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File:  ltr to Congress, 76 scientists 2012.pdfResource Type: Letters

File:  ltr to Congress, 76 scientists 2012.pdfResource Type: Letters

'They hid the facts and continued business as usual, which meant causing sickness and deaths.'

Source

Press Release: CNX’s Expanded Radiation Monitoring and Disclosure Fall Short. FracTracker calls for comprehensive radiation testing and enforceable public reporting requirements across Pennsylvania’s oil and gas industry.

The post CNX’s Expanded Radiation Monitoring and Disclosure Fall Short appeared first on FracTracker Alliance.

Iran has experienced multiple crises over the past few years, including economic challenges and war. So far, however, these have not appeared to affect one of the most practical initiatives developed by local conservation leaders in northern Iran: Gavbangi.

In Farsi Gavbangi refers to the call of the maral (also known as Caspian red deer, Cervus elaphus maral), who live in the green mountains in northern Iran from early September to early October. Maral habitat in Iran spans forests from the Azerbaijan-Iran borderland in the northwest to Golestan National Park in the east.

In autumn the forests in the north display beautiful, colorful leaves, and local people commonly hear a sound like a cow that they call Gav (cow) bangi (call). It is both inspiring and reassuring to hear the charismatic calls of deer echoing through the forests, a reminder of a functioning ecosystem. As a former conservation volunteer in Iran and a current Ph.D. student in natural resources at the University of Vermont, I experienced Gavbangi in northern Iran’s protected areas. During that time I witnessed firsthand the vital role of community collaboration in maral’s conservation.

I have also seen the importance of this collaboration: Poachers know this is the ideal time to find deer, specifically males.

A herd of maral in Kiasar National Park, Iran. Photograph by Hamed Tizrooyan. Used with permission.

Maral are a protected species in Iran, but according to the Iranian Department of Environment they face two main threats: habitat loss and poaching. During Gavbangi volunteer conservationists collaborate with rangers and protected area managers to address both threats in protected areas and potential habitats.

Volunteers stay in scheduled locations across the habitat, listening to deer calls and ensuring that poachers do not take advantage of this vulnerable period. Volunteers are divided into small groups assigned to remote areas that are difficult to monitor with a small number of rangers. Their visible presence alone acts as an obstacle, discouraging poachers from entering.

These days economic pressure may be driving an increase in poaching, although there is no reliable data. Human development like expanding road networks also makes these efforts more critical than ever.

A male Maral pictured by Hamed Tizrooyan at Kiasar National Park, Iran, Photo by: Hamed Tizrooyan. Used with permission.

Social media and wildlife photography have played a significant role in promoting awareness of species and habitat protection in Iran. Many young volunteers became interested in conservation activities by seeing the beauty of nature and its residents.

The most interesting social aspect of Gavbangi is how volunteers gather. In my experience social media, activists, and the role of wildlife photographers are crucial, as they showcase the beauty of nature and its diverse forms. These individuals typically work closely with rangers to manage volunteers and identify the best locations. This is an excellent example of collaboration between the public sector and volunteer conservationists, which began around 15 years ago.

A group of volunteers at Gavbbangi, Kiasar National Park, Iran, 2025, Photo by Amirhossein Gohardehi (used with permission)

Many experts say it’s necessary to see interested individuals as an opportunity to preserve biodiversity. The main advantage of these activities is that they involve more people in conservation, which could lead to more effective conservation of the red deer.

There is an ongoing debate among conservationists about whether participation in Gavbangi should remain purely voluntary or be integrated into ecotourism programs, where participants pay to join. Although hosting a tour can bring money to the area and invest it in conservation, it can attract irresponsible individuals and increase the human population, which can negatively affect the project’s goal and compromise the area’s safety.

To me another aspect of Gavbangi is that it provides amateur volunteers with the opportunity to explore the ecosystem in the wild, which could be an excellent driver for enhancing conservation.

As a former volunteer turned professional conservationist, I feel it essential that volunteer initiatives like Gavbangi be closely monitored as they grow to ensure they stay on the right path, especially in engaging younger generations in protecting the Maral during its most vulnerable period. To achieve this, it would be beneficial if local conservation groups collaborate with conservation experts to train the volunteers. And Gavbangi leaders can benefit greatly from engaging local residents on conservation efforts.

Based on my conversations with several experts involved in Gavbangi, Iran’s ongoing challenges have not had a direct impact on the event so far. However, conservationists in the country are under considerable pressure, and we may see the effects of these crises in the next Gavbangi event.

It is our collective responsibility to ensure that future generations can still hear the haunting call of the deer echoing through the northern forests of Iran.

References:

Hadi Pourmosa, S. M. G. (2024). Habitat suitability modeling of the Caspian Red Deer (Cervus elaphus maral) in the central zone of the Hyrcanian region: Identification of priority conservation areas. https://doi.org/10.5281/ZENODO.13823908

Kiabi, B. H., Ali Ghaemi, R., Jahanshahi, M., & Sassani, A. (2004). Population status, biology and ecology of the Maral, Cervus elaphus maral , in Golestan National Park, Iran. Zoology in the Middle East, 33(1), 125–138. https://doi.org/10.1080/09397140.2004.10638071

Kolahi, M., Sakai, T., Moriya, K., Yoshikawa, M., & Esmaili, R. (2014). From paper parks to real conservations: Case study of social capital in Iran’s biodiversity conservation. https://www.sid.ir/en/VEWSSID/J_pdf/108220140111.pdf

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

Incredible Journeys: How Hoofing It Helps Deer and Caribou

The post Gavbangi: Iran’s Long-Running Conservation Effort Relies on Volunteers — and Turns Them Into Habitat Protectors appeared first on The Revelator.

This is a first-hand account by Margaretha Winda, a journalist based in Pulang Pisau, Central Kalimantan, on Indonesia’s wildfires, which has produced hazardous smoke that chokes its people and wildlife, and has spread to neighbouring countries Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore, and the Philippines. 

There is something ironic about forest and land fires. A blaze may start on a single plot of land. But the resulting smoke and haze do not recognize boundaries of ownership. They move past fences, roads, villages. They enter homes, schools, and the lungs of people who never lit a match. Those who never started the fire are the ones who end up paying for it — and that is as true a few kilometers from the fire as it is a few hundred.

What it’s like here

I remember one morning this season waking up to a sky already overcast, the sun reduced to a faint, sickly yellow smear behind the haze. The smell hits before anything else — burning peat, sharp and distinctive, the kind that settles into your chest until it’s hard to take a full breath. And yet life around me didn’t stop: women were still washing clothes at the riverbank with no protection at all, no masks, no thought given to a health check. Children rode their bicycles to school through thick smoke, unmasked, because no notice had come telling schools to close.

This year is worse than anything I remember from three years ago. Back then, fires happened too, but the smoke never got this thick, and it was brought under control quickly. This year’s fires spread everywhere, and the response never caught up.

Where I live, in Pulang Pisau, 1,503 hotspots and 38 fires have burned 334 hectares this season. Jabiren Raya alone accounts for 1,303 hotspots and 257 hectares — including peat near the Tumbang Nusa bridge up to 40 meters deep, among the deepest burning in the regency. It smolders underground and resists rain rather than burning out quickly.

A Forest and Land Fire Control Brigade worker tries to extinguish a fire in Pulang Pisau, Central Kalimantan province, on Aug 12, 2026. Photo: Reuters/Ajeng Dinar Ulfiana

I am not writing this from a distance. I’m a journalist, and this season my job has put me at the fire sites themselves, working right up against the smoke. The one thing that’s changed for me is that I now have to wear a mask more carefully than ever, just to avoid getting sick myself — though for most people around me, that choice doesn’t even exist. Work doesn’t stop for haze. There is no version of survival here that includes staying home.

It has reached my own family, too. I have two children, and both came down with acute respiratory infections during this haze season that simply wouldn’t clear — coughing, flu, and at one point diarrhea. They were not the only ones. Children and elderly people across my community have ended up in hospital, struggling to breathe.

Other impacts I’ve seen

Nationally, Indonesia’s health ministry recorded nearly 51,000 acute respiratory infection cases tied to the haze in July and August alone. Two volunteers fighting fires in Central Kalimantan died this month from breathing difficulties. An orangutan was found on a plantation in West Kalimantan and later died of suspected smoke inhalation; firefighters elsewhere have found snake and pangolin carcasses in burned areas.

I’ve seen versions of this closer to home too. In Pulang Pisau, in the early morning and evening, visibility here drops to about one meter. The wildlife I’ve seen displaced is mostly snakes, turtles, and monkeys — animals whose habitat simply burned out from under them. A duck farm near one of the fire sites was directly hit as well, its surroundings caught up in the same blaze. On schooling: some areas of Pulang Pisau have shifted to distance learning, but others are still holding regular in-person classes in the middle of all this smoke — there’s no consistent rule, just whatever each school decides on its own.

And the government’s presence has been strangely uneven. Even as fires grew large across the district, official attention stayed narrowly fixed on Desa Tumbang Nusa, while other areas burned with far less response. 

Smoke doesn’t stop at the borders

I’ve lived through enough dry seasons here to recognize the warning signs: the sky dimming to a dull yellow-grey before the smoke rolls in for good. The wind carries the smoke north toward Palangka Raya. This year, it even crossed the Java Sea and kept going — and by the first week of September, four other countries were living inside it too.

• Singapore. On September 4, residents woke up to a smoggy sky as the air quality index crossed into unhealthy territory. By late afternoon, IQAir’s global rankings placed the city with the third-worst air on the planet.
• Malaysia. In Sarawak state, the capital Kuching had already been ranked the world’s most polluted city for over a week straight, with a hazardous reading of 311. On September 4, its Air Pollutant Index in the town of Serian surged past 500 — a level that can halt nonessential work and outdoor activity — prompting Malaysia’s king to consent to a state of emergency there. A Serian resident told reporters, “Even when I turn on the air conditioner, I can still smell the smoke in my house.” Days earlier, the health ministry reported asthma cases up 259% and upper respiratory infections up 124% in a single week.
• The Philippines. Officials declared air quality “acutely unhealthy” across Manila’s metro area, the Visayas, and Mindanao — three separate island groups, hundreds of kilometers apart, choking on the same haze. The health department was telling people to mask up..
• Brunei. Hazy conditions have blanketed the sultanate since mid-August, with no clear end in sight as the fires behind it keep burning.

The city center blanketed in thick haze in Kuching, Sarawak state, Malaysia, on Sept. 4, 2026. Photo: AP Photo/Xpin Voon.

We may live in very different places, but our fears are starting to sound the same. Families in Sarawak are now doing what mine has done all season — watching their children for coughs, keeping them inside, waiting for the air to clear. Those who contributed least to causing this crisis are so often the first, and the hardest, hit by it. 

An estimated 10.67 million people are affected by this haze here in Indonesia alone.  Citizens have taken this to court before. In 2017, a group of Palangka Raya residents won a citizen lawsuit against the Indonesian government over its failure in handling forest and land fires and in preventing a haze disaster — a court found the state guilty of unlawful negligence, a ruling upheld on appeal and again by the Supreme Court in 2019, only to be dismissed again in a judicial review on 2022. But winning in court hasn’t meant winning in practice: judgments like this one have gone largely unenforced. 

So when people elsewhere start watching their children for coughs and keeping them indoors, waiting for the air to clear — I recognize that fear completely. It’s the one my family has lived inside all season, without the world watching.

Why this keeps happening

Landowners are responsible for safeguarding their land. Companies are responsible for ensuring their operations don’t create risk. Government is responsible for making sure all of this is actually enforced — not just showing up once a fire is already large.

And I want to be precise about who is actually burning, because this gets misunderstood constantly, both inside and outside Indonesia. Dayak communities here largely stopped clearing land by fire a long time ago. The fires happening now are not, in my experience, a story about traditional farming practices gone wrong. 

