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Israel’s fossil gas power play pushes climate action to the sidelines
When Israel’s prime minister approved a $35-billion deal to supply natural gas to Egypt last month, Energy Minister Eli Cohen said the benefits of increased gas trade with its neighbour went far beyond money.
“The approval of this gas agreement is a historic moment for the State of Israel, both in the security-diplomatic sphere and the economic sphere,” Cohen said on December 17.
In contrast, Egyptian officials – sensitive to the optics at home due to widespread anger over Israel’s military offensive in Gaza – played down the political significance of the deal, saying it was “purely commercial”.
The deal’s final approval, which had been delayed by several months, reflects Israel’s commitment to ramp up offshore gas extraction as a way to assert its regional dominance and shore up economic ties amid international criticism over the war in Gaza, analysts say.
While Israel has a globally renowned clean-tech sector, the push on fossil gas underscores how climate action is low on the country’s priority list.
Climate action takes a backseatShortly before the gas export deal was finalised, at COP30 in Brazil, Israel declined to add its voice to calls by more than 80 countries for a roadmap to transition away from fossil fuels. And before that, in October, the Energy Ministry said the country would fail to meet a 2025 target for renewables to make up 20% of its energy mix.
Israel’s latest climate plan sets a target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 27% by 2030 from 2015 levels, and it has not yet presented an updated nationally determined contribution (NDC) due in 2025.
The government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is also preparing to launch a new offshore gas exploration campaign within weeks, following the signing in October of a ceasefire agreement to end two years of war between Israel and the Hamas militant group in Gaza.
Beyond the Middle East, Israel’s gas push also highlights another challenge for the global clean energy transition as fossil fuels play a key role in political instability and conflict, from Ukraine to Venezuela.
Fuelling the economyFossil gas accounts for about 70% of Israel’s energy mix, followed by renewables – mainly solar – and coal.
Last year, the 27 billion cubic metres (bcm) of gas extracted off Israel’s coast were split almost evenly between domestic consumption and exports to Jordan and Egypt, the only two buyers of Israeli gas, both of which are vocal allies of the Palestinians.
Despite their condemnation of the war, neither country sought to halt the gas trade during Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, which killed about 71,000 Palestinians and left most of the coastal enclave in ruins.
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Israeli gas exports to both countries increased 13% during 2024, maintaining an upward trend in shipments of the fossil fuel since 2018.
“Both Egypt and Jordan may signal solidarity with Palestinians in public, but their infrastructures tell a different story,” wrote Rafeef Ziadah, a UK-based scholar and human rights activist.
A man charges his mobile phone by a source from the electric solar panels above his house at Al-Basaysa village which is almost fully dependent on solar energy, as the country struggles with continuous power cuts and an energy crisis, in Sharqiya, Egypt, July 22, 2024. REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El Ghany A man charges his mobile phone by a source from the electric solar panels above his house at Al-Basaysa village which is almost fully dependent on solar energy, as the country struggles with continuous power cuts and an energy crisis, in Sharqiya, Egypt, July 22, 2024. REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El GhanyIsrael’s gas exports to Egypt were halted for several weeks in 2023 when the war began, and again in 2025 when Israel launched a brief air war against nuclear sites in Iran – disrupting an increasingly important supply of energy to Egypt, which has faced power shortages in recent years as its own gas production dwindled.
Egypt is heavily dependent on fossil gas for energy generation, with renewables, mainly hydropower, making up only about 11% of the power mix, according to data from the Ember think-tank.
For Israel, gas is a win-win tradeGas production has also been an important source of revenue for Israel, and income has been growing in recent years, including during the war in Gaza. Israel’s gas revenues grew in 2024 to 2.3 billion shekels ($720 million) from 2.1 billion a year earlier, official data shows.
Some of the gas proceeds feed Israel’s sovereign wealth fund, but much of the income from gas – mainly royalties and corporate tax – goes directly to state coffers, helping to fund Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza war, both of which are opposed by Jordan and Egypt.
