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Nations are “back on track” to adopt a framework for curbing global shipping emissions, following the latest International Maritime Organization’s (IMO) meeting in London, UK.

The proposed “net-zero framework” had been expected to be approved by countries at the IMO towards the end of 2025.

Instead, the Trump administration was accused of “bully-boy” tactics as the US led a concerted effort to reject the framework, leading to its approval being delayed.

Since then, the US, other fossil-fuel producers and some industry groups have called for the framework to be stripped of its carbon-pricing mechanism, or abandoned entirely.

At the Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC84) meeting in London, UK, last week, nations tried once again to reach an agreement on the framework.

Opponents said they were trying to seek consensus, but supporters, such as Brazil, the EU and Pacific islands, pointed out the framework was already a “careful balance of interests”.

Liberia and Panama – “flag states” for a third of the world’s commercial shipping – led a counter-proposal, alongside Argentina, which effectively cut carbon pricing from the framework.

Ultimately, however, the meeting ended with a reconfirmation that delegations are committed to rebuilding consensus on global shipping emissions. 

The framework survived the negotiations and the committee will now try to adopt it at its December 2026 meeting.

Below, Carbon Brief explains why the framework has proved so contentious, who the major players have been and what the final outcome was at the latest IMO meeting.

• Why was the net-zero framework delayed last year?
• Why do some countries oppose the net-zero framework?
• What ‘alternative frameworks’ were discussed?
• What do supporters of the net-zero framework want?
• What was the final outcome from the IMO meeting?

Why was the net-zero framework delayed last year?

In April 2025, nations at the IMO had agreed on a “net-zero framework” at their MEPC83 meeting in London, despite the US withdrawing halfway through.

Later that year, in October 2025, they failed to formally adopt the framework after a fraught “extraordinary session” that saw US negotiators accused of “bully-boy tactics”.

(The MEPC usually meets once a year, but additional meetings or intersessionals can be added to deal with an “extraordinary event or critical maritime environmental crisis”. The October session was organised specifically to consider the adoption of the framework and other draft amendments.)

The framework was meant to be a practical set of measures to achieve the global net-zero target for shipping, agreed at the IMO in 2023. The target is significant, as international shipping is responsible for more than 2% of emissions and is not covered by the Paris Agreement.

Following a week of negotiations at the April 2025 meeting, the remaining nations had voted on approving a compromise proposal for an emissions levy – effectively a carbon tax on global shipping – and a credit-trading system. 

A majority of nations had agreed to this framework that would have set a lower emissions-intensity reduction target of 4% in 2028, rising to 30% in 2035. It had also included an upper target that would have increased from 17% in 2028 to 43% in 2035.

Ships that failed to lower their emissions intensity in line with these limits would have needed to purchase “remedial units” for $380 per “tier two” unit. This would have fed into a new IMO “net-zero fund”. 

Those who met the lower target, but fell short of the more difficult upper target, would have had to pay into the IMO fund, but at the lower rate of $100 per “tier one” unit.

The number of compliant ships had been expected to grow under this framework, reducing the number of vessels reliant on buying units and helping to reduce emissions intensity by over 40%, as the chart below shows. 

Reduction in emissions intensity of shipping fuel compared to 2008 reference year, showing percentage made up of tier two (red), tier one (pale red) and compliant emissions (grey). Source: IMO.

The purchase of units to comply with the rules had been expected to raise $10-15bn annually in the initial years of the fund, as well as help with the development of zero and near-zero (ZNZ) greenhouse gas fuels and energy sources, according to thinktank IDDRI. 

In turn, the fund would have been used to support developing countries to decarbonise shipping.

A clear majority of 80% of the eligible voters – not including those who abstained or the US – approved the framework at the April 2025 meeting.  

The 63 countries that voted in favour included the EU, China, India and Brazil, while those that voted against included major fossil-fuel producers, such as Saudi Arabia, Russia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). 

Following this “landmark” agreement, countries had then been expected to formally adopt the framework at the next MEPC session in October 2025. 

However, the meeting proved challenging. The US “unequivocally rejected” the proposal and lobbied extensively against adoption, including by threatening governments, individual diplomats and shipping companies with sanctions, visa restrictions, tariffs and port fees.

During the October meeting, the US and its allies pushed for a shift from a “tacit” approval system for the net-zero framework to one that would require explicit acceptance by governments. This would mean it would only come into force if, six months later, two-thirds of nations actively accepted the deal, Climate Home News explained at the time. 

Negotiations continued throughout the week before Saudi Arabia called to adjourn the meeting, a move that was passed after it was backed by 57 countries. 

As such, the decision on the adoption of the net-zero framework was pushed back by a year.

Among the 63 countries that supported the IMO net-zero framework at MEPC83 in April 2025, 15 supported the adjournment and 10 abstained – showing that some nations that had previously supported the framework had softened on the deal, following lobbying by the US, Saudi Arabia and their allies.

Going into the April 2026 MEPC84 meeting, it was clear that agreement on the framework would not be straightforward. A report ahead of the meeting from University College London (UCL) noted: 

“The level of support is noticeably weaker than in April [2025] and likely reflects the effectiveness and efforts made by sides supporting or opposing the net-zero framework over the intervening period.”

In the week ahead of the MEPC84, US IMO delegation lead Wayne Arguin told a meeting that there was a “clear, strong and sizable bloc of countries opposed to the [net-zero framework]” and “no prospect of achieving consensus”, according to Politico. 

As the meeting kicked off on 27 April 2026, IMO secretary-general Arsenio Dominguez called on parties to engage in “engage in constructive and pragmatic exchanges”. 

Why do some countries oppose the net-zero framework?

A coalition of countries, including the US, Saudi Arabia and various fossil-fuel producers, strongly oppose the IMO net-zero framework that was agreed last year.

They were supported by a wider group of industry bodies and major flag states – countries where many ships are registered – which were instrumental in advancing “alternative frameworks” at the latest meeting. (See: What ‘alternative frameworks’ were discussed?)

Documents submitted ahead of the April 2026 meeting laid out the basis for this opposition, with the US criticising the net-zero framework’s “significant shortcomings”, concluding:

“The most appropriate path forward is to end consideration of the IMO net-zero framework entirely.”

More nuance came in a statement from a group of primarily large fossil-fuel producers, including Saudi Arabia, Russia and Algeria, which was also backed by the US.

It stressed the need for “alternative” frameworks, with an emphasis on achieving consensus, as well as “practicability, equity and trust”. In practice, this meant a system without any carbon pricing, “top-down restrictions” or “international penalties”.

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Opposing countries said any outcome should be “technology-neutral”, meaning it should not disadvantage specific fuels, potentially including liquified natural gas (LNG) and other fossil fuels.

These nations also stressed what they claimed were the potential impact of additional net-zero costs on “food and energy security”.

Much of their criticism was based on supposed economic harm that the net-zero framework would cause, particularly in developing countries.

These arguments purported to be about fairness for these countries. Yet some opponents of the framework were also calling for the IMO fund to be abandoned.

If this IMO fund were lost, then developing countries could lose out on a potential source of support for their own maritime decarbonisation, as well as potentially their broader energy transitions.

As well as supporting the fossil-fuel producers’ call for “alternative frameworks”, the UAE filed its own submission questioning the legitimacy of the IMO in establishing a new fund. 

The US submission to the IMO stated that the fund would provide “pennies on the dollar compared to the economic hardship” brought about by the framework overall. 

US delegates distributed flyers at the IMO meeting, emphasising the financial burden they claimed the framework would place on developing countries. While low-carbon shipping will come with substantial costs, analysts said the US figures were “not credible”.

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Campaigners accused the US of “pretending to care about other countries’ economies”, pointing out that the energy crisis – triggered by the US-led war on Iran – is costing the shipping industry billions. 

Moreover, they stated that the Trump administration’s new port entry fees would be a far greater financial burden for the global shipping industry than the mooted net-zero rules. 

Analysis by UCL shipping researchers ahead of MEPC84 concluded that the Trump administration would potentially be less able to exert “soft power and influence” at the talks than last year. Additionally, it pointed to a Supreme Court ruling that limited the US’s capacity to impose punitive tariffs. 

In practice, the US was less vocal at the talks, choosing to support alternative framework ideas proposed by other IMO members.

