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Must do better: Bowen seeks rule change to force energy retailers to do right thing by electricity customers
Federal energy minister seeks principles-based rule change to ensure retailers are doing more than just the bare minimum to engage with electricity customers.
The post Must do better: Bowen seeks rule change to force energy retailers to do right thing by electricity customers appeared first on Renew Economy.
Contested wind project pivots turbines and cuts footprint after discovering more endangered cycads
Wind farm developer has shaved 110 hectares off its footprint after working with EPBC planners to improve the environmental credentials of the contested project.
The post Contested wind project pivots turbines and cuts footprint after discovering more endangered cycads appeared first on Renew Economy.
SwitchedOn podcast: The hidden energy guzzler in Australian backyards – and how it could help the grid
Australia’s backyard pools could help support a cleaner and more flexible electricity grid and save households hundreds of dollars a year.
The post SwitchedOn podcast: The hidden energy guzzler in Australian backyards – and how it could help the grid appeared first on Renew Economy.
First of a kind “carbon refinery” to embed emissions in concrete and other building materials
An Australian facility will seek to prove carbon can be embedded into useful products, such as concrete, paint and plasterboard, and resold for a profit.
The post First of a kind “carbon refinery” to embed emissions in concrete and other building materials appeared first on Renew Economy.
How Trump and Burgum hijacked the Park Service and America’s birthday party
Kate and Aaron talk to Jayson O’Neill, a longtime public lands watchdog and Montanan who previously led the Western Values Project and now heads up a campaign called Save Our Parks. Jayson explains how the Trump administration is using the National Park Service to funnel money into Trump’s vanity projects in DC, as well as how President Donald Trump and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum subverted America250, an organization chartered by Congress to celebrate America’s upcoming 250th birthday.
News- National Park Entrance Fees Are Funding Trump’s D.C. Projects – New York Times
- Americans’ national parks passes will pay for Trump’s July 4 plans, documents show – Washington Post
- Mike Lee’s fast-track attempt to scrap this national monument’s management plan has failed – Salt Lake Tribune
- Judge orders Trump administration to restore signs changed at national parks – CNN
- Save Our Parks website
- Analysis: Reporting signs that “disparage” American history – CWP
- Watch this episode on YouTube
Produced by Aaron Weiss, Lauren Bogard, Kate Groetzinger, and Lilly Bock-Brownstein
Feedback: podcast@westernpriorities.org
Music: Purple Planet
Featured image: Photo of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool filled with algae; Source: Ali Khan/Wikimedia
The post How Trump and Burgum hijacked the Park Service and America’s birthday party appeared first on Center for Western Priorities.
Zero interest loans launched to help lower income homes get off gas with solar, batteries, insulation
State government launches Home Energy Saver program offering zero-interest loans of up to $15,000 to help pay for upgrades including rooftop solar, batteries, electric appliances and insulation.
The post Zero interest loans launched to help lower income homes get off gas with solar, batteries, insulation appeared first on Renew Economy.
Old Salt Co-op Cattle Ranches Earn Audubon Bird-Friendly Land Certification
New Zealand dairy giant signs two major solar deals as it works to wean itself off coal boilers
World's biggest dairy exporter signs PPAs with two new solar projects as part of its efforts to wean itself off the use of coal power for boilers.
The post New Zealand dairy giant signs two major solar deals as it works to wean itself off coal boilers appeared first on Renew Economy.
Unique off-grid trial proves technical case for renewable hydrogen power, despite repeated fuel cell failures
A unique trial of renewable hydrogen power in an off-grid coastal community has struggled because of repeated failures from the hydrogen fuel cell.
The post Unique off-grid trial proves technical case for renewable hydrogen power, despite repeated fuel cell failures appeared first on Renew Economy.
How Birds Are Helping Deepen the Social Work Practice of One Great Lakes Chapter Leader
Donovan Shell Feud: Multiple Links
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California’s Conservation Goals Depend on the People Who Carry Them Out
SUWA Statement on approval of Keg Knoll airstrip in the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness – 6.16.26
June 16, 2026 – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
SUWA Statement on approval of Keg Knoll airstrip in the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness – 6.16.26 Action by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is unnecessary and unlawfulContacts:
Grant Stevens, Communications Director, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA); (319) 427-0260; grant@suwa.org
Salt Lake City, UT – Last Friday, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released a decision authorizing private airplanes to take off and land in the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness by designating the previously unauthorized Keg Knoll backcountry airstrip as open for aircraft use. The airstrip is located on the west side of Labyrinth Canyon and north of Canyonlands National Park. Below is a statement from SUWA Wildlands Director Neal Clark and additional information.