Part of why these fires catch and spread so easily  goes back decades, to how this land was managed. Much of Kalimantan’s peat has been drained for industrial agriculture, including oil palm, leaving it dry enough to burn like fuel instead of holding the water that once kept it from catching. Indonesian law requires companies operating on peatland to keep it wet, but those rules are widely ignored, and to make it worse the President dismantled the ad hoc government agency that tasked specifically for peat restoration last year, leaving accountability gap that no other institutions seem to prepared to fill.

Burnt peatland in Central Kalimantan province, Indonesia, in August 2026. Photo: Krismes Santo Haloho/Mongabay Indonesia.

What’s also changed is the climate in which we now live. Longer, hotter dry seasons — the kind scientists tie to the broader climate crisis – are setting the stage for fires to start faster and burn longer. Layered on top of this year’s own strong El Niño, fires can now burn underground indried-out peat for months.

The way forward

Communities here already practice gotong royong — mutual cooperation, neighbors carrying each other through hardship. I opened a volunteer relief post in the Kahayan Hilir subdistrict this season to supply logistics to Masyarakat Peduli Api — the volunteer firefighters actually on the ground putting these fires out. A lot of people have stepped up to donate food and drink for them. But those volunteers are still going out without basic equipment — hoses to fight the fire, fuel for the pumps that draw water. That gap shouldn’t be theirs to fill alone, and it shouldn’t have to substitute for a government or companies acting before the smoke crosses a border, rather than after.

This haze disaster isn’t new, and it isn’t only this year’s story — it comes back every long dry season, and every year the response arrives just as unprepared as the last. My ask, to the government and to anyone reading this far: don’t let this become an opportunity for a handful of elites remain unaccountable while residents’ rice fields burn, while elderly people, children, and pregnant women are hospitalized, while the actual cost gets absorbed by people who had no hand in causing it.  In the end, polluters are darkening our collective skies and must pay for the damage they’ve caused. From burning fossil fuels that heat up the planet to clearing forests for plantations, it’s the actions of big corporations, not small farmers, that are setting our forests on fire. 

These are the very forests and lands that have given life to our communities for generations that deserve better than to be reduced to smoke. Governments must step up and hold the polluters accountable, so that our forests, our country, and all of us who live here can finally breathe freely again.   

 

The post The Haze We All Breathe: A Letter from Kalimantan, Indonesia appeared first on 350.

Picture a world where half the planet’s cattle ranches simply aren’t there anymore. Where does all that land go? What do farmers grow instead? And who wins or loses in the process? A major new analysis in Nature finally puts real numbers behind those questions.

The team modeled what would happen if the world actually switched to sustainable diets, rather than sticking with business as usual. The results are dramatic: cattle production could fall by half by 2050. The amount of land devoted to farming fruits, vegetables, nuts, and legumes could rise by 1.5 million square kilometers—more than twice the area of France—while the land area used to farm wheat, corn, rice, and other grains might fall by a similar amount.

The goal was “to recognize, a little more honestly, what would be the magnitude of these changes,” says Daniel Mason-D’Croz, an economist at Cornell University and one of three lead authors on the study. And importantly, “what kind of disruptions and dislocations it would mean for [food] producers?”

 

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The work grew out of a string of findings over the past few years. In 2018, a team that included Mason-D’Croz predicted the environmental footprint of global food production would grow 50 to 90% by 2050, driven by growing populations, rising wealth, and more meat-eating. They also found that staying within planetary boundaries would take multiple fixes at once: less food waste, better agricultural technologies, and worldwide dietary change. Around the same time, the EAT-Lancet commission reported that eating less meat and more plants would cut rates of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and some cancers—while also helping the planet.

So what does the reshuffled map actually look like? They found that by 2050, reduced livestock farming would free up vast stretches of grassland unsuitable for most crops—land that might go to wind or solar power, rewilding, or other uses. Production of sugar crops, such as cane, could drop by roughly a third. Some farming would shift to entirely new locations, depending on the crops and the health of local soils and water supplies. Prices of meats, dairy, and grains could fall by 15 to 30 percent, while those of fruits, vegetables, nuts and legumes might rise a few percentage points.

“The challenges are really big,” says Mason-D’Croz—and if the food transition is to succeed, it will need to address them. “Livestock is a really important source of income in rural communities,” he says, citing one example. Any food transition will need to find new pathways and futures those local economies. “If you ignore these things, you probably won’t have the political will to make some of these changes.”

Gibson, et al. “Food systems transformation would reshape global agriculture.” Nature. 2026.

Image: ©Anthropocene Magazine

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68 disputed documents, allegations concerning disclosure of Kent Quinlan’s identity, a reserved Supreme Court judgment—and ASIC has already been urged in Parliament to examine the case

The long-running litigation between former ERM Power executive Kent Quinlan and Shell Energy Operations Pty Ltd has reached another potentially important stage, with the Supreme Court of Queensland being asked to determine how legal professional privilege interacts with Australia’s statutory protections for corporate whistleblowers.

At the centre of the latest hearing are 68 documents that Quinlan is seeking from Shell.

According to a detailed report published on 18 September 2026 by Michael West Media, Shell maintains legal professional privilege over the disputed material, while Quinlan’s legal team argues that at least some communications may fall within the crime/fraud—or iniquity—exception to privilege. (Michael West)

Justice Soraya Ryan has reserved judgment and reportedly indicated that she hopes to deliver her decision by 7 November 2026. (Michael West)

This is an interlocutory dispute. The underlying allegations made by Quinlan remain contested and have not been determined at trial.

The 68 documents

Quinlan, formerly a senior executive at ERM Power before the company was acquired by Shell in 2019, has for years pursued litigation arising from matters he says he reported internally.

His allegations include claims concerning sham electricity transactions, insider trading, market manipulation, inflated profits, disclosure of his identity as a whistleblower and subsequent retaliation.

Those are Quinlan’s allegations. They are not findings of wrongdoing by a court.

The latest hearing concerns whether Shell can withhold the 68 documents on the basis of legal professional privilege.

Michael West Media reports that Tony Morris KC, appearing for Quinlan, invoked the exception under which privilege does not protect communications made in furtherance of crime, fraud or certain improper conduct attracting civil penalties. (Michael West)

Morris reportedly argued that if communications were created in furtherance of the misconduct alleged by Quinlan, privilege would not attach merely because lawyers were involved.

Shell’s position, according to the same report, is that Australia’s 2019 whistleblower reforms do not override legal professional privilege. (Michael West)

That leaves the court confronting an unusually important question: what happens when documents over which privilege is asserted are themselves alleged to contain evidence relevant to breaches of statutory whistleblower protections?

Shell evidence and 50 disputed documents

One reported feature of the hearing deserves particular attention.

According to Michael West Media, Shell’s own evidence identifies 50 of the 68 disputed documents as disclosing Quinlan’s identity as a whistleblower without his consent. (Michael West)

That statement should presently be treated as a report of evidence and argument before the court—not as a judicial finding that Shell unlawfully disclosed Quinlan’s identity.

Whether the circumstances amounted to a breach of the Corporations Act protections, and what consequences might follow, are matters for the court.

Nevertheless, the number illustrates why the privilege dispute is potentially consequential.

This follows the June disclosure judgment

The present hearing is not an isolated development.

In Quinlan v Shell Energy Operations Pty Ltd [2026] QSC 115, the Supreme Court dealt in June with a series of interlocutory applications concerning disclosure and redactions.

The court ordered some further disclosure while refusing broader relief sought by Quinlan. Importantly, however, the challenge concerning legal professional privilege was left for later determination.

That is the issue which has now returned to court.

Our previous coverage can be found here:

Kent Quinlan v Shell: Court Fast-Tracks Evidence After Terminal Cancer Diagnosis (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

And Parliament has now entered the picture

There is another reason the latest hearing deserves attention.

Only two weeks ago, Senator Paul Scarr raised the Quinlan litigation during a hearing of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services.

Addressing ASIC Chair Sarah Court, Senator Scarr referred to corporate defendants seeking suppression orders concerning evidence connected with allegations of corporate wrongdoing and asked:

“Doesn’t that raise red flags that ASIC should be looking into this matter?”

He subsequently encouraged ASIC to take a serious look at the case.

Sarah Court responded:

“Yes, Senator, we can do that.”

Our report on that intervention is here:

Senator Paul Scarr Urges ASIC to Examine Kent Quinlan’s Shell Case After Raising “Red Flags” (Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com)

The parliamentary exchange did not establish the truth of Quinlan’s allegations and did not amount to an ASIC finding against Shell.

It did, however, put the regulator’s possible examination of the circumstances firmly on the public record.

Why the privilege ruling could matter beyond Shell

The immediate dispute concerns Quinlan and Shell, but the legal issue has potentially wider significance.

Australia strengthened its corporate whistleblower regime in 2019. Among its central protections is confidentiality surrounding the identity of qualifying whistleblowers.

Legal professional privilege is itself a longstanding and important protection, permitting clients to obtain confidential legal advice.

The difficulty presented in the Quinlan litigation is the collision between those principles where a party argues that privileged communications themselves may be relevant to alleged prohibited conduct.

Quinlan’s case therefore poses a question with implications extending beyond Shell:

Can legal professional privilege protect documents alleged to form part of the very conduct that whistleblower legislation was enacted to prevent?

Justice Ryan’s eventual reasons may provide an important answer—or at least clarify where Australian law draws the boundary.

A decision expected before Quinlan gives evidence

There is now a significant timetable.

Justice Ryan has reserved judgment and reportedly hopes to give her decision by 7 November 2026. (Michael West)

Quinlan is then scheduled to give evidence for approximately two weeks from 7 December 2026, based on an evidence-in-chief statement reported to run to almost 4,000 pages. (Michael West)

His evidence timetable has particular urgency because of his serious illness, which has previously led the proceedings to be accelerated.

That makes the coming weeks potentially important both for Quinlan personally and for the wider litigation.

What has—and has not—been established

Given the seriousness of the allegations, the distinction is essential.

Established from the public court and parliamentary record: litigation is continuing; disclosure and privilege have been contested; the latest privilege hearing has occurred; judgment has been reserved; and Senator Scarr has publicly asked ASIC to examine circumstances surrounding the case.

Reported from the latest hearing: 68 documents are disputed; Shell’s evidence reportedly identifies 50 as containing disclosure of Quinlan’s whistleblower identity without consent; Quinlan invokes the iniquity exception; Shell relies upon legal professional privilege.

Not established: that Shell or any other defendant committed insider trading, market manipulation, sham transactions, unlawful whistleblower disclosure, retaliation or other wrongdoing alleged in the proceedings.

Those allegations remain contested.

The next date to watch

The immediate date for the diary is 7 November 2026.

If Justice Ryan delivers the anticipated judgment by then, the court may provide considerably greater clarity about the disputed documents and, potentially, about the relationship between legal professional privilege and Australia’s corporate whistleblower regime.

After years of litigation, the Quinlan proceedings have now attracted judicial, parliamentary and potentially regulatory attention simultaneously.

That makes the next judgment considerably more than another procedural waypoint.

Sources: Michael West Media — 18 September 2026 | Previous RoyalDutchShellPlc.com Quinlan coverage | 4 September ASIC/Parliament report

Shell Whistleblower Case: Queensland Court Weighs Legal Privilege Against Whistleblower Protection was first posted on September 18, 2026 at 12:51 pm.
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The drought hits hardest peasant farmers practicing subsistence agriculture who were forced onto marginal lands after being stripped of their ancestral territories.

The post Guatemala: Drought, Hunger, Dispossession, and an Unfulfilled Agrarian Agreement appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.

Without a dedicated Special Procedure, implementation of UNDROP risks becoming fragmented and inconsistent.

The post Geneva: Peasant Voices at the United Nations Continue Defending the Right to Seeds appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.