What ‘alternative frameworks’ were discussed?

There were two main alternatives to the net-zero framework considered at MEPC84. 

Japan suggested some ideas as a “possible basis for discussion”, which included removing the need for ships to pay into an IMO fund when they fail to meet emissions targets. 

It also suggested simply relaxing the emissions targets, in order to make them easier for shipping companies to meet.

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The second – and more significant – counter-proposal to the net-zero framework was not submitted by the US or its fossil-fuel producer allies. 

Instead, it came from Liberia, Panama and Argentina, three countries that have strong political and historical ties with the US.

This was particularly notable given Liberia and Panama’s status as the top two “flags of convenience”, as shown in the chart below. A third of the world’s commercial shipping is registered in these small states, giving them disproportionate significance within the talks.

Deadweight tonnage of the ten largest merchant fleets in 2025 by flag of registration, million tonnes. Source: UNCTAD.

Their proposal, offered in the spirit of “consensus‑building”, said that only fuels already considered “commercially viable” should be included in the IMO’s carbon-intensity targets. 

The Argentina-Liberia-Panama proposal was dismissed by observers as “business-as-usual”, as it removes incentives to develop clean fuels, any substantial means of enforcement and opportunities to raise funds to help developing countries.

Delaine McCullough, director of the shipping programme at the Ocean Conservancy, tells Carbon Brief:

“By removing the mandatory greenhouse gas price, you take away the ability to provide any kind of rewards or other incentives, and you also take away the regulatory incentive, so you just end up where we are today.”

This was the proposal that the net-zero framework’s most prominent opponents, including the US and the Gulf states, rallied around at MEPC84. 

Among those also backing the idea during the talks were some developing countries, such as Ghana, Nigeria and Sierra Leone, that also said they wanted the IMO outcome to provide them with financial support. 

This came in spite of the proposal stating there should be “no establishment of an IMO fund”. Speaking on condition of anonymity, a small-island state delegate tells Carbon Brief: 

“Many countries that support the Liberia-Panama-Argentina submission also seek support for transition, capacity-building and mitigation of negative impacts. This support will not be available if [that] approach is taken.”

Some delegates questioned the decision by Liberia and Panama to lead this pushback against the net-zero framework. Both nations had previously supported an emissions levy on shipping, which would have been far more ambitious than the framework they now oppose. 

Observers noted ties between nations that opposed the framework and parts of the shipping sector – including US-based interests and LNG assets.

Among the industry voices arguing strongly against the net-zero framework have been the American Bureau of Shipping and a group of international shipping companies and registries – including the national registries of Liberia and Panama.

The latter group voiced “significant concerns” and called for “alternative proposals”. Rather than a domestic entity, the Liberian registry that issued this statement is a privately owned US company.

Reflecting on these issues, Prof Tristan Smith, an energy and transport expert at UCL, wrote on LinkedIn:

“Privately owned registries have leverage over their host governments because one angry shipowner’s personal wealth is more than the flag state’s GDP and governments of low-income countries can’t easily take risks with even small volume revenues.”

Major Greek shipowners, including some with US-linked LNG interests, also opposed the net-zero framework, citing the “absence of support from major and influential states representing a significant share of global tonnage”.

Greece itself had reportedly pushed back against the framework behind the scenes, despite the EU’s public, unified position of support.

What do supporters of the net-zero framework want?

There were many vocal supporters of the net-zero framework at MEPC84, including a broad range of developed and developing countries. 

Among them were the EU, Brazil, Mexico, Kenya, Pacific island states, Australia and the UK.

Having supported the net-zero framework last April, but voted to postpone its adoption in October, China expressed support for a carbon-pricing system and an IMO fund in a technical submission issued ahead of MEPC84.

The major shipping nation had remained quiet during the US-Saudi disruption in October last year, so its submission was viewed as a positive for backers of the framework.

Colombia, which was simultaneously hosting a global conference on “transitioning away” from fossil fuels, also emerged as a supporter of the net-zero framework.

There has also been support from some sections of the shipping industry, including a large coalition of ports, logistics companies and clean-fuel providers. 

Supportive nations pointed out that the net-zero framework was the result of years of talks and already represented what Pacific island states called a “fragile compromise”. They framed it as the “only politically viable option” for hitting the IMO’s net-zero goal.

Pacific islands and around 50 other nations had originally called for a universal carbon levy on shipping. Ultimately, they were forced to accept the net-zero framework as a compromise, but Pacific islands said they would revert to their call for a levy if they felt the framework was being “watered down”.  

The demand for a levy was strongly opposed by numerous countries, including some of the current framework’s supporters, such as Brazil and Australia.

In a bid to revive the net-zero framework, a submission by Brazil sought to “dispel any possible potential misunderstandings”, stressing that the approach is “flexible” and “should not be mistaken for a ‘global tax’”.

For example, Brazil notes that the framework “does not exclude any fuels” and that even existing “bunker” fuels and LNG could be used, as long as carbon intensity targets are met. (Ships could, for example, use carbon capture and storage to meet the goals.)

Michael Mbaru, a low-carbon shipping expert for the Kenya climate special envoy, told a briefing ahead of the conference that the net-zero framework was in developing countries’ interests: 

“If the global package unravels, pressure grows for more regional and unilateral measures instead, and this is particularly difficult for African and other developing countries, because fragmented regulation raises compliance, complexity [and] transaction costs.”

In response to the Argentina-Liberia-Panama proposal that opponents of the framework had coalesced around, the Solomon Islands pointed out that, in seeking “consensus”, this group was ignoring the numerous parties that wanted more ambition, rather than less. It stated in a submission:

“There is no reason to expect that a new proposal, that differs from the IMO net-zero framework, would find a majority, much less a consensus.”

Nevertheless, supporters of the net-zero framework also acknowledged that there were some areas where greater clarity might help countries to finalise the details.

These areas include clarifying technical considerations such as: how fuel intensity is calculated; addressing the potential impacts of net-zero rules on food security; the governance of the IMO fund; and regulation of sustainable fuel certification schemes.

Given this, there was broad support for more discussions at an extra “intersessional” meeting later this year, in order to hash out these final details before attempting to approve the net-zero framework once more.

What was the final outcome from the IMO meeting?

Ultimately, the IMO’s net-zero framework remains on the table and will now be negotiated further in the autumn, ahead of the next MEPC session in December 2026. 

The decision, as well as the general willingness to move forward noted by numerous observers, was broadly welcomed. IMO secretary-general Arsenio Dominguez said:

“We are back on track, but we have to rebuild trust. I encourage you to maintain this momentum through your intersessional work and to prepare submissions that can bring the membership together.”

MO Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez speaking at the Marine Environment Protection Committee on 27 April 2026 at IMO Headquarters in London. Credit: IMO / Flickr

Over the week of negotiations, nearly 100 delegations took to the floor to voice their opinions on the adoption of the net-zero framework. 

As well as discussion of the previously proposed net-zero framework, Argentina and Japan put forward alternative proposals, although neither gathered significant support. 

The Argentinian proposal was substantially different from the net-zero framework and did not include either a greenhouse gas price or a fund. It saw support from just 24 member states and, even when combined with the Japanese proposal to form a “technical-only” compromise, it was unable to gain a majority. 

According to the UCL Shipping and Oceans Research group, despite numerous efforts to put forward options that would be more acceptable to the US and Saudi positions – such as technical-only proposals – these failed to find “viable ways forward”. 

This is important, as normally within the IMO, when two proposals have similar levels of support such as this, they can be merged or a compromise found. 

On the final day of negotiations, countries agreed to take forward the original net-zero framework, which was agreed in principle back in April 2025.  

More than half of the nations at the IMO meeting were in favour of it, including members such the EU, Brazil, Colombia, Kenya, Tuvalu and others. They accepted the framework, as originally agreed, as the basis for further work.

The countries that supported it remain largely unchanged from previous meetings, but there was additional support. 

Most of the supporters had opposed the adjournment at the IMO session in October, which pushed the adoption of the net-zero framework back. But five additional countries that had supported adjournment switched sides, along with 10 countries that had not taken a side, now clearly supporting the framework, according to UCL. 

Others pushed back against the net-zero framework and called for reopening it for substantial changes. This included the US, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Liberia and others, predominantly oil and gas exporters. 