“Wilderness is a finite resource and should be managed in a way that protects the reasons it’s designated in the first place—the preservation of natural soundscapes, solitude, wildlife habitat, and non-motorized recreational opportunities,” said Neal Clark, Wildlands Director at the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA). “Unfortunately, the Trump administration BLM seems unable to say no to activities that are fundamentally incompatible with wilderness, including motorized aircraft use. Degrading the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness so a handful of private pilots can land their planes at one more backcountry airstrip is a disservice to the landscape and public lands users seeking a wilderness experience. We’ll be exploring every possible way to right this decision and protect the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness from the impacts of private aircraft use.”
Additional information:
The Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness was designated by Congress in 2019, as part of the Dingell Act. While the Wilderness Act gives the BLM some discretion to allow (or prohibit) continued use at airstrips that were legally established prior to wilderness designation, it does not allow the agency to authorize aircraft use when the airstrip was not legally open prior to the wilderness designation.
The BLM Price Field Office’s 2008 management plan—the land use plan in effect when the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness was established—specifically lists five “existing and currently used backcountry airstrips” for continued noncommercial and limited commercial aviation use; Keg Knoll is not on the list. And for good reason, as it was unused and reclaiming at the time. The agency’s 1999 wilderness inventory of Labyrinth Canyon confirms as much, noting “abandoned airstrips” in the Keg Knoll area.
SUWA’s members sent over 3,000 comments in opposition to the decision.
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The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) is a nonprofit organization with members and supporters from around the country dedicated to protecting America’s redrock wilderness. From offices in Moab, Salt Lake City, and Washington, DC, our team of professionals defends the redrock, organizes support for America’s Red Rock Wilderness Act, and stewards a world-renowned landscape. Learn more at www.suwa.org.
The post SUWA Statement on approval of Keg Knoll airstrip in the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness – 6.16.26 appeared first on Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.
Montezuma Audubon Center Honored as Hobart and William Smith Colleges "Community Partner of the Year"
Hudson Valley Students and Teachers Bring “Youth Climate Summit” Experiences to Albany for Youth Advocacy Day
Protect Beach-nesting Birds from Fireworks this July Fourth Weekend
Fact brief - Does solar energy need subsidies to compete with fossil fuels?
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline.
Does solar energy need subsidies to compete with fossil fuels?Unsubsidized utility-scale solar is now generally cheaper than building fossil fuel power plants.
Costs are often compared using “levelized cost of energy,” the average lifetime cost to build and run a power plant divided by the electricity it produces. A 2025 analysis estimates the mean LCOE of utility-scale solar at about $58 per megawatt-hour without subsidies, compared to $79 for new natural gas plants and $128 for new coal. The International Energy Agency reports solar energy is the cheapest source of new electricity generation in most parts of the world.
Solar costs have fallen sharply over the past decade as panel prices have dropped and the industry has grown. Subsidies can further lower costs, but solar is not dependent on them to compete with fossil fuels.
Go to full rebuttal on Skeptical Science or to the fact brief on Gigafact
This fact brief is responsive to quotes such as this one.
Sources
International Energy Agency World Energy Outlook 2020
Lazard Lazard Releases 2025 Levelized Cost of Energy+ Report
Reuters Around 90% of renewables cheaper than fossil fuels worldwide, IRENA says
Scientific American Wind and Solar Energy Are Cheaper Than Electricity from Fossil-Fuel Plants
Columbia Law School Sabin Center for Climate Change Law Rebutting 33 False Claims About Solar, Wind, and Electric Vehicles
Please use this form to provide feedback about this fact brief. This will help us to better gauge its impact and usability. Thank you!
About fact briefs published on Gigafact
Fact briefs are short, credibly sourced summaries that offer "yes/no" answers in response to claims found online. They rely on publicly available, often primary source data and documents. Fact briefs are created by contributors to Gigafact — a nonprofit project looking to expand participation in fact-checking and protect the democratic process. See all of our published fact briefs here.
Honour for climate lawyer
The lawyer who successfully led a landmark challenge on onshore oil and gas at the Supreme Court was appointed an OBE in the King’s birthday honours.
Estelle Dehon KC (third from left) with campaigner Sarah Finch (third from right) and the Weald Action Group legal team outside the Supreme Court after the landmark judgement on climate emissions, 20 June 2024. Photo: DrillOrDropEstelle Dehon KC received the honour for services to environmental law.
