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The resolution would open doors to speculative trade on seeds, making it prohibitively expensive for peasant farmers and Indigenous peoples who feed the territories.

The post Chile: Peasant And Indigenous Organizations Reject Government Proposal To Commercialize Peasant Seeds appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.

Footy for Climate, founded by two ex AFL stars, aims to install solar and battery at more than 500 local sporting clubs by 2030, delivering savings of $5 million.

The post Footy for Climate: Ex AFL stars help football and netball club with new solar and battery system appeared first on Renew Economy.

Tucked among forested slopes and pristine valleys in a corner of northeastern India, young villagers have been busy knocking on doors – hoping to convince sceptical elders that graphite mining would bring much-needed jobs to their distant region.

“The youth in our village migrate to cities for work. What’s better than to have jobs near home?” Gollo Doni, a farmer and secretary of the local youth association, told Climate Home News as he and other members in their 20s discussed the latest meetings between locals and representatives of Oil India Limited (OIL), a state company exploring graphite and vanadium reserves in Arunachal Pradesh.

The mining plans in the state, which is home to more than one-third of India’s graphite reserves and the subject of a sovereignty dispute with China, reflect a push by the Indian government to position itself as a leading producer of battery-grade graphite as the mass rollout of batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) and power storage drives demand for the mineral.

• Jun 18, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier Warning against ‘consumer club’ as G7 forms critical minerals alliance G7 countries want to reduce their reliance on China for minerals and protect supplies from geopolitical interests but experts see few benefits for developing nations Read more
• Jun 10, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier Brazil jostles for rare earths share as US-China rivalry heats up With the world’s second-largest reserves of rare earths after China, Brazil is catching the eye of US and Chinese companies – spurring the government’s critical minerals policy push Read more
• May 26, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier After another battery startup bankruptcy, can Europe ever cut reliance on China? Norway’s Morrow Batteries set out to challenge Chinese producers, but a cash crunch forced it to file for bankruptcy in a setback for European ambitions for clean energy sovereignty Read more

An average electric car contains about 60 kg of graphite anode materials, according to the International Energy Agency, and the graphite supply chain is heavily dominated by China, which produces about 80% of the world’s natural graphite and controls more than 90% of global refining.

As Western countries seek to reduce their dependency on China, India’s reserves of graphite and other minerals vital for the switch to clean energy have caught governments’ attention, with Germany signing a critical minerals partnership agreement in January.

Ambitious plans

But hurdles remain to India’s ambitious plans to ramp up critical minerals output, both to position itself as an alternative to China and to meet its own fast-growing needs.

India has a target for 30% of new vehicle sales to be electric by 2030, and demand for EV lithium batteries looks set to surge close to 35-fold between 2023 and 2035, according to S&P Global Mobility, driven by growth in two- and three-wheelers in the country of 1.4 billion people.

Although domestic manufacturing of EV batteries is expanding, the sector remains at an early stage and India depends heavily on imports from China, South Korea and Japan.

Gollo Doni (left) and other members of the All Pith-Seer Youth Welfare Association meet to discuss graphite exploration around Phop village in Arunachal Pradesh, India (Photo: Cheena Kapoor)

At the same time, it wants to get graphite processing off the ground, aiming to turn its reserves of the mineral – which rank among the world’s 10 biggest – into higher value battery-grade supplies.

The energy transition has a rare earth problem: These startups are solving it

With exploration already underway, the next step should be starting discussions about developing processing facilities – including support from foreign partners, said Kaira Rakheja, South Asia energy analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA).

“These exploration and extraction projects have a long gestation period. So even if discussions on processing start now, it will still take a while,” she said, noting India’s simultaneous push to create “rare earth corridors” encompassing every step of production.

Hurdles ahead

India’s graphite reserves are mainly of a lower grade, however, making processing for use in battery anodes more complex, while the country is a late entrant.

“We are not a big player in the market and have missed the bus,” said Aditya Ramji, director of the Global South Clean Transportation Centre at the University of California, Davis.

While exploration work is already underway at several sites in Arunachal Pradesh, and at some places in eastern and southern India, production will take at least two years to start, said Tana Tage, director at the Centre for the Earth Sciences and Himalayan Studies, OIL’s local partner and holder of a 10% stake in the Phop project. 

Graphite powder, used for battery paste, is pictured in a Volkswagen pilot line for battery cell production in Salzgitter, Germany, May 18, 2022. German carmaker will launch its so called “Mission SalzGiga”, a plant for battery cell production, including battery recycling, on July 7, 2022. REUTERS/Fabian Bimmer Graphite powder, used for battery paste, is pictured in a Volkswagen pilot line for battery cell production in Salzgitter, Germany, May 18, 2022. German carmaker will launch its so called “Mission SalzGiga”, a plant for battery cell production, including battery recycling, on July 7, 2022. REUTERS/Fabian Bimmer

A mine would create about 300 jobs and the project’s partners are discussing options for processing the site’s medium- to high-grade graphite locally, Tage added, despite voicing concern about a lack of technological know-how. 

“India does not have the large-scale, advanced processing capabilities to achieve the ultra-high purity levels required for EV batteries and clean technologies,” he told Climate Home News.

Diversification drive

Despite such challenges, industry experts say India could benefit from the push to find sources of battery graphite other than China.

“We can’t beat China in this space, but we can still create a space for ourselves in buying and selling, as everyone is looking for a space to diversify,” said Rishabh Jain, fellow at the Council on Energy, Environment  and Water, a New Delhi-based think-tank.

India’s government hopes the bilateral memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed with Germany could help.

A graphite deposits visible on a hillside near the village of Phop, Arunachal Pradesh, India (Photo: Cheena Kapoor)

As well as pledging cooperation on critical minerals exploration, the declaration envisions the exchange of know-how to add value through processing and recycling, facilitating investment and building the supply chain resilience of both countries. That could include identifying joint research projects and facilitating cooperation between industry players.

• Jun 5, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier The scramble to stockpile critical minerals could drive up energy transition costs Researchers warn that uncoordinated stockpiling could push up prices of minerals needed for clean energy technologies and delay their roll out Read more
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• May 27, 2026 Clean Energy Frontier Recycling could meet half of Europe’s critical mineral needs by 2050 A new report by an EU-funded research project says the bloc could harness its “urban mines” to reduce its dependence on China for energy transition minerals Read more

“India and Germany will work together to mutually strengthen supply chains in the field of critical minerals,” a spokesperson for the German government’s energy strategy said. “We will encourage companies to build strong ties in terms of knowledge sharing, offtake agreements and investments.”

Germany is already supporting several domestic projects focused on converting graphite into battery anode material – valuable experience that could potentially be shared with India, said Rakheja. In return for shared technical expertise, India offers a strong pool of workforce talent and a big market.

“This way, both partners can look beyond China,” she said.

India sets achievable green electricity and emissions intensity targets

The MoU, which is non-binding, is “a good start”, said Svenja Schöneich, a senior advisor at the NGO Germanwatch, adding that it was thin on details, including on how to add value to India’s critical mineral resources.

“The partnership document should figure out the problem of local value creation. It should also consider that it can’t really skip processing through China,” Schöneich said.

An official at India’s Mining Ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

Trade deals and tax breaks

Beyond the five-year German accord, India has implemented numerous policy measures aimed at securing its own supplies of critical minerals and adding value to its mineral exports, for example by signing favourable trade deals. Last year, India’s graphite was granted zero-duty access to the US, just as the tariffs on Chinese graphite imports climbed to a high 160%. 