According to UCL, two countries flipped from opposing adjournment to opposing the framework. UCL notes that “this indicates the fluidity of a portion of the positions and the sustained uncertainty around adoption later this year”.

The figure below shows supporters of the net-zero framework or other options at the latest meeting, colour-coded according to their position on the adjournment vote in October 2025.

Position on the next steps for the net-zero framework at the IMO’s latest meeting in April 2026. Credit: UCL

The net-zero framework was, ultimately, the only option in the final outcome text. While it has “survived”, “survival is not a victory and we cannot end up in a cycle of open-ended negotiations”, Em Fenton, senior director of climate diplomacy at Opportunity Green, tells Carbon Brief. They add: 

“We must now look forward to moving towards adoption of the framework later this year in a way that maintains urgency and ambition, and delivers justice and equity for countries on the frontlines of climate impacts.”

The IMO committee agreed to establish an intersessional working group to resolve a number of outstanding concerns and “drive broader convergence on a global measure” ahead of the next MEPC meeting. 

Member states will be able to submit new amendments and adjustments to the draft net-zero framework, to complement those already approved.

The two intersessional meetings will take place in September and November, ahead of MEPC85 in December. 

Christiaan De Beukelaer, senior lecturer in culture and climate at the University of Melbourne, tells Carbon Brief: 

“The ship is mostly built, though it’s obvious that more work needs doing on its interior. Right now, some are trying to finish the build while others are trying to scuttle it.”

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Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz was defeated by a grassroots movement that faced down systematic intimidation in an extraordinary act of popular mobilisation. The attempt to restart democracy in Hungary stands a better chance of success than at any time since 1989. Will Péter Magyar take the country in the right direction?  

The events in Budapest on the night of Viktor Orbán’s election defeat on 12 April were pivotal and unforgettable. Hundreds of thousands of people flooded the streets in a carnival-style fiesta. This level of popular enthusiasm was seen neither in October 1989, when the new republic was proclaimed, nor in May 1990, when the first democratically elected government was formed. “It was like winning the World Cup,” witnesses said. 

Younger generations, who have spent all their adult lives under Orbán’s rule, campaigned hardest for change and feel that they are the main winners. Generation Z’s overwhelming support for Péter Magyar’s Tisza party spread to older age groups, too, and was a game-changer across the country. 

According to political scientists Andrea Szabó and Zoltán Gábor Szűcs-Zágoni, what happened on 12 April 2026 was “not just a critical election, a landslide or a change of government. It can truly be described as an electoral revolution: a bloodless constitutional political shift marking the beginning of a new era driven by the collective power of society.” 

What made this “electoral revolution” possible? What consequences is Viktor Orbán’s downfall likely to have in Hungary, Europe and beyond? And how easy will it be to restore democracy to a country in which the division of powers has effectively collapsed? 

Changing course 

The Hungarian constitutional system is modelled on Germany’s Kanzlerdemokratie and gives the prime minister a particularly strong position vis-à-vis the other parts of government. However, after 2010, Orbán effectively turned Hungary into an “absolute republic”, a term coined by political scientists Gábor Török and Péter Farkas Zárug to describe a system combining electoral democracy with the unrestrained use of state resources and a personality cult surrounding the leader.1

János Széky wrote in Élet és Irodalom that Magyar’s victory in fact ends Viktor Orbán’s 28-year reign, which began during his first term in office between 1998 and 2002. But the significance of the 12 April vote pertains to an even larger period of recent Hungarian history. These elections also mark nearly four decades since the transformation from a one-party system to a Western-type liberal democracy in 1989. 

A former frontrunner of westernisation in the east-central European context, Hungary began to lose ground in the 2000s. The overwhelming vote for change can be interpreted as a call for another push towards the West after the previous attempt in 1989–90, which started promisingly but ultimately failed. 

The 12 April election also marks the end of decades of fruitless and detrimental political rivalry between a triumphant radical right and an increasingly frustrated and powerless Left. The “cold civil war” that Orbán has been waging since 2004 with his left-wing counterpart, the former prime minister Ferenc Gyurcsány, has finally ended in mutual destruction. Gyurcsány’s Democratic Coalition received just one per cent of the popular vote and will not be represented in parliament. Orbán is also leaving parliament after 36 continuous years as an MP. 

For the first time since 1920, there will be no left-wing or liberal parties in the Hungarian parliament. The political landscape now comprises three different shades of right: EU-compatible, moderate conservatism (Tisza); anti-EU radical illiberalism (Fidesz); and neofascism (Mi Hazánk, or “Our Motherland”). 

The absence of left-liberal opposition in the Hungarian parliament sends a grim message to the rest of Europe. If left-wing political parties cannot connect with voters, those voters will have to look elsewhere for political representation. Almost two-thirds of the 3.4 million Hungarians who voted for Tisza came from liberal, left-wing or green backgrounds. There are several new MPs in the 141-strong Tisza group with left-wing and/or liberal leanings. Despite its conservative profile, represented by Magyar himself, Tisza is a surprisingly diverse party, where leaders and rank-and-file activists from different backgrounds coexist. 

Political scientist Balázs Jarábik has argued that the elections demonstrated Hungary’s ongoing democratic potential. But if Péter Magyar truly intends to effect change, he must address the long-standing illiberal tendency to grant the government almost unlimited power. Will Magyar make wise use of the complex network of legal instruments that could easily transform a democratically elected prime minister into a plebiscitarian leader and potential autocrat? And can he resist the temptation to use his supermajority to consolidate his personal power? 

These are the real questions awaiting answers. Viktor Orbán’s authoritarian path was not an anomaly or a bug in the system, but the extreme consequence of a constitutional mindset anchored in the idea of a dominant party and “stable” governance. 

A defeat for Putin 

Following the vote, Fidesz pundits began arguing that Orbán’s swift acceptance of the results showed that the system was far less authoritarian than his opponents claimed. However, this is contradicted by the evidence. For almost two years, Fidesz had employed a variety of tactics, legal and illegal, to suppress the dissent voiced by Tisza. Since 2024, the Hungarian government had exploited the powers of the security agencies and received covert support from Russia and, to a lesser extent, the United States to destroy the only genuine contender and secure Orbán’s fifth consecutive term in office. 

Orbán’s ultimate decision not to crack down on the opposition was motivated not by respect for the democratic will of the Hungarian people but because of an unprecedented display of force from Europe. It is tempting here to draw a parallel with the changes of 1989. However, in 1989, the peaceful transformation of communist Hungary into a multi-party democracy was supported by all the major powers and took place at the end of the East–West ideological divide. During this election campaign, by contrast, both Putin’s Russia and Trump’s United States openly backed Fidesz. 

Since late February, Orbán had been plagued by damaging press leaks. These originated from an entity of which Hungary was still a part, but which Orbán had started to label as his “main enemy”: the European Union. Several European security agencies cooperating on the Hungarian file had intercepted phone conversations between Orbán’s foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, and his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, as well as between Orbán and the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. They revealed a pattern of strategic cooperation and moral collusion that made Orbán’s presence in Brussels undesirable. 

The exposure of the public misconduct of senior Hungarian officials went far beyond the well-known issue of systemic corruption. The failed geopolitical ventures of the Orbán system were exposed, including the attempted armed rescue of former Bosnian–Serb leader Milorad Dodik in 2025, which was thwarted by decisive American intervention, and the scandal surrounding the planned Hungarian military mission to Chad. While rumours could be heard in diplomatic and military circles about Hungarian involvement in the African operations of the infamous Wagner Group, the truth appears to be more straightforward. The deployment of 200 military personnel to a high-risk combat zone of little strategic importance to Hungary may have been driven by the glory-seeking ambitions of Gáspár Orbán – the son of the outgoing prime minister and then-army captain – who wanted to save local Christians regardless of potential losses among his fellow soldiers. 

According to analysts in both the West and Russia, Orbán’s departure represents a significant strategic setback for Putin. Although Hungary is not a major military or economic power, it has played a crucial political role in advancing Russian interests. Moscow has lost its most valuable and long-cultivated “insider” within the European Union and NATO. As a legitimate European leader rather than a puppet, Orbán was the Kremlin’s most effective tool within the West. 