She is one of the UK’s leading environmental and climate law barristers.
She was named planning and environment silk of the year in the Chambers UK Bar Awards 2024. She has been on every ENDS Report power list of environmental professionals since 2022 and received a climate law and governance global leadership award at the COP27 climate conference. She was also named environmental/sustainability bar champion of the year at the Legal 500 UK ESG Awards 2024, and barrister of the year at The Lawyer Awards 2025.
Ms Dehon, of Cornerstone Barristers, said yesterday:
“I am absolutely bursting with pride and happiness to receive an OBE. And for services to environmental law! I never even dreamed that such a thing could happen. I am both thrilled and profoundly moved that it has and am also deeply grateful to those who nominated me, who clearly dream bigger than I do.”
Ms Dehon secured what became known as the Finch Ruling at the Supreme Court almost two years ago. The result required decision-makers to take into account carbon emissions from burning onshore oil and gas production.
The decision immediately quashed planning permission at the Horse Hill oil site in Surrey. It led to withdrawal of consent for oil production at Biscathorpe in the Lincolnshire Wolds and expansion of the Wressle oil site in North Lincolnshire.
The ruling also influenced decisions on the Rosebank and Jackdaw oil and gas fields in the North Sea, permission for a new UK deep coalmine, infrastructure developments and industrial-scale agriculture.
Ms Dehon said:
“With greenhouse gas emissions still rising; adaptation still so slow and the degradation of nature continuing apace while being normalised in political speech, it is easy to be demotivated.
“But the legal community has so much ability to effect positive change. Our voices are heard in places of power across society. Now is the time we must use them.”
Last year, Ms Dehon argued in a legal opinion that proposals by Europa Oil & Gas at Burniston qualified as fracking under North Yorkshire’s planning policy. In 2016, she represented Friends of the Earth at the planning inquiry on Cuadrilla’s fracking plans at Preston New Road and Roseacre Wood in Lancashire.
Ms Dehon has been a trustee of the UK Environmental Law Association since 2019 and for three years was a trustee of the Women’s Environmental Network.
Since 2022, she has been co-chair of the Bar Council’s climate crisis working group. In 2023, Ms Dehon founded Cornerstone Climate, a cross-disciplinary centre for climate litigation and advice. She recently led production of The Cornerstone Climate Guide: Key Concepts and Definitions. The guide aimed to promote greater understanding of climate-conscious language and remove barriers to understanding key concepts, legislation and policy.
Is Canada spending $6 billion on yesterday's workforce?
UPDATE: After DOL links Kroger to yet another forced labor case, will the grocery giant ever learn the Power of Prevention?
Since its inception in 2010, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers’ Fair Food Program has brought life-saving human rights guarantees to hundreds of thousands of farmworkers and helped transform the practice of farm labor management on farms from Florida to California. Indeed, the FFP has ushered in nothing short of a human rights revolution in the fields for nearly two decades now, eliminating longstanding abuses in our country’s trillion-dollar food industry ranging from systemic wage theft and deadly working conditions to sexual assault modern-day slavery.
Along the way, many of the world’s largest retail food brands have joined the Fair Food Program — including household names like McDonald’s, Walmart, and Whole Foods — recognizing the program’s unique power not just to remedy abuses after they have happened, but actually to prevent human rights violations altogether, and so to prevent the full-blown public relations crises that can occur when egregious abuses are connected to popular consumer brands through their supply chains. Here at the FFP, we call that invaluable risk mitigation capacity of the program the “Power of Prevention”, and we are proud not only of the FFP’s immense impact on farmworkers’ lives over the past 16 years, but of its impact on our participating buyers’ and participating growers’ business practices and supply chain management, as well.
It’s really quite simple: Sometimes the best headline is the headline that never happens, especially when that headline is a US Department of Justice press release connecting yet another brutal forced labor prosecution to your company’s supply chain. And yet…
All too many retail food brands — among them many well-known companies like Publix, Kroger, and Wendy’s — still refuse to join the FFP. Instead, they continue to cling to the long-discredited “Corporate Social Responsibility” playbook, claiming — against ample and painful evidence — that their supplier codes of conduct and occasional social audits are effective and sufficient to address any labor abuses in their suppliers’ operations. As a result, there are still far, far more farmworkers who toil beyond the reach of the Fair Food Program’s powerful protections than there are who harvest our food in the FFP’s environment of dignity and respect.