Laury Haytayan, a Middle East and North Africa energy expert, described the gas ties between Israel and Egypt as a “kind of co-dependence”.
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While that might be politically uncomfortable, Egypt’s energy crisis means it cannot afford to be choosy, analysts say.
“Israel remains an important pillar of the energy supply in neighbouring countries, contrary voices notwithstanding,” Israel’s Petroleum Commissioner Chen Bar Yoseph told Climate Home News.
The gas platform for Leviathan, Israel’s largest gas field is seen from a helicopter near Haifa bay, northern Israel, August 1, 2023. REUTERS/Ari Rabinovitch The gas platform for Leviathan, Israel’s largest gas field is seen from a helicopter near Haifa bay, northern Israel, August 1, 2023. REUTERS/Ari RabinovitchThe recent finalisation of the Egypt export deal also drew praise from Israel’s main international ally, the United States, with the State Department calling it “a major win for American business and regional cooperation”.
US oil major Chevron, which holds a 40% stake in Israel’s offshore Leviathan field and operates the field, plans to expand it as a result of the agreement.
“More gas will be found”When Netanyahu announced his approval of the deal, he said it would encourage other companies to explore for more gas resources off the Israeli coast.
“More gas will be found,” Netanyahu said, two weeks after the Energy Ministry said it was close to launching a new tender for gas exploration in offshore blocks.
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The deal signed between Egyptian firm Blue Ocean Energy and Chevron, along with its partners in Leviathan, will see 130 billion cubic metres of Israeli gas pumped to Egypt over the next 15 years. Israeli media reports linked the planned offshore gas expansion to concerns over limited gas reserves which resurfaced in the wake of the export agreement.
Israeli officials hope the ceasefire in Gaza, coupled with the finalisation of the Egypt deal, will boost international interest in the bidding, which could take place early this year.
Pro-Palestinian groups denounce explorationClimate and environmental campaign groups, meanwhile, have repeatedly demanded that Israeli gas exploration be frozen, citing the potential consequences for planet-heating emissions and marine ecosystems.
Palestinian human rights NGOs have warned that the hunt for fossil gas could also expand Israel’s illegal exploitation of Palestinian natural resources since several maritime zones earmarked by Israel for gas exploration overlap waters claimed by Palestinians in a 2019 submission to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
“Israel cannot operate there unilaterally. It is not an Israeli territorial or economic zone with authority to operate there,” said Suhad Bishara, legal director at Adalah, an Israel-based organisation focused on promoting Palestinian rights.
“Any company that agrees, or enters, or is associated with drilling in this area is complicit in breaching international law,” Bishara said.
Climate Justice Coalition activists take part in a pro-Palestinian protest during the United Nations climate change conference COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan November 11, 2024. REUTERS/Aziz Karimov Climate Justice Coalition activists take part in a pro-Palestinian protest during the United Nations climate change conference COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan November 11, 2024. REUTERS/Aziz KarimovWhether or not more exploration licences are granted, some experts question how much more undiscovered oil and gas lies beneath the seabed off Israel.
Geologist Yossi Langotsky, considered the father of Israeli offshore gas, has long maintained that the Leviathan and Tamar fields – which are not in areas claimed by the Palestinians – are the only large gas reservoirs along Israel’s coast.
For as long as the two fields are producing enough, Israel will likely find a willing buyer in energy-hungry Egypt – whatever the geopolitical backdrop.
“Even when regional leaders rail against occupation or genocide, the gas keeps flowing,” said Ziadah, the UK-based rights activist.
The post Israel’s fossil gas power play pushes climate action to the sidelines appeared first on Climate Home News.
The battle over a global energy transition is on between petro-states and electro-states
Jennifer Morgan is a senior fellow with the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy and Climate Policy Lab at Tufts University and a former special climate envoy for the German government.