When the government announced the national budget in February, it included a raft of financial measures aimed at kickstarting a plan to process minerals domestically – the details of which are expected to be announced in the coming months.

They included zero customs duty on critical mineral inputs and enhanced tax deductions for exploration, while the government’s production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme allocated the equivalent of $1.87 billion to build domestic battery cell manufacturing.

Before that can happen, progress on new mining – such as the Arunachal Pradesh graphite projects – is vital, Jain said.

“We are in 2026, and looking to move towards a cleaner world. This is the future,” he said.

The state government in Arunachal Pradesh agrees. It called last year for fast-tracked environmental permitting for graphite projects, new infrastructure around mine sites and reforms to avoid legal disputes that could hold the sector back. 

Gollo Kami, 60, a cardamom farmer and a traditional hunter has lived all his life in Phop village. He worries about the impact of mining on the local environment (Photo: Cheena Kapoor)

Back in the village of Phop, youth association secretary Doni said that while reluctant residents did not raise an objection to OIL’s preliminary exploration licence, he fears a bigger fight ahead.

Tage said up to 3,000 people could ultimately be displaced if the project proceeds, raising questions about whether economic benefits would outweigh the social and environmental costs.

“It has been difficult to make the elders agree to actual mining,” Doni said, as he and other young villagers sipped on sweet tea in a thatched mountain house. “We are trying to convince our elders that mining will not only bring resources for the nation, but bring us jobs here.”

This article was produced as part of the India-Germany Climate and Energy Journalism Programme organised by Clean Energy Wire, supported by Heinrich Böll Stiftung.

The post India looks to untapped graphite riches for slice of critical minerals boom appeared first on Climate Home News.

Uncertainty around the timeline for closure of Australia's remaining coal generators are having a material impact on investment on new wind projects needed to replace them.

The post Coal closure “interventions” are stifling investment in the very projects needed to replace them appeared first on Renew Economy.

Small Australian manufacturers urged to cut fossil fuels from their production lines with help of $10 million fund designed to decarbonise forgotten areas of industry. 

The post Fund created to help small manufacturers cut fossil fuels from their production lines appeared first on Renew Economy.

The black box of a federal consumer renewable energy scheme raises questions over whether it's value for money.

The post Still a rip off? Some energy retailers have slashed GreenPower rates, others haven’t bothered appeared first on Renew Economy.

More households are looking to install solar, or increase the size of their existing systems, as interest in home batteries and EVs grows in light of rising energy prices.

The post Households want bigger solar systems as they eye battery storage and EVs appeared first on Renew Economy.

Northern British Columbia is entering a period of economic transition, with new opportunities emerging in clean energy, critical minerals, transportation, mass timber and other low-carbon industries. This report finds that while workforce development...

Picture a fly landing on what looks like a perfectly ordinary leaf. Within half a second – literally faster than you can blink – that leaf snaps shut like a jaw. The fly is trapped, and over the next week or so, the plant slowly digests it alive. This isn’t science fiction. It’s just Tuesday for a Venus flytrap.

Carnivorous plants have fascinated people for centuries. Charles Darwin himself called the Venus flytrap “one of the most wonderful plants in the world” back in 1875, and frankly, I think he undersold it. But while most articles lump all meat-eating plants together into a quick overview, I want to go deeper on two species that are especially remarkable – and surprisingly different in how they operate: the Venus flytrap (Dionaea muscipula) and the sundew (Drosera).

Why would a plant bother eating bugs?

Here’s the thing most people get wrong about carnivorous plants: they don’t eat insects because they’re hungry in the way we think of hunger. These plants still photosynthesize. They still pull energy from sunlight like any other green thing on Earth. The insect-eating is really about one problem – terrible soil.

Venus flytraps are native to a remarkably small region: a roughly 75-mile radius around Wilmington, North Carolina. That’s it. The entire wild population exists in the boggy, acidic, nutrient-poor wetlands of the Carolinas. Sundews are more widespread – there are roughly 200 species found on every continent except Antarctica – but they share the same fundamental challenge. They grow in places where the soil is so stripped of nitrogen, phosphorus, and other essential minerals that a normal plant would simply starve.

So these plants evolved an alternative supply chain. Instead of pulling nutrients up through roots, they get them by dissolving insects. It’s an elegant solution to a brutal environment, and it’s happened independently across multiple plant families over millions of years – a phenomenon biologists call convergent evolution.

The Venus flytrap: a snap trap with a counting brain

Let’s start with the headline act. The Venus flytrap’s trap mechanism is one of the fastest movements in the entire plant kingdom, closing in approximately 100 milliseconds. But speed alone isn’t what makes it extraordinary. What’s genuinely astonishing is that this plant can count.

How the trigger system works

Each trap lobe has three to four tiny trigger hairs on its inner surface. Here’s the critical detail that most articles skip over: a single touch does nothing. The trap requires two stimulations of those hairs within about 20 seconds to snap shut. Scientists believe this “counting” mechanism prevents the plant from wasting energy on false alarms – a raindrop, a piece of debris, a grain of sand.

But it doesn’t stop at two. Research published in a 2016 study in Current Biology by Rainer Hedrich’s team showed that the flytrap actually counts up to five touches:

• Touch 1 – the plant goes on alert, priming its electrical system
• Touch 2 – the trap snaps shut
• Touch 3 – the plant begins producing the hormone jasmonic acid
• Touches 4 and 5 – digestive glands activate and begin secreting enzymes

This means the Venus flytrap doesn’t just catch prey – it assesses whether the catch is worth digesting before committing resources. A trap that closes on nothing will reopen in about 12 hours. But once those digestive juices start flowing, the trap stays sealed for 5 to 12 days while the plant absorbs the nutrient-rich soup.

The cost of each snap

One fact that rarely comes up: each individual trap can only close and reopen about 5 to 7 times in its lifespan before it becomes permanently inactive and shifts into functioning purely as a photosynthetic leaf. This is why poking your flytrap repeatedly for fun is genuinely harmful – you’re burning through a finite resource. I’ve watched people at garden centers trigger every single trap on a display plant, effectively exhausting the poor thing for entertainment. Don’t be that person.

Sundews: the patient sticky trap

If the Venus flytrap is a steel-jaw trap, the sundew is flypaper – but far more sophisticated than that analogy suggests. Sundews use what botanists call an adhesive trap, and watching one work up close is mesmerizing in a slightly unsettling way.

Tentacles tipped with glue

Every sundew leaf is covered in hair-like structures called tentacles – sometimes hundreds per leaf – each tipped with a glistening droplet of mucilage. This sticky substance looks like morning dew (hence the name), and it’s what lures insects in. Many species produce mucilage that contains both a sweet scent and UV-reflective compounds, essentially tricking insects into thinking they’ve found nectar.

When an insect lands, it sticks. As it struggles, it contacts more tentacles, which then slowly bend inward toward the prey. In some species, like the Cape sundew (Drosera capensis) – probably the most commonly grown species in the U.S. – the entire leaf curls around the insect within a few hours. The leaf then secretes digestive enzymes similar to those in your own stomach, breaking down the soft tissues of the insect over one to two weeks.

Why sundews might actually be better hunters

Here’s something that surprised me when I first dug into the research: sundews are arguably more efficient predators than Venus flytraps. Consider the numbers. A single Cape sundew leaf can catch multiple insects simultaneously. There’s no “counting” requirement, no 20-second timing window. The trap doesn’t wear out after a set number of uses – old tentacles regenerate their mucilage, and the plant continuously produces new leaves.