Moscow secures loyalty by offering cash, business opportunities, and political attention. Amplifying fears of migration, war, and the loss of national identity has helped to translate pro-Kremlin sentiments into local politics across the region. Now, with the collapse of the invincibility myth, other pillars of Russian influence in East-Central Europe may also be under threat. 

Moscow has lost its most valuable and long-cultivated “insider” within the European Union and NATO. […] Now, with the collapse of the invincibility myth, other pillars of Russian influence in East-Central Europe may also be under threat. 

Péter Magyar has said his government will seek pragmatic cooperation with Russia, particularly on energy, and an immediate “crusade” against Moscow is not in sight. Nevertheless, Hungary will cease to be a “spanner in the works” in the EU, enabling more coherent decision-making. Putin’s loss of his only real foothold in Europe is a significant setback for Russian foreign policy. 

The revolt of “deep Hungary” 

Much has been said and written about Péter Magyar, the mole within the system who has exposed its moral decay and corruption more than anyone else. Gábor Bruck, one of Hungary’s leading election campaign strategists, has said that in his many decades in the field, he has never witnessed a performance of such calibre. For around two years, Magyar travelled the length and breadth of the country – literally on foot for weeks at a time – visiting no fewer than 700 locations and reaching millions of citizens in person. Many Hungarians living outside Budapest had never had the opportunity to shake hands with or speak to a national politician. 

Counting on the support of Budapest – a long-standing stronghold of the anti-Fidesz liberal left – Magyar instead focused on the hidden, invisible Hungary of 2,500 villages and hundreds of small towns with populations of just a few thousand. The election results show that support for Tisza was spread across the whole country and not limited to the cities. Orbán’s electoral and cultural stronghold, “deep Hungary”, turned its back on him and embraced the vision of radical change promoted by Magyar. 

However, it would be reductive to focus solely on the top level of the Tisza Party. Magyar deserves historic credit for daring to issue an existential challenge to Orbán’s power within the unfair electoral system Orbán had established. Nevertheless, he had something that Orbán’s power machine lacked: a genuine grassroots movement with widespread support. In the years to come, Tisza will likely be studied as the model of a “popular front” democratic mobilisation, capable of uniting right, left and centre behind a common cause. 

The party’s structure was organised into three distinct yet loosely connected tiers. The first was Péter Magyar, a political animal with innate charisma, a huge capacity for work, and exceptional strategic instincts. András Körösényi, the doyen of Hungarian political scientists, pointed out that Magyar’s extraordinary success highlights not only the fragility of an autocratic system, but also an increasingly widespread and pronounced trend towards plebiscitary democracy. 

The second tier, which has so far been almost imperceptible, concerns the party as a formal political structure. With only a few dozen members, the party could easily be described as an electoral committee centred around its founder and natural leader. 

The third tier is perhaps the most intriguing. Since 2024, over two thousand “Tisza islands” have spontaneously formed in hundreds of Hungarian localities, including villages where there has probably been no political activity since 1945-46 or the turbulent days of the 1956 uprising. 

Although it is impossible to estimate the exact number, it is safe to say that hundreds of thousands of people have been actively involved in opposition politics over the past two years. This is in a country with barely eight million potential voters. The Tisza Islands have no legal status and are not formally affiliated with the small party headquarters. The members form a grassroots civic community of equals and have become a powerful example of informal, bottom-up democracy in a country that has lost its institutional democracy. After long complaining about the lack of civic commitment and interclass solidarity in Hungarian society, social scientists have finally found a topic of great interest: the emergence of a politically oriented social force outside the traditionally progressive capital city of Budapest. 

The best example of grassroots action came on election day, when Tisza mobilised 50,000 unpaid volunteers. Despite the personal risks, they dedicated themselves to political change – the first time this has happened in recent Hungarian history. Almost 5,000 civilians patrolled the polling stations most affected by Fidesz’s well-established vote-buying scheme. As the documentary film A szavazat ára (“The price of the vote”) revealed, this ranged from bussing voters to polling stations to handing out alcohol and drugs to addicts. Fidesz reportedly even threatened to take away people’s jobs or custody of their children. Vote-buying gained the ruling party more than 200,000 votes in 2022; its campaign strategists hoped it would secure up to twice that number in 2026. 

The presence of these volunteers, who were travelling around by car or motorcycle, managed to curb the phenomenon. In areas where “electoral tourism” had been most heavily monitored, observers prevented tens of thousands of people from voting fraudulently. 

Tisza is also leading a quiet gender revolution in a country where politics has always been heavily male-dominated. Women make up one-third of its parliamentary group, while only 17 of Fidesz’s 135 MPs during the previous parliamentary term were women. According to the party’s list, successful businesswoman Ágnes Forsthoffer will become president of the National Assembly, while the former diplomat and energy expert Anita Orbán has been designated foreign minister. 

The greater presence of women in the Tisza is not the result of compliance with “gender quotas”, but a sociological reality and cultural breakthrough. Female activism has played a decisive role in establishing and operating Tisza. These women are primarily middle-aged and active in the private sector. Dissatisfied with the state of the country, they have the time and practical experience of managing daily life to contribute to the community. 

Democratic culture 

All this said, the damage inflicted on representative democracy in Hungary between 2010 and 2026 will be long-lasting. Orbán’s System of National Cooperation found fertile ground due to the established pattern of patronage-based autocracy and the lack of functioning democratic models. 

The largely spontaneous social mobilisation that brought about the downfall of the Orbán regime is not enough to overcome the longstanding weakness of Hungary’s democratic culture. Magyar’s parliamentary supermajority enables him to dismantle the former power system brick by brick without putting the legal system under strain, as happened in Poland after the defeat of PiS in 2023. The question is whether he will be able to restrain his own almost unlimited power, or whether his charismatic leadership of the party will backfire when serious issues concerning democratic standards arise. 

Perhaps even more importantly, the new government will need to democratise the education system and political discourse. Mutual hate, grievances and scapegoating must be replaced by a new collaborative spirit. The hundreds of thousands of young people who voted for democracy and integration with the West should be given the opportunity to learn about democracy while attempting to implement it. 

The support received by the new elite on 12 April brings great historical responsibility. Magyar and his government will need to study the errors made during the 20-year experiment that began in 1989–90 in order to avoid repeating them. For example, the political reintegration of the former authoritarian elite should be preceded by a process of lustration; crimes should be prosecuted and publicly exposed. 

Above all, however, the new government must abandon the anti-democratic practices deeply rooted in the past century – from Miklós Horthy to Viktor Orbán and János Kádár – and establish a democratic state capable of addressing the numerous challenges of the current one. 

This article first appeared in Eurozine. It is republished here with permission.

1. Péter Zárug Farkas, Gábor Török: Orbán ​kora. Vázlat egy abszolút köztársaság felemelkedéséről, Budapest, L’Harmattan, 2026. ︎

Joe Redmayne reflects on the role of trades councils during the 1926 general strike

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The new economy of the Amazon Channel Comment brendan 5th May 2026 Teaser Media

Joint letter to Prime Minister Mark Carney on the urgency of the now-overdue Alberta-federal MOU on climate and energy policies, signed by the leaders of six leading climate and clean energy expert groups.Key facts on the Iran war and the energy...

The gleaming electric motors rolling off the production line at a factory in northeastern England offer an answer to one of the energy transition’s thorniest challenges.

The Advanced Electric Machines (AEM) plant outside Newcastle is at the forefront of building a new generation of motors made without rare earths, a group of 17 nearly indistinguishable metals used to manufacture most of the high-performance permanent magnets that power electric vehicles.

CEO James Widmer, a former aerospace engineer who founded the company in 2017, compares heavy reliance on rare earths in EV motors to the ill-fated decision to add lead to gasoline to resolve a technical issue.

“Putting rare earths in motors is the same thing,” Widmer told Climate Home News in a video call from his office. “You don’t need it, but somebody did it because it was easy.”

Widmer’s firm is among a handful of startup companies working with researchers to eliminate the need for rare earths in magnets and motors – offering a pathway to ease pressure on new mining and refining for one of the world’s most concentrated value chains.

Unease over China’s grip on supplies

As countries strive to reduce their climate-warming emissions by switching to electric transportation, demand for rare earths is soaring. That is increasing pressure for mining new resources and raising concerns about China’s supply chain domination.