Two years ago, countries around the world set a goal of “transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems in a just, orderly and equitable manner”. The plan included tripling renewable energy capacity and doubling energy efficiency gains by 2030 – important steps for slowing climate change since the energy sector makes up about 75% of the global carbon dioxide emissions that are heating up the planet.
The world is making progress: More than 90% of new power capacity added in 2024 came from renewable energy sources, and 2025 saw similar growth.
However, fossil fuel production is also still expanding. And the United States, the world’s leading producer of both oil and natural gas, is now aggressively pressuring countries to keep buying and burning fossil fuels.
The energy transition was not meant to be a main topic when world leaders and negotiators met at the 2025 United Nations climate summit, COP30, in November in Belém, Brazil. But it took centre stage from the start to the very end, bringing attention to the real-world geopolitical energy debate underway and the stakes at hand.
Fight over transition roadmap at COP30Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva began the conference by calling for the creation of a formal roadmap, essentially a strategic process in which countries could participate to “overcome dependence on fossil fuels.” It would take the global decision to transition away from fossil fuels from words to action.
More than 80 countries said they supported the idea, ranging from vulnerable small island nations like Vanuatu that are losing land and lives from sea level rise and more intense storms, to countries like Kenya that see business opportunities in clean energy, to Australia, a large fossil fuel-producing country.
Opposition, led by the Arab Group’s oil- and gas-producing countries, kept any mention of a “roadmap” energy transition plan out of the final agreement from the climate conference, but supporters are pushing ahead.
I was in Belém for COP30, and I follow developments closely as former special climate envoy and head of delegation for Germany and senior fellow at the Fletcher School at Tufts University. The fight over whether there should even be a roadmap shows how much countries that depend on fossil fuels are working to slow down the transition, and how others are positioning themselves to benefit from the growth of renewables. And it is a key area to watch in 2026.
The battle between electro-states and petro-statesBrazilian diplomat and COP30 President André Aranha Corrêa do Lago has committed to lead an effort in 2026 to create two roadmaps: one on halting and reversing deforestation and another on transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems in a just, orderly and equitable manner.
What those roadmaps will look like is still unclear. They are likely to be centred on a process for countries to discuss and debate how to reverse deforestation and phase out fossil fuels.
Over the coming months, Corrêa do Lago plans to convene high-level meetings among global leaders, including fossil fuel producers and consumers, international organisations, industries, workers, scholars and advocacy groups.
For the roadmap to both be accepted and be useful, the process will need to address the global market issues of supply and demand, as well as equity. For example, in some fossil fuel-producing countries, oil, gas or coal revenues are the main source of income. What can the road ahead look like for those countries that will need to diversify their economies?
Nigeria is an interesting case study for weighing that question.
Oil exports consistently provide the bulk of Nigeria’s revenue, accounting for around 80% to over 90% of total government revenue and foreign exchange earnings. At the same time, roughly 39% of Nigeria’s population has no access to electricity, which is the highest proportion of people without electricity of any nation. And Nigeria possesses abundant renewable energy resources across the country, which are largely untapped: solar, hydro, geothermal and wind, providing new opportunities.
A solar microgrid run by Husk Power Systems serves Kiguna village in Nasarawa state, Nigeria, September 26, 2022 (Photo: Megan Rowling) A solar microgrid run by Husk Power Systems serves Kiguna village in Nasarawa state, Nigeria, September 26, 2022 (Photo: Megan Rowling) What a roadmap might look likeIn Belém, representatives talked about creating a roadmap that would be science-based and aligned with the Paris climate agreement, and would include various pathways to achieve a just transition for fossil fuel-dependent regions.
Some inspiration for helping fossil fuel-producing countries transition to cleaner energy could come from Brazil and Norway.
In Brazil, Lula asked his ministries to prepare guidelines for developing a roadmap for gradually reducing Brazil’s dependency on fossil fuels and find a way to financially support the changes.