Sundews also display a wider prey range. While Venus flytraps primarily catch crawling insects – ants, beetles, and spiders make up the bulk of their diet in the wild – sundews snag everything from fungus gnats to mosquitoes to even small butterflies, depending on the species and leaf size.

Venus flytrap vs. sundew: a side-by-side look Feature Venus flytrap Sundew (Cape sundew) Trap type Active snap trap Adhesive (sticky) trap Closing speed ~100 milliseconds Minutes to hours (tentacle curling) Prey per leaf One at a time Multiple simultaneously Trap lifespan 5–7 closures per trap Reusable until leaf naturally dies Native range Coastal Carolinas only Every continent except Antarctica Winter dormancy Required (3–4 months) Varies by species; tropical types skip it Beginner-friendliness Moderate – needs dormancy period High – Cape sundew is very forgiving What most care guides don’t tell you

If you’re thinking about growing either of these plants at home – and they genuinely make incredible houseplants – there are a few things I wish someone had told me earlier.

Water quality matters more than you think

Both Venus flytraps and sundews are extremely sensitive to dissolved minerals. Tap water in most American cities contains enough chlorine, fluoride, and calcium to slowly kill these plants over weeks. Use distilled water, rainwater, or water filtered through reverse osmosis. This is non-negotiable. I’ve seen more carnivorous plants die from tap water than from any other cause.

Skip the fertilizer – and the hamburger

Feeding your flytrap bits of ground beef is a surprisingly persistent myth. Meat contains fats and proteins that the plant can’t properly break down, leading to rot. If you want to feed your plant indoors, use small, recently killed insects – freeze-dried bloodworms from a pet store work well for sundews. But honestly, if your plant sits near a window, it’ll catch enough on its own.

The dormancy question

Venus flytraps require a cold dormancy period of roughly 3 to 4 months with temperatures between 35°F and 50°F. Without it, the plant weakens over successive growing seasons and eventually dies. Many first-time growers in warmer states don’t realize this. An unheated garage or a refrigerator (yes, really) can work. Most sundew species from tropical regions, on the other hand, grow year-round without dormancy – another point in their favor for indoor growers.

Conservation: a wild plant under pressure

The Venus flytrap is listed as Vulnerable by the IUCN, and its wild habitat keeps shrinking. Poaching is a serious problem – in 2014, North Carolina made the theft of Venus flytraps a felony, punishable by up to 25 months in prison. Habitat loss from development and fire suppression (these plants depend on periodic wildfires to clear competing vegetation) compounds the issue.

Sundews face their own pressures, particularly species with very limited ranges. The great sundew (Drosera anglica), once widespread across northern bogs in the U.S., has seen significant population declines due to wetland drainage.

If you’re growing these plants, make sure you’re purchasing nursery-propagated specimens – never wild-collected ones. Reputable growers will be transparent about their sourcing.

More than just a novelty

Venus flytraps and sundews aren’t just fascinating curiosities. They’re windows into how life adapts under pressure – how evolution can turn a passive, rooted organism into something that hunts. The flytrap’s electrical signaling system has even drawn interest from researchers studying plant neurobiology (a controversial but growing field), while sundew mucilage is being studied for potential biomedical applications, including wound-healing adhesives.

Whether you’re a seasoned plant hobbyist or just someone who’s always been quietly curious about that little flytrap in the hardware store, these organisms reward closer attention. They’re tougher, smarter, and more nuanced than most people give them credit for. For more perspectives on topics like these – where science meets the natural world in unexpected ways – you can explore additional reading at Counterview.

Start with one Cape sundew on a sunny windowsill. Watch it catch its first gnat. I promise – you’ll be hooked.

Europe has spent several weeks enduring blistering heat. The heatwave the continent experienced last month closed schools, disrupted power supplies, and has been linked to thousands of deaths. France, Germany, and Denmark all saw their highest temperature ever, according to the World Meteorological Organization. Now, new data shows that western Europe set another record: its hottest June ever. 

The readings, from the European Union’s Copernicus Earth observation program, showed that western Europe averaged 20.74 degrees Celsius, or a little over 69 degrees Fahrenheit, across the entire month — night and day. That squeaks past the previous mark set during June of 2025, and is more than 3 degrees Celsius above the average for the month. Ocean temperatures were also the hottest ever recorded. Globally, June was only .01 degrees Celsius off the all-time high.

“These records reflect a climate system continuing to accumulate heat,” Samantha Burgess, deputy director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service, said in a statement. “The result is increasingly intense heatwaves, a persistently warm ocean, and growing risks for people, ecosystems, and infrastructure across Europe and beyond.”

Read Next Across Europe, heat adaptation plans are being put to a brutal test Naveena Sadasivam

The late-June heatwave followed a similar spike in May, and preceded still more high temperatures in July. These extreme conditions would have been virtually impossible 50 years ago, the World Weather Attribution initiative noted last month. Climate change, it said, is driving a new, dangerous norm that’s wreaking havoc on European systems that weren’t built for these risks. 

“Many people still live, work, and study in places that are not designed for the temperatures we are now experiencing,” Carolina Pereira Marghidan, with the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre, said in a statement. “We need greater investment in heat-resilient homes, cities, and infrastructure to keep people safe.” 

Recent extremes are reminiscent of Europe’s sweltering summer of 2003. Since then, World Weather Attribution scientists say climate change has made daytime heat of the kind Europe is experiencing 10 times more likely and overnight extremes 100 times more likely. Going into the morning of June 28, a weather station in East Saxony, Germany, recorded a minimum temperature of 29.4 degrees Celsius, or nearly 85 Fahrenheit. The country’s meteorological agency, Deutscher Wetterdienst, called the reading historic.

Experts say elevated overnight minimums are especially concerning for human health. “When we have these high nighttime temperatures, the body isn’t able to recover sufficiently,” said Kurt Shickman, who works on heat issues at the World Resources Institute. “They’re going into the next hot day with a couple strikes against you from a health perspective.” 

The heat is also further fueling wildfire risks in parts of Europe that are already dry. Fires in Spain and southern France have caused thousands to flee, thwarted Tour de France spectators, and killed at least one firefighter. Such conditions are expected to continue, as is the general trend toward a warmer planet. 

Extreme weather can sometimes prompt policymakers to take action. After the 2003 heatwaves, European governments developed early warning systems and other adaptation measures that research shows would have reduced deaths by as much as 75 percent. Shickman also points to apps like Extrema, which help people map the thermally safest route when they’re traveling. But he says there’s a lot more that could still be done — from increasing access to affordable air conditioning to installing more resilient infrastructure, such as reflective roofs and cooler walls — in the face of a warming future. 

Extreme heat is “something that we’re seeing more and more of,” said Shickman. But he’s also optimistic that events like this can also be a catalyst for change. “These types of iconic moments can be galvanizing for years and years to come.”

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Western Europe just set the record for its hottest June ever on Jul 8, 2026.

Hiking through mud, thick and slippery, puts a damper on anyone’s enthusiasm. Such was the case for my intern and me on a humid summer morning, making our way to our first Western...

This is a re-post from Carbon Brief

Clean power added more to global energy supplies than any other source in 2025, according to the latest Energy Institute statistical review of world energy.

Outside the Covid pandemic, it was also the first year ever in which wind and solar, when combined, contributed more new energy than any of the individual fossil fuels.

The findings illustrate the “growing prominence” of electricity in the global energy system, according to the Energy Institute, a professional membership body that took over the production of the annual statistical review from oil firm BP in 2023.

It notes that electricity demand is rising much faster, at 3% in 2025, than energy use overall at 1.7% – and that all of the new power supply came from low-carbon sources.