Headline News:

• “Why Beer At Oktoberfest Could Soon Be In Short Supply” • Heat, parched soil, and noticeably smaller hop cones: for many hop farmers in Austria this year’s harvest is sobering. One of the country’s most important hop-growing regions, the Mühlviertel, is especially hard hit. Even the plants that survived the dry spell have not developed as they should. [Euronews]

Growing hops vines (NRCS Oregon, public domain)

• “BYD Planning Four Factories in Europe” • To help achieve its sales goals, now that the EU has high tariffs on EVs produced in China, BYD has to set up production facilities in Europe. The news this week is that BYD is planning on having three vehicle assembly plants and one battery factory in Europe. That’s the plan for now, at least. [CleanTechnica]
• “Greenland And Antarctica Have Lost 12 Trillion Tonnes Of Ice Since 1979” • Greenland and Antarctica have lost 12.5 trillion tonnes of ice since 1979, raising global sea levels by around 3.2 cm, according to a major scientific study. The researchers found that ice loss has accelerated in recent decades, particularly since the 1990s. [Euronews]
• “Greenpeace Satellite Analysis Exposes Disinformation By Moscow On Ukrainian Attacks” • An investigation by Greenpeace Ukraine and McKenzie Intelligence Services, exposes the Russian disinformation campaign claiming that Ukrainian artillery and drone strikes have badly damaged critical electric infrastructure supplying the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. [Greenpeace]
• “Ørsted Installs Second Hornsea 3 Topside” • Orsted has installed the second and final offshore converter station at the 2.9-GW Hornsea 3 wind farm off east England. The OCS was built by Aibel in Thailand, before sailing 13,000 nautical miles to Haugesund, Norway, for the installation and commissioning of high voltage equipment by Hitachi. [reNews]

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

Australia’s offshore regulator says a Prelude FLNG technician suffered hand fractures after turning gear moved unexpectedly during a manual engagement task. NOPSEMA found that Shell had not implemented effective engineering controls to prevent automatic operation and was relying too heavily on procedures, communication and worker actions to control hazardous energy.

Shell Australia has been issued with a new occupational health and safety improvement notice at Prelude FLNG after a worker suffered fracture injuries to the hand during the startup of a steam turbine generator.

The underlying NOPSEMA notice is more significant than the bare fact that an injury occurred.

According to Australia’s National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority, the incident exposed a weakness in the way hazardous energy was being controlled during a manual task.

NOPSEMA concluded that Shell had contravened offshore health and safety law — and that it was likely to contravene the same provision again unless the underlying control system was changed.

That is the real story.

What happened on 2 August 2026

NOPSEMA says that on 2 August 2026, a production technician was manually engaging the turning gear during startup of a steam turbine generator at Prelude FLNG.

The normal pneumatic engagement system had failed.

Manual engagement was therefore being used instead.

During that activity, an automated start sequence energised the turning-gear motor.

The barring equipment moved.

The technician suffered fracture injuries to the hand.

The incident immediately raises the most basic machinery-safety question:

Why was equipment capable of automatic movement while a worker was manually engaging it?

NOPSEMA’s inspection went directly to that issue.

The regulator’s answer: the engineering controls were not enough

NOPSEMA identified four principal problems.

First, it said effective engineering controls had not been implemented to prevent automatic operation of the turning gear during manual engagement.

Second, manual engagement remained necessary whenever the pneumatic engagement system was unavailable.

Third, the task relied predominantly on procedural controls, worker actions and communication to prevent exposure to hazardous energy.

And fourth, NOPSEMA said critical controls — including electrical-isolation requirements and supervision of procedural compliance — had not been effectively implemented or verified.

That distinction between engineering controls and procedural controls is crucial.

A procedure tells a worker what should happen.

An engineering control is intended to make the dangerous event physically impossible, or at least substantially less likely.

In hazardous-energy work, the latter is generally the stronger protection.

A worker should not have to rely on everybody remembering every step

The regulator’s reasoning is unusually clear.

NOPSEMA said the activity depended predominantly upon administrative controls, procedures and individual actions to prevent exposure to hazardous energy.

The inspector was not satisfied that reasonably practicable measures had been implemented to prevent the equipment becoming energised or moving while manual engagement was taking place.

NOPSEMA therefore concluded that Shell had contravened Clause 9(1) of Schedule 3 of the Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage Act 2006.

This is not simply criticism that someone failed to follow a procedure.

It is criticism of the control architecture itself.

The safety system depended too heavily on humans ensuring that the automated system did not operate at the wrong moment.

The regulator’s requirement is that Shell now redesign or strengthen the system so that the hazard is better controlled at source.

NOPSEMA said the same incident could happen again

The notice does not treat the August injury as a completed event with no continuing significance.

NOPSEMA said Shell was likely to contravene the law again because manual engagement remained part of operational practice whenever the pneumatic system was unavailable.

In other words, the underlying task had not disappeared.

Nor had the mechanism that produced the injury.

The regulator said existing controls still relied predominantly on procedural compliance, communication and worker actions.

That finding explains why an improvement notice was issued.

The issue was not merely what happened to one technician on one day.

It was whether the same combination of conditions could expose another worker to the same hazard.

The potential consequences go beyond a broken hand

NOPSEMA’s notice describes the continuing risk in stark terms.

Workers undertaking manual engagement of the steam turbine generator turning gear could be exposed to unexpected or uncontrolled movement.

That could result in a person being:

struck;

trapped;

or:

crushed

by moving equipment or between moving and fixed components.

NOPSEMA identified potential consequences including:

fractures;

crush injuries;

and:

permanent impairment.

That puts the August injury into context.

The technician suffered fractures.

The regulator is warning that the same mechanism could potentially produce something considerably worse.

What Shell has now been ordered to do

NOPSEMA has required action on two levels.

Before any further manual engagement of the turning gear is undertaken, Shell must implement and verify controls preventing the turning-gear motor, automated start sequence or any other relevant energy source from causing movement while a person could be exposed.

Then Shell must review the design and operation of the turning-gear engagement system itself.

The objective is to:

eliminate or minimise the need for manual engagement;

prevent workers being exposed to unexpected energisation or movement;

and demonstrate that critical controls — including isolation, verification, supervision and procedural controls — are implemented, maintained and verified effectively.

NOPSEMA has given Shell 180 days from the date of the notice to complete the required actions.

This is an improvement notice — not a shutdown order

The distinction matters.

NOPSEMA did not issue a prohibition notice stopping Prelude FLNG from operating.

It issued an OHS Improvement Notice.

Under NOPSEMA’s enforcement framework, an improvement notice can be issued when an inspector believes a duty holder has contravened offshore OHS law and that the contravention creates, or could create, a health and safety risk.

The notice remains in effect until the required actions have been completed.

Failure to comply is an offence. (NOPSEMA)

So this should not be reported as:

“NOPSEMA shut down Prelude.”

It did not.

The correct statement is:

NOPSEMA has formally required Shell to improve the safety controls governing this activity.

The notice remains open

NOPSEMA’s current published-notices register lists Improvement Notice 2130, dated 10 September 2026, against Shell Australia and Prelude FLNG.

Its status is shown as:

Open. (NOPSEMA)

That means the regulatory process is still active.

The notice will cease to have effect once Shell completes the required actions and the relevant compliance process is satisfied.

Prelude already has a regulatory history

The latest notice should not be treated as though Prelude has never before attracted regulatory concern.

That would be inaccurate.

In December 2021, Prelude suffered a major loss of power following smoke in an uninterrupted power supply room.

The event led to loss of normal power, repeated power interruptions and degradation of some critical systems.

Seven workers were treated for heat-related conditions during the incident, including four who required intravenous fluids. (NOPSEMA)

NOPSEMA subsequently issued a general direction requiring Shell to investigate and demonstrate that Prelude could operate safely during a power-loss event before production resumed. (NOPSEMA)

That episode was considerably more serious operationally than the current hand injury.

But it established an important background:

Prelude is a technically complex facility in which failures of energy, automation and critical systems can have consequences extending well beyond a single piece of machinery.

Hazardous gases produced another notice in 2025

NOPSEMA issued Shell another improvement notice at Prelude in February 2025.

That notice concerned exposure to hazardous gases including benzene and hydrogen sulphide.

The regulator said Shell had received reports of odour problems over an extended period and that workers had presented with health effects.

NOPSEMA was not satisfied that Shell had comprehensively assessed the sources and circumstances of potential exposure or effectively controlled the gases at source. (NOPSEMA)

The notice required Shell to implement improved detection, monitoring and control systems.

NOPSEMA’s current register shows that notice as complied with. (NOPSEMA)

That point should also be recorded.

The existence of a past notice does not mean the violation remains outstanding indefinitely.

Another Prelude notice in 2023

In July 2023, NOPSEMA issued a separate improvement notice over controls associated with work to remove a pressure-relief and vacuum-relief valve on an off-specification condensate tank.

NOPSEMA’s register now records that notice as complied with. (NOPSEMA)

Taken together, the record does not support the simplistic proposition:

“Prelude is permanently unsafe.”

But neither does it support treating the latest incident as an isolated regulatory curiosity.

Over several years, Australia’s offshore regulator has repeatedly intervened on different occupational and process-safety issues at the facility.

The important safety principle is hierarchy of controls

There is a broader reason the latest notice deserves attention.

Industrial safety normally distinguishes between stronger and weaker types of controls.

At the stronger end are measures that eliminate the hazard or physically prevent exposure.

Further down the hierarchy are administrative controls:

procedures;

training;

communications;

supervision;

permits;

and instructions.

Those controls matter.

But they can fail because human beings make mistakes.

People become distracted.

Shift handovers are imperfect.

Instructions are misunderstood.

Assumptions differ.

The regulator’s criticism at Prelude effectively reflects that principle.

Shell’s task depended too heavily on people and procedure when an engineering solution should have better prevented automatic energisation.

Automation becomes dangerous when its boundaries are unclear

There is another feature of the incident that deserves attention.

Automation usually improves industrial safety.

Machines perform repeatable sequences.

Interlocks prevent unsafe states.

Computer systems remove some opportunities for human error.

But automation introduces another risk when operators cannot be certain exactly when equipment may start or move.

That becomes particularly dangerous when a worker has physically entered the operating envelope of machinery to perform a manual intervention.

In such circumstances, the fundamental protection is isolation.

The worker should not have to trust that an automated start sequence will not run.

The system should prevent it from running.

That is effectively what NOPSEMA is now requiring Shell to demonstrate.

Prelude’s scale makes small failures important

Prelude FLNG is one of the largest floating industrial facilities ever constructed.

Its purpose is remarkable:

produce natural gas offshore;

process it;

liquefy it;

store LNG;

and load it directly onto LNG carriers,

all without sending the gas to a conventional onshore liquefaction plant.

That concentration of equipment makes Prelude technologically impressive.

It also creates formidable complexity.

Power generation.

Cryogenic systems.

Compressors.

Gas processing.

Storage.

Marine systems.

Automated controls.

Rotating equipment.

Emergency systems.

Thousands upon thousands of components have to interact safely on a floating installation far from shore.

Against that background, an injury involving a turning gear can sound minor.

It is not minor to the person whose hand was fractured.

And from a process-safety perspective, unexpected movement caused by uncontrolled hazardous energy is exactly the kind of mechanism that must be taken seriously before it produces a worse outcome.

The correct question is not whether Prelude has accidents

Every large industrial system experiences faults.

No credible safety regime assumes otherwise.

The meaningful question is:

What happens after the fault?

Does another layer of protection prevent a worker being exposed?

Does the machinery fail safely?

Does isolation prevent automatic energisation?

Can a single equipment fault combine with a procedural weakness to create an injury?

The latest NOPSEMA notice says that in this instance the protection was not good enough.

That finding deserves attention precisely because it comes from the offshore safety regulator rather than from speculation outside the facility.

Commentary

There is a tendency in corporate safety communications to describe injuries as unfortunate individual events.

A hand fracture.

A trip.

A dropped object.

A maintenance incident.

That framing can obscure the more important engineering question:

What system allowed the injury to happen?

NOPSEMA’s notice is useful because it does not stop at the injured technician.

It traces the event backwards.

The pneumatic system failed.

Manual intervention became necessary.

An automatic sequence remained capable of energising the motor.

The task relied predominantly upon procedures and human actions.

Critical isolation and supervision controls were not effectively implemented or verified.

Then the machinery moved.

That chain is the story.

And the regulator’s answer is equally important.