His decree specifically mentions creating an energy transition fund, which could be supported by government revenues from oil and gas exploration. While Brazil supports moving away from fossil fuels, it is also still a large oil producer and recently approved new exploratory drilling near the mouth of the Amazon River.
Norway, a major oil and gas producer, is establishing a formal transition commission to study and plan its economy’s shift away from fossil fuels, particularly focusing on how the workforce and the natural resources of Norway can be used more effectively to create new and different jobs.
Both countries are just getting started, but their work could help point the way for other countries and inform a global roadmap process.
The European Union has implemented a series of policies and laws aimed at reducing fossil fuel demand. It has a target for 42.5% of its energy to come from renewable sources by 2030. And its EU Emissions Trading System, which steadily reduces the emissions that companies can emit, will soon be expanded to cover housing and transportation. The Emissions Trading System already includes power generation, energy-intensive industry and civil aviation.
Fossil fuel and renewable energy growth aheadIn the US, the Trump administration has made clear through its policymaking and diplomacy that it is pursuing the opposite approach: to keep fossil fuels as the main energy source for decades to come.
The International Energy Agency still expects to see renewable energy grow faster than any other major energy source in all scenarios going forward, as renewable energy’s lower costs make it an attractive option in many countries. Globally, the agency expects investment in renewable energy in 2025 to be twice that of fossil fuels.
At the same time, however, fossil fuel investments are also rising with fast-growing energy demand.
The IEA’s World Energy Outlook described a surge in new funding for liquefied natural gas, or LNG, projects in 2025. It now expects a 50% increase in global LNG supply by 2030, about half of that from the US. However, the World Energy Outlook notes that “questions still linger about where all the new LNG will go” once it’s produced.
What to watch forThe Belém roadmap dialogue and how it balances countries’ needs will reflect on the world’s ability to handle climate change.
Corrêa do Lago plans to report on its progress at the next annual UN climate conference, COP31, in late 2026. The conference will be hosted by Turkey, but Australia, which supported the call for a roadmap, will be leading the negotiations.
With more time to discuss and prepare, COP31 may just bring a transition away from fossil fuels back into the global negotiations.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
The post The battle over a global energy transition is on between petro-states and electro-states appeared first on Climate Home News.
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Fortitude Gold starts County Line mine operations, gets permits for Scarlet South
Fortitude Gold now has a second producing asset in Nevada after announcing the start of mining operations at its exploration-stage County Line project.
Fortitude is developing five high-grade gold projects along the historic Walker Lane mineral belt, leveraging the existing facilities at its Isabella Pearl mine, a conventional open-pit heap leach operation that is already producing gold dore.
In a press release Wednesday, the Denver-based gold miner said it has made the first shipment of mineralization from County Line to the Isabella Pearl processing facility, located about 14 miles away.
“We are excited to have begun operations at County Line, marking another Fortitude Gold milestone of placing our second Nevada gold mine into production,” Fortitude Gold’s CEO Jason Reid said in a news release.
The new mine consists of two historic open pits, with mining occurring initially from the bottom of the County Line pit. According to Fortitude, it plans to proceed with a pit layback during the second half of 2026 and extend into the second half of 2027.
In the meantime, the company is updating the County Line mineral resource to include exploration drilling from the other East pit, which was not included in the original 2022 resource estimate.
The project has several areas with exploration upside potential that are anticipated to expand the project’s mine life, including a target north of the County Line pit, an area south of the East pit, the Newman Ridge area to the east, as well as an area further to the south at the historic Rex mine, Fortitude said.
Scarlet SouthEarlier in the week, Fortitude also received approvals from the Bureau of Land Management and the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection to construct and operate the Scarlet South open-pit gold mine.
The project is located approximately 500 meters northwest of its Isabella Pearl mine and processing facilities. Operations are expected to begin at Scarlet South in the coming weeks, the company said.