While it includes data on data-centre demand for the first time, the review shows that these only make up 2% of all electricity use and 15% of the increase in 2025.

(The review does not explore other sources of demand, but separate data shows electrification of industry, heat and transport is a far larger driver of growth than data centres.)

At the same time, every source of energy – including coal, oil, gas, nuclear and hydro – also reached global all-time highs in 2025, the statistical review shows.

While the 86% of “primary energy” that came from fossil fuels is a record low, their real contribution to the economy is far lower, because roughly two-thirds of their energy is lost during combustion.

Below, Carbon Brief highlights the key findings of the review in six charts.

• Global energy supplies increase 1.7% in 2025
• Fossil fuels met a record-low 86.2% of global energy supply
• The ‘primary energy fallacy’ ‘inflates fossil fuels’
• Wind and solar were biggest source of new energy in 2025
• Clean energy met all of global electricity growth in 2025
• China generates more power than the US, EU and India combined

Global energy supplies increase 1.7% in 2025

The review shows that global energy supply reached a record high in 2025, climbing 10 exajoules (EJ, 1.7%) to more than 600EJ for the first time ever.

Within this total, there were new all-time highs for every energy source: oil; coal; gas; nuclear; wind and solar; as well as hydro and other renewables. This is shown in the figure below.

Total global energy supply by fuel, exajoules. Source: Energy Institute (2026).

Notably, coal hit a new record of 166EJ in 2025, up 0.7% from a year earlier and 2.8% above the level reached in 2014, which had been seen as a potential peak for the fuel.

Wind and solar saw the fastest growth, up by 18.3% year-on-year, as well as adding more to global supplies – in combination – than any single fuel source.

Fossil fuels met a record-low 86.2% of global energy supply

Nevertheless, on the basis of these primary energy figures, the contribution of low-carbon sources to the global energy system still looks relatively small.

The latest data shows that fossil fuels made up 86.2% of global primary energy supplies, as shown in the figure below.

Share of total global energy supply from fossil fuels and clean-energy sources, including nuclear and renewables, %. Source: Energy Institute (2026).

The rise of nuclear power had pushed the fossil-fuel share of global energy down to 91% as long ago as 1986, before the Chernobyl disaster pulled the plug on further growth.

It is only in the past decade that clean-energy sources have started to gain more ground, as a result of the rapid expansion of wind and solar.

The ‘primary energy fallacy’ ‘inflates fossil fuels’

Crucially, however, the statistical review is based on “total energy supply” (TES), a measure of primary energy. This counts the energy stored in coal, oil, gas and nuclear fuel going into the energy system, whereas for renewables it measures the amount of electricity coming out.

Yet, most of the energy in fossil fuels is lost as waste heat during combustion.

In fact, some two-thirds of all primary energy is lost before it can be turned into useful energy that moves a car, warms a home or keeps the lights on.

This gives rise to the “primary energy fallacy”, which tends to “inflate…the perceived contribution of fossil fuels” and the difficulty of replacing them with low-carbon energy sources.

For example, the figure in the post shows that 105 units of energy went into the global transport sector – almost all of it oil – but this only generated 20 units of transport “energy services”.

In other words, less than 20% of the primary energy being used for transport actually ends up moving people or goods, while the remaining 80% was lost as waste heat.

Until 2024, the statistical review sought to address this issue by using the “substitution method” for clean-energy sources. This listed the primary energy supplied by wind and solar, for example, as the amount of fossil fuels that would have been needed to generate the same amount of electricity.

It stopped using this approach in 2025, explaining that this would reveal the higher efficiency of a clean-energy system that loses less energy during fossil-fuel combustion. It explained:

“Put simply, in future we will need to supply less energy in the form of clean electricity to undertake the same amount of work as the equivalent energy supplies from fossil fuels. Primary energy demand will decrease as the energy system increasingly electrifies and renewable electricity continues to increase its share of generation..”

Wind and solar were biggest source of new energy in 2025

With this in mind, it is all the more notable that wind and solar, in combination, were the world’s biggest source of new energy in 2025, as shown in the figure below.

Again, perhaps two-thirds of the new primary energy added by fossil fuels last year will never actually contribute useful work to the economy, because it will be lost as waste heat.

In contrast, the new energy added by wind and solar is in the form of electricity and almost all of it can be used directly to power factories, homes, appliances and electric vehicles.

Contribution to the change in total global energy supply by fuel, %. Source: Energy Institute (2026).

Moreover, wind and solar saw the fastest growth by far, up 18% in 2025 alone. Over the past decade, they expanded fivefold, while coal, oil and gas grew by 6%, 9% and 21%, respectively. 

Clean energy met all of global electricity growth in 2025

The impact of renewables is clearest in the power sector, where combined with a new record for nuclear power, they met all of the growth in global electricity demand in 2025.

This is shown in the figure below, which illustrates how fossil generation was flat last year and how wind and solar now generate more electricity than hydro or nuclear power.

Global electricity generation by fuel, terawatt hours. Source: Energy Institute (2026).

The review says that wind and solar power, when combined, grew by 18% in 2025, whereas there was a small decline in coal generation balanced by a small rise for gas.

Overall, it says that global electricity generation increased by some 940 terawatt hours (TWh, 3%), roughly three times the annual demand of the UK.

Separate figures, included in the review for the first time, show that data centres used 788TWh of electricity in 2025, up 130TWh on a year earlier.

This means that data centres accounted for 2% of global electricity demand. 

China generates more power than the US, EU and India combined

The Energy Institute report says that the power sector is set to play an increasingly important role, because it is growing more quickly than other parts of the global energy system.

There is also increasing political attention on the idea of using expanded clean-power supplies to rapidly electrify other parts of the economy, particularly heat and transport.

The COP31 presidency has called for countries to back a global goal for 35% of “final” energy to come from electricity by 2035, against a global average today of around 22%.

China is well ahead of the global average, with electricity making up 30% of its final energy supplies in 2025. It recently adopted a 35% by 2030 target for electrification.

One reason it has been able to do this is the huge scale of its electricity system. Indeed, China now generates more electricity than the US, EU and India combined, as shown in the figure below.

Electricity generation by country, terawatt hours. Source: Energy Institute (2026).

While much of the rise in China’s electricity has historically come from coal-fired generation, there was enough growth of clean-power sources to push coal down last year.

This summer, find time to explore new practices, solutions, and more with Food Tank’s 2026 summer reading list.

1. Abiding Hunger: An American Paradox by Roger Thurow (Forthcoming September 2026)

For nearly 20 years, Roger Thurow’s books on hunger have taken readers around the globe. His fifth lands in the United States—both one of the world’s biggest food producers and the home of nearly 50 million people experiencing food insecurity. In Abiding Hunger, the former Wall Street Journal foreign correspondent and global agriculture senior fellow at The Chicago Council on Global Affairs traces a history of “hidden hunger” and the systems that continue to fuel it.

2. Bitter Honey: Big Ag’s Threat to Bees and the Fight to Save Them by Jennie Durant

The title of this book has two meanings for Jennie Durant. On one hand, it references the bitter honey produced by bees when they pollinate almonds—a massive industry that drives nearly all of the nation’s commercial bees to California every year. It’s also a nod to the challenges faced by beekeepers in the United States. Durant, a researcher and former U.S. Department of Agriculture fellow, highlights the communities at the forefront of America’s bee crisis and ultimately vouches for a food system that “works with nature, not against it.”