Do not merely improve the wording of the procedure.

Change the controls.

Reduce or eliminate the need for manual engagement.

Prevent unexpected energisation.

Verify isolation.

That is a much more meaningful response than simply reminding workers to “take care.”

Prelude’s history makes the notice harder to dismiss

No single incident proves a systemic safety culture failure.

That claim would go beyond the evidence.

The current notice concerns one particular activity.

The 2025 gas-exposure notice concerned a different hazard.

The 2023 notice involved another maintenance activity.

The 2021 power-loss investigation concerned facility-wide resilience.

They should not simply be added together as though they were one event.

But neither should they be considered in complete isolation.

Together they show that NOPSEMA has had reason, on multiple occasions, to intervene formally at Prelude.

That is a matter of public regulatory record.

For a facility as complex and strategically important as Prelude FLNG, those records deserve scrutiny.

What is established

On 2 August 2026, a Prelude production technician suffered fracture injuries to the hand during manual engagement of steam turbine generator turning gear.

The normal pneumatic engagement system had failed.

During the manual task, an automated start sequence energised the turning-gear motor, causing movement of the barring equipment.

NOPSEMA found that Shell had not implemented effective engineering controls to prevent automatic operation during manual engagement.

The regulator also found that the activity relied predominantly on procedures, communication and worker actions and that critical controls including isolation and supervision had not been effectively implemented or verified.

NOPSEMA concluded that Shell had contravened Clause 9(1) of Schedule 3 to the Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage Act and was likely to contravene the provision again unless the risk was addressed.

Shell has been given 180 days to complete the required actions.

NOPSEMA currently lists the notice as open. (NOPSEMA)

What is not established

The notice does not establish that Prelude FLNG as a whole is unsafe.

It does not establish that Shell deliberately exposed the worker to injury.

It does not allege that the incident was concealed.

And it does not amount to a prohibition on Prelude production.

The regulator’s finding is specific:

the controls governing manual engagement of the turning gear were inadequate and must be improved.

Sources

NOPSEMA — OHS Improvement Notice 2130, Prelude FLNG, 10 September 2026.

This is the primary regulatory document setting out the injury, the circumstances, the legal contravention, the continuing risk and the corrective actions required of Shell.

NOPSEMA — OHS Improvement Notice 2130, Prelude FLNG

NOPSEMA — Published directions and notices.

The regulator currently lists Improvement Notice 2130 against Shell Australia Pty Ltd and Prelude FLNG with status Open. (NOPSEMA)

NOPSEMA — Published directions and notices

NOPSEMA — Investigation of the December 2021 Prelude FLNG power-loss incident.

The investigation records facility-wide power disruption and seven workers treated for heat-related conditions. (NOPSEMA)

NOPSEMA — Prelude FLNG power-loss investigation report

NOPSEMA — OHS Improvement Notice 1967, February 2025.

The notice addressed workforce exposure risks involving benzene and hydrogen sulphide at Prelude. NOPSEMA’s register now lists it as complied with. (NOPSEMA)

NOPSEMA — Improvement Notice 1967

Energy News Bulletin: reporting on the new Prelude improvement notice and worker injury.

Energy News Bulletin — Shell hit with NOPSEMA notice after injury onboard Prelude

Site-wide disclaimer applies.

Prelude Worker Injured After Machinery Energised During Manual Task — NOPSEMA Orders Shell to Fix Safety Controls was first posted on September 18, 2026 at 10:08 am.
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Shell-led LNG Canada could make a final investment decision on Phase 2 as early as October, according to Reuters. If approved, the expansion would roughly double the Kitimat facility’s capacity from 14 million tonnes a year to about 28 million tonnes. More importantly, it would connect Shell’s enlarged Western Canadian gas position directly to Asian LNG markets at a time when buyers are increasingly concerned about supply security.

Shell may be approaching one of the most consequential investment decisions in its global LNG portfolio.

Reuters reported on 17 September that the partners in LNG Canada could reach a final investment decision on the proposed Phase 2 expansion as early as next month, citing three people familiar with the matter.

The project would add roughly another 14 million tonnes per annum of LNG capacity, taking the Kitimat facility from its current 14 mtpa to approximately 28 mtpa.

That would effectively double the scale of Canada’s first major LNG export terminal.

But the number alone does not explain why Phase 2 matters so much to Shell.

The real significance lies in what sits behind the liquefaction trains:

Shell’s expanding Montney gas production.

Its 40% stake in LNG Canada.

Its global LNG trading organisation.

Its shorter Pacific shipping route to Asia.

And now:

a geopolitical environment in which Asian customers are placing increasing value on diversified supply that does not depend upon Middle Eastern shipping routes.

That combination makes Phase 2 potentially much more than an expansion project.

It could become one of the clearest expressions yet of Shell’s integrated gas strategy.

First, the important caveat

Phase 2 has not yet been approved.

Reuters reports that a decision could come as early as early October.

But Shell told Reuters that it continues to work with its venture partners to explore pathways towards a possible expansion, and that any decision would depend upon factors including competitiveness, affordability, government support and stakeholder needs.

LNG Canada itself was equally careful.

It said that any final investment decision remained subject to each joint-venture participant independently satisfying its commercial, fiscal, regulatory and governance requirements.

The company said only that it hoped to make a decision before the end of 2026.

So the correct position today is:

Phase 2 appears to be moving closer to FID.

Not:

Phase 2 has been sanctioned.

That distinction should remain explicit until the partners make a formal announcement.

Shell is the largest shareholder

The LNG Canada ownership structure is:

Shell — 40%

PETRONAS — 25%

PetroChina — 15%

Mitsubishi — 15%

KOGAS — 5%

Shell therefore holds the largest individual interest and operates the project through LNG Canada Development Inc.

The existing facility consists of two LNG trains with combined capacity of approximately 14 mtpa.

The proposed expansion would add two further trains and roughly double the plant’s output.

That alone would make Phase 2 significant.

But recent developments have made it strategically more interesting.

LNG Canada only started shipping last year

Phase 1 reached a historic milestone on 30 June 2025, when its first LNG cargo departed Kitimat.

Shell described the project at the time as a new supply source primarily serving Asian markets and said LNG Canada would strengthen its integrated gas portfolio.

The existing plant was one of Canada’s largest private-sector investments, with Reuters putting Phase 1’s cost at approximately C$40 billion.

So Shell and its partners are potentially considering doubling the facility barely more than a year after LNG Canada entered commercial operation.

That is an unusually rapid transition from:

“Can this vast project actually be built and started?”

to:

“Should we build another two trains?”

The answer is not yet known.

But even serious consideration of Phase 2 at this stage says something important about how the partners view the asset.

The location is one of LNG Canada’s greatest advantages

Kitimat is not simply another liquefaction terminal.

Its geography gives Shell a significant structural advantage in supplying Asia.

Shell’s own investor material says LNG Canada can reach Asian markets in around 10 days.

The same presentation shows indicative shipping times of roughly:

24 days from the US Gulf Coast;

16 days from the Middle East;

and:

8 days from Australia.

That matters because LNG is not just natural gas.

It is natural gas plus liquefaction plus shipping plus regasification.

Every extra day at sea costs money.

A shorter route can mean:

lower freight costs;

less fuel consumption;

less exposure to vessel availability;

faster cargo cycling;

and fewer maritime chokepoints.

Shell describes LNG Canada as having lower supply and shipping costs versus the US Gulf Coast, giving it what the company calls a structural margin advantage.

That is precisely the sort of advantage Wael Sawan’s Shell now prioritises.

And there is no Panama Canal problem

US Gulf Coast LNG bound for Asia can face a choice.

Transit the Panama Canal when capacity and vessel dimensions permit.

Or take a much longer route.

Canadian Pacific LNG avoids that problem.

A cargo leaving Kitimat is already on the Pacific side of North America.

That means LNG Canada is geographically aligned with the markets Shell expects to drive a substantial share of future gas demand.

Shell has said LNG Canada offers an advantageous route to Asia with shipping times substantially shorter than those from the US Gulf Coast.

That was commercially attractive before the latest Middle East disruption.

It becomes more interesting when customers begin attaching an explicit premium to supply-route diversity.

Reuters says Asian buyers are increasingly focused on security

This is where the timing becomes particularly important.

Reuters reports that LNG customers — especially in Asia — are placing greater emphasis on supply security because of:

the Middle East conflict;

Red Sea disruption;

and uncertainty surrounding future flows through the Strait of Hormuz.

That does not mean LNG Canada replaces Middle Eastern LNG.

Qatar alone is too important for that.

Nor does it mean Canadian LNG is insulated from every geopolitical or operational risk.

But it does offer a geographically distinct source of supply.

For a utility or national energy buyer trying to diversify procurement, that matters.

The attraction is therefore not merely that Canada can supply LNG.

It is that Canadian LNG reaches Asia through an entirely different geopolitical corridor.

Shell has just spent $13.9 billion buying more Canadian energy

Then comes the ARC Resources acquisition.

On 2 September 2026, Shell completed its acquisition of ARC Resources for an updated equity value of approximately US$13.9 billion, assuming roughly US$2.5 billion of net debt and leases for an enterprise value of approximately US$16.5 billion.

ARC adds approximately 370,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day across gas and liquids and dramatically expands Shell’s position in the Montney basin of British Columbia and Alberta.

Shell explicitly said when announcing the acquisition that ARC’s gas reserves have the potential to support its LNG growth in Canada.

That makes the timing of a possible LNG Canada Phase 2 decision especially significant.

Only weeks after completing one of Shell’s largest recent acquisitions, the company could move towards creating a much larger export outlet for Western Canadian gas.

That starts to look less like coincidence and more like an integrated strategy.

Groundbirch already feeds LNG Canada

Shell was already vertically integrated before buying ARC.

Its Groundbirch gas asset in British Columbia supplies LNG Canada as well as the domestic gas market.

ARC adds much more gas-producing acreage and resources in the same broad basin.

Shell’s April acquisition presentation went further.

It identified LNG Canada Phase 2 explicitly as part of the strategic upside from the combination.

On one slide, Shell described LNG Canada Phase 2 as providing:

“optionality to further accelerate shift towards non-US international pricing.”

That sentence deserves attention.

Because it explains in financial terms why Shell might want another 14 million tonnes of LNG capacity.

From AECO gas to international LNG pricing

Western Canadian natural gas is frequently priced against AECO, a benchmark that can trade at substantial discounts when local gas supply exceeds takeaway capacity.

A gas producer selling exclusively into that market is exposed to those regional conditions.

Liquefaction changes the equation.

Convert Canadian gas into LNG and move it to Asia, and the molecule can gain exposure to international pricing rather than remaining trapped inside the Western Canadian gas market.

Shell’s own analysis shows the potential effect.

Its April 2026 presentation estimated that the combined portfolio had roughly:

40% AECO exposure

and:

60% international exposure

before Phase 2.

With LNG Canada Phase 2, Shell’s indicative analysis showed that changing to approximately:

20% AECO exposure

and:

80% international exposure.

That is arguably the single most revealing chart in the entire Phase 2 story.

The expansion is not simply about producing more LNG.

It is about changing where Shell’s Canadian gas is priced.

Shell calls that a structural margin advantage

The same Shell presentation makes the economic logic explicit.

Lower supply and shipping costs to Asia compared with US Gulf Coast exports can generate what Shell calls a:

“structural margin advantage.”

That phrase goes directly to Wael Sawan’s corporate strategy.

Shell is not pursuing growth simply because growth looks impressive.

The company repeatedly says projects must compete for capital and generate attractive returns.

That is why Phase 2 remains conditional.

The partners still have to decide that the economics justify another enormous investment.

But if it does pass that test, Shell’s own analysis suggests that the opportunity is unusually integrated:

produce low-cost Canadian gas;

liquefy it at a plant Shell already knows;

ship it across a comparatively short route;

sell it into higher-value international markets;

and optimise the entire chain through Shell’s global trading organisation.

Trading sits in the middle again

This follows a pattern we have already seen in Shell’s US power transactions.