And that’s why the CIW continues to uncover and help prosecute modern-day slavery cases on non-FFP farms, including the recent case US v. Moreno, which came to light after two workers hid in the trunk of a car driven by a Good Samaritan who helped the workers escape the control of their crewleader and call the CIW to report the rampant abuse and threats they had experienced at the camp. That slavery case cast a national spotlight on the growing issue of forced labor in agriculture, and inspired the CIW’s 5-day, 50-mile march from Pahokee, FL to Palm Beach — home of Wendy’s former board chairman Nelson Peltz. When announcing that the defendant in the case had been sentenced to nearly a decade in prison, the US Department of Labor also disclosed that Kroger, a long-time Fair Food Program holdout, had been buying watermelons from the forced labor operation.
Today, we want to share an update on that case and, in that context, take a moment to reflect on the FFP’s unique “Power of Prevention”.
Here below is the latest update from the US Department of Justice on US v. Moreno — including the announcement that Alexander Villatoro Moreno, who was a critical player in the forced labor ring, was extradited from Mexico, pleaded guilty to conspiracy, and just received a 70-month prison sentence:
Mexican National Pleads Guilty to Racketeering Conspiracy Involving the Forced Labor of Mexican WorkersAlexander Villatoro Moreno, age 53, also known as Quichi, pleaded guilty in federal court in Tampa, Florida, to conspiracy under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. A federal grand jury in the Middle District of Florida had previously returned a six-count indictment against multiple defendants for their roles in the conspiracy, which victimized Mexican H-2A workers who, between 2015 and 2017, had worked in the United States harvesting fruits, vegetables and other agricultural products.
According to court documents, Villatoro Moreno and his co-defendants operated and managed Los Villatoros Harvesting (LVH), a farm labor contracting company, that functioned as a criminal enterprise compelling victims to work in Florida, Kentucky, Indiana, Georgia and North Carolina. Villatoro Moreno and his co-defendants fraudulently recruited Mexican nationals to come into the United States on short-term, H-2A, agricultural visas and misled the United States to secure visas for the victims. Villatoro Moreno and his co-defendants charged workers exorbitant recruitment fees to work for LVH and lied to the victims about how much they would be paid, the hours they would work, the working conditions and the reimbursement they would receive for paying recruitment fees and other expenses. The workers were then compelled to provide long hours of physically demanding agricultural labor, six to seven days a week, for far less pay than they were entitled to under the law.
In addition to the work conditions, Villatoro Moreno and his co-defendants used various coercive means to compel the victims’ labor, including imposing debts on workers; confiscating the workers’ passports; subjecting workers to crowded, unsanitary and degrading living conditions; verbally abusing and humiliating the workers; threatening workers with arrest, jail time and deportation; isolating workers by preventing them from interacting with anyone other than LVH employees; and threatening to physically harm the workers’ family members back in Mexico if the workers failed to comply with their demands.
When officials began investigating, Villatoro Moreno obstructed the federal investigation by helping to prepare false payroll information to conceal underpayments to the workers and distributing fake reimbursement receipts to the victims to make it appear that LVH was complying with the law by reimbursing the workers for their travel-related expenses.
In the course of the investigation, one worker told prosecutors: “All this time, I could not return to Mexico for fear that something would happen to me. That the Villatoros had paid someone to kill me.” In the press release announcing Villatoro Moreno’s sentencing, representatives from the Department of Justice had this to say: “The victims in this case were deceived by conspirators and subjected to deplorable conditions while being exploited for greed and profit,” said US Attorney Gregory W. Kehoe for the Middle District of Florida. “Today’s judgment sends a clear message that we will leverage the resources of our law enforcement partners to uphold our nation’s immigration laws and vigorously prosecute those who engage in human trafficking.” “Villatoro Moreno and his co-conspirators lured victims from Mexico with false promises of fair wages and good working conditions. It was all a lie,” said Special Agent in Charge Brett Skiles of the FBI Miami Field Office. “In addition to harsh and extreme working conditions, the workers were subjected to poor living conditions, charged excessive expenses, and endured humiliating treatment and threats. Not only is this wrong, but it is also against the law. Investigating this case was a team effort. I commend the Palm Beach County Human Trafficking Task Force, the Department of Labor, the Diplomatic Security Service, and numerous workers’ rights groups for their close cooperation.” “Today’s sentence sends a clear message that those who exploit vulnerable workers and engage in forced labor will face serious consequences,” said Acting Special Agent in Charge Jose R. Figueroa of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Miami Field Office. “We are committed to protecting workers, safeguarding the integrity of the H‑2A program, and relentlessly pursuing those who manipulate the immigration system. HSI will continue to leverage partnerships across the government, with private industry, and around the world to combat forced labor and disrupt crimes of victimization…” Read more of the DOJ press release here The Power of Prevention
While successful slavery prosecutions of individual farm bosses provide a measure of justice for victims, they are a limited and ultimately insufficient tool if the goal is to end forced labor altogether.