3. Black Farmers in America: Fighting for an Equitable Food System by Mya O. Price (Forthcoming August 2026)

Mya O. Price is no stranger to the work of food justice, community building, and health advocacy. In Black Farmers in America, Price—a professor at George Washington University’s Global Food Institute—unravels America’s Black agricultural history, present, and future through case studies centering both the resiliency of Black farmers and the benefits of local food systems. Focal points include cooperative farming models in the South, urban agriculture in Detroit, and land reparations in the Mississippi Delta.

4. Building a Sustainable Kitchen: A Practical Guide to Prioritizing the Planet from the Heart of Your Home by Naomi Hansen

For Saskatchewan-based food writer Naomi Hansen, the kitchen is a place where even small habits become gateways to the larger ecosystems that govern our food, environment, and daily lives. Each chapter of Hansen’s Building a Sustainable Kitchen is a crash course in different everyday interactions with food: buying, preparing, eating, disposing, and beyond. Hansen draws connections between how those behaviors matter deeply to a range of environmental issues. She offers tangible strategies on how to improve them, like repurposing leftovers and growing food at home.

5. Cheese Trekking: How Microbes, Landscapes, Livestock, and Human Cultures Shape Terroir by Trevor Warmedahl

After a decade of cheesemaking in the United States, Trevor Warmedahl found himself managing a cheese plant in Mongolia—kickstarting his fascination with and documentation of pastoral cheese production around the world. Cheese Trekking follows Warmedahl across the Eurasian continent, where he discovers everything from yak milk-based aaruul in western Mongolia to goat cheese in the Italian Alps. Combining intimate reflection with technical know-how, the book is an ode to non-industrial cheesemaking traditions and the many living things that partake in them.

6. Climate Change and Civic Engagement: The Origins and Future of the Climate Justice Movement by Paul Almeida (Forthcoming July 2026)

Social movements expert Paul Almeida examines how communities fight for decarbonization and just climate transitions in this data-forward book. It tells success stories of civic engagement and subsequent policy implementations, taking particular interest in the San Joaquin Valley, California’s agricultural hub. Almeida discusses community members’ willingness to pursue climate action as a testament to how deepened public participation can build sustainability practices for generations. He makes a compelling case for the paramount role of collective action.

7. Consider the Anchovy: A Journey in Pursuit of the Little Fish with the Big Flavour by Sudi Pigott

Ask Sudi Pigott about anchovies, and she’ll give many reasons why these “eco saviors” are not only “worthy of appreciation, but of respect and protection.” The food journalist unpacks the small fish’s outsized role in both marine ecosystems and food cultures across the globe, taking readers through anchovy explorations in Athens, Basque Country, the French Riviera, and more. Restaurant owners, fishers, and sobadoras—women who filet anchovies in Cantabria, Spain—are among those who share their expertise in Consider the Anchovy, where each chapter ends with a recipe from its region of focus. 

8. Cooking the Borderlands: Spice and Smoke Between Mexico and the States by Claudette Zepeda

Claudette Zepeda was “raised with one foot in each country,” she writes in Cooking the Borderlands. In her first cookbook, the San Diego chef and former Top Chef competitor showcases the diverse foodways of cities in a region often used as a “pawn in a political game.” The chapters move through Zepeda’s memories along the U.S.-Mexico border, from Mexicali—once the home of 19th-century Chinese immigrants working on railroads—and its Chinese food infused with Mexican flavors to Coahuila and Tamaulipas, where Tex-Mex was born and red meat is king.

9. Eating on a Mountain at the End of the World: How I Found Love, Humor, and Beauty in My Quest for Ethical Food by Zackary Vernon

Zackary Vernon’s journey to find balance in his food world—to find ways to “fail better,” as he says—is both deeply relatable and uniquely illustrative in its depiction of alternative foodways. The memoir documents Vernon’s attempts to ethically source, cook, and eat in a tiny Appalachian town, where he grapples with questions that define American food culture and the food choices of many. How much of a difference does buying from local farmers make? What does it mean to eat ethically, and is it feasible to achieve? 

10. Eat to Hustle: 75 High-Protein Plant-Based Recipes by Robin Arzón

Robin Arzón didn’t come from a plant-based household. The head instructor at Peloton describes a dinner table filled with Cuban, Puerto Rican, and Jewish staples—and while she maintains a plant-based diet today, the goal has always been to keep flavor and fuel a priority. With advice from registered dietitian Dalina Soto, Eat to Hustle is Arzón’s take on exciting, on-the-go, meatless eating. She includes a macronutrient breakdown in each of her recipes, which incorporate a range of legumes, veggies, and protein supplements into everyday meals. (She is also one of Food Tank President Danielle Nierenberg’s favorite instructors #Robin’sWolfPack).

11. Fermenting for the Future: Japanese Pickles and Microbial Foodways by Aya Hirata Kimura

Consumers might recognize tsukemono as the pickled vegetables in a bento box. Aya Hirata Kimura, however, knows that it’s much more—a small but mighty dish with over a thousand years of history encompassing intersections of health, art, industrialization, and biodiversity in many forms. As fermented foods maintain their popularity in modern wellness culture, Kimura—a multidisciplinary researcher and professor who grew up in Japan and Singapore—traces connections between the environmental, political, cultural, and anatomical elements of the food system, all via a deep dive into this everyday Japanese staple.

12. First Helpings: A History of Children and Food by Deborah Albon and Amy Palmer (Forthcoming July 2026)

First Helpings explores the history of children’s foodways and the people, corporations, places, and systems that influence their diets and perceptions of food itself. Beyond the question of what kids should eat, the book examines the politics of school meals, social cues at the dinner table, and the historical struggle of child hunger. Focusing on children in Britain, childhood studies professors and former teachers Deborah Albon and Amy Palmer point to food as a crucial gateway to understanding children’s history and bettering their futures.

13. Food Policy Councils: Building Civic Engagement and Community Well-Being by Nessa J. Richman (Forthcoming July 2026)

The United States is home to more than 300 food policy councils—although few Americans know that they exist or what they do. Nessa J. Richman—the executive director of the Rhode Island Food Policy Council—offers a look at the regional and local groups of food-focused citizens working for increased food access, sovereignty, and more in their communities. The book gives advice for existing councils on bolstering civic participation, fundraising, and working with elected officials, as well as a roadmap for food systems advocates to build new councils from the ground up.

14. Ice Cream Queen: Flavors from Black America’s Past, Present, & Future by Lokelani Alabanza

Sarah Estell, a Black woman who owned an ice cream shop in the 1840s, was known as the “Ice Cream Queen.” In Ice Cream Queen, Lokelani Alabanza honors the Black pioneers who “deserve front-and-center placement in the canon of American ice cream.” The Nashville-based pastry chef highlights Southern Black foodways with recipes like Pepper Jelly & Cream Cheese and Juneteenth Sorbet swirled with raspberry-hibiscus syrup. The cookbook is also ripe with historical knowledge, featuring a timeline of Black ice cream makers and brief lessons on the cultivation of ice cream’s key ingredients.

15. It’s on You: How Corporations and Behavioral Scientists Have Convinced Us That We’re to Blame for Society’s Deepest Problems by Nick Chater and George Loewenstein

Consumer responsibility isn’t everything, and big changes require new rules, behavioral scientists Nick Chater and George Loewenstein argue. The food system comes into play several times in It’s on You, which unpacks how the United States tried to fight its obesity epidemic by “blaming the victim” and how eaters are expected to reduce their carbon footprints to mitigate the climate crisis. The book provides a unique take on personal responsibility, criticizing “nudge” policies for preventing communities from making real progress.