Physical assets become more valuable when they support Shell’s trading capability.

LNG Canada is the same principle on a much larger scale.

Shell does not merely receive its share of LNG and sell it to one fixed customer.

Its Integrated Gas organisation manages a global portfolio.

Cargoes can be sold under long-term arrangements.

Others can be optimised.

Market exposure can be managed geographically.

Shipping can be redirected.

Gas can be sourced from Shell-owned production or purchased from the market.

That optionality becomes more valuable during periods of volatility.

Phase 2 could therefore connect the whole Canadian chain

Put the pieces together.

Shell now has:

a vastly enlarged Montney resource position;

existing gas production at Groundbirch;

ARC’s producing and development assets;

a 40% interest in LNG Canada;

a functioning Pacific Coast export terminal;

one of the world’s largest LNG trading portfolios;

and a direct route into Asia.

Phase 2 could enlarge the pipe connecting all of those pieces.

That is why this story matters far more than the simple headline:

“LNG plant may double in size.”

It potentially converts Shell’s Canadian upstream acquisition into a more valuable international gas business.

The Indigenous ownership proposal is also significant

There is another important element that should not be treated as a footnote.

In July 2026, LNG Canada announced an equity option agreement with MNT Investments LP, representing the economic-development organisations of five neighbouring First Nations:

the Gitga’at First Nation;

Gitxaała Nation;

Haisla Nation;

Kitselas First Nation;

and Kitsumkalum.

The agreement gives MNT Investments the opportunity to invest up to C$1 billion for a majority ownership interest in a special-purpose entity that would purchase the additional LNG storage tank planned for Phase 2.

The tank would then be leased back to LNG Canada.

LNG Canada says the arrangement could become one of the largest Indigenous ownership positions in Canadian energy infrastructure.

Importantly, the agreement is conditional on Phase 2 being approved.

That makes the forthcoming investment decision important not only to Shell and its international partners, but also to communities around the project.

More than 100 cargoes already shipped

By July 2026, LNG Canada said the first phase had shipped more than 100 LNG cargoes since operations began on 30 June 2025.

That operational history matters.

Phase 2 would not be a greenfield proposal built around a theoretical future facility.

The marine terminal exists.

The first two liquefaction trains exist.

The pipeline connection exists.

Cargoes are moving.

The workforce, operating systems and supporting infrastructure are already substantially in place.

That does not remove construction risk.

Two new LNG trains would still involve enormous expenditure and execution complexity.

But it means Phase 2 begins from a very different position from Phase 1.

The first phase was difficult enough

That deserves emphasis.

Phase 1 took years of planning, construction and capital.

The C$40 billion price tag cited by Reuters gives some indication of the scale.

A decision to expand cannot therefore be interpreted simply as Shell deciding that “LNG prices are high, so build more.”

The partners have to assess:

construction cost;

labour availability;

gas supply;

contracting;

future carbon costs;

fiscal terms;

project returns;

shipping economics;

regulation;

stakeholder requirements;

and long-term LNG demand.

LNG Canada itself has repeatedly said Phase 2 must satisfy tests concerning competitiveness, affordability, pace, future greenhouse-gas emissions and stakeholder needs.

That is why an early-October decision remains plausible rather than certain.

Shell also has a carbon argument

Shell presents LNG Canada as comparatively advantaged on emissions intensity.

The project uses efficient gas turbines and hydroelectric power for supporting energy needs, and Shell says the facility is designed to rank among the lower-carbon-intensity LNG plants globally.

LNG Canada says any Phase 2 pathway would need to maintain its greenhouse-gas-intensity ambition.

That does not make LNG carbon-free.

Liquefaction consumes energy.

Methane leakage matters.

Shipping produces emissions.

And ultimately the natural gas is burned by customers.

But within the LNG industry, production and liquefaction carbon intensity increasingly affect project competitiveness.

That gives LNG Canada another characteristic Shell can attempt to monetise.

Then there is the coal argument

Shell continues to argue that LNG can support emissions reduction where gas replaces coal in power generation.

When the first LNG Canada cargo departed, Shell said Asian markets moving away from coal represented an important use case for the project.

That argument is contested because the actual climate outcome depends upon methane leakage, plant efficiency, what fuel is genuinely displaced and how long the gas infrastructure operates.

But from Shell’s commercial perspective, the important point is clear:

Asia remains central to its long-term LNG demand thesis.

And LNG Canada is designed geographically around supplying that market.

The timing could hardly be more favourable — commercially

There is a temptation to describe the present geopolitical crisis as “good for LNG Canada.”

That would be too crude.

Wars and supply disruptions impose severe human and economic costs and should not be reduced to convenient investment narratives.

But commercially, the current environment undeniably strengthens one part of LNG Canada’s investment case:

supply diversification.

Only yesterday Shell’s own chief economist warned that global energy-market “shock absorbers” are weakening after tens of millions of tonnes of expected LNG supply were lost.

Now Reuters reports that Shell’s flagship Canadian LNG project may be approaching a decision to double capacity.

Those stories are related.

Not because the Middle East conflict created LNG Canada Phase 2 — the expansion has been contemplated for years.

But because present conditions make the strategic value of geographically diversified LNG supply easier to see.

For Shell shareholders, this could be an unusually coherent growth project

A frequent problem with large energy-company portfolios is that acquisitions and capital projects can seem disconnected.

Here the pieces fit remarkably well.

Shell bought ARC.

ARC adds gas.

Shell already owns Groundbirch.

Groundbirch feeds LNG Canada.

Shell owns 40% of LNG Canada.

Phase 2 would double liquefaction capacity.

Canada’s west coast gives direct access to Asia.

Shell trades LNG globally.

And its own modelling suggests Phase 2 could materially increase international pricing exposure while reducing dependence on AECO.

That is strategic integration in a very literal sense.

But the capital test still matters

All of this does not mean the partners should automatically approve Phase 2.

The scale of LNG investment now proposed around the world is enormous.

North American LNG export capacity is expanding rapidly.

Projects are being developed in the United States, Canada, Qatar and elsewhere.

An asset that looks extremely attractive in a tight market can face very different economics when a wave of new supply arrives.

Shell has to consider the market expected when Phase 2 actually begins producing — not merely the market of September 2026.

That is why cost discipline remains critical.

If project costs rise enough, even an excellent location can lose its advantage.

Shell’s own numbers show why management is interested

The strongest evidence that Phase 2 has moved beyond a vague future possibility comes from Shell itself.

In April, while explaining the ARC acquisition to investors, Shell placed LNG Canada Phase 2 directly inside the value-creation logic of the transaction.

It showed the proposed project on its Canadian asset map.

It identified Phase 2 pricing as a source of additional upside.

And it modelled the expansion as potentially shifting the enlarged gas portfolio towards substantially greater international price exposure.

Those are not promises that FID will happen.

But they tell investors exactly why Shell cares about it.

Commentary

LNG Canada Phase 2 may eventually prove to be one of the simplest ways to understand Wael Sawan’s Shell.

The company wants upstream resources.

But preferably advantaged ones.

It wants LNG growth.

But preferably where transport economics are attractive.

It wants trading optionality.

It wants international pricing.

It wants investments capable of generating strong returns.

And it increasingly prefers businesses in which multiple parts of Shell’s portfolio reinforce one another.

Canada now offers all of those things in one chain.

Montney gas at one end.

Asian LNG buyers at the other.

Shell sitting in between as producer, liquefaction shareholder, shipper, marketer and trader.

The acquisition of ARC Resources made that chain substantially larger.

Phase 2 could make it substantially more valuable.

That does not make approval inevitable.

The partners still have to decide whether the economics justify committing many billions of dollars more.

But if Reuters is correct that an FID could come within weeks, the decision would be much more than another LNG project sanction.

It would amount to a major statement about where Shell believes the future of its gas business lies.

Not merely underground in Canada.

But across the Pacific.

What is established

LNG Canada Phase 1 has two trains with combined capacity of about 14 mtpa, and its first cargo departed on 30 June 2025.

Shell owns 40% of the venture.

The proposed Phase 2 expansion would add two further trains and approximately double capacity to around 28 mtpa.

Reuters reports that a final investment decision could come as early as early October 2026, citing three people familiar with the matter.

Shell and LNG Canada have not announced a final investment decision.

Shell’s own ARC Resources investor presentation identifies Phase 2 as potential upside and says it could increase the portfolio’s international pricing exposure while reducing AECO exposure.

Shell completed its acquisition of ARC Resources on 2 September 2026, adding approximately 370 kboe/d and substantial Montney gas and liquids resources.

Five neighbouring First Nations, through MNT Investments LP, have an option to invest up to C$1 billion in infrastructure associated with Phase 2 if the expansion proceeds.

What remains uncertain

The timing of FID remains uncertain.

The final capital cost has not been publicly established in the material reviewed here.

The exact design and ultimate capacity of Phase 2 may still evolve.

Future LNG prices, construction costs and long-term demand remain uncertain.

And no current market condition guarantees that an investment sanctioned today will generate the returns expected when it begins operating years later.

Sources

Reuters, 17 September 2026: Shell-led LNG Canada could approve Phase 2 expansion by early October, sources say.

Reuters report

Shell, 30 June 2025: announcement of LNG Canada’s first cargo; Shell’s 40% interest and existing 14 mtpa capacity.

Shell — First cargo leaves LNG Canada

Shell, 27 April 2026: ARC Resources acquisition announcement and strategic rationale.

Shell — Agreement to acquire ARC Resources

Shell ARC Resources investor presentation, April 2026: Shell’s analysis of Phase 2, international pricing exposure, AECO exposure and shipping advantage.

Shell — ARC Resources acquisition presentation

Shell, 2 September 2026: completion of the ARC Resources acquisition.

Shell — Completion of ARC Resources acquisition

LNG Canada, 14 July 2026: Indigenous equity option involving MNT Investments LP and five neighbouring First Nations; investment option of up to C$1 billion conditional on Phase 2 proceeding.

LNG Canada — Indigenous equity option

LNG Canada: current Phase 2 information and confirmation that the expansion remains under consideration by the joint-venture participants.

LNG Canada — Phase 2 information

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From Canadian Gas to Asian Buyers: Why LNG Canada Phase 2 Could Become the Centrepiece of Shell’s LNG Strategy was first posted on September 18, 2026 at 9:53 am.
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As the executive director of the Living Independent Network Corp, Jeremy Maxand does what he can to help people who don’t drive get around in southern Idaho. As in most of rural America, public transit options are limited.

The nonprofit organization, which serves those with disabilities, receives $100,000 annually from the state through a federal appropriation. The money finances cards riders use to pay for transportation, but Maxand described the region’s transit as a “bare-minimum lifeline service” and “piecemeal.” 

And yet, even that could soon worsen. 

The surface transportation programs authorized by the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, signed by President Joe Biden in 2021, expire by the end of the year. Lawmakers are hammering out the details of the bipartisan BUILD America 250 Act, which would reauthorize those programs. Transportation advocates say the Biden-era legislation failed to broaden Americans’ mobility options beyond cars, but they see the proposed BUILD Act as a significant step backward.

That’s because the bill would authorize $16.5 billion less for public transit than its predecessor, with $103.3 billion over five years compared with the baseline of $119.9 billion in the Jobs Act, according to the American Public Transportation Association. When adjusted for inflation, the BUILD Act would need an additional $24 billion to match that level, according to the Urban Institute. Every state would receive at least $10 million less in formula funding over the five years the law would be in effect.

“There would be a large decline in funding for public transit, and that would especially be true for projects that require what’s called capital investment funding — projects that require major investments for new lines,” said Yonah Freemark, a researcher with the organization.

Freemark said the effects would extend well beyond major cities. “Public transit is often portrayed as something that is subways in New York City,” he said. “The reality is that millions of people rely on public transit in a lot of smaller communities, including a lot of rural communities and tribal communities around the country. … Those rural transit systems are much more reliant on federal support to provide the service that they offer than are the urban transit agencies.”