China controls more than 90% of global rare earth separation and refining capacity and makes nearly all of the world’s permanent magnets – one of the building blocks of advanced technologies from EV motors and wind turbines vital to the energy transition to microchips, AI data centres and fighter jets. 

An employee assembling a motor at AEM’s factory outside Newcastle (Photo: Advanced Electric Machines)

Beijing spooked Western governments last year when it announced new export restrictions on supplies of rare earths and technological know-how in response to US tariffs on imports of Chinese goods. Automakers were left facing shortages. 

While some of Beijing’s retaliatory curbs were suspended within months, China’s willingness to use its industrial clout over technological chokepoints to advance its geopolitical objectives has injected momentum into the efforts of companies such as AEM to find alternatives to rare earths.

“The best way to avoid the problems with these materials…isn’t to drill, baby, drill. The best way is just not to use them in the first place,” said Widmer. 

Cutting that dependency would help shrink the environmental footprint of EV motors by keeping costly-to-extract rare earths in the ground, Widmer said.

Rare earth-free motors?

The auto industry had already been manufacturing electric motors using rare earth magnets for 20 years when Widmer set up AEM after conducting PhD research at the University of Newcastle.

Toyota’s Prius model, which is widely recognised as the first mass-produced hybrid passenger car, was launched in 1997 and used rare earth magnets in its motor.

About 80% of modern EV drivetrains now rely on high-performance rare earth permanent magnets to convert electricity into torque, according to a 2024 study, fuelling demand for the metals as EV adoption gains traction across the world, from Europe to South Asia.

Rapid electrification has doubled demand for magnet rare earths since 2015 and it is projected to increase by another 30% by 2030, according to the International Energy  Agency (IEA). It recently put the cost of adequately diversifying the supply chain at $60 billion over the next decade.

Demand for EVs and concerns over oil dependence have rocketed back onto the political agenda after the Iran war sparked unprecedented disruptions to global oil markets, reigniting simmering debates about supply chain sovereignty for energy.

James Widmer CEO of AEM, at the company’s factory outside Newcastle (Photo: Advanced Electric Machines)

Contrary to their name, rare earths are found nearly everywhere on the planet in small quantities. However, larger, economically viable deposits are difficult to find and costly to extract.

On top of the expense, getting rare earths out of the ground is energy-intensive and generates toxic waste and sometimes radioactive by-products. This has led to large-scale environmental damage in China and Myanmar, where unregulated mines have become a major source of rare earth elements and are driving environmental destruction and violence, according to NGOs.

Lighter, greener, less risky

Instead of rare earth magnets, AEM’s motors rely on electrical steel laminations – thin stacked sheets of specialised metal – that create a magnetic field when powered.

The company says its electric motors are more energy-efficient and, in some configurations, more power-dense than traditional rare earth motors and reduce the emissions and polluting waste associated with permanent magnet motor manufacturing processes. 

“And we’ve gotten rid of this enormous liability in the supply chain at the same time,” Widmer said.

• Mar 6, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier South African rare earths project aims to rival Chinese with low-cost model The EU-backed Zandkopsdrift project plans to offset the high cost of rare earths production with another mineral in hot demand for use in batteries Read more
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The company, which manufactures electric motors for passenger cars and trucks as well as for the agricultural and aerospace sectors, expects demand for its technology to grow as buyers become increasingly aware of the risks of supply chain disruption and the environmental harm caused by rare earth mining.

AEM’s motors are already being used in commercial vehicles, for example in truck axles in the Netherlands, and the company aims to expand into new regions through a joint venture with Indian manufacturing firm Sterling Tools, a company spokesperson said.

An employee working on a AEM rare earth-free motor in the company’s factory outside Newcastle (Photo: Advanced Electric Machines) ‘Reinventing the wheel’

Some 8,000 kilometres from AEM’s factory floor, a group of Silicon Valley engineers has been inundated with enquiries since Beijing announced its export restrictions on technologies to mine and smelt rare earths, magnet production and recycling. 

As manufacturers worried about shortages, the rare earths supply chain bottleneck became a board-level conversation and executives started scouting for alternatives, said Ankit Somani, a former Google engineer and the co-founder of Conifer.

“Every startup needs an unfair advantage – and that was ours,” he told Climate Home News, adding that the challenge is now to keep up with demand. 

The San Francisco-based startup’s technology removes rare earths from electric scooters and small delivery vehicles by placing the motor directly inside the wheel hub, an innovation it describes as “literally reinventing the wheel”. 

Co-founders Ankit Somani and Yateendra Deshpande speaking at Conifer’s research and development facility in Sunnyvale, California (Photo: Conifer)

To transfer power inside vehicles, the company uses a refined form of iron oxide – the same basic compound as rust – known as a ferrite magnet. 

Somani said the technology reduces the costs of manufacturing electric vehicles by eliminating the need for expensive rare earth supplies. 

Conifer’s first production line already produces 75,000 motor components a year in the city of Pune in western India, the hub of its manufacturing operations, where electric two- and three-wheelers are booming. 

To keep up with demand, the company is planning to open a 250,000-unit capacity facility, Somani said. 

The next generation of magnets

At Minnesota-based Niron Magnetics, which produces permanent magnets using iron nitride instead of rare earths, vice president Tom Grainger said last year’s supply chain disruption had been a wake-up call.

“What was always possible but never quite material – the risk of geopolitical interference in magnet supply chains – became real in 2025,” he told Climate Home News. 

In contrast to magnets that depend on Chinese rare earth supplies, the company’s iron nitride magnets are made from the abundant and inexpensive elements, iron and nitrogen.

Niron estimates that iron nitride magnets could replace roughly two-thirds of the global permanent magnet market.

• Feb 25, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier Battery passport plan aims to clean up the industry powering clean energy Some of the world’s largest battery makers are piloting a scheme led by the Global Battery Alliance to reward manufacturers that meet social and environmental standards Read more
• Mar 26, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier Dutch startup’s rust-powered batteries could help crack Europe’s energy storage gap Ore Energy says its long-duration batteries made of iron and air can help Europe cut its dependence on critical minerals supply chains and boost renewables Read more
• Nov 3, 2025 Clean Energy Frontier Self-taught mechanics give second life to Jordan’s glut of spent EV batteries As EV sales boom in Jordan, a lack of formal infrastructure for dealing with end-of-life batteries is leading to some innovative solutions Read more

Niron Magnetics’ first consumer-facing magnet, used in a professional loudspeaker, was rolled out earlier this year and the firm has already received investment from automotive giants General Motors, Stellantis and parts provider Magna International. 

The company is developing its first full-scale manufacturing plant in Sartell, Minnesota, which aims to produce up to 1,500 tonnes of magnets annually when it opens in 2027, targeting consumer electronics, as well as the automobile sector, data-centre cooling pumps, robotics and drones. 

By Chinese standards, that is a modest start: a typical factory in China can produce between 5,000 and 20,000 tonnes of rare earth magnets, said Grainger. But Niron’s model is designed to be replicated anywhere with basic industrial infrastructure. Unlike rare earth processing, it requires no proximity to a mine or complex chemical permitting. 

“The goal…is a factory that has the scale to deliver in sufficient quantities for large programmes – with the economics that come with scale,” Grainger said. 

The firm is already looking for a second site in the US to build a 10,000-tonne per year facility, equivalent to approximately 1-2% of the global permanent magnet market share, according to the company. 

Governments ramp up support

Anxious to protect their industries from potential supply gaps, Western countries are supporting research into innovative rare earth alternatives.

Jean-Michel Lamarre, a team leader at Canada’s National Research Council, said  the government’s science agency, which has been developing rare earth-free motor technologies, is working on using 3D printing to produce magnets. 

Lamarre said that while removing rare earths from electric motors significantly reduces the costs of materials, making new designs commercially viable remains a challenge. 

Difficulties include scaling up manufacturing capability and responding to rapidly changing market conditions, a spokesperson for Canada’s Department of Natural Resources said.

Conifer’s motor assembly plant in Pune, India (Photo: Conifer)

The US, Canada and the European Union have announced billions in subsidies and financial support to mine and produce more of the materials themselves, as well as funding research on rare earths substitutes. The US government is also investing heavily in American rare earths and magnet producers.  

Recycling rare earth elements from discarded computers, motors and wind turbines also has a role to play in boosting domestic production, said Nicola Morley, a professor of materials physics at the University of Sheffield in the UK, who advises major manufacturers including Siemens and Volkswagen.