“Having recently been granted permits for our Scarlet South open pit, we now target our third operating gold mine at Scarlet South in the very near future,” Reid said. “Once we are granted permits, our synergistic hub and spoke business plan allows us to place new mines into production much faster and for less capital by leveraging existing infrastructure as opposed to building brand new processing facilities at every new mine.”
“We plan to deliver gold to our Isabella Pearl processing facility from three different sources, Isabella Pearl deep, County Line and Scarlet South, in 2026,” he added.
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Trump Administration, State of Utah Strike Dangerous Deal to Advance State Control of National Forests – 1.8.26
January 8, 2026 – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Trump Administration, State of Utah Strike Dangerous Deal to Advance State Control of National Forests – 1.8.26Contacts:
Grant Stevens, Communications Director, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA); (319) 427-0260; grant@suwa.org
Laiken Jordahl, Center for Biological Diversity, (928) 525-4433, ljordahl@biologicaldiversity.org
Mike Garrity, Executive Director, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, 406-410-3373 wildrockies@grmail.com
Laura Welp, Southern Utah Director, Western Watersheds Project, (435) 899-0204, laura@westernwatersheds.org
Salt Lake City, UT – The Trump administration and the state of Utah today announced an agreement to assert Utah’s control over 8 million acres of national forests while cutting public oversight and weakening environmental reviews. The agreement sets the stage for vastly expanded commercial logging as well as state control and management over a host of national forest resources, including minerals, recreation and grazing. All told, the intent of the agreement is clear: to hand publicly owned national forests over to the state of Utah to benefit corporate interests over those of the American public.
Today’s announcement marks a significant escalation in Utah officials’ long-held goal of wresting control, and ultimately ownership, of public land from the American people.
“Utah politicians have failed repeatedly to sell off public lands outright, so now they’re teaming up with their Trump cronies to push the same disgraceful agenda,” said Laiken Jordahl, national public lands advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity. “This agreement strips federal protections, shuts the public out of decision-making and puts Utah’s old-growth forests directly on the chopping block. The American people will see this latest scheme for what it is, a backdoor push to privatize our public lands.”
The agreement creates a “shared framework” that shifts significant decision-making power over to the state, expands logging and cements state influence in federal forest management decisions while limiting public participation.
“Utahns love our national forests — from the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache to the Manti-La Sal to the Dixie — and the incredible opportunities they provide for recreating with family and friends, often right out our back doors. It’s essential that our national forests remain in public hands and are not handed over to the state of Utah for short-term gain or other forms of destructive mismanagement,” said Steve Bloch, legal director at the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. “We fear that the new Agreement unveiled today does exactly that: It sets the stage for Utah officials to have both a heavy hand and the loudest voice in how our national forests are managed, crowding out all other stakeholders. That’s not how this is supposed to work, and we’ll be watching closely to see how the agreement plays out on the ground.”
U.S. Sen. Mike Lee’s (R-UT) consistent and repeated efforts to sell off public lands have failed in every instance during the 119th Congress, uniting Americans across party lines to defend their shared national heritage. Today’s agreement echoes that effort, shifting control of public forests toward industry and privatization.
“The Shared Stewardship Agreement is nothing more than a sneaky way to clearcut roadless areas in National Forests in Utah,” said Mike Garrity, Executive Director of the Alliance for the Wild Rockies. “Roadless areas provide clean drinking water and function as biological strongholds for populations of threatened and endangered species.”
“Good governance means including the public in discussions about the national forests we all care about,” said Laura Welp, Southern Utah Director of Western Watersheds Project. “Governor Cox is once again conducting business with the federal government behind closed doors, with little or no advance notice, bypassing meaningful public involvement. These stewardship agreements will accelerate large timber cutting projects, degrade habitats in roadless areas, and authorize other activities that lack broad national support. This approach mirrors a familiar pattern of attempting to shift control of federal public lands – in which every American has an equal interest – to the state. We call on both the Forest Service and the State of Utah to act transparently and to engage the public in open, meaningful discussions about the future of our shared public lands.”