Many public transit agencies have been struggling financially since ridership plummeted during the pandemic, exacerbating years of underinvestment. Further cuts could have severe effects, particularly in rural areas, transit advocates and experts said.

The cuts could be particularly painful in Idaho, which the Urban Institute estimates would see the nation’s biggest percentage drop in federal formula transit funding, at 18 percent. Maxand noted that local governments have limited ability to raise money for public transportation. 

“When the federal funding goes away, everything goes away,” he said. That could leave those with disabilities socially isolated, only able to leave their homes for medical needs. 

Maine faces a similar problem. The Urban Institute estimates its federal formula funding would fall 16 percent. Josh Caldwell, a co-facilitator of Transportation for Maine who also works for the Natural Resources Council of Maine, said the state’s transit system already needs improvement.

“Nowhere in the state do we have service that is at the standard that we’d like to see, which is a regularity of every 15 minutes,” he said. 

The state receives about 38 percent of its funding from the federal government. The Maine Department of Transportation already faces a $400 million transportation funding shortfall because gas tax revenues have decreased thanks, in part, to the state’s decision to freeze the tax relative to inflation in 2011.

Though less rural than Maine, Indiana would see a comparable decline in federal formula transit funding under the BUILD Act. Austin Gibble, a transit planner in Indianapolis, said the cuts could lead the region’s transit agency IndyGo to delay bus purchases, forcing it to rely on older, less reliable vehicles.

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Gibble is more concerned about what the cuts might mean for less populated areas. “Rural agencies in Indiana are already horrifically oversubscribed,” he said. In Hamilton County, the largest county in Indiana without fixed route transit service, Gibble said the waitlist for rides on Hamilton County Express, which requires a reservation, can be weeks long. 

The impacts aren’t limited to rural America. The Urban Institute estimates that New York City would lose $2.3 billion over five years. Representative Jerry Nadler, who represents parts of the city, was the lone Democrat on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee to oppose the bill. 

“It continues a familiar pattern: Highways are treated as the default national priority, while rail and transit are left fighting for insufficient resources, despite carrying millions of people, supporting regional economies, and reducing congestion,” Nadler said in a statement. 

Danny Pearlstein, the policy and communications director at Riders Alliance, said Democrats should think bigger when it comes to transportation legislation. 

“The Biden infrastructure bill was not the high water mark,” he said. “We could do much better than that in a variety of different ways, and we shouldn’t hold up bipartisanship as a core value of how we fund transportation when we have such sharply diverted views of the role of government to invest in people and communities.”

LeeAnn Hall, the campaign manager of the Alliance for a Just Society’s National Campaign for Transit Justice, said the debate is also about affordability. Transportation is the second-highest cost in Americans’ household budgets.

Reduced transit service could push some households toward another car, Hall said. “They have to pay more for gasoline. They’re going to be paying more for insurance. They have to think about parking. They have to think about maintenance and repair,” she said. “It’s expanding their household budget.”

Hall argued that investing in transit benefits people whether they use it or not. “Every dollar that we invest in public transit reduces congestion numbers, makes driving safer, and creates opportunities for families to have options,” she said. 

As for residents of southern Idaho, Maxand hopes to provide them with as many transit options as possible, but they’re all getting more expensive to run, especially as fuel prices continue rising. He expects federal cuts to hit seniors and people with disabilities the hardest. 

“It’s like saying you’re not going to pay for electricity to power the ventilator, but you’re going to leave the ventilator,” he said. “What are we doing here? This is not sustainable.”

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Federal transit cuts could hit rural America hardest on Sep 18, 2026.

Georgia’s Public Service Commission, or PSC — the group that has final say over how the state’s largest electric utility generates electricity and how much it charges customers — regularly hears from members of the public during its meetings. But because those meetings are almost always in Atlanta, many of the commenters typically come from the metro area. 

Since the spring, commissioner Alicia Johnson, one of two recently-elected Democrats, has been pressing the commission to meet in a different part of the state as a way to open the floor to different commenters. On Tuesday, the PSC finally did that.

“For over 100 years, the Public Service Commission has met in Atlanta and rarely, if at all, has meetings across the state,” Johnson, whose PSC district includes Chatham and Effingham counties, said. “This was an opportunity for me to have our commissioners come out and actually speak with their constituents outside of Atlanta to move away just from hearing the voices of interveners or advocates.”

The commissioners traveled to Savannah to hear from coastal residents. Following a brief administrative meeting and a presentation on the PSC’s recent actions on data centers, including approval of Georgia Power’s contract with OpenAI and new protections for regular customers, the floor opened for public comments. 

Many of those who spoke voiced concerns over the OpenAI data center that is planned for Effingham County, just outside of Savannah, and called for more transparency around the company’s contract with Georgia Power — the largest for a single customer since the utility started reporting its contracts in 2024.

“There’s a reason you’re named the Public Service Commission and not the Georgia Power service commission or the OpenAI service commission,” said Bill Wright of Pooler, a city northwest of Savannah. “Your name tells you where your loyalty should lie.”

The commissioners clarified the limited scope of their involvement with data centers: They oversee the making and selling of electricity only if a data center chooses Georgia Power as its utility. They encouraged attendees to take up their concerns with local elected officials.

Commenters also criticized the commission over power bills. 

Michael Hawthorne, an organizing strategist with the Sierra Club, argued the commission is supposed to set reasonable rates for electricity. Then he posed a question to the room at large.

“Does anybody feel like everything’s reasonably priced?” he asked.

The audience replied with a resounding “No.”

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The frustration and anger from the Savannah crowd wasn’t surprising, Johnson said.

“It’s what I’ve heard since running for office, and so I’m just glad that our other commissioners got to hear some of it, too,” she said.

Jason Shaw, a Republican from a south Georgia district and the PSC chair, said the meeting reinforced what he’s heard from constituents as well. In an interview after the meeting, Shaw said transparency has been a core issue with the OpenAI data center in particular, starting at the local level. But he said Georgia Power needs to share more information about its data center contracts, too.

“We’ve got to do a better job of forcing the company to be able to present more to us that’s not redacted,” he said. “And I think that’s something that we’re working really closely on.”

Some commenters accused the commissioners of failing to represent the interests of the public that elected them — and reminded them another election is coming up in November.

“If you truly want to be on this board, it’s time to step up and protect the people,” said Corey Foreman, a candidate running for the state senate from a coastal district. “If you can’t do that, I will be more than happy to help remove you.”

All five members of the PSC were Republicans from 2006 until the start of this year, when Peter Hubbard and Johnson took office after unseating two Republican incumbents in an election that focused largely on power bills and the commission’s recent history of rate increases. The two Democrats have cast dissenting votes several times and closely questioned Georgia Power officials. But both have also been candid that their ability to shift policy on emissions, rates, data centers, and other issues is limited while they are in the minority on the PSC.

The District 3 seat currently held by Hubbard and the District 5 seat recently vacated by Republican Tricia Pridemore are both on the ballot in November. If the Democratic candidates win both seats, the party would hold a majority on the commission for the first time in decades.

Hubbard was elected to a one-year term last year and is now facing former Republican commissioner Fitz Johnson in a rematch election for a six-year term. In District 5, Democrat Shelia Edwards is running against Republican Josh Tolbert. While the candidates have to live in their districts, both races are statewide.

Early voting begins October 13.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline In Savannah, Georgia’s utility regulators faced public wrath over data centers on Sep 18, 2026.

Shell’s chief economist says global energy markets have so far absorbed an extraordinary loss of oil and LNG supply from the Middle East. But the mechanisms that cushioned the blow — weaker demand, inventory drawdowns, spare infrastructure and rising American production — are wearing thin. Europe enters winter with unusually low gas stocks. Asian buyers are already retreating from expensive LNG. And Shell warns that even reopening disrupted trade routes would not immediately restore normal conditions.

There are times when a single phrase explains a complicated market remarkably well.

On 16 September 2026, Adam Ritchie, chief economist at Shell Trading, told an industry conference in Oslo that global energy markets had demonstrated impressive resilience despite severe disruption in the Middle East.

But then came the warning:

“Those shock absorbers are weakening.” (London South East)

That may be the most important energy-market statement Shell has made this week.

Because according to Shell’s calculations, the world has already lost approximately:

36 million tonnes of LNG

and:

1.6 billion barrels of crude oil and condensates

since the current Middle East disruption began. (London South East)

For perspective, Reuters reports that the 36 million tonnes of missing LNG is roughly equivalent to the combined LNG imports of Britain and France last year. (London South East)

Yet the global energy system did not collapse.

The interesting question is why.

And the more important question now is what happens as the buffers that prevented collapse begin to disappear.

How did the world absorb such a large supply loss?

Shell’s answer is instructive.

The market was cushioned by a combination of:

weaker Chinese demand;

inventory drawdowns;

flexible shipping capacity;

spare pipeline capacity;

and:

rising oil and gas production in the Americas.

Together, those mechanisms absorbed a remarkable amount of disruption. (London South East)

That is what Ritchie means by “shock absorbers.”

They are not one emergency reserve controlled by one government.

They are the spare capacity and behavioural flexibility scattered throughout the global energy system.

Consumers use less.

Cargoes change destination.

Inventories are drawn down.

Pipelines carry more.

Producers elsewhere increase output.

Traders redirect supply.

The market adapts.

Until it cannot.

The warning is that the spare capacity is disappearing

Ritchie’s argument is not that the market has failed.

It is almost the opposite.

The market has worked extraordinarily hard.

The problem is that the mechanisms doing the work are becoming exhausted.

As inventories fall, there is less stored energy available for the next disruption.

As spare shipping capacity is deployed, there are fewer vessels available to solve the next bottleneck.

As pipeline systems operate closer to their limits, there is less ability to reroute gas.

And as alternative producers increase output, their remaining spare production capacity becomes smaller.

That makes subsequent shocks more dangerous than the first one.

A system with abundant slack can absorb bad news.

A system operating close to its limits transmits bad news directly into prices.

That is the essence of Shell’s warning.

Europe is entering winter with an uncomfortable problem

Nowhere is the vulnerability more obvious than Europe.

Reuters reported this week that European Union natural-gas storage is only about 67% full.

That is described as a record low for this point in the year and is far below the EU’s target of storage reaching 80% of capacity by December. (BOE Report)

Shell’s President of Integrated Gas, Cederic Cremers, described Europe as entering the end of autumn with historically low storage levels. (BOE Report)

That creates a familiar but dangerous dependency.

Europe now needs:

continued LNG arrivals;

continued Norwegian pipeline supply;

manageable winter temperatures;

and sufficiently weak Asian demand to prevent an aggressive bidding war for cargoes.

Lose one of those advantages and the market becomes tighter.

Lose several simultaneously and prices could move very rapidly.

Germany shows how thin the margin has become

Germany provides an especially revealing example.

Reuters reported that German gas-storage sites were only around 53% full in early September, the lowest level for that point in the year since records began approximately 15 years ago. (Yahoo Finance)

Germany’s state-owned SEFE has already begun increasing gas storage, while the government is examining additional market incentives to encourage traders to hold more winter supply. (Yahoo Finance)

That is a significant change of posture.

Europe spent years building resilience after the loss of large quantities of Russian pipeline gas.

Now it is discovering that resilience itself requires constant replenishment.

Storage is not resilience if the tanks are empty.

The Strait of Hormuz remains the critical pressure point

The most important LNG bottleneck is the Strait of Hormuz.

Before the current disruption, approximately one fifth of global LNG supply passed through the route.

Qatar and the United Arab Emirates are among the most important exporters affected.

Shell’s own LNG Outlook 2026, published in June, stated that severe disruption through Hormuz had shut in around one fifth of the world’s monthly LNG supply since the conflict began. (Shell)

That is not a marginal loss.

Global LNG trade totalled approximately 422 million tonnes in 2025.

Removing tens of millions of tonnes from that market in a short period creates an enormous reallocation problem. (Shell)

Every missing Middle Eastern cargo has to be replaced, substituted or rationed somehow.

America has helped save the market

One of the most important stabilising forces has been the growth of LNG supply from North America.