Recycling alone has the potential to reduce the need for primary rare earths supplies by up to 35% by 2050, according to the IEA.

Today, around 1% of the rare earths used in end-products is recycled because of technical and economic challenges. But startups are seizing on interest in creating circular supply chains that reduce reliance on China.

Better than rare earths

While recycling may be a relatively quick way for major markets to bolster their supplies of magnet metals, some researchers expect scientists to come up with groundbreaking alternatives to rival rare earths within a matter of years.

At Georgetown University in Washington DC, physicist Kai Liu and his team are working to create new materials for magnet production using a machine that bombards atoms of up to six different metals onto a surface simultaneously – like six games of pool played at once. As they land, the atoms bond into new crystal structures, which Liu’s team tests for magnetic properties. 

Their research has already led to a discovery of magnet materials, Liu said, adding that he is hopeful for further breakthroughs by the scientific community.

“I am cautiously optimistic that within the next five to 10 years, the community might find something comparable or better than rare earths,” he said.

Main image: An employee working on an AEM motor at the company’s factory outside Newcastle (Photo: Advanced Electric Machines)

The post The energy transition has a rare earth problem: These startups are solving it appeared first on Climate Home News.

When Cara Leibowitz, a wheelchair user and disability studies professor in New York City, peered outside her window after one of the East Coast’s many winter snowstorms, she realized she was completely stuck inside.

“I’d look out and I’d be like, ‘Oh, the sidewalk isn’t too bad,’” she said. “And then I’d look at the curb cut, and I’d be like, ‘Oh, never mind. Guess I’m not going outside today.’”

This experience is a common one for disabled people during snowstorms and other severe weather events. Disabled people in cities all over the East Coast suffered this winter due to cities’ lack of planning for how to ensure mobility for disabled people in the aftermath of the snowstorms. 

This was a tough winter; approximately 123 million people faced above-average snow accumulation, the highest amount in five years. This has also been the winter with the most extreme cold in over two decades for large portions of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic regions.

Disabled people living in East Coast cities faced similar challenges this winter: the snow blocked sidewalks and curb cuts for weeks, preventing residents from accessing necessary medical care, causing increased physical pain, and the emotional loss of social activities. 

These experiences are not just anecdotal. Research has shown that wheelchair users make fewer trips outside per day and travel shorter distances during winter months, with the gap widening sharply on days with snow accumulation. A study conducted after Winter Storm Uri in 2021 found that Texas households with a disabled person had more service disruptions, adverse experiences, and slower recovery after the storm compared to households without any disabled people.

Of course, the snows of winter have long since melted, but advocates say that is never too early for cities to begin preparing for next season to better incorporate accessibility. 

Snow problems

Advocates say snow causes real safety concerns for the many disabled people who are trapped inside.

“It makes me feel like our government officials think or care very little of the independence and safety of people with disabilities because they are knowingly putting us at increased risk,” said Germán Parodi, the co-executive director of The Partnership for Inclusive Disaster Strategies, which focuses on equity, access, and inclusion of disabled people before, during, and after disasters and emergencies.

“When a disaster happens, like a massive winter storm, it is the government’s responsibility, the city’s responsibility, the local government’s responsibility to provide safety for the people living in that area,” continued Parodi, a wheelchair user in Philadelphia. “Keeping mountains of snow on curb cuts is not only a risk factor for people with disabilities who use mobility aids, but an argument can be made that it is a failure for the whole community.”

In many cities, property owners are legally required to clear snow and ice from the adjacent sidewalks and curb cuts. But just one forgotten stretch of sidewalk can make an entire path unusable for disabled people. More cities could adopt a system like New York’s, where day laborers are paid to shovel sidewalks, but even that program didn’t quickly create clear paths across a wide area of even that most-walkable city. 

Sometimes, the sidewalks were cleared, but the path wasn’t wide enough for wheelchair users to be able to use it. Emma Albert, a wheelchair user and master’s student at Northeastern University in Boston, got stuck in the snow multiple times and had to rely on her friends to free her. Her experiences violate Boston’s snow removal policy, which specifies that property owners must clear at least a 42-inch-wide path within three hours of the snow stopping or otherwise face a fine.

“A lot of the pathways that they paved weren’t wide enough for my wheelchair to get through. I called them ‘Ozempic paths,'” she said. “Obviously a wheelchair can’t fit through this, but also I don’t know how anyone is fitting through this path.”

Physical and social harm

Many disabled people experienced a worsening in their physical condition due to being stuck inside when it snowed.

“Winter is a worse time for me physically in general,” said Kelly Mack, a wheelchair user and writer in Washington. So the aquatic therapy followed by the whirlpool are things that help me maintain my strength, and I definitely lost strength and I was having worse chronic pain.”

Bri Arce, a student in Philadelphia with multiple disabilities, has occasional chronic pain that can interfere with her walking. The snow made her pain worse as well.

“I’m already in pain, I can barely keep my balance. The last thing I needed was to be trudging through thick piles of snow and darn near slipping on ice every two seconds, so it just made the journey a lot harder,” she said.

Snow doesn’t only harm people with mobility disabilities; it also gets in the way of people with visual disabilities.

Kenia Flores, a policy advocate in Washington who is blind and uses a white cane, said the snow made it difficult for her to navigate. At times, Flores had to rely on others to help guide her while she walked, even though she is usually fully independent. 

“I feel very confident using my cane, but what’s like kind of scary is even if you feel a clear path, you don’t know what awaits you on the other side if there’s more ice or more snow,” she said.

The winter weather has also caused social isolation, as Albert of Boston explained. 

“It’s definitely been really frustrating in terms of having to say no to plans that I wanted to go to or trying to go to plans that I was excited about and then realizing that I wouldn’t be able to get there,” Albert said.  

Planning for the future

There are some resources available to disabled people during snowstorms. The Partnership runs a Disability and Disaster Hotline that provides information, referrals, and other resources to disabled people seeking urgent disaster-related needs. Parodi said 13 percent of the calls they received in 2026 have been related to snow, such as inquiries about disruptions to basic needs and services, damage to property not fully covered by insurance, and problems getting food and other supplies. 

Much of the work to clear snow after severe storms falls on individual cities, but this is clearly a systemic issue, according to Parodi, due to a lack of national leadership focused on accessibility in emergency management. He said it is unclear who is currently leading the Disability and Integration Division of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Additionally, because the partial Department of Homeland Security shutdown includes FEMA, the agency was operating at reduced capacity for much of the winter.

Advocates mainly want cities to listen to the voices of disabled residents, perhaps, as Parodi has called for, by creating committees focused on the needs of disabled people during disasters.

“Those spaces need to be accessible, physically, communication, programmatically, and compensation needs to be built in for the time and expertise that members of these community will be contributing and spending to properly identify your localities’ issues, gaps, and opportunities in disasters,” he said. “So there is no one blanket answer, but bring your community.”

• As funding for transit from the Biden administration dries up, Americans who live in food deserts and can’t afford cars increasingly have problems accessing groceries, with some paying money they don’t have for delivery service because they have no other option. (The Guardian)
• Unless wages, safety and scheduling flexibility improve, the shortage of workers at transit agencies is likely to worsen, according to the American Public Transportation Association. (Smart Cities Dive)
• This list of cities with the most frustrating commutes doesn’t include a lot of surprises. (The Hill)
• Amtrak is considering making it easier to carry guns onboard trains, even though that’s how the man accused of trying to assassinate President Trump last month traveled to Washington, D.C. (Baltimore Banner)
• An NYU study found that a significant proportion of shared bike and scooter trips replace car trips, but those networks do not reach far enough into low-income neighborhoods.
• Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey is introducing legislation that differentiates between e-bikes/scooters and faster, more dangerous types of two-wheeled transportation like motorcycles, which the administration said would protect pedestrians while keeping the safety focus on trucks and SUVs. (Streetsblog MASS)
• California is going to start citing driverless vehicles for violating traffic laws. If a Waymo breaks the law, the company gets the ticket. (CNET)
• Amtrak is discontinuing a route between Fort Worth and Oklahoma City after those respective states failed to include funding in their budgets. As a result, a proposal to extend the line to Kansas is probably kaput. (KERA)
• According to Greater Greater Washington‘s analysis of D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s long-suppressed congestion pricing study, drivers would benefit the most from the policy because of the time they’d save as a result of would reduce congestion.
• Pittsburgh is seeking input from residents on their perception of mobility and transportation safety. (WPXI)
• After a month-long education campaign, Richmond is now ticketing drivers who park in bike lanes. (12 On Your Side)
• Urbanist gamers have more choices than Sim City. (Planetizen)

Hoo boy. The stupid and evil, somehow accelerating, burn. America's so-called leader, the "Worst That Has Ever Drawn Breath," manifests ever more cognitive dissonance on steroids. Absurd, addled, vindictive, looming above "a circus of death and chaos," he commits war crimes, guts voting rights, plots devastation, abases decency, murders mercy, yet whines about mean jokes. But as America reels, Banksy, Bruce, Platner and others increasingly declare, "We are not fucking doing this anymore."