16. Our Knives Will Save Us: Dispatches from a White Mountain Apache Chef by Nephi Craig (Forthcoming July 2026)

The healing power of cooking is the heart of Our Knives Will Save Us. Nephi Craig—who grew up on the White Mountain Apache reservation in Arizona—recounts the journey of personal hardship, culinary and cultural rediscovery, and revitalization that took him across the globe before landing back in his hometown of Whiteriver. The memoir expounds Craig’s studies of Indigenous foodways, which catalyzed both the formation of his identity as a chef and his 2021 opening of Café Gozhóó in Whiteriver, an Indigenous restaurant that employs individuals recovering from substance abuse.

17. Plots and Deeds: Agrarian Annihilation and the Fight for Land Justice in Palestine by Paul Kohlbry

Paul Kohlbry brings readers to three Palestinian villages, where he met peasants operating a food cooperative, sowing seeds, and protesting land theft. The anthropologist and professor challenges assumptions of peasants as either “heroic revolutionaries or tragic victims” and unravels how Israeli occupation, inflation, and real estate developers’ commodification of land merge to create “agrarian annihilation.” In doing so, Kohlbry amplifies the voices of farmers fighting for “both the return of the land that was taken, and a return to the land.”

18. Soomaaliya: Food, Memory, and Migration: A Cookbook by Ifrah F. Ahmed

“Because of Somalis’ historic reliance on a rich oral tradition,” Ifrah F. Ahmed writes, you won’t find many Somali cookbooks. Restaurants too are relatively few abroad, where Somali food is often misattributed or lumped under the umbrella of a large region, according to Ahmed. Soomaaliya—named for the country Ahmed and her family left in 1996 as refugees—is the writer and chef’s way of spotlighting her homeland and its diaspora. Its recipes, including green hot sauces and teatime beignets known as bur, are accompanied by vivid profiles of Somalian restaurateurs, food producers, and more.

19. Spain My Way: Eat, Drink, and Cook Like a Spaniard by José Andrés and Sam Chapple-Sokol

José Andrés has always kept his roots in Spain, where he was raised and learned to cook and which he now celebrates with Spain My Way. The restaurateur and humanitarian—with Sam Chapple-Sokol, editorial director of his restaurant group—presents 130 recipes encapsulating what he likes to cook at home, including both Spanish staples and unique local specialties. The cookbook is a love letter to commensality, and full of lessons in what Andrés calls the two distinguishing traits of Spanish food: “amazing products and a deep respect for time.”

20. The Book of Coffee: A Philosophy by Julian Baggini 

The Book of Coffee positions its subject as something that is ubiquitous, mundane, and sometimes, an afterthought. Mundane in this case, however, doesn’t mean boring, but wonderfully simple in how easily coffee exemplifies much more than a hit of caffeine. With beginning and ending words from barista and content creator James Hoffman, food philosopher Julian Baggini navigates the beverage’s social meanings with curiosity and joy. He uncovers how modern coffee culture has come to not only inspire aesthetic appreciation but represent a desire for “a life that is at ease with itself.” 

21. The Farm Is Here by Jeff Tkach

Combining memoir, agriculture research, and deep reflections on what it means to nourish the soul, The Farm Is Here is a look into the minds of one of regenerative agriculture’s biggest cheerleaders. Jeff Tkach, the CEO of the Rodale Institute, recounts how his own battle with a disease led him to discover intimate relationships between soil health and human health. The book urges readers to find meaning in connecting deeply and sustainably with their food—especially on the farm, which Tkach believes can “transform nearly every area of our lives.”

22. Tin Can Coast: A History of Industry, Greed, and Fishing in the Golden State by Joseph Ogilvy (Forthcoming July 2026)

As tinned fish packed in fancy olive oil remains all the rage on store shelves, Joseph Ogilvy takes the conversation to California, whose complicated fishing history remains overlooked. Tin Can Coast reckons with the state’s often exploitative relationship with its coasts. The chef and writer explores how the California Current—once home to troves of large yellowfin tuna, abalone, and sardines—became a gold mine for profit. Ogilvy traces the geopolitical, capitalist, and cultural forces that led to the growing popularity of seafood, racist immigrant policies, and the depletion of sea once brimming with life.

23. Tiny Gardens Everywhere: A History of Urban Resilience by Kate Brown

Urban sprawl and a lack of green space dominate the ecological narrative of today’s cities, but Tiny Gardens Everywhere rejects that notion. Environmental historian Kate Brown unpacks how small gardens run by the working class across Europe and North America gave roots to community building, surprising biodiversity, and nutritious food production in unexpected places. The book gives long-overdue credit to the 19th- and 20th-century urban gardeners who achieved “many of the goals of contemporary food sustainability reformers.” 

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

The post 23 New Books We’re Reading This Summer appeared first on Food Tank.

‘City slicker’ payments swell to $2.6B with Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill and farm bailouts Anthony Lacey July 8, 2026

More than 92,000 “city slickers” living in some of the biggest metropolitan areas in the U.S. took in over $2.6 billion in farm subsidies between 2020 and 2025, even though many of these people don’t live or work on farms, a new EWG analysis finds.

The soaring payouts went to 13,000 more city slickers compared to last year’s analysis, that looked at payments through 2024, EWG found. At the same time, farm bankruptcies have recently reached new heights.

EWG analyzed Department of Agriculture data and found that between 2020 and 2025, $2.6 billion in farm subsidies went to 92,766 residents of Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, New York and 197 other major metro areas – with many never setting foot on farmland.

These payments averaged more than $28,000 per person between 2020 and 2025, or just over $4,700 each per year, EWG’s analysis found.

Even more taxpayer funds are going to city recipients this year after Republicans in Congress pushed through President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act. The law enlarged loopholes that make it easier to qualify for the payouts and get more money.

It hiked payment limits from $125,000 to $155,000 per person, letting every member of some farms collect up to $155,000 a year each, even if they don’t live or work on a farm, as long as it is organized as a pass-through entity, such as a joint venture, S corporation or limited liability corporation.

EWG compiled a list of the 200 biggest metro areas, along with the number of urban recipients and the total farm subsidies they received between 2020 and 2025, including many new recipients in those areas possibly benefiting from the expanded loopholes:

200 largest metro areas with city slicker subsidy recipients

Image Record subsidy amounts

The U.S. is reaching record levels of agricultural industry bailouts, exceeding $25 billion since early 2025, with even more taxpayer-funded handouts still being requested. And these latest bailouts follow payouts from multiple disaster programs in the first and second Trump administrations.

The subsidy increases were paid for with cuts to Medicaid totaling nearly $1 trillion and $187 billion in cuts to hunger assistance programs. These reductions have led to hospital closings and the loss of hunger assistance for over 4 million Americans, including more than 800,000 children. 

As more and more funding is made available for farm subsidies, many recipients benefit from rules that allow people not involved in day-to-day life on the farm to collect payments.

Farm subsidy recipients must be “actively engaged” in farming. 

But it’s very easy to qualify as “actively engaged,” even for someone who never lives or works on a farm. The farm bill’s loopholes allow urban residents to get farm subsidies, even if they do not live or work on a farm. The Government Accountability Office in 2018 found that roughly one-fourth of farm subsidy recipients do not contribute any personal labor to farms.

Another GAO report, issued last month, examined improper payments made to the agriculture industry. It found that a tariff relief program from Trump’s first term had an improper payment rate of 19.3%. A USDA disaster program made improper payments at a rate of 45.2%.

The White House recently requested $11 billion to once again bail out the agricultural industry over the rising costs of fertilizer and fuel from Trump’s war with Iran. This would drive up total farm safety net spending to over $55 billion in 2026 alone.