Shell itself says the ramp-up of new liquefaction capacity in North America has helped offset Middle Eastern disruption. (Shell)

That trend matters enormously.

The United States is already the world’s largest LNG exporter and is expected to expand exports substantially through the end of the decade.

For Europe, American LNG has become increasingly important as Russian pipeline supply has declined.

For Asia, the same cargoes represent competition.

And that creates one of the defining characteristics of the modern LNG market:

Europe and Asia are increasingly bidding for the same flexible supply.

Asia is already responding by buying less

High prices eventually solve a supply problem in one brutal way.

They destroy demand.

Reuters reports that Asia’s LNG imports are heading towards their weakest September in eight years.

Expected arrivals of approximately 20.09 million tonnes would be down from 22.27 million tonnes in September 2025. (BOE Report)

Why?

Because LNG has become too expensive for many buyers.

Spot prices in Asia have climbed close to $30 per million British thermal units, compared with roughly $10 before the conflict. (BOE Report)

For wealthy utilities in Japan or Europe, painful prices can sometimes be absorbed.

For price-sensitive markets in South and Southeast Asia, the response is different.

Buy less LNG.

Burn more coal.

Use more domestic gas.

Switch fuels.

Curtail demand.

Or simply go without.

That creates an uncomfortable paradox for Shell

Shell is one of the biggest beneficiaries of a global LNG market.

It is also exposed to what happens when LNG becomes too expensive.

Shell describes itself as one of the world’s leading LNG suppliers.

Its LNG business met approximately 16% of global LNG demand in 2025. (Shell)

Its portfolio includes supply from more than ten countries and sales into more than thirty.

It also controls or charters one of the world’s largest LNG shipping fleets. (Shell)

That scale gives Shell extraordinary flexibility.

If prices differ sharply between markets, Shell can redirect cargoes.

If one region weakens, another may absorb supply.

If shipping routes change, Shell’s large fleet and trading operation can adapt.

Volatility therefore creates opportunities.

But volatility also has a limit.

When prices become sufficiently high, customers leave the market.

That is not good for long-term demand.

Shell’s strategic bet on LNG is enormous

This matters because Shell has made LNG central to its corporate strategy.

At its 2025 Capital Markets Day, Shell said it intended to grow LNG sales by 4% to 5% annually through 2030. (Shell)

Its 2025 Annual Report records LNG sales of 73 million tonnes, up from 66 million tonnes the previous year.

Shell said 2025 included the highest number of LNG cargoes it had ever delivered in a single year. (Shell)

The company also expects global LNG demand to rise substantially over the long term.

Shell’s 2026 outlook forecasts demand increasing by approximately 65% by 2050, to nearly 700 million tonnes annually. (Shell)

So when Shell warns that the global LNG market is losing its shock absorbers, it is not offering an academic observation.

This is one of the most important markets in Shell’s entire corporate strategy.

The trading desk sits at the centre of all this

The warning also fits remarkably well with another theme visible across Shell’s recent strategy.

Trading.

Shell’s Integrated Gas business does not merely produce LNG.

It buys it.

Sells it.

Ships it.

Redirects it.

Optimises it.

Arbitrages geographic price differences.

And combines physical infrastructure with financial and contractual flexibility.

Shell’s own portfolio description says the Integrated Gas segment markets and trades natural gas, LNG, power and carbon-emission rights. (Shell)

That means disruption can enhance the value of Shell’s trading capability.

If an LNG cargo has dramatically different values in Europe and Asia, optionality becomes valuable.

If one shipping route closes, an organisation capable of redirecting supply gains an advantage.

If markets fragment, a company with physical assets in multiple regions can exploit those differences.

Shell’s scale becomes useful precisely when the system becomes complicated.

But extreme volatility can stop being profitable and start becoming destructive

There is a temptation to assume that higher energy prices automatically mean higher profits for Shell.

That is too simple.

Very high prices can create:

demand destruction;

counterparty stress;

political intervention;

windfall taxes;

subsidies;

industrial shutdowns;

fuel switching;

recession;

and accelerated investment in alternatives.

A customer who pays an expensive LNG bill is still a customer.

A customer who switches permanently to coal, domestic gas, nuclear power or renewables is not.

That is why the current crisis is strategically ambiguous for Shell.

Short-term volatility may favour Shell’s trading business.

Long-term affordability problems can undermine the growth story on which Shell’s LNG strategy depends.

What happens when the route reopens?

Perhaps the most sobering part of Ritchie’s warning concerns what comes after the disruption.

The intuitive assumption is simple:

Hormuz reopens.

Ships sail again.

Supply returns.

Prices fall.

Problem solved.

Shell says reality may be considerably messier.

Ritchie warned that even if disrupted energy chokepoints reopen, bottlenecks involving shipping, production and supply chains could prevent markets returning immediately to normal.

He suggested tight conditions could persist well into 2027, assuming no additional damage to energy infrastructure. (London South East)

Then comes the second phase.

Restocking.

The world has drawn down inventories to survive the disruption.

Those inventories eventually have to be rebuilt.

That process itself creates additional demand.

So restoring the flow of energy does not instantly restore the buffer that previously existed.

The market has borrowed resilience from the future

That may be the clearest way to understand Shell’s warning.

The global energy system has survived the current disruption partly by borrowing resilience from the future.

It used inventories that would otherwise have been available later.

It used spare pipeline capacity.

It used shipping flexibility.

It relied on weaker demand.

It accelerated alternative production.

Those mechanisms kept the system functioning.

But once used, they have to be restored.

Storage must be refilled.

Inventories rebuilt.

Ships repositioned.

Maintenance completed.

Supply chains normalised.

That means even after the immediate crisis passes, the energy system can remain fragile.

Weather now matters enormously

There is one variable nobody controls.

Winter.

Reuters reports that industry executives see a cold winter in Europe and Asia as one of the principal risks.

Wood Mackenzie chairman Simon Flowers said a colder-than-normal winter could push global LNG prices towards $40 per million BTU, although that is a scenario rather than a forecast. (BOE Report)

At such prices, further demand destruction would become likely.

A mild winter would relieve pressure.

A severe winter would do the opposite.

Energy security can therefore turn on meteorology as much as geopolitics.

Shell’s warning is also a warning to governments

There is an obvious policy implication.

Modern energy systems have been built increasingly around efficiency.

Just-in-time supply.

Optimised inventories.

Interconnected markets.

Global shipping.

Flexible trading.

Under normal conditions, that reduces cost.

Under extreme conditions, it can reduce redundancy.

Shell’s “shock absorber” metaphor therefore raises an uncomfortable question:

How much spare capacity should the global energy system deliberately maintain?

Too much spare capacity is expensive.

Too little makes consumers vulnerable to geopolitical disruption.

That problem is not unique to LNG.

Oil inventories, electricity storage, spare generation, pipelines and fuel reserves all involve the same trade-off.

Resilience costs money.

So does the absence of resilience.

There is a broader irony here

Shell has spent years arguing that LNG contributes to energy security because it allows natural gas to move across oceans rather than remaining trapped within pipeline systems.

That argument is valid.

The global LNG market genuinely creates flexibility.

But the present crisis demonstrates the other side.

LNG depends upon:

liquefaction plants;

shipping routes;

LNG carriers;

regasification terminals;

finance;

insurance;

and access through critical maritime chokepoints.

A pipeline can be geopolitically vulnerable.

So can a ship.

There is no completely geopolitics-proof energy system.

Diversification is the real protection.

Shell’s own numbers make the scale difficult to ignore

Return to the two figures:

36 million tonnes of LNG.

1.6 billion barrels of crude oil and condensates.

Those quantities have already disappeared from the expected global supply system.

And yet markets have continued functioning.

That is evidence of impressive resilience.

But resilience should not be confused with immunity.

The buffers that allowed the world to absorb those losses are smaller now than they were when the crisis began.

The next disruption therefore begins from a weaker starting point.

That is what Adam Ritchie was warning about.

Commentary

Shell’s message deserves attention precisely because the company has every reason to understand the mechanics of this market.

It is not merely an LNG producer.

It is producer, shipper, buyer, seller, trader and optimiser.

Few companies possess a better view across the entire physical LNG chain.

And the message coming from that vantage point is not:

everything is fine.

It is:

the system has coped remarkably well, but much of the spare capacity that allowed it to cope has now been consumed.

For Shell shareholders, that creates both opportunity and danger.

Scarcity increases the value of flexible supply.

Volatility increases the value of trading expertise.

Geographical price differences create arbitrage opportunities.

Shell possesses all three advantages.

But an energy market cannot become indefinitely more expensive without eventually damaging the demand it is designed to serve.

The strongest LNG business in the world still needs customers capable of buying LNG.

That may be the central tension of Shell’s LNG strategy in 2026.

The company is positioned extremely well for a volatile market.

What it cannot control is how much volatility the market itself can withstand.

What is established

Shell calculates that approximately 36 million tonnes of LNG and 1.6 billion barrels of crude oil and condensates have been lost from expected global supply during the Middle East disruption. (London South East)

Shell’s chief economist Adam Ritchie said weaker Chinese demand, inventory drawdowns, flexible shipping, spare pipeline capacity and higher American production had helped absorb the shock, but warned that those buffers were weakening. (London South East)

EU gas storage is around 67% full, described by Reuters as a record low for this time of year and below the EU’s 80% December target. (BOE Report)

Shell’s Cederic Cremers has described European storage levels entering late autumn as historically low. (BOE Report)

Shell expects LNG sales to grow by around 4–5% annually through 2030 and describes LNG as central to its Integrated Gas strategy. (Shell)

Shell’s 2026 LNG Outlook estimates that global LNG demand could rise to nearly 700 million tonnes annually by 2050. (Shell)

What remains uncertain

The duration of disruption through the Strait of Hormuz remains uncertain.

The severity of the coming northern-hemisphere winter is unknown.

Future LNG prices cannot be predicted with confidence.

The extent to which Asian demand destruction proves temporary or structural is also uncertain.

And Shell’s suggestion that normalisation could take well into 2027 should be understood as an industry assessment based on current conditions, not a guaranteed timetable.

Sources

Reuters, 16 September 2026: Shell and Equinor warn that global energy-market “shock absorbers” are weakening; includes Shell’s estimate of 36 million tonnes of lost LNG and 1.6 billion barrels of lost crude oil and condensates. (London South East)

Reuters report — Energy market shock absorbers weakening, Shell and Equinor warn

Reuters, 16 September 2026: European gas storage at approximately 67%; Shell Integrated Gas President Cederic Cremers warns of historically low stocks entering winter. (BOE Report)

Reuters report — Global LNG prices could spike this winter on low European gas stocks

Shell LNG Outlook 2026: Shell’s assessment of global LNG supply, disruption through Hormuz and long-term demand growth. (Shell)

Shell LNG Outlook 2026

Shell Annual Report and Accounts 2025: LNG sales, Integrated Gas performance and Shell’s 4–5% annual LNG sales growth target through 2030. (Shell)

Shell Annual Report and Accounts 2025

Reuters, 15 September 2026: Asian LNG demand weakened as high prices encouraged fuel switching and reduced purchases. (BOE Report)

Reuters market analysis, 16 September 2026: Asian September LNG imports expected to be the weakest for that month in eight years. (BOE Report)

Site-wide disclaimer applies.

Shell Warns the World Is Running Out of Energy “Shock Absorbers” — 36 Million Tonnes of LNG Already Missing was first posted on September 18, 2026 at 9:28 am.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net

The Endangered Species Act has stood as a pillar of conservation in the United States since 1973, bringing animals like bald eagles, manatees, and humpback whales back from the brink of extinction. 

But now, the Trump administration has taken its boldest step yet in an effort to strip legal protections for endangered species. Starting this week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says that it now considers it legal to kill a federally protected animal, as long as it wasn’t on purpose.

The directive comes after another recent revision to these legal protections went into effect this week, saying that damaging an animal’s habitat is no longer considered “harming” it. The two changes in combination take the teeth out of the Endangered Species Act and pave the way for industries to log, mine, pollute, or travel through areas without regard for what lives there.