The agreement released today was crafted without public input and solely between the Trump administration and the state of Utah. It follows on the heels of a closed-door meeting between Utah politicians and Department of the Interior officials last month, where they reportedly pressed for increased off-road vehicle use, paving a backcountry road and eliminating timed entry and other permit systems, all while attempting to maximize visitation in already overburdened national parks. It also follows the Trump administration’s June 2025 proposal to roll back the Roadless Rule, which cited Utah as a test case to justify opening wild public forests to logging, roads and industrial development.
Montana and Idaho recently finalized similar state-federal agreements handing significant decision-making power over to the states. Utah’s agreement pushes the approach further than ever before by explicitly empowering state influence over recreation and grazing uses on national forests — a significant expansion beyond the timber-focused frameworks in Montana and Idaho.
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The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) is a nonprofit organization with members and supporters from around the country dedicated to protecting America’s redrock wilderness. From offices in Moab, Salt Lake City, and Washington, DC, our team of professionals defends the redrock, organizes support for America’s Red Rock Wilderness Act, and stewards this world-renowned landscape. Learn more at www.suwa.org.
The post Trump Administration, State of Utah Strike Dangerous Deal to Advance State Control of National Forests – 1.8.26 appeared first on Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.
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Greenland miner Amaroq soars on report of US gov’t investment
Greenland miner Amaroq’s (AIM, TSXV: AMRQ) shares surged on Thursday after reports came out that the company had held talks with the US government about investing in its mining projects in the Arctic island.
In an interview with CNBC, Amaroq chief executive Eldur Olafsson said discussions have been held with US government bodies about potential investment opportunities, which may include “offtake agreements, infrastructure support and credit lines.”
The report comes amid intensified efforts by the Trump administration to “buy” the Danish territory that boasts a vast endowment of untapped resources. According to government data, Greenland holds as many as 40 minerals that the US government considers to be “critical” to its national and economic security.
Toronto-based Amaroq currently operates the Nalunaq gold mine in southern Greenland, a historic site that it brought back into production in late 2024. It also has several other gold and critical minerals assets across the island, such as the Black Angel zinc-lead-silver project in the west, historically one of Greenland’s highest-grade base metal operations.
The company is currently said to hold the largest portfolio of mineral exploration licenses in Greenland. As a result, it has attracted strong demand from investors on both sides of the Atlantic in an oversubscribed funding round, and has also received funding interest from state-backed agencies in the US and Europe.
With respect to potential investments in these projects, a US State Department spokesperson told CNBC that “the United States is eager to build lasting commercial relationships that benefit Americans and the people of Greenland.”
Greenland urges US, Europe to invest in its critical minerals, or China willFollowing the CNBC report, shares of Amaroq rose more than a quarter to a near 52-week high of C$2.61 in Toronto, taking its market capitalization to over C$1.1 billion ($800 million).
On the same day, the Canadian miner also released its annual production results, showing that gold output from Nalunaq amounted to 6,600 oz, which is above the mid-point of its annual guidance range. The gold mine is currently in the production ramp-up phase, having only entered production for over a year after sitting idle for more than a decade.
China-Japan rare earth spat curbs exports
China’s threats this week to restrict rare earths exports to Japan could harm the Japanese economy and manufacturers, which heavily depend on China for supplies of the critical minerals.
China’s Ministry of Commerce announced Tuesday a ban on the export to Japan of dual-use items that have civilian and military applications, the state-run China Daily reported.
But Beijing is also considering curbs on export permits for some rare earth-related products, according to the Daily.
The move appears to be a reaction by Beijing against comments made in November by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, who suggested Japan could become involved in a military conflict over Taiwan, a sensitive issue for China which regards Taiwan as its own province.