The proposed “Farm Bill 2.0” making its way through the Senate this month will do nothing to fix these problems. Instead it will maintain the status quo and send billions of dollars in subsidies to city slickers who have nothing to do with farming.

Locating city slickers

For the analysis, EWG identified city slickers living in ZIP codes in the 200 most populous metro areas. Using existing datasets, EWG identified city slicker subsidy recipients as those living in areas with a population density greater than 3,000 people per square mile within census-designated metro areas. 

To rule out non-urban areas, the methodology looked at places the USDA doesn’t consider rural as well as ZIP codes that are outside a distance to a city center dictated by the city’s population size. The methodology also looked at other metrics to determine an area's rural status.

This analysis updates and builds on previous EWG estimates of city slickers, which included only recipients who lived within city limits. The updated methodology seeks to capture urban sprawl, which has changed how certain areas are defined, and to foster a better understanding of how many subsidy recipients live in urban areas.

Areas of Focus Farm Subsidies Over 13,000 more urban-area residents took in farm subsidies in 2025 than in 2024 Authors Jared Hayes July 9, 2026

A new analysis from clean energy think tank Energy Innovation finds that the Trump administration's rollback of clean energy policy will add more than half a trillion dollars to American households' collective energy costs by 2040, even as it publicly promises lower bills. 350.org says the findings confirm what millions of Americans are already living through this summer: a sudden AI-driven electricity crunch colliding with policy choices that are making the problem worse, not better.

According to the report, the cumulative impact of the administration's actions, including the repeal of clean energy tax credits, new barriers to permitting wind and solar, and a tilt toward more expensive coal-fired power, will raise the average household's energy costs by $460 by 2035, rising to $490 a year by 2040. That comes on top of electricity rates that have already spiked 7.4% nationwide since last fall, with more than a dozen states seeing double-digit increases, driven in part by the explosive growth in data center electricity demand.

The findings land just as households across the eastern US are living the consequences directly. A "heat dome" and severe storms over the Fourth of July weekend left almost a million households without power across more than a dozen states, and sent wholesale electricity prices up more than 240% in New England and doubled in New York City. Detroit was among the hardest hit: roughly 350,000 people lost power, some for four to five days, with outages still ongoing for some. Detroit's utility, DTE, ranked among the worst-rated in the country, has pushed through repeated rate hikes even as reliability has failed to improve, including a $242.2 million increase approved in February during a deadly cold snap, and a further request in April for up to $474 million, an 11% increase.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has intervened in DTE and Consumers Energy's current rate cases over the pattern, saying DTE continues to treat Michigan families like an open checkbook to satisfy its shareholders, whether through massive rate hike requests or secret data center contracts.

Candice Fortin, US Campaigns Manager at 350.org, said:

"This report puts numbers on something households are already feeling in their bills and their blackouts. We were told cutting clean energy would lower costs. Instead, we're seeing the opposite: rates spiking, grids failing under record heat, and households paying more while data centers' electricity use explodes. You can't fix an affordability crisis by blocking the cheapest, fastest power we have to build. The fossil fuel industry and this administration's policies are adding fuel to the fire, and ordinary ratepayers are the ones getting burned."

The Trump administration disputes the report's findings, with the White House and Department of Energy characterising Energy Innovation's analysis as partisan and arguing that rolling back clean energy regulation will ultimately lower prices by letting market forces determine new generation. Energy Innovation and other independent analysts maintain there is a direct line between the administration's policies and rising bills, pointing to the growing gap between the promise of cheaper energy and the reality households are experiencing this summer.

Meta’s latest AI image generation feature raises serious privacy concerns by automatically allowing public Instagram profiles to be used in AI-generated images unless users actively opt out. The new “Muse Image” model enables users to generate AI images using another person’s likeness simply by tagging their public Instagram account in a prompt. Consumers are not affirmatively asked for permission, are not notified when their images are used, and AI-generated images already created from their content will remain even if they later disable the feature. While Meta says users can opt out through account settings, those controls require users to navigate multiple layers of settings rather than obtaining clear, affirmative consent before their likeness is used.

J.B. Branch, director of federal AI governance and technology policy at Public Citizen, issued the following statement:

“Meta has once again chosen the creepiest possible path. People should not wake up to discover their face has become raw material for someone else’s AI experiment. This is another invasion of consumers’ privacy. Instead of asking for meaningful consent, Meta quietly defaults users into the system and buries the opt-out in account settings. It’s a playbook we’ve come to expect from a company with a long history of putting its business interests ahead of the public.

“Unfortunately, we’ve reached a point where many technology companies treat every piece of our personal information—our photos, our voices, our biometric identifiers, even our relationships—as raw material to fuel their AI ambitions. Privacy has already been eroded in countless ways, but allowing companies to appropriate people’s likenesses without meaningful, affirmative consent crosses what should be a brightline. If our faces can be repurposed for AI simply because we posted a public photo, then very little remains off limits. Congress should establish clear privacy protections that require affirmative consent before companies can use a person’s image or likeness for AI products.”

View the full size guide with clickable links here.

Welcome!

The guide has been compiled with the intention of increasing public access to services that are free or low-cost in the New Orleans area. Most listings are for services located in Orleans & Jefferson parishes, although select state and nationwide services have also been included.

Listed resources were contacted by phone and asked to verify the information listed. Organizations were specifically and intentionally asked about funding options for uninsured patients, the availability of Spanish translation services, and their ability to provide services for transgender and non-binary patients. Available transgender and non-binary services have been incorporated throughout and can also be found in a dedicated section of this guide.

This guide is a 2026 update based on information compiled by staff and volunteers for the REACH NOLA/Common Ground Health Clinic Community Resource Guide from 2006-14, and working directly from the 2025 edition, which sourced information compiled by volunteers at the Center for Ethical Living & Social Justice Renewal, as well as the Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming NOLA Resource Guide produced by Dr. Jennifer Glick and Dr. Robin Ivester.

In response to the world around us this year, we have added a new immigration section and have expanded the food and mental health sections.

This edition has been produced in partnership with Imagine Water Works as a public service by volunteer community members and is available free of charge to all people.

Download a free copy for printing here. This version saves paper and can be folded into a booklet. We encourage people and organizations to print your own copies as needed. Copies should remain unedited. Please do not add logos or remove the front page, credit pages, resource pages, or ISBN#.

If you are an organization and would like to partner with us to print copies of your own with your logo and can share or cover printing costs, email klie@imaginewaterworks.org. We are happy to work with your team to make this information available to all.

HELP US PRINT COPIES: DONATE TO THE NOCRG Acknowledgements:

Many people did the work of making this edition of the resource guide possible!

Thanks to the entire Imagine Water Works team for partnering on this project and hosting our volunteers so hospitably, to Antigravity and Imagine Water Works for digital distro, and to many New Orleanians committed to community care and harm reduction, including but not limited to: Klie Kliebert, Carly Ry, Sana Fujimora, Ben Collongues, Virginia Gregory, Elizabeth Gelvin, Sarah Watson, Angelique Thomas, everyone who came out to our volunteer call-a-thons, and even more lovely folks who wish to remain anonymous, and probably you.

Finally, love and appreciation to Harriet Burbeck for the cover art. Beauty matters!

Contact us with questions, additions, requests, and offers to volunteer or collaborate:
Coleen Murphy, coordinating organizer, at NOLAresourceguide@gmail.com

The post New Orleans Community Resource Guide 2026 appeared first on Imagine Water Works.