The fate of the country’s rarest creatures could come down to the meaning of two seemingly simple words: “harm” and “take.” In this case, “take” refers to killing an animal. 

“A vessel that inadvertently strikes a whale has not taken it, because the vessel’s course was not set against the whale,” said the memo, signed by Brian Nesvik, director of the Fish and Wildlife Service. “Felling a tree is not a take of the bats roosting in it unless the tree was felled for the purpose of killing or capturing them.”

Legal experts say this is an unprecedentedly narrow view of what these words mean in the Endangered Species Act, and that the moves are sure to be challenged in court. Almost two dozen states recently sued the Trump administration over changes to the law, and more lawsuits from environmental groups are expected to come. And if history is any indicator, the agency could soon find itself on the losing side of an old argument — one that’s been heard in courts before. 

“They are trying to disregard 50 years of the act, and how the agency — and everybody — has always interpreted this word,” said Ryan Shannon, an attorney at Defenders of Wildlife, a conservation nonprofit that has long spearheaded endangered species recovery efforts. “This is not a bunt — they are really swinging for the fences with this.”

That’s because the words “harm” and “take” are at the core of what makes the Endangered Species Act so effective. 

Efforts to protect the northern spotted owl are one such example. Decades of logging in the Pacific Northwest had eliminated much of its forest habitat. But after the species was listed under the act in 1990, cutting down those trees was considered to be harming the owl, and therefore illegally “taking” it.

The law has been a thorn in the side of industries for decades. Environmentalists have often sued companies that want to log, mine, or build in a particular area, using the Endangered Species Act to make their case.

Now, “the administration is telling every industry in America that killing endangered wildlife is fine as long as it wasn’t their primary goal,” said Andrew Wetzler, an executive at the Natural Resources Defense Council, in a statement. “But unintentional harm is exactly what is driving many species towards extinction.”

Read Next Gray whales are starving as the Arctic warms. Will the US protect them? Sachi Kitajima Mulkey

The Supreme Court has considered these words and their meanings before. In a 1995 case, Babbitt v. Sweet Home, it ruled that modifying a creature’s habitat — such as logging the forest where spotted owls live — counts as harming it. In a dissenting opinion, the late Justice Antonin Scalia argued that “take” means to directly kill or injure wildlife. The Trump administration’s new memo uses Scalia’s interpretation — even though the majority of the court disagreed with Scalia back then. 

Earlier this summer, in a revision that changed which actions it considers to be “harming” an animal, the Trump administration argued that there’s a “traditional meaning” of the word “take,” meaning “to kill or capture a wild animal.” But the verb “take” is so notoriously difficult to define that it’s been tormenting dictionary editors for more than a century. In 2001, the lexicographer Kory Stamper spent weeks trying to capture all the senses of the word, and she reflected that the ordeal “unspooled” her sanity, leading to panic and despair.

In 2024, the Supreme Court ruled that courts — not agencies — have the power to interpret the law. That decision was generally seen as a blow to environmental efforts, but in this case, it might mean the Trump administration doesn’t have final say in how it interprets the Endangered Species Act.

All these factors make the Fish and Wildlife Service’s memo legally flimsy, if not illegal, according to Brett Hartl, director of government affairs at the Center of Biological Diversity, an environmental nonprofit. 

The memo is “essentially performative cruelty for the sake of it” and “barely worth the paper it’s printed on,” Hartl said. “They’re trying to turn it into an anti-poaching statute, but it’s actually supposed to be the strongest conservation law in the world.”

Ironically enough, the administration’s rewrite may leave companies in a tougher spot than before, Shannon said, because it blows up the settled rules they’d been following for decades. Corporate attorneys now have to choose between telling clients to take advantage of the agency’s new approach, or holding off in case a court or new administration puts the old protections back into place.

For companies that actually want long‑term regulatory certainty, like timber corporations and real estate developers, Shannon said that this deregulatory swing may be “more than they ever really would have asked for.”

If the courts do end up siding with the Trump administration, some species will suffer more than others. Those listed as endangered in more recent decades were given “critical habitat protections,” which provided an extra layer of scrutiny to activities that could harm animals and were made mandatory for all newly listed animals.

But many of the species listed during the Endangered Species Act’s early years — including the Florida panther and the California sea otter — never received those protections. Instead, they depend on broader language in the law, like “harm” and “take.” That means the animals America once wanted to protect the most could now be the most exposed.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The fate of the Endangered Species Act rests on 2 simple words on Sep 18, 2026.

Centre for Earth Works (CFEW) is a research-driven, youth-led organisation committed to protecting the earth by working closely with communities to build practical, lasting solutions that empower people to conserve their environment and adopt sustainable practices that support both livelihoods and ecological balance.

For nearly a decade, CFEW has consistently advanced environmental sustainability through innovative programmes, grounded research, and proactive community-based advocacy. Through this commitment, CFEW supports communities in taking ownership of environmental stewardship and responding to local challenges with locally driven solutions. 

Community members and stakeholders cheer for a photograph after a training by CfEW

CFEW is a member of the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA) and is one of the implementing partners of the GAIA-led Methane Reduction in Nigeria (MAMRN) Project, a major zero-waste and climate-action initiative focused on diverting organic waste from open dumpsites and landfills. It aims to reduce hazardous methane emissions, build circular economies, and empower communities by turning municipal waste into economic gold. 

In this article, part of a forthcoming series, we spoke with Benson Dotun, the founder of Centre for Earth Works, about their work as a partner in Jos, Plateau State, for the project.    

Thank you for joining us, Benson. Several organisations carry out the project through different activities, but with the same goal. Can you share insights into best practices for collaborating with other organisations on a project in Nigeria?

Collaboration has been a valuable component of this project, particularly through GAIA members’ participation in several activities. Based on our experience within this project and the broader Nigerian context, a few best practices stand out for effective collaboration with other organisations.

Clarity of roles and expectations from the outset is essential. Clearly defining responsibilities, solid deliverables, and areas of contribution helps reduce overlap, manage expectations, and ensure that each organisation’s strengths are effectively utilised.

Open and consistent communication strengthens partnerships. Regular check-ins, transparent information sharing, and timely feedback help build trust and allow partners to adapt quickly to emerging challenges or changes in context.

Finally, learning-oriented collaboration enhances long-term impact. Creating space for reflection, documentation, and knowledge exchange allows partners to learn from one another and strengthens the overall quality of the project. Within this project, collaboration with GAIA members has reinforced the importance of aligning technical expertise with community-based implementation to achieve sustainable outcomes.

Could you share some perspective on the current waste crisis in Nigeria and how this project aims to address this? 

Over the past decades, Jos and Nigeria as a whole have experienced rapid population growth and urban expansion, integrating surrounding villages into the metropolitan area. This urbanisation has been paralleled by a sharp rise in municipal solid waste (MSW) generation. Without proper waste management infrastructure, indiscriminate dumping has become widespread, creating both environmental and public health hazards.

Dumpsites are particularly concerning as hotspots for methane emissions. Methane (CH₄) is produced when organic waste (such as food residues, yard waste, and animal waste) decomposes under anaerobic conditions typical of unmanaged dumpsites. 

According to the European Environment Agency (EEA, 2025), landfills and dumpsites are the third-largest source of anthropogenic methane emissions globally, after agriculture and fossil fuels. Methane is a short-lived but highly potent greenhouse gas, with 80 times the warming potential of CO₂ over 20 years. 

According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), food waste comprises about 24% of municipal solid waste disposed of in landfills. Because it decays rapidly, food waste in landfills contributes more to methane emissions than any other landfilled material. An estimated 58% of methane emissions from municipal waste landfills are from landfilled food waste.

This project responds directly to these challenges by addressing methane emissions at their source through improved waste management practices. By promoting separation and composting, the project reduces the volume of biodegradable materials that end up in dumpsites, thereby limiting anaerobic decomposition and methane generation. In doing so, the project not only contributes to climate mitigation but also supports cleaner urban environments, improved public health outcomes, and more sustainable waste management systems within Nigeria.

Do you have a personal milestone or favourite moment in this project so far?

One of the most significant milestones for us at Centre for Earth Works has been establishing the Material Recovery Facility (MRF) and turning the concept into a space for waste sorting and recovery. 

The MRF has created a structured system for separating waste streams, particularly organic waste, which is often overlooked but is a major driver of methane emissions when disposed of in open dumpsites.

A waste recovery facility build by CFEW as part of the MAMRN Project

Another defining moment has been the pilot implementation of Black Soldier Fly (BSF) farming for organic waste management. This approach has shown the potential to divert biodegradable waste from dumpsites and convert it into useful by-products. For us at the Centre for Earth Works, this pilot has been both a learning experience and a proof of concept that low-cost, nature-based solutions can be effective in the Nigerian context.

Equally important has been the project’s growing awareness component. Through our engagement, it became clear that many waste pickers and other key stakeholders were not previously aware of the link between organic waste, methane emissions, and climate change. 

Seeing these groups begin to understand the environmental and health risks associated with unmanaged organic waste and their role in reducing those risks has been particularly rewarding. It highlights the project’s impact beyond infrastructure by building knowledge and changing perceptions around waste and methane reduction.

We have seen these key themes emerge in this project (Organic Waste Management, Infrastructure Development, Waste Picker Integration, Capacity Building and Awareness Raising, Local Government Engagement, National Policy Advocacy and Emissions Monitoring. Could you share experiences (as applicable) on any of these topics within this

Project so far?

Several of these themes have been central to the project’s progress so far and have shaped both implementation and learning at the Centre for Earth Works.

Organic Waste Management has been a core focus alongside the set-up of our Material Resource Recovery Facility and the pilot use of the Black Soldier Fly (BSF) process. These efforts have demonstrated practical ways to divert organic waste from dumpsites, reduce methane emissions, and convert biodegradable waste into useful by-products, while remaining context-appropriate and low-cost.

A CFEW-trained waste picker displays an organic compost and vegetable waste

In terms of Infrastructure Development, the establishment of the MRF represents a significant step forward. Beyond being a physical structure, it has served as an enabling platform for improved waste sorting and recovery, as well as for experimentation with organic waste treatment solutions. It has also provided a visible reference point for demonstrating what decentralised waste management infrastructure can look like at the community level.

Waste Picker Integration has been another important aspect of the project. Through engagement and sensitisation, waste pickers have been recognised not only as informal actors but as key stakeholders in waste recovery and methane reduction. The project has created space for dialogue, inclusion, and a better understanding of their role within a more organised waste management system.

Capacity Building and Awareness Raising have been critical across all project components. Training and engagements revealed significant gaps in understanding the links between organic waste, methane emissions, and climate change. 

Addressing these gaps has empowered waste pickers, community members, and other stakeholders with knowledge to adopt better practices and see their work as part of a broader climate solution.

Finally, on Local Government Engagement, the project has created opportunities to start conversations with relevant authorities on organic waste management, methane reduction, and the need for supportive local policies and infrastructure. These engagements have helped build institutional interest and lay the groundwork for longer-term collaboration.

Overall, these experiences show how the project integrates infrastructure, community engagement, policy, and learning to address organic waste and methane emissions in a holistic and scalable way.

What is the path forward for your organisation and possible next steps from this project?

The path forward for the Centre for Earth Works builds directly on the lessons, structures, and partnerships established through this project. A key next step is to consolidate and scale the organic waste management systems piloted, particularly by strengthening operations at the Material Recovery Facility (MRF) and expanding the use of nature-based solutions, such as the Black Soldier Fly (BSF) process and other composting methods, including biogas production.

Another important priority is to deepen the integration and capacity of waste pickers and community actors. Building on the awareness and skills developed during the project, CFEW plans to support more structured participation, improved working conditions, and stronger linkages between informal waste workers.

CFEW also intends to strengthen engagement with local stakeholders to translate project learnings into more sustained institutional support. This includes advocating for decentralised organic waste management, improved waste segregation practices, and approaches that reduce methane at the local level.

The post Learning-oriented collaboration enhances long-term impact: CFEW on the MAMRN Project. first appeared on GAIA.

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