Amidst what the head of Amnesty International calls "the year of the predators," humanity itself is under attack, most notably by our ludicrous narcissist and his "casual, bewildering cruelty." Despite his foolishness, Nesrine Malik writes, "This is what evil looks like": See history's portrayals of Hitler - "the startling insignificance of this man who has set the world agog" - and Mussolini, "that funny man, that consummate buffoon." Trump's "farcical puniness," Malik notes, is "a projection onto the world, not of large intent, but of smallness and fear...The consequences of his violence are secondary to the validation that comes from inflicting it (to) erase his terror of humiliation (and) feed his sociopathic appetite for escalation." Thus can deeply silly still equal dangerous.

Daily, the large and small atrocities are both, albeit without the resonance of the label "fascist" only because he lacks the wit, intent and coherence it requires. The war in Iran veers on: "Another day, another pivot. Trump flails." It's won, not, won but not by enough, it's not a war, we made a deal, we don't want a deal, talks are going well, we don't wanna talk, Iran struck a school full of young girls, or if we did it's Obama's fault. Give me ballroom or give me death: The solution to gun violence that kills 12 children a day, wounds 32 more and has affected over 390,000 kids since Columbine - is to build one rich white guy who's never expressed any grief over any of them a gilded bunker of his own. The way to keep more people safe is to kill as many as possible, including by firing squad.

Also, Bill Maher, Hakeem Jeffries, Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel are low IQ losers, James Comey tried to kill and "inflict bodily harm on" him with "aggravated beachy seashell pictures," he's so "young, vital, vibrant" he could've joined the Artemis II astronauts easy like he aced his three screening tests for dementia - "A lion, a giraffe, a bear, and a shark. Which one is the bear?" - which the Villages audience def couldn't do, ditto sketchy Harvard Law graduate Hussein Obama. America's response to his musing what we'd do if a con man moron turned up - "How do you get to be president and you're stupid?": "That would suck - we'd probably have unprovoked wars, high gas prices and all our allies would hate us," "He's so close to getting it," "The Irony Meter is dead after spontaneously combusting," and "You're a fucking moron." Also, so grotesquely weird.

Latest bonkers Jesus/doctor post with an umbilical-cord-eating eagle. Nothing to see here.Image from Truth Social

Meanwhile, the Orwellian rules for what you can/can’t see/say keep spooling out, lies sold as half-truths to justify a brazen, racist, whitewashing of both present and past under the shameless moniker of content “inappropriately disparaging Americans past or living,” but always white. Among dozens of changes at our National Parks, gone are signs about the contributions of Native Americans and women, warnings about climate change "not grounded in real science," evidence of Founding Fathers owning slaves and explorers' atrocities against Native tribes. But you do get Trump's loathsome mug plastered on park passes, like on our money, buildings, passports ad nauseum. Happily, fighting back for years have been patriots like the Resistance Rangers, the Alt National Park Service and whatever genius slapped these "Sex Offender" flyers across D.C.'s parks.

Hence incrementally, far too slowly but feeding vital hope and our frayed spirits, the flip side of our grim absurdist timeline begins to emerge as Trump and his monstrous clowns flail, fail, dig their own dank holes. So many horrors should have sparked it -Gaza, ICE, USAID, the boundless greed, cruelty, stupidity. Instead, prices did it, a non-stop, staggering incompetence that saw people being screwed once too often and lied to about one too many senseless wars. Last week, Banksy registered his own anti-imperialist protest in a middle-of-the-night dropping into the heart of ceremonial London a large statue mocking such Blind Patriotism. Mirroring the classical style of surrounding monuments celebrating the British Empire's inglorious colonial past, he presents a suited man, his flag flying into his face, one foot poised to step off into his own demise. Much like, you know.

Banksy's new Blind Nationalism art work amidst London's colonial monumentsImage from Banksy Instagram page

Kicking off his Land of Hope and Dreams American tour several weeks ago, Bruce Springsteen offered his own fiery rebuttal to "a corrupt, incompetent, racist, reckless and treasonous administration," which drew roars from a huge first night crowd in Minneapolis. Equal parts celebration and call to action, The Boss insisted, "This is still America, and - shades of the Big Lebowski, "this will not stand." Summoning "the righteous power of art, music and rock and roll in dangerous times," he asked the crowd to "join with us in choosing hope over fear, democracy over authoritarianism, the rule of law over lawlessness, ethics over unbridled corruption, resistance over complacency, unity over division, and peace over....(lights come up to segue into) "WAR! What is it good for? Absolutely nothin'!" complete with Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello shredding a solo. A righteous, dynamic pair.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

In contrast, standing grotesque and slumped-shouldered in a dingy, empty corner, is the small, mad man-child who spent Monday bellowing to a weary world that Iran will be "blown off the face of the Earth" if it targets U.S. ships in the Strait of Hormuz, which his inane recklessness closed in the first place. Online, in "the most desperate shit" to ever make its demonic way from the White House, a juvenile lackey posted him saying, "Winning it" on a loop for over 60 minutes, which still didn't make it so. The text read, "Can't stop, won't stop." Please fucking do. A horrified America: "This is a real tweet from a real account about a real man who leads a real country." Kyle Kulinski, on "the war criminal of all war criminals" who makes genocidal threats and bleats about insults: “We are not fucking doing this anymore. You don't get to say shit."

Still, one Tom Wellborn says it best in, “A Eulogy for the Worst That Has Ever Drawn Breath,” subtitled “Being a Complete and Unflinching Account of the Most Loathsome Specimen Ever to Consume Resources, Occupy Space, and Insult the Patience of a Universe That Deserved So Much Better." "There are villains, and then there are monsters, and then there are creatures so cosmically, transcendently... terrible that language itself recoils," he begins. "Grammar buckles. Syntax weeps...He is this thing. He is the thing past the thing past the thing. He is the sub-basement of the human condition, the moldy crawlspace beneath that sub-basement, and the writhing centipede beneath that."

"He has no morals. Not a single one. Not even the bad morals that at least imply a moral framework: the corrupt cop who loves his dog, the mob boss who goes to church. No. He exists in a morality vacuum so total that ethicists have proposed naming it after him...A being entirely without moral content. Not evil, because evil requires intention. Simply absent of the entire apparatus...A moral negative space shaped vaguely like a man...He has no empathy....like a raisin...He is incapable of the most basic social theater that even sociopaths manage....He takes without asking. He takes everything without asking. He takes things that aren’t takeable...The principle being: I can....He is stupid in a way that is almost majestic...His stupidity (is) total. Unified....He has been wrong about everything, always, without exception..."

"He is callous the way concrete is callous: not through malice, not through choice, but through an utter material inability to register (another) person’s pain...You could show him the face of grief, and he would wonder aloud if there was parking nearby...He is vicious the way a blunt instrument is vicious: through sheer, undirected force, through the momentum of his own awfulness...He is smelted fury with no purpose, unforged, unbent, uselessly molten....(He is) a statistical outlier so extreme that evolution seems to be embarrassed by him, a glitch in the long project of civilization...And the most horrifying part...He will never know any of this. He will never know what he is." Name it, damn it, take it down. Maine's Graham Platner hopes to help do that. We wish him well.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

Boletínes periódicos de TGA Suscribirse Puedes sucribirse en la página página de RiseUp. Última entrega * TEJIENDO ALTERNATIVAS #19: Educación y aprendizaje II (Abril de 2026) Anteriores (en español) * [TEJIENDO ALTERNATIVAS #05] Poder y Democracia * [TEJIENDO ALTERNATIVAS #06] Cambio Climático y Alternativas * TEJIENDO ALTERNATIVAS #07 Para Gustavo Esteva (1936-2022), in memoriam

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This article was written by Eduardo González‑Sargas, a Colorado State University research scientist and ecologist whose work focuses on river and restoration ecology.For more than a decade...