The debate over building energy codes, and energy efficiency in general, often centers on upfront cost. But energy efficiency more than makes up for that incremental cost with longer-term savings that add up over time, like the power of compounded interest.

A recent Department of Energy (DOE) release estimates that adopting the 2024 International Energy Conservation Code (IECC) would increase residential construction costs by $9.2 billion annually, or up to $14,000 per home. Rather than focusing on the headline figure alone, it is useful to examine the estimate in the context of overall home costs and long-term homeowner economics.

Put the cost in context

Since the IECC is an energy code for residential buildings, let’s focus on single-family homes. Adding multifamily homes would only strengthen the following cost argument.

The U.S. builds roughly one million new single-family homes each year. Spread across those homes, DOE’s $9.2 billion figure implies about $9,200 per home.

Now compare that to actual home costs. Using data from the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB):

• Average construction cost: $428,000
• Total price including land and soft costs: $665,000

That means that the  $9.2 billion headline represents:

• 2.15% increase relative to construction cost
• 1.38% increase relative to full home price

In other words, even under DOE’s assumptions, energy codes raise total home costs by around one to two percent. That is small relative to normal year-to-year swings in material costs, interest rates, or land prices.

It is also far below the $31,000 figure often cited in industry testimony.

What do homeowners get in return?

The key question is not cost alone. It is cost versus savings.

DOE’s analytical framework recognizes this. It evaluates:

• upfront incremental cost
• annual energy savings
• payback period
• life-cycle cost over a 30-year mortgage
• annual cash flow to the homeowner

This matters because homeowners do not experience costs in isolation. They generally experience monthly cash flow. Lower energy consumption can also improve long-term affordability by reducing exposure to future energy price volatility while supporting a more efficient and reliable energy system.

Independent analysis from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) shows that the 2024 IECC:

• reduces household energy costs by 6.8% on average
• produces positive cash flow in year one
• yields about $144 in net savings in the first year

Even if the upfront cost were $9,200, the structure of mortgage financing means:

• the incremental monthly mortgage cost is modest
• energy savings offset that cost immediately
• households come out ahead from the start

Looking Beyond Simple Payback DOE’s press release emphasizes long “payback periods,” suggesting some exceed 10 years. But simple payback may not be the strongest for housing decisions:

1. Because Most Homes are financed. Buyers do not pay $9,200 upfront in cash. They typically finance it over 30 years.
2. Cash flow matters more than payback. DOE’s methodology highlights “years to positive cash flow” as a key metric. = On that basis, IECC performs well.
3. Homes last decades. Efficiency improvements in the building envelope deliver savings over the life of the home, not just a short payback window.

Discussions about housing affordability often focus on reducing upfront construction costs. When asking how we can improve affordability for homeowners, an equally important consideration is the long-term cost of owning and operating a home. Building energy efficiency can help lower energy bills over decades, making it an important part of the affordability conversation.

As policymakers, builders, and consumers evaluate future building energy codes, the discussion should consider both upfront costs and long-term value. Looking at both sides of the equation provides a more complete picture of how energy efficiency can support housing affordability over the life of a home.

As energy demand continues to grow from new housing, transportation, manufacturing, and data centers, improving building efficiency can help reduce unnecessary energy demand while supporting affordability and system reliability. Using energy more efficiently remains one of the lowest-cost strategies for reducing waste and managing long-term energy costs.

This article is part of Food Tank’s primer series, “Food Tank Explains.” Each installment unpacks the ideas, innovations, and challenges shaping today’s food and agriculture systems, offering clear insights into complex topics. To explore more articles in the series, click here.

Functional foods are generally those that contain naturally occurring or added compounds, providing health benefits beyond basic nutrition. While research suggests functional foods may support long-term health when consumed alongside a balanced diet, questions remain about the extent of their benefits.

Communities around the world have long used food, herbs, and spices to treat illness and promote well-being. Ancient civilizations in India, Greece, and Egypt used moringa to support skin health and mental fitness. Ayurveda and Traditional Chinese Medicine practices incorporated turmeric as an anti-inflammatory and tea as an antioxidant. Foods like ginger and peppermint have long been used to relieve nausea and facilitate digestion.

The modern concept of functional foods emerged in Japan. In 1991, the country introduced its Foods for Specified Health Uses (FOSHU) program, creating one of the first regulatory systems for foods with scientifically supported health claims. Since then, consumer interest in functional foods has steadily grown.

“The push for functional foods gets stronger every year,” says Dr. Marion Nestle, the Paulette Goddard Professor of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health, Emerita, at New York University. According to Fortune Business Insights, the global functional food and beverage industry is projected to grow from US$437.62 billion in 2026 to US$983.17 billion by 2034.

Government agencies, researchers, and international organizations generally define functional foods as those with health benefits beyond basic nutrition, but they differ on which foods belong in that category.

Some definitions of functional foods, including those used by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the Royal Society of Chemistry, include naturally functional foods, such as berries rich in antioxidants, oats containing cholesterol-lowering soluble fiber, fatty fish high in omega-3 fatty acids, fermented foods with probiotics, and nuts rich in unsaturated fats and other beneficial nutrients.

Others, including the Institute of Food Technologists, research published in Frontiers in Nutrition and Nutrients, and the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, also apply the term to foods that have been fortified, enriched, or enhanced to provide a specific health benefit. Common examples include vitamin D milk, calcium-fortified orange juice, probiotic yogurt, and margarine containing plant sterols.

Academic, government, and private research institutes around the globe are currently conducting extensive research on functional foods’ health impacts. Some researchers have linked some functional foods to lower cholesterol, improved gut health, reduced inflammation, and better blood sugar control, suggesting they may hold promise for public health.

But scientists warn that functional foods are not a cure-all. No single food can cure or prevent diseases, and functional foods cannot replace medical treatments, according to the Mayo Clinic. Researchers emphasize that functional foods further health when they complement, not replace, a balanced, nutritious diet.

Researchers also warn that functional food marketing can create a health halo, leading consumers to perceive products as healthy based on a single health claim, rather than all product ingredients and processing.

There are also significant socioeconomic barriers to equitable access. Functional foods often cost three to five times more than conventional products, and research suggests that higher household income levels are often associated with more functional food purchases.

Regulatory approaches also vary widely around the world. The European Union requires manufacturers to submit scientific evidence before health claims can appear on food labels. In contrast, the United States has no formal legal definition of a functional food, instead regulating these products under existing food and labeling laws. As a result, consumers may encounter different products and health claims depending on where they live.

As research on functional foods continues to evolve, experts emphasize that realizing their public health potential will require stronger evidence and clearer standards. “Food quality data, grounded in comprehensive and standardized molecular analysis, must become a central metric for how we measure, manage, and build value across food and health systems,” according to Selena Ahmed, the Executive Director of The Periodic Table of Food Initiative and Dean of Food EDU at the American Heart Association, John de la Parra, Director of the Food Initiative at The Rockefeller Foundation, Justin Siegel, Faculty Director of the Innovation Institute for Food and Health at the University of California Davis, and Roy Steiner, Senior Vice President of the Food Initiative at The Rockefeller Foundation. “Without knowing what’s actually in our food, the tens of thousands of molecules, we cannot design food systems that sustain health.”

FAO highlights the need for better food safety frameworks as new functional products enter the market. Researchers call for larger clinical studies involving more diverse populations, along with greater multidisciplinary collaboration between nutrition science, medicine, and the food industry.

Consumers should “just be aware of what you’re actually putting into your body, because not all products that are labeled ‘functional’ are truly effective,” says Grace Derocha, a nutritionist who is also a spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

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Photo courtesy of Ash Kanis, Unsplash

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