Asian rare earth stocks surge on new China-Japan export curbs Huge economic lossesWhile details on rare earth export restrictions weren’t yet known, analysts said the economic fallout for Japan could be severe.
The country’s automotive industry, which uses rare earths for magnets, drivetrains and batteries could be forced to cut production or halt manufacturing altogether if rare earths are cut off, Hidetoshi Tashiro, chief economist at Japan’s Infinity LLC told China Daily. Tashiro is also CEO of Terra Nexus Project Management Services.
A ban could easily affect other manufacturers as well, including the wider electronics industry and especially semiconductor producers, he said.
If the rare earths restrictions last three months, Japan could incur losses of about 660 billion yen ($4.2 billion), pulling down nominal and real GDP by an annualized 0.11%, according to analysis from Japan’s Nomura Research Institute. After one year, those losses could reach 2.6 trillion yen, denting GDP by 0.43%.
Japan’s Nikkei stock index fell more than 1% on Thursday, after falling by the same amount on Wednesday and Tuesday.
Billions worth of importsJapanese trade figures cited by China Daily show that in 2024, electrical machinery and telecommunications equipment imports from China totalled 7.7 trillion yen, personal computers and peripherals came to 2.4 trillion yen, precision optical instruments 400 billion yen, and rare earths 200 billion yen. Those imports totalled about 10.7 trillion yen, comprising around 42% of Japan’s total imports from China that year.
China’s export restrictions echo a similar move by Beijing in 2010, when it sharply cut rare earth shipments to Japan following a territorial dispute over the Senkaku Islands.
Supply chain independenceThough the ban only lasted about two months, it alerted Japan to its reliance on China for the critical minerals and spurred it to seek other suppliers.
In 2011, Japanese conglomerate Sojitz and government mineral agency Jogmec made a $250 million deal with Australia’s Lynas Rare Earths (ASX: LYC) for long-term supply of the 17 elements. Lynas holds the Mount Weld mine in Western Australia and is the largest producer of rare earths outside of China. Lynas processes the elements at a facility in Malaysia.
Lynas becomes first producer of heavy rare earths outside ChinaThe Lynas deal and other supply chain arrangements have helped Japan reduce its reliance on Chinese rare earths to 60-70% today from 90% in 2010, according to Jogmec data cited by The New York Times.
US rare earths dealsJapan’s initiatives to bolster its supply chain resilience came several years before the United States accelerated similar efforts.
In August, the Department of Defense and MP Materials (NYSE: MP) – the only producer of rare earths in North America – signed a 10-year off-take agreement that sets a price floor of $110 per kg for neodymium-praseodymium materials.
That followed a $500 million deal in July between MP and Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) for domestic supplies of rare earths for smartphones and electric vehicles.
Silver price extends slide on index rebalancing
Silver extended its slide on Thursday as investors braced for a commodity index rebalancing and took profits on a metal that has more than doubled in value over the past year.
Spot prices declined as much as 5% to $73.91 an ounce, before paring some losses. It follows a 4% drop from the previous session after surging past $80 per ounce again earlier this week.
Click on chart for live prices.Meanwhile, gold held steady after erasing a 1% loss from earlier in the session.
Index rebalancingInvestors are positioning themselves for an annual rebalancing of commodity indexes, which would require funds to sell precious metals futures contracts worth billions of dollars in the next few days.
Citigroup estimates that about $6.8 billion in silver futures could be sold, equivalent to about 12% of open interest on Comex, while outflows from gold futures will total roughly the same amount.
Both metals faced a similar index selloff last year, without causing a discernible drag on the market, according to a December note from JPMorgan Chase. The bank, however, said the amount of selling required in silver is more outsized this year.
Compared to gold, silver is more exposed to index rebalancing, and thus is more volatile. Exchange data showed that silver-backed ETFs saw their biggest one-day outflow since October on Wednesday.
