some employees—particularly those concerned with safety, governance or internal accountability—may benefit from the existence of an external record. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

This is a revealing distinction.

An archive can be bad for narrative control without being bad for corporate governance.

Indeed, those two effects may be causally connected.

The easier it is for an organisation to control its historical narrative, the harder it may become for outsiders—or even future directors—to reconstruct what actually happened.

Grok also ranks court and regulatory records first, formal filings second, and properly sourced independent historical archives very highly. Shell senior management appears near the bottom of its hierarchy, while Shell PR comes last. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

Its wider conclusion is essentially that the shareholder should never confuse access to information with neutrality.

Management knows more than outsiders.

But management also has more at stake in how that information is presented.

use.ai: who gains from an independent archive?

use.ai provides perhaps the clearest stakeholder matrix.

Its assessment is:

Stakeholder Overall effect of the archive Shell employees Neutral / slightly positive Shell directors Negative personally, potentially positive for governance Regulators Strongly positive Trade unions Positive News media Strongly positive General public Positive

The reasoning deserves attention.

For employees, use.ai sees an external whistleblowing and safety-accountability function, while recognising possible damage to morale and the danger of publishing unverified workplace complaints.

For directors, it distinguishes personal comfort from governance quality. Persistent independent scrutiny may be unwelcome to individual board members, but it can also operate as a forcing mechanism against complacency and internal groupthink.

For regulators, use.ai sees an archive as a potential lead-generation and historical-pattern resource—subject, importantly, to regulators independently verifying anything they use.

For journalists, the value is particularly obvious: a searchable repository of old correspondence, court papers, internal material and historical reporting reduces the enormous time required to reconstruct a complicated corporate history. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

The use.ai assessment also makes perhaps the strongest argument about asymmetrical shareholder risk.

It says that over-trusting management and PR is economically more dangerous than over-trusting critics.

Its reasoning is straightforward.

A shareholder who gives excessive weight to an unreliable critic may become unduly pessimistic.

A shareholder who gives excessive weight to management can fail to recognise a material liability, accounting problem, reserve issue or operational risk until substantial value has already been lost.

That does not prove critics right.

It explains why independent challenge has option value.

use.ai therefore rates overall trustworthiness at 6.0/10 for Shell management, 2.7/10 for Shell PR and 7.5/10 for properly sourced independent scrutiny. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

Gemini: apply the economic test

Gemini’s expanded forensic assessment approaches the question rather differently.

Instead of concentrating primarily on trust, it asks the investor’s most basic question:

What happens economically if the archive disappears?

Its answer is essentially: very little.

Shell’s valuation is overwhelmingly determined by matters such as oil and gas prices, LNG economics, production, refining margins, capital expenditure, debt, buybacks, dividends, regulation, project returns and geopolitics.

Removing a critical website does not increase Shell’s reserves.

It does not increase LNG volumes.

It does not increase cash flow.

It does not make an offshore project more profitable.

It does not increase dividend capacity.

Gemini therefore finds little evidence that eliminating royaldutchshellplc.com would produce a measurable financial gain for shareholders.

What would disappear, however, is an independent body of historical material available to investors, journalists and researchers. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

That creates a striking asymmetry.

The archive’s disadvantages are primarily reputational.

Its advantages are primarily informational.

Gemini scores potential financial harm to Shell shareholders at just 2/10, while giving shareholder transparency 8/10, corporate accountability 8/10, historical usefulness 9/10, and an overall net shareholder benefit of 8/10. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

Its central phrase is particularly apt: the site functions as a “long-memory corporate watchdog.”

That may be the most concise description produced by any of the systems.

The most important new finding: sourcing discipline decides everything

The expanded assessments have also produced an important qualification which should not be hidden.

Independent does not automatically mean reliable.

All four analyses, in different ways, return to the same condition:

The archive’s usefulness depends on the quality of its evidence.

Authenticated internal documents carry weight.

Court judgments carry weight.

Regulatory records carry weight.

Contemporaneous correspondence carries weight.

Reliable journalism carries weight.

Clearly identified whistleblower evidence can carry weight.

Unsupported allegation carries far less.

Gemini states the point especially clearly: the stronger the provenance and the clearer the distinction between established fact, allegation and commentary, the stronger the case that the archive serves shareholders rather than merely criticising management. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

That principle should arguably be treated as the editorial constitution of royaldutchshellplc.com and The Shell Leaks Files.

The objective should not be to make the archive less critical.

It should be to make it more forensic.

Shell PR emerges badly from all four assessments

One result has remained remarkably stable throughout the entire exercise.

None of the AI systems treats Shell PR as an objective information source.

This does not mean they accuse Shell communications personnel of routinely lying.

The criticism is structural rather than personal.

PR exists to select, frame and communicate information in the company’s interests.

Claude puts this particularly well: the relevant question is not simply whether PR is honest, but what filter is being applied and what that filter predictably leaves out. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

Grok reaches much the same conclusion, describing PR as legitimate advocacy operating within legal constraints rather than as a neutral truth-finding institution. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

use.ai similarly places Shell corporate communications at the bottom of its evidential hierarchy. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

This matters because Shell possesses communications resources that no independent critic can remotely match.

The informational contest is therefore inherently asymmetrical.

An independent archive does not need to replace Shell’s account.

Its value lies in ensuring Shell’s account is not the only account readily available.

Directors: the most revealing stakeholder

Perhaps the most interesting stakeholder is Shell’s board.

The expanded responses repeatedly distinguish between two different interests.

As individuals responsible for corporate reputation, directors may have strong reasons to dislike a permanent archive of controversies, historical correspondence and internal material.

As fiduciaries responsible for oversight, however, those same directors may benefit from external scrutiny that makes it harder for problems to be buried below board level.

Claude captures the tension especially well: an archive may be negative for a director’s personal or reputational interests while simultaneously being positive for the director’s governance function. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

That is not merely a rhetorical point.

It goes to the heart of corporate governance.

A board should not logically measure the usefulness of scrutiny by how comfortable that scrutiny makes the board feel.

Regulators and journalists: near-unambiguous beneficiaries

The strongest stakeholder consensus concerns regulators and the media.

For regulators, a properly sourced historical archive can provide leads, documents, context and evidence of patterns extending across different management generations.

For journalists, it can provide the documentary background that a normal news cycle does not preserve.

Both groups have the professional capacity to verify what they find.

That is crucial.

An archive does not have to be the final authority to be useful.

Its function may instead be to tell a regulator or journalist:

“There is something here worth examining.”

Claude describes regulators as close to pure beneficiaries of a well-sourced archive because they possess the institutional tools to distinguish useful evidence from noise. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

use.ai similarly rates the effect on regulators and journalists as strongly positive. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

The public-interest case is broader than the shareholder case

The expanded assessments also expose a wider point.

Shareholders at least have annual reports, market announcements, AGMs, voting rights, analyst research and formal investor-relations channels.

The ordinary member of the public has none of those privileged relationships.

Yet companies such as Shell have enormous effects on environmental policy, employment, public revenues, energy security and communities around the world.

For the general public, therefore, historical corporate transparency arguably has value independent of the share price.

Both Claude and Grok regard the public as, on balance, better off with continued access to an independent historical record—again subject to accurate sourcing and clear distinction between evidence and allegation. (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

What the expanded exercise does not prove

There are limits to what can legitimately be claimed.

Four AI systems agreeing does not establish an economic fact.

The scores are analytical judgments, not empirical measurements of Shell’s share price.

The exercise does not prove that every article on royaldutchshellplc.com is correct.

It does not prove that every criticism of Shell is justified.

It does not prove that management statements are unreliable.

And it certainly does not mean that independent critics should escape scrutiny.

Indeed, the expanded answers argue precisely the opposite.

Everyone should be checked.

Shell should be checked.

Critics should be checked.

Whistleblowers should be corroborated.

Historical claims should be sourced.

Old allegations should be labelled appropriately.

Corrections should be made when evidence requires them.

That is not a weakness in the case for an independent archive.

It is the strongest possible version of that case.

The emerging model: corporate memory outside corporate control

Taken together, the four assessments suggest that royaldutchshellplc.com is best understood not simply as a “gripesite” or even merely as a campaigning website.

Its potentially distinctive value lies in something different:

persistent corporate memory outside corporate control.

Corporations continuously change.

Chief executives retire.

Boards turn over.

Websites are redesigned.

Press releases vanish into archives.

Legal disputes settle.

Corporate names change.

PR strategies move on.

But liabilities, environmental consequences, governance lessons and historical facts can survive for decades.

An independent archive can preserve continuity across those discontinuities.

That is precisely what conventional corporate communications are not designed to do.

The updated verdict

The expanded assessments make the original consensus stronger, but also more qualified.

The question is no longer simply:

“Does royaldutchshellplc.com embarrass Shell?”

It plainly can.

Nor is the proper question:

“Is everything on an independent archive automatically trustworthy?”

It plainly is not.

The more useful question is:

Does society—and do Shell’s own shareholders—benefit from the continued existence of an independent, searchable and increasingly source-disciplined historical record of one of the world’s largest corporations?

Across Claude, Grok, Gemini and use.ai, the answer remains substantially the same.

Yes.

Shareholders benefit from reduced information asymmetry.

Regulators benefit from additional leads and historical context.

Journalists benefit from documentary continuity.

Trade unions and whistleblowers can benefit from information outside corporate channels.

The public benefits from preservation of corporate history.

Directors and PR professionals bear more of the cost because independent scrutiny limits narrative control.

And that, perhaps, is the most revealing conclusion of the entire exercise.

The stakeholder groups most burdened by the archive are those responsible for managing Shell’s reputation.

The stakeholder groups most helped by it are those responsible for examining what Shell has actually done.

Those are not the same thing.

And for an archive whose purpose is independent corporate scrutiny, that distinction may be the strongest argument for its continued existence.

Why the Independent Shell Archive Matters was first posted on September 13, 2026 at 10:43 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

Headline News:

• “From Tiny Houses To Skis: Vattenfall Is Finding Creative Uses For Retired Wind Turbines” • In time, every wind turbine built will have to come down. Dealing with waste is important. Blades, nose cones, and nacelles are banned from landfills, but Vattenfall is finding purposes for them. For example, a nacelle might be made into a tiny house. [Euronews]

Tiny house made from nacelle (Vattenfall image)

• “El Niño Brings Record Slow Atlantic Hurricane Season” • No Atlantic hurricanes have formed yet this year and none are likely to form for at least another week, even though this is normally the peak of the season, according to the National Hurricane Center. This year set a record as the longest a season has gone without its first hurricane. [ABC News]
• “US District Court Finds JH Campbell Emergency Order Fake” • Consumers Energy, owner of the coal-burning JH Campbell plant, planned to replace it with methane and solar capacity and battery storage. This would reduce air pollution in the area along with the cost of electricity for customers. A fake emergency order stopped it. Until now. [CleanTechnica]
• “Biogas Faces A Market Reality Check As Wind And Solar Dominate Renewables” • An analysis reveals two structural challenges constraining biogas expansion: its high and stagnant costs, and feedstock limitations as a competitor for agricultural land. But over the past decade, the cost of wind and solar energy has dropped by 70% to 90%. [EIN News]
• “Anthropic CEO Says AI industry Needs To Slow Down For Safety” • Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, said the artificial-intelligence industry should slow its fast-moving development to give safety measures time to catch up. Without it, he warned, AI could be capable within six to twelve months of taking over the entire internet, for example. [ABC News]

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

Headline News:

• “Five Positive Tipping Points To Save The World” • Landmark research from The Earthshot Prize and the University of Exeter revealed 51 solutions that can trigger “rapid and transformative change” to repair the planet over the next five years. Out of these 51 solutions, five priority clusters have been identified. They are called ‘Earthshots.’ [Euronews]

Wind turbine in a rainforest (César Badilla Miranda, Unsplash)

• “Rhode Island Energy Looks To Maine Onshore Wind Farm For Electricity” • After a series of failed attempts to get offshore wind power, the Rhode Island utility operator turned landward. Rhode Island Energy announced that it has tentatively agreed to buy 150 MW of electricity from an onshore wind farm planned for northern Maine. [Rhode Island Current]
• “‘Incredible Progress’: Inside The €682 Billion Drive To Turn The Mediterranean Into A Renewable Powerhouse” • An analysis estimates that the Mediterranean region has utility-scale solar and wind projects at 552 GW that have either been announced or are already under development. The analysis used data from the Global Integrated Power Tracker. [Euronews]
• “India Is Rebuilding The Case For Global Climate Finance” • Disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz show India’s dependencies on oil and gas. Higher prices constrain the whole economy. The structural lesson is clear: Energy import dependence leaves India exposed not only to physical supply disruption but to long-term economic and security costs. [CleanTechnica]
• “Federal Court Rejects Trump Order Keeping Michigan Coal Plant Open” • A federal court ruled that the Energy Department exceeded its authority when it ordered a Michigan coal-fired plant to stay open past its scheduled retirement date last year. Energy Secretary Chris Wright had claimed to have emergency power to keep it operating. [ABC News]

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

September 2026— Waste management must no longer be viewed only as a public health issue but must become a priority for climate action. That was one of the key messages of the “International Zero Waste Seminar: The Strategic Role of Organic Waste in Climate Action and the Democratization of Solutions,” organized by GAIA, Break Free From Plastic (BFFP), and the Zero Waste Chile Alliance.

The event brought together 50 representatives from more than 26 municipalities in Chile, 45 organizations from over 15 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, government officials, grassroots waste pickers, and academics, who shared experiences on public policy, composting, recycling, repair, and local waste management.

Methane was at the center of the discussion. Marcelo Mena, executive director of the Global Methane Hub, emphasized that “if we reduce methane emissions, the drop in temperature would be practically immediate,” and argued that reducing organic waste is one of the most effective and cost-efficient measures to move in this direction.

Juan Pablo Escudero, a researcher at UCLA’s Emmett Institute, highlighted the contribution of new technologies in identifying sources of methane. “The big climate action isn’t just about stopping the burning of oil. We have to look at waste,” he stated.

Organic Waste: From Problem to Resource

The seminar focused particularly on the potential of organic waste to produce compost, regenerate soil, and reduce emissions.

Mariela Pino, a methane mitigation campaigner for GAIA Lac, noted that “waste management is no longer just a public health issue” and that its connection to climate change requires a different approach. Pino argued that moving toward zero waste requires maximizing the recycling of organic and inorganic materials, implementing separate collection systems and source separation, and ensuring adequate funding.

She also highlighted the importance of linking waste management to soil protection and food production: “We have to view waste not only as a public health issue, but as part of a socio-environmental economy that generates significant benefits,” she said.

The case studies presented showed that these solutions are already being implemented. In the Quinta Normal municipality of Chile, for example, a pilot program for organic recycling at open-air markets is underway, while in Melipeuco, the municipality has been working since 2021 on a local zero-waste strategy in collaboration with local communities.

Meanwhile, Fértil Compostaje, a family-run farming business in Chile’s La Araucanía region, processes between 20 and 30 metric tons of agricultural waste to produce compost. Its director, Germán Jara, warned about the deterioration of agricultural soils and stated: “We’re not burying waste; we’re burying the solution to regenerate our soils.”

A transition that must include waste pickers

The role of grassroots waste pickers was another key focus of the meeting. Soledad Mella, from the National Association of Waste Pickers of Chile, called for the transition to zero-waste systems to incorporate those who have historically sustained material recovery. “A just transition isn’t about moving waste from one place to another—it’s about shifting power, investment, and opportunities toward those who sustain recycling,” she said.

From Brazil, Roselaine Mendes, international secretary of the Latin American and Caribbean Network of Waste Pickers (RedLacre), highlighted the importance of providing economic recognition for the work of waste pickers. “Simply making a living from the sale of materials isn’t sustainable. We need to be paid for our work,” she noted.

The seminar also addressed the progress and challenges of Chilean public policies, including the Extended Producer Responsibility Law, infrastructure for organic waste management, public education, and coordination among national, regional, and municipal governments.

For Magdalena Donoso, regional coordinator for GAIA and BFFP in Latin America and the Caribbean, the progress achieved is the result of the organization and perseverance of various stakeholders. “Agendas shift when those with unyielding determination decide to organize and take action before success seems possible, and they persevere because they refuse to accept that what makes no sense should continue to be perpetuated,” she stated.

The meeting concluded with a call to strengthen collaboration among governments, municipalities, social organizations, waste pickers, communities, academia, and the private sector to accelerate local solutions that reduce emissions, prevent waste, and move toward zero-waste systems.

Nairobi, Kenia, 11 de septiembre de 2026. BirdLife International, National Audubon Society y CAF - Banco de Desarrollo de América Latina y el Caribe anunciaron la culminación del Marco de Bonos...

Honduras must immediately stop the execution of over 1000 eviction orders issued under a new law that shields agro-industrial land from historic tenure claims- says the UN experts.

The post UN experts: Honduras must immediately halt mass evictions of peasant, Indigenous and Afro-descendant communities appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.

It’s all food safety delays at the FDA JR Culpepper September 11, 2026

The Food and Drug Administration has delayed a long list of food chemicals and food safety actions, both promised and legally required. In some cases, these actions have been overdue for more than 30 years.

The chemicals the FDA has ignored have been linked to serious health harms, including cancer and hormone disruption.

The FDA’s record speaks for itself. 

Where the federal government is failing, states are stepping in to protect public health. Some chemicals with long overdue pending actions, including butylated hydroxyanisole, or BHA, and potassium bromate, have already been banned by individual states – which have a far better track record than the FDA when it comes to food chemicals. 

But a draft bill newly proposed in Congress, the FRESH and Affordable Foods Act, could cancel those state laws.

To shine a light on these failures, EWG created a report card showing the cases in which the FDA has missed its own deadlines for oversight of serious food safety issues. 

+ CLOSED -> + TO ADD A ROW: copy one ... block and change the text. ===================================================================== --> .dn { display: none !important; } .flipped-vert { transform: rotateX(180deg); } .table-wrapper { margin-bottom: 10px; } .table-cat { border-bottom: 1px solid #000; border-top: 1px solid #000; cursor: pointer; display: flex; font-family: niveau-grotesk, sans-serif; font-weight: bold; justify-content: space-between; padding: 20px 0; } .toggle-wrapper { align-items: center; display: flex; } .toggle { width: 20px; } .table-wrapper table { display: table; width: 100%; } table thead tr { border-top: none; border-bottom: 1px solid #565450; } th, td { text-align: left; vertical-align: top; } .row-title { line-height: 1.4; max-width: 444px; } .row-desc { color: #565450; line-height: 1.4; margin-top: 8px; max-width: 444px; } Regulations and guidance ActionKey dates and deadlinesStatusFinalize industry guidance on arsenic in apple juiceProvide information to manufacturers on the action level for inorganic arsenic in apple juice that the FDA considers protective of human health and achievable with the use of good manufacturing practices.The FDA proposed draft guidance in 2013.

In 2018, the FDA announced that a draft level would be finalized by year end. The FDA finalized the guidance in 2023.Finalized after a five-year delay.Finalize produce safety ruleEstablish science-based minimum standards for the safe growing, harvesting, packing and storage of fruits and vegetables grown for human consumption.The Food Safety Modernization Act was signed into law in 2011.

The FDA originally proposed a produce safety rule in 2013. The proposed rule was modified in 2014.

The final rule was issued in 2015, and a revised final rule addressing contamination from agricultural water was proposed in 2022. The revised rule was finalized in 2024.Finalized after delay.Petitions ActionKey dates and deadlinesStatusRespond to carcinogenic flavors food additive petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2016.

In 2018 it granted the petition after the organizations involved, including EWG and others, filed a lawsuit.Approved after a two-year delay.Respond to butylated hydroxyanisole food and color additive petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 1990.Delayed more than 36 years. BHA is under post-market review. The FDA issued a request for information in February but the petition is still pending.Respond to potassium bromate citizen petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2000.Delayed more than 26 years.Respond to caramel coloring citizen petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2011.Delayed more than 15 years.Respond to bioaccumulating PFAS in food contact materials citizen petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2021.Delayed more than five years.Respond to bisphenol A food additive petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2022.Delayed more than four years.Respond to titanium dioxide color additive petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2024.Delayed more than three years.Respond to fluorinated polyethylene petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2025.Delayed more than one year.Respond to lead in baby food petition for reconsiderationThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2025.Delayed more than a year.Respond to lead as a food additive petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2020.Delayed nearly six years.Respond to carcinogenic solvents petitionThe deadline for the FDA to respond to the petition was in 2024.Delayed nearly two years. document.querySelectorAll('.table-cat').forEach(item => { var toggle = item.querySelector('.toggle'); item.addEventListener('click', event => { toggle.classList.toggle('flipped-vert'); item.nextElementSibling.classList.toggle('dn'); }); }); Authors Iris Myers September 14, 2026

A majority of Utahns support restoring protections for Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments, according to a new poll commissioned by the Grand Canyon Trust. The poll was conducted by New Bridge Strategy and surveyed 500 registered voters.

President Donald Trump slashed the size of both monuments by roughly 90 percent in July and eliminated the Bears Ears Commission, which guided the management of Bears Ears and consisted of representatives from the Hopi, Navajo Nation, Ute Mountain Ute, Zuni, and the Ute Indian Tribes. Roughly 3 million acres of public lands that now fall outside the monument boundaries are open for new mining claims starting today.

The poll results also show that a majority of Utah voters think Native American Tribes should have a strong role in public land management and support a president’s ability to designate national monuments. “These findings demonstrate broad public recognition that Tribal nations must remain meaningfully involved in stewardship and co-management of their ancestral lands,” Davina Smith-Idjesa, co-chair of the Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition and a member of the Navajo Nation, said in a press conference Wednesday.

Autumn Gillard, a member of the Southern Paiute Tribe and coordinator of the Grand Staircase-Escalante Inter-Tribal Coalition, agreed, saying, “When Tribal voices are excluded, land management decisions lose generations of understanding that cannot be replaced by a short study or an administrative review.”

Maroon Bells fees to increase as county prepares to take over management

The Pitkin Board of County Commissioners on Wednesday approved a special use permit to take over management of the Maroon Bells Scenic Area from the U.S. Forest Service in 2027. Forest Service officials justified the decision by stating that the funding available to manage the Maroon Bells Scenic Area has “not kept pace with the rising costs of sustainably operating and maintaining the area.” The special use permit would allow Pitkin County to run everything from day-to-day operations like staffing and maintenance but would still require raising visitor fees to help “support operational expenses.” The county wants to increase the day-use fee at the Maroon Bells from $10 to $30, while campground fees and wilderness permit trailhead parking would more than double. Will Roush, the executive director of Wilderness Workshop, said of the decision, “Transferring essential public lands management functions to counties and private contractors without any Forest Service public process is a dangerous precedent, and everyone who cares about our public lands should be concerned about what this means for their future stewardship and accessibility.” To learn more, read our Westwise blog post about this issue.

Quick hits Why the federal government is losing its war on fire

RE:PUBLIC

Maroon Bells visitation fees to increase as county prepares to take over management

Denver7 News

Poll: Majority of Utah voters want protections for Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante to be restored

Salt Lake Tribune | Utah News Dispatch | Inside Climate News | Native News Online | Fox13 Now | Grand Canyon Trust [poll results]

If Colorado River compact heads to the Supreme Court, ‘everybody loses,’ experts say

KUNC

Moab-Arches shuttle officially launches as agencies begin measuring impact

Salt Lake Tribune

New Mexico sues federal government for refusing to reimburse state for $61 million in wildfire costs

SourceNM

Opinion: Trump’s attacks on the environment are out of touch with America

TIME

Lawsuit says BLM Colorado oil and gas lease sales ignored critical wildlife corridors

Colorado Newsline | Colorado Sun

Quote of the day

This president labels his policies ‘America first,’ but on public lands and national parks he’s simply put America last. As someone who was in those rooms making the case, I could not be more disappointed. And it doesn’t need to be this way.”

—Benji Backer, founder and CEO of United By Nature, TIME

Picture This

@nationalparkservice

The National Park Service is honored to formally recognize the National 9/11 Pentagon Memorial as an Affiliated Area of the National Park System.

This week, as the nation marks 25 years since September 11, 2001, this designation recognizes the enduring national significance of this place of remembrance and honors the 184 people who lost their lives at the Pentagon and aboard American Airlines Flight 77.

The two-acre outdoor memorial, which opened in 2008, is a solemn place of reflection and remembrance. The memorial features 184 illuminated units, each dedicated to an individual who was killed on September 11, 2001. Together, they create a lasting tribute to the lives lost and the families, friends, and communities forever changed that day.

NPS Photos

Featured image: Bears Ears National Monument – Moon House. Photo by Bob Wick, BLM.

The post As mining threat looms, poll confirms Utah voters want monuments protected appeared first on Center for Western Priorities.

Hilary Swank letter urging Gov. Gavin Newsom to sign diaper ingredients disclosure bill Anthony Lacey September 11, 2026

Attached is actor and children’s health advocate Hilary Swank’s letter urging California Gov. Gavin Newsom to sign AB 1901, a diaper ingredients disclosure bill.

File Download Document hilary-swank-letter-to-gov-newsom-ab-1901.pdf Areas of Focus Family Health Women's Health Children’s Health Toxic Chemicals California Guest Authors Hilary Swank September 11, 2026

Print article Share

Wildfires currently burning large swathes of land in Indonesia are on track to produce emissions on a par with the country’s most-intense fire season this century, according to experts. 

Data from the Global Fire Emissions Database reveals that, as of 7 September, fires in Indonesia produced 76m tonnes of carbon (MtC) in 2026.

This puts 2026 on the same trajectory as 2015, when fires burned 2.6m hectares of land across the country and generated a total of 333MtC. 

Dr Guido van der Werf, a researcher at Wageningen University in the Netherlands, tells Carbon Brief that the fires in Indonesia are “more or less on track” to reach levels seen 11 years ago.

Parts of the country – including the eastern province of Papua – are “burning more than they’ve ever burned”, he says.

Indonesia is no stranger to emissions-intensive fires. Research has estimated that the record 1997 fire season generated carbon emissions equivalent to 13-40% of all global fossil-fuel emissions that year. 

Meanwhile, a separate study that looked at carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from the 2015 fires in south-east Asia – which primarily burned Indonesia – found they were greater than the total of the EU’s fossil-fuel emissions that year. The “severe haze” from the fires has been linked to more than 100,000 premature deaths across the region.

El Niño influence

As in 2015 and in 1997, this year’s Indonesian fires come during an El Niño year.

The naturally-occurring climate phenomenon, linked to ocean temperatures in the Pacific, periodically drives up temperatures and dries out land in Indonesia – creating the conditions for fires so immense that they imprint on global emissions. 

Scientists are projecting that this year’s El Niño – which started in June and is expected to last into 2027 – will be one of the most intense on record.

var gform;gform||(document.addEventListener("gform_main_scripts_loaded",function(){gform.scriptsLoaded=!0}),document.addEventListener("gform/theme/scripts_loaded",function(){gform.themeScriptsLoaded=!0}),window.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded",function(){gform.domLoaded=!0}),gform={domLoaded:!1,scriptsLoaded:!1,themeScriptsLoaded:!1,isFormEditor:()=>"function"==typeof InitializeEditor,callIfLoaded:function(o){return!(!gform.domLoaded||!gform.scriptsLoaded||!gform.themeScriptsLoaded&&!gform.isFormEditor()||(gform.isFormEditor()&&console.warn("The use of gform.initializeOnLoaded() is deprecated in the form editor context and will be removed in Gravity Forms 3.1."),o(),0))},initializeOnLoaded:function(o){gform.callIfLoaded(o)||(document.addEventListener("gform_main_scripts_loaded",()=>{gform.scriptsLoaded=!0,gform.callIfLoaded(o)}),document.addEventListener("gform/theme/scripts_loaded",()=>{gform.themeScriptsLoaded=!0,gform.callIfLoaded(o)}),window.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded",()=>{gform.domLoaded=!0,gform.callIfLoaded(o)}))},hooks:{action:{},filter:{}},addAction:function(o,r,e,t){gform.addHook("action",o,r,e,t)},addFilter:function(o,r,e,t){gform.addHook("filter",o,r,e,t)},doAction:function(o){gform.doHook("action",o,arguments)},applyFilters:function(o){return gform.doHook("filter",o,arguments)},removeAction:function(o,r){gform.removeHook("action",o,r)},removeFilter:function(o,r,e){gform.removeHook("filter",o,r,e)},addHook:function(o,r,e,t,n){null==gform.hooks[o][r]&&(gform.hooks[o][r]=[]);var d=gform.hooks[o][r];null==n&&(n=r+"_"+d.length),gform.hooks[o][r].push({tag:n,callable:e,priority:t=null==t?10:t})},doHook:function(r,o,e){var t;if(e=Array.prototype.slice.call(e,1),null!=gform.hooks[r][o]&&((o=gform.hooks[r][o]).sort(function(o,r){return o.priority-r.priority}),o.forEach(function(o){"function"!=typeof(t=o.callable)&&(t=window[t]),"action"==r?t.apply(null,e):e[0]=t.apply(null,e)})),"filter"==r)return e[0]},removeHook:function(o,r,t,n){var e;null!=gform.hooks[o][r]&&(e=(e=gform.hooks[o][r]).filter(function(o,r,e){return!!(null!=n&&n!=o.tag||null!=t&&t!=o.priority)}),gform.hooks[o][r]=e)}}); #gform_wrapper_5[data-form-index="0"].gform-theme,[data-parent-form="5_0"]{--gf-color-primary: #204ce5;--gf-color-primary-rgb: 32, 76, 229;--gf-color-primary-contrast: #fff;--gf-color-primary-contrast-rgb: 255, 255, 255;--gf-color-primary-darker: #001AB3;--gf-color-primary-lighter: #527EFF;--gf-color-secondary: #fff;--gf-color-secondary-rgb: 255, 255, 255;--gf-color-secondary-contrast: #112337;--gf-color-secondary-contrast-rgb: 17, 35, 55;--gf-color-secondary-darker: #F5F5F5;--gf-color-secondary-lighter: #FFFFFF;--gf-color-out-ctrl-light: rgba(17, 35, 55, 0.1);--gf-color-out-ctrl-light-rgb: 17, 35, 55;--gf-color-out-ctrl-light-darker: rgba(104, 110, 119, 0.35);--gf-color-out-ctrl-light-lighter: #F5F5F5;--gf-color-out-ctrl-dark: #585e6a;--gf-color-out-ctrl-dark-rgb: 88, 94, 106;--gf-color-out-ctrl-dark-darker: #112337;--gf-color-out-ctrl-dark-lighter: rgba(17, 35, 55, 0.65);--gf-color-in-ctrl: #fff;--gf-color-in-ctrl-rgb: 255, 255, 255;--gf-color-in-ctrl-contrast: #112337;--gf-color-in-ctrl-contrast-rgb: 17, 35, 55;--gf-color-in-ctrl-darker: #F5F5F5;--gf-color-in-ctrl-lighter: #FFFFFF;--gf-color-in-ctrl-primary: #204ce5;--gf-color-in-ctrl-primary-rgb: 32, 76, 229;--gf-color-in-ctrl-primary-contrast: #fff;--gf-color-in-ctrl-primary-contrast-rgb: 255, 255, 255;--gf-color-in-ctrl-primary-darker: #001AB3;--gf-color-in-ctrl-primary-lighter: #527EFF;--gf-color-in-ctrl-light: rgba(17, 35, 55, 0.1);--gf-color-in-ctrl-light-rgb: 17, 35, 55;--gf-color-in-ctrl-light-darker: rgba(104, 110, 119, 0.35);--gf-color-in-ctrl-light-lighter: #F5F5F5;--gf-color-in-ctrl-dark: #585e6a;--gf-color-in-ctrl-dark-rgb: 88, 94, 106;--gf-color-in-ctrl-dark-darker: #112337;--gf-color-in-ctrl-dark-lighter: rgba(17, 35, 55, 0.65);--gf-radius: 3px;--gf-font-size-secondary: 14px;--gf-font-size-tertiary: 13px;--gf-icon-ctrl-number: url("data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg width='8' height='14' viewBox='0 0 8 14' fill='none' xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%3E%3Cpath fill-rule='evenodd' clip-rule='evenodd' d='M4 0C4.26522 5.96046e-08 4.51957 0.105357 4.70711 0.292893L7.70711 3.29289C8.09763 3.68342 8.09763 4.31658 7.70711 4.70711C7.31658 5.09763 6.68342 5.09763 6.29289 4.70711L4 2.41421L1.70711 4.70711C1.31658 5.09763 0.683417 5.09763 0.292893 4.70711C-0.0976311 4.31658 -0.097631 3.68342 0.292893 3.29289L3.29289 0.292893C3.48043 0.105357 3.73478 0 4 0ZM0.292893 9.29289C0.683417 8.90237 1.31658 8.90237 1.70711 9.29289L4 11.5858L6.29289 9.29289C6.68342 8.90237 7.31658 8.90237 7.70711 9.29289C8.09763 9.68342 8.09763 10.3166 7.70711 10.7071L4.70711 13.7071C4.31658 14.0976 3.68342 14.0976 3.29289 13.7071L0.292893 10.7071C-0.0976311 10.3166 -0.0976311 9.68342 0.292893 9.29289Z' fill='rgba(17, 35, 55, 0.65)'/%3E%3C/svg%3E");--gf-icon-ctrl-select: url("data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg width='10' height='6' viewBox='0 0 10 6' fill='none' xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%3E%3Cpath fill-rule='evenodd' clip-rule='evenodd' d='M0.292893 0.292893C0.683417 -0.097631 1.31658 -0.097631 1.70711 0.292893L5 3.58579L8.29289 0.292893C8.68342 -0.0976311 9.31658 -0.0976311 9.70711 0.292893C10.0976 0.683417 10.0976 1.31658 9.70711 1.70711L5.70711 5.70711C5.31658 6.09763 4.68342 6.09763 4.29289 5.70711L0.292893 1.70711C-0.0976311 1.31658 -0.0976311 0.683418 0.292893 0.292893Z' fill='rgba(17, 35, 55, 0.65)'/%3E%3C/svg%3E");--gf-icon-ctrl-search: url("data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg width='640' height='640' xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%3E%3Cpath d='M256 128c-70.692 0-128 57.308-128 128 0 70.691 57.308 128 128 128 70.691 0 128-57.309 128-128 0-70.692-57.309-128-128-128zM64 256c0-106.039 85.961-192 192-192s192 85.961 192 192c0 41.466-13.146 79.863-35.498 111.248l154.125 154.125c12.496 12.496 12.496 32.758 0 45.254s-32.758 12.496-45.254 0L367.248 412.502C335.862 434.854 297.467 448 256 448c-106.039 0-192-85.962-192-192z' fill='rgba(17, 35, 55, 0.65)'/%3E%3C/svg%3E");--gf-label-space-y-secondary: var(--gf-label-space-y-md-secondary);--gf-ctrl-border-color: #686e77;--gf-ctrl-size: var(--gf-ctrl-size-md);--gf-ctrl-label-color-primary: #112337;--gf-ctrl-label-color-secondary: #112337;--gf-ctrl-choice-size: var(--gf-ctrl-choice-size-md);--gf-ctrl-checkbox-check-size: var(--gf-ctrl-checkbox-check-size-md);--gf-ctrl-radio-check-size: var(--gf-ctrl-radio-check-size-md);--gf-ctrl-btn-font-size: var(--gf-ctrl-btn-font-size-md);--gf-ctrl-btn-padding-x: var(--gf-ctrl-btn-padding-x-md);--gf-ctrl-btn-size: var(--gf-ctrl-btn-size-md);--gf-ctrl-btn-border-color-secondary: #686e77;--gf-ctrl-file-btn-bg-color-hover: #EBEBEB;--gf-field-img-choice-size: var(--gf-field-img-choice-size-md);--gf-field-img-choice-card-space: var(--gf-field-img-choice-card-space-md);--gf-field-img-choice-check-ind-size: var(--gf-field-img-choice-check-ind-size-md);--gf-field-img-choice-check-ind-icon-size: var(--gf-field-img-choice-check-ind-icon-size-md);--gf-field-pg-steps-number-color: rgba(17, 35, 55, 0.8);}

EmailThis field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Free fortnightly newsletter

.preheader p{ margin-top: 0; font-family: 'PT Sans', sans-serif; font-weight: var(--type--3--font-weight--bold); color: var(--button--color); font-size: var(--button--font-size, inherit); } .newsletter-inline{ display: flex; border: solid 1px #333333; padding: 1em; background: #ffffff; } .inline-email{ display:inline-block; margin-right:1em; margin-top:0 !important; margin-bottom:0.5em; } #field_submit{ display:inline-block; margin-top:0 !important; } .gform_wrapper .gfield+.gfield{ margin-top:0 } Email gform.initializeOnLoaded( function() {gformInitSpinner( 5, 'http://www.carbonbrief.org/wp-content/plugins/gravityforms/images/spinner.svg', false );jQuery('#gform_ajax_frame_5').on('load',function(){var contents = jQuery(this).contents().find('*').html();var is_postback = contents.indexOf('GF_AJAX_POSTBACK') >= 0;if(!is_postback){return;}var form_content = jQuery(this).contents().find('#gform_wrapper_5');var is_confirmation = jQuery(this).contents().find('#gform_confirmation_wrapper_5').length > 0;var is_redirect = contents.indexOf('gformRedirect(){') >= 0;var is_form = form_content.length > 0 && ! is_redirect && ! is_confirmation;var mt = parseInt(jQuery('html').css('margin-top'), 10) + parseInt(jQuery('body').css('margin-top'), 10) + 100;if(is_form){jQuery('#gform_wrapper_5').html(form_content.html());if(form_content.hasClass('gform_validation_error')){jQuery('#gform_wrapper_5').addClass('gform_validation_error');} else {jQuery('#gform_wrapper_5').removeClass('gform_validation_error');}setTimeout( function() { /* delay the scroll by 50 milliseconds to fix a bug in chrome */ jQuery(document).scrollTop(jQuery('#gform_wrapper_5').offset().top - mt); }, 50 );if(window['gformInitDatepicker']) {gformInitDatepicker();}if(window['gformInitPriceFields']) {gformInitPriceFields();}var current_page = jQuery('#gform_source_page_number_5').val();gformInitSpinner( 5, 'http://www.carbonbrief.org/wp-content/plugins/gravityforms/images/spinner.svg', false );jQuery(document).trigger('gform_page_loaded', [5, current_page]);window['gf_submitting_5'] = false;}else if(!is_redirect){var confirmation_content = jQuery(this).contents().find('.GF_AJAX_POSTBACK').html();if(!confirmation_content){confirmation_content = contents;}jQuery('#gform_wrapper_5').replaceWith(confirmation_content);jQuery(document).scrollTop(jQuery('#gf_5').offset().top - mt);jQuery(document).trigger('gform_confirmation_loaded', [5]);window['gf_submitting_5'] = false;wp.a11y.speak(jQuery('#gform_confirmation_message_5').text());}else{jQuery('#gform_5').append(contents);if(window['gformRedirect']) {gformRedirect();}}jQuery(document).trigger("gform_pre_post_render", [{ formId: "5", currentPage: "current_page", abort: function() { this.preventDefault(); } }]); if (event && event.defaultPrevented) { return; } const gformWrapperDiv = document.getElementById( "gform_wrapper_5" ); if ( gformWrapperDiv ) { const visibilitySpan = document.createElement( "span" ); visibilitySpan.id = "gform_visibility_test_5"; gformWrapperDiv.insertAdjacentElement( "afterend", visibilitySpan ); } const visibilityTestDiv = document.getElementById( "gform_visibility_test_5" ); let postRenderFired = false; function triggerPostRender() { if ( postRenderFired ) { return; } postRenderFired = true; gform.core.triggerPostRenderEvents( 5, current_page ); if ( visibilityTestDiv ) { visibilityTestDiv.parentNode.removeChild( visibilityTestDiv ); } } function debounce( func, wait, immediate ) { var timeout; return function() { var context = this, args = arguments; var later = function() { timeout = null; if ( !immediate ) func.apply( context, args ); }; var callNow = immediate && !timeout; clearTimeout( timeout ); timeout = setTimeout( later, wait ); if ( callNow ) func.apply( context, args ); }; } const debouncedTriggerPostRender = debounce( function() { triggerPostRender(); }, 200 ); if ( visibilityTestDiv && visibilityTestDiv.offsetParent === null ) { const observer = new MutationObserver( ( mutations ) => { mutations.forEach( ( mutation ) => { if ( mutation.type === 'attributes' && visibilityTestDiv.offsetParent !== null ) { debouncedTriggerPostRender(); observer.disconnect(); } }); }); observer.observe( document.body, { attributes: true, childList: false, subtree: true, attributeFilter: [ 'style', 'class' ], }); } else { triggerPostRender(); } } );} );

Dr Mark Parrington, a senior scientist from the Copernicus Climate Change Service explains: 

“From August until the end of October [to] November is the dry season in Indonesia. We do normally see fire around this time of year, but nowhere near the scale that we’ve seen this year, or indeed any of the previous El Niño years”.

Dr Nisa Novita, strategic lead for peatland at Indonesian environmental NGO Yayasan Konservasi Alam Nusantara, tells Carbon Brief that El Niño “does not directly cause most fires”, but acts as a “major amplifier by creating hotter and drier conditions, making fires easier to ignite, spread faster and much harder to control”. 

Studies have shown that fires in Indonesia often occur where there has been significant land clearance and peatland drainage for agriculture and palm oil plantations. These practices create a dry landscape that is highly flammable during times of drought.

Pink bars show years in which an El Niño event was called by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. GFED fire emissions data for 1980-96 is from Field et al. (2009) and Van Marle et al. (2017); data for 1997-2022 is from Van der Werf et al. (2025); and data for 2022 onwards is from Chen et al. (2026).

Van der Werf says the scale of this year’s fires – and whether they will end up being more intense than 2015 – will depend on the length of this year’s El Niño event, as well as the effectiveness of recent peatland conservation efforts.

Novita explains that Indonesia’s fires are heavily emissions-intensive due to its large tropical peatland ecosystem: 

“When peatlands are degraded and drained due to canal development for agriculture, the water table drops, making the peat dry and highly flammable especially during dry seasons or El Niño events, like now.