First, prosecutions are inherently backward-looking. By the time a case reaches court, workers have already endured the abuses typical of forced labor operations — physical violence, psychological trauma, sexual abuse, and dangerous or even deadly working conditions. Even when justice is served, it is difficult, if not impossible, to fully repair the harm inflicted on those victims.
A Fair Food Standards Council auditor (left) interviews a worker on an FFP farmMoreover, the legal framework used in forced labor prosecutions generally targets the employers closest to the workers: crewleaders and farm bosses directly involved in the abuse. Those higher up the supply chain — from farm owners to the retail brands purchasing the produce harvested by exploited workers — almost always emerge unscathed. Though they may have known, or should have known, about the abuse, and though they often benefit indirectly through lower labor costs and lower prices, they rarely face consequences when a crewleader is convicted of forced labor.
Early on in the CIW’s three-decade fight against human trafficking, it became clear that prosecutions alone would never end forced labor. If the movement’s broader goals — ending modern-day slavery in the fields and creating a world without victims — were ever to be achieved, something more was needed. The solution lay in addressing the underlying economics that had made slavery and other widespread farm labor abuses possible for generations.
The incentives were clear. For decades, major food retailers used their enormous purchasing power to push prices lower and lower throughout their supply chains. As farm-gate prices fell, growers struggled to survive on increasingly thin margins, often by suppressing wages and minimizing labor costs. Combined with weak and infrequent enforcement of labor laws, this created a system in which those who violated workers’ rights were effectively rewarded — whether through wage theft, sexual harassment, or forced labor — and rarely punished for their crimes.
As Warren Buffett’s longtime investor partner Charlie Munger famously said, “Show me the incentives, and I’ll show you the outcomes.” That principle applies as much to farm labor management systems as it does to financial markets. When economic pressures encourage abuse and legal protections are weakly enforced, exploitation flourishes. But the reverse is also true. When protecting workers is rewarded, and violations carry meaningful consequences, outcomes change. Abuses decline, accountability increases, and the possibility of a world without victims comes into view.
That is not merely a theory.
Since the launch of the Fair Food Program in 2010, incentives on participating farms have been fundamentally transformed. By leveraging the purchasing power of participating buyers, the FFP rewards growers who comply with its labor standards through continued business and preferential purchasing, while growers who violate workers’ rights risk losing access to major markets.
Just as importantly, the program protects workers who report violations. Retaliation itself is a serious violation that can jeopardize a grower’s relationships with some of the largest food buyers in the world. The result is a powerful system of worker-driven monitoring that ensures abuses are identified quickly and violators face real consequences. As a result, forced labor, sexual violence, and other severe human rights abuses have been effectively eliminated on participating farms for nearly two decades.
That is the “Power of Prevention” in action.
Central to the program’s success are the CIW’s legally binding agreements with participating buyers, who commit to preferentially purchasing from suppliers that comply with the FFP’s labor standards and suspending purchases from those who don’t. These market incentives helped transform Florida’s tomato industry from what federal prosecutors once called “ground zero for modern-day slavery” into what one human rights expert described on the front page of The New York Times as “the best workplace environment in U.S. agriculture.” No comparable system exists elsewhere in American agriculture.
Had the Fair Food Program been operating on the melon farms involved in the U.S. v. Moreno case, its protections and enforcement mechanisms would have dispelled the climate of fear among workers and detected even minor abuses before they escalated into forced labor. Yet buyers of those melons, including Kroger, continue to reject participation in the program. Instead, they rely on a failed model of voluntary standards and social audits that has repeatedly proven incapable of protecting workers or preventing abuse.
That is why nationwide expansion of the Fair Food Program is so urgently needed.
As Fair Food allies, you play an indispensable role in expanding the market power behind the program. By making your voices heard in executive offices and corporate boardrooms, you help pressure companies to take responsibility for labor conditions in their supply chains. Farmworkers need your continued support to ensure that companies such as Kroger, Publix, and Wendy’s embrace genuine, worker-driven social responsibility and join the Fair Food Program.
Stay tuned for an upcoming digital action where you can help call on more corporate buyers — including Kroger, Publix, and Wendy’s — to join the Fair Food Program.
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