“I’ve been running this process for many years, and we haven’t seen any outsized flow like this one,” said Kenny Hu, a strategist at Citi.
Broadly bullishDespite the two-day slump, analysts remain broadly bullish on precious metals due to heightened geopolitical risks, namely heightened China-Japan trade tensions and the capture by the US of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro.
Banks bullish on gold price as Morgan Stanley sets $4,800 targetGold is coming off its best annual performance since 1979 after hitting record highs 50 times throughout 2025. The rise was supported by central bank purchases and inflows to ETFs. A sagging US dollar added further fuel to prices, making the metal more affordable for buyers in other currencies.
“The rally is fueled by a potent mix of safe haven and risk-off purchases, spurred in part by USD weakness, and policy uncertainty,” wrote HSBC’s chief precious metals analyst James Steel, who sees gold hitting $5,000 an ounce in the first half of 2026, bolstered by rising geopolitical risks and rising fiscal debts.
Silver was even more spectacular than gold with a gain of 150%, as a historic short squeeze gripped the market last October and helped drive prices to unprecedented levels towards year’s end.
(With files from Bloomberg)
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Energy Fuels estimates $1.8B value for Madagascar mineral sands project
Energy Fuels (NYSE: UUUU) (TSX: EFR) has released an updated feasibility study (FS) for its 100%-owned heavy mineral sands (HMS) project in Madagascar, highlighting its strong economics and potential to be a contributor to the global rare earth supply chain.
The Vara Mada project was acquired by the company in 2024 through its takeover of Australia’s Base Resources. At the time, Energy Fuels pegged the project (then known as Toliara) as a major source of monazite, a phosphate mineral that contains rare earth elements. It also cited the project’s potential output of ilmenite and zircon, which are sources of titanium and zirconium, respectively.
The FS report estimated that Vara Mada could produce approximately 959,000 tonnes of ilmenite, 66,000 tonnes of zircon and 24,000 tonnes of monazite, plus 8,000 tonnes of rutile, a naturally occurring titanium dioxide mineral. The project has an initially modelled mine life of 38 years, with the potential to increase following refinements and further drilling.
Based on these forecasts and a current resource estimate for the Ranobe deposit, the FS gave the project an after-tax net present value (at 10% discount) of $1.8 billion — equating to $7.30 per share — and an internal rate of return of 24.9%. The NPV represents an 80% increase on the previous figure calculated by Base Resources.
“The FS confirms what we’ve known since we acquired the project in 2024. Vara Mada is a generational, one-of-a-kind project that has the potential to positively alter the dynamics of global rare earth and critical mineral supply chains,” Energy Fuels CEO Mark Chalmers said in a news release Thursday.
Shares of Energy Fuels rose as much as 2% in New York following the FS release, sending its market capitalization to $4.5 billion.
Source of rare earth oxidesIn its press release, Energy Fuels said Vara Mada serves as a key part of its diversified critical materials business centered around its White Mesa mill in Utah.
Once in production, monazite material from Vara Mada would be transported to White Mesa for further processing into light and heavy rare earth oxides. The facility is only functioning uranium mill in the US, and also has the capability to process monazite into rare earth oxides.
“Monazite concentrates produced from Vara Mada, and other HMS projects globally, are a rich source of both light and heavy ‘magnet’ REEs, used in a variety of clean energy and advanced technologies, including electric and hybrid vehicles, advanced robotics and manufacturing, consumer electronics, renewable energy, and key defense technologies,” Chalmers noted.
Under its current “Phase 1” capacity, the White Mesa mill can process up to 10,000 tonnes of monazite concentrate per year into up to 1,000 tonnes of neodymium-praseodymium (NdPr) oxide. Energy Fuels has plans to expand its processing capabilities into heavy rare earths, producing up to 48 tonnes of dysprosium and 14 tonnes of terbium oxides. The expanded facility, it says, could be operational as soon as the fourth quarter of 2026.
Energy Fuels produces first heavy