“Unlike fires in dry ecosystems, peat fires can smolder underground, so the soil itself becomes readily available fuel.”

Extensive peatland restoration efforts in Indonesia in recent years have been credited with reducing the number of fires during the 2019 El Niño.

After the catastrophic fires in 1997-98, the Indonesian government introduced a range of measures designed to strengthen peatland protection and restoration through dedicated institutions and regulations. This included the introduction of a moratorium on licenses to convert forests and peatlands into plantations and logging areas. 

In the aftermath of the 2015 fires, it established an official peatland restoration agency, which was given an additional mandate for mangrove restoration in 2021. This agency was dissolved last year. Novita says:

“We have learned and improved…But the question is: is it enough? Or are we still underestimating the risk that degraded peatlands pose, especially when we face another El Niño?”

Van der Werf says it remains unclear from the 2026 fire data how great an impact recent efforts to restore peatland in Indonesia have had on reducing the impact and spread of the fires: 

“I had hoped that this year Indonesia would be relatively quiet, even though we have a big El Niño…You could argue if those regulations worked, then this wouldn’t be a big fire [season], even though it [has been] very dry. 

“This is maybe the case in Sumatra [which has seen a quiet fire season], but definitely not in other regions. Papua [a region of Indonesia] and [neighbouring country of] Papua New Guinea – those are the new frontiers. They are basically going through the same thing that Sumatra went through 20 years ago.”

Related Revealed: England’s June 2026 heatwave sparked record demand for ambulances 14.09.2026 Health and society Revealed: More than 1,000 NHS operations cancelled due to record UK heatwaves 11.09.2026 Health and society Guest post: How extreme heat is ‘creeping’ from summer into autumn and spring 10.09.2026 Heatwaves Q&A: What can – and cannot – be said about global warming’s role in the 2026 Himalayan floods 08.09.2026 Rainfall and flooding

The post El Niño: Indonesia fire emissions in 2026 ‘on track’ to match record for this century appeared first on Carbon Brief.

“The Hub” is a weekly round-up of transportation related news in the Philadelphia area and beyond. Check back weekly to keep up-to-date on the issues Clean Air Council’s transportation staff finds important.

Join the Clean Air Council in participating in the Pretzel Pedal Challenge! Log your bike rides from September 1-30 to automatically earn points that qualify you for discounts and prizes! Create a Share-A-Ride profile to join!

Image Source: NBC Philadelphia

NBC Philadelphia: Speeding, double parking fuel safety concerns on East Girard Avenue – East Girard Avenue in Fishtown is an extremely busy corridor, and advocates held a walkthrough this week to push for safety improvements for pedestrians, drivers, cyclists, and transit riders. Issues facing this corridor include speeding drivers, double-parked cars, illegal turns, and pedestrians crossing outside of crosswalks. Improvements could include dedicated turning zones, pedestrian infrastructure, curb extensions, and more traffic signs.

Image Source: PA Trolley Museum

Mass Transit: Off the Beaten Path: Pittsburgh’s streetcar past keeps rolling at Pennsylvania Trolley Museum – Children can enter the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum for free throughout September. The museum, located in Washington County, has more than 50 trolleys and streetcars on display. Visitors can ride working trolleys along 4 miles of track. Pittsburgh’s trolley system dates back to the late 1800s, and visitors can learn all about that history and more.

Image Source: Metro Philadelphia

Metro Philadelphia: Gusset Plate Project brings art under the El in Kensington – Murals painted by residents over the past few years were installed onto triangular gusset plates that connect columns and beams holding up the Market-Frankford Line along Kensington Avenue. The Kensington and Harrowgate neighborhoods have received a little more color due to the mural plates, which can be found between Huntington and Tioga stations.

Other Stories

PARK(ing) DAY PHL: PARK(ing) Day is September 18, 2026

Pennsylvania Capital-Star: The Pennsylvania Turnpike is added to Oklahoma’s PikePass system

New Jersey State Democrats: SINGLETON, CCSNJ, SJTA TO ANNOUNCE NEW MICROTRANSIT SHUTTLE IN BURLCO

Virgina Mercury: Amtrak to suspend Virginia-to-D.C. service for critical track upgrades Oct. 16–26

As the planet heats up, tundras are thawing, wetlands are fermenting, and forests are succumbing to larger and more frequent wildfires. The breakdown of these natural systems is unleashing huge volumes of emissions, further intensifying warming from the burning of fossil fuels. According to new research, such feedback loops could amplify human-driven warming by 20 to 30 percent.

Read more on E360 →

Headline News:

• “Vestas Reaches New Turbine Heights” • Vestas claims that a new EnVentus 7.2-MW machine installed in Winnberg, Germany, has the highest hub height ever for an onshore turbine at 199 meters (653 feet). The prototype project also has a Firmengruppe Max Bögle concrete hybrid tower. A second turbine is planned for installation next year. [reNews]

Vestas wind turbine (Vestas image)

• “Spanish Zinc-Air Battery Design Boosts Capacity And Power By 80%” • Researchers at the Institute of Materials Science of Barcelona developed an architecture for zinc-air batteries that can boost their power output by up to 80% without altering their core chemistry. This opens up a new avenue for designing more efficient, higher-performance batteries. [Euronews]
• “US Solar In 11-GW Q2 Surge” • The US solar industry added 11.4 GW of new electricity generating capacity in Q2 2026, a 45% year-over-year increase and a 43% increase from Q1. The Solar Energy Industries Association and Wood Mackenzie said that utility-scale solar led the Q2 surge with 9.6-GW installed, up 61% year-over-year. [reNews]
• “UK Households Face Higher Energy Bills Unless Aging Grid Is Upgraded, Report Warns” • Failure to accelerate updates to the UK’s aging power grid to handle rising renewable generation could cost consumers billions of pounds by 2030, the official spending watchdog has warned. Up to £70 billion in investment is required for upgrades. [Yahoo News UK]
• “MN Power Ordered To Continue Investigating Alternatives To New Gas Plant” • The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission rejected a request by Minnesota Power to build a costly new gas plant to meet future energy demand and ordered the electric utility to continue investigating alternatives that would maintain grid reliability. [CleanTechnica]

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