Energy and economic security can be rapidly reinforced by stopping gas loss. The amount of methane vented and leaked into the air today by the global oil and gas industry is even greater than the total pre-war volume of gas passing through the Strait of Hormuz. When flared gas is added, this overall energy waste is equal to over one-half of worldwide LNG exports.

With energy markets roiling over the loss of 20% of the gas volume traveling through this chokepoint, companies have a responsibility to stop their gas loss on energy security grounds alone. Moreover, given price hikes due to the ongoing conflict, there are immediate economic benefits for selling rather than wasting their gas.

Texas’s oil and gas industry spotlights this massive energy and economic opportunity. Preventing gas venting and flaring in Texas alone could make up the total lost gas volume due to current disruptions in the Persian Gulf. Preventing gas waste and accurately accounting for companies’ self-reported gas loss is not only fair practice, but it also has paybacks for industry and increases resource royalties to the Texas state budget. By keeping gas in the pipe and out of the air, operators can also safeguard people and the planet. As one of the world’s biggest oil and gas producers, Texas serves as a case study to investigate and quantify how companies can step up to bolster energy, economic, and climate security by stopping gas loss.

Reducing system inefficiencies bolsters energy security

There are inefficiencies in oil and gas industry operations that lead to gas waste and methane emissions. The industry acknowledges it. Mitigating product loss, which is paramount when energy supplies are constrained, can be prevented by tighter oversight, better operations, and strategic investments.

Gas loss is becoming increasingly visible due to advances in satellites, sensors, and continuous monitoring. Ongoing measurements are creating alignment around a new priority: turning actionable data into operational decisions that improve reliability, reduce costs, offer payback, and increase production efficiency. The barrier is no longer technology, but workflows — ensuring that actionable insights reach engineers and operators in time to drive change.

Over 10,000 plumes have been spotted in Texas alone over the past several years, amounting to some hundreds of tons of wasted methane gas. A recent gas release spewing over three tons of methane was detected on the eastern edge of the Permian Basin in Texas, as shown below. The two leaks detected by Carbon Mapper at this site, which persisted for two days, wasted as much energy as it takes to dry over 300,000 loads of laundry.

Sample methane plume spotted in Texas by satellites Source: Carbon Mapper Data Portal, Accessed April 14, 2026.

Lowering the volume of gas we waste heightens energy security because more gas makes it to market. Conversely, supply shocks trigger fuel shortages, especially in import-dependent nations. And energy insecurity drives up the price of oil and gas, leading to inflation and economic insecurity.

Preventing gas waste produces revenue streams and boosts economic security

Methane is the main component in gas, and is also co-produced with oil. When it’s allowed to escape into the atmosphere, it’s sheer energy and material waste. When kept in the pipe and sold, it’s a valuable commodity. Moreover, when companies minimize their operational inefficiencies, the gains are transformed into economic benefits for communities in the form of increased revenues, royalties, and jobs.

The industry knows its gas value proposition. When prices are high, gas loss drops. It then rises when prices are low, as plotted for the United States below.

On a global scale, the estimated 81 million metric tons of methane that the oil and gas industry squanders annually through venting and leaking its gas has an estimated economic value today of $20 billion to 50 billion a year, depending on highly variable gas prices. (See endnote for assumptions). In terms of overall financial opportunities, the economic loss of wasted gas is twice as great when also accounting for the additional 150 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas that is flared worldwide. Given the high volatility of global gas prices, foregone revenue streams, royalties, and resource rents from wasted gas are a material corporate and national concern.

Stopping methane emissions rapidly improves climate security

Methane is over 80 times more powerful at heating Earth over its decade-long lifetime. In other words, every metric ton of methane that is stopped or avoided dramatically lowers damages wrought by droughts, flash floods, excess heat, firestorms, and other climate-driven disasters. The fastest path to reducing methane emissions is improving oil and gas industry operations to prevent gas loss. The companies that succeed in this quest are those that can keep their gas in the pipe.

Improved measurement, models, and methodologies are enabling the shift from data insights to durable action. For example, Carbon Mapper’s data portal identifies large point source methane-emitting events. This focuses operators’ attention on rapidly fixing their super-emitting assets. Separately, NASA’s Black Marble product analyzes nightlights using the VIIRS satellite to make gas flaring data publicly available. And ClimateTRACE quantifies wide-ranging oil and gas industry methane emissions between countries.

Drilling down in Texas

RMI’s study, Drilling Down on Gas Loss, finds that Texas oil and gas operators’ self-reported gas loss is likely 3–4.5 times higher than what is currently self-reported. This results in energy waste and methane emissions that are highly variable across basins, well types, and production volumes, as mapped below.

For example, in February 2026, Carbon Mapper detected a plume in Big Spring, Texas (illustrated above) that emitted 3.4 tons of methane per hour. Coincidentally, this major gas release is in Howard County, Texas, the same county that RMI’s study identified as highly wasteful. Together, bottom-up and top-down analyses can provide real-world validation of gas loss.

Across Texas, the volume of wasted gas identified in this state alone could yield some 15.6 bcm per year of marketable gas. In 2024, before gas prices recently spiked, over $1 billion in Texas’s gas value was forgone, with associated lost tax revenue of nearly $100 million. Today, this amounts to $1.6 billion in forgone gas value at current Henry Hub gas prices.

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Over half of the gas wasted in Texas is attributed to low-volume oil wells that intentionally vent their gas (predominantly methane) directly into the air. This loss is under operators’ control. Moreover, this intentional waste is frequently disguised through under- or false reporting. Nearly one-half of Texas’s company-operated oil leases reported zero gas produced or zero gas loss during at least one month in 2024. Gas leases more accurately reported their product loss.

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Why industry needs to accurately report and stop gas loss

The sizeable gas loss in Texas alone masks the scale of energy waste from an industry that is largely promoting waste reduction. For example, at CERAWeek 2026 — the largest energy convening in Houston, Texas — numerous companies made clear that the oil and gas industry is ready to treat methane and wasted gas not just as an environmental liability, but as signals of operational inefficiency and lost economic value.

Some operators note that spikes in flaring during production is too common, reinforcing the need for actionable, real-time data to improve operations. Other operators emphasize that methane mitigation is becoming embedded in operational excellence, with reductions made through equipment upgrades. Across international and national oil and gas companies, the message was consistent: better data leads to better operations — reducing downtime, improving process control, and modernizing equipment — which directly translates into lower emissions and economic gains.

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When companies reduce gas waste, they not only make a difference to their bottom lines. The war in the Middle East highlights a devastating reminder that preventing gas loss is also a matter of energy security. All told, some 112 billion cubic meters of gas passes through the Strait of Hormuz annually. Remarkably, this disrupted trade volume that is upending global energy markets is just a fraction of the 280 billion cubic meters of gas that oil and gas companies discard through venting and flaring every year. We have the policy and market tools to prevent gas loss. If acted on, this will win-win-win, significantly bolstering energy, economic, and environmental security.

Acknowledgment: Thank you to Dwayne Purvis (Purvis Energy Advisors) for his lead on the Texas study, Drilling Down on Gas Loss.

Endnotes: These calculations assume (1) a methane content in gas of 74%–85%; (2) methane density of 0.657 kilograms per cubic meter; (3) a heat conversion of 1038 btu per cubic foot; (4) resource pricing of $3.70 per million British Thermal Units (MMbtu) for pipelined natural gas anchored on Henry Hub; (5) $11.33 per 1000 cubic feet for LNG; (6) 2024 Waha Gas Hub and Henry Hub prices of $0.21 to 2.21/MMbtu, respectively; (7) April’s Henry Hub gas spot price is computed as $2.79 per MMbtu for 2026.

The post Stopping Global Gas Loss in Its Tracks appeared first on RMI.

A proposed rule would declassify “chemical recycling” as incineration. We think that’s a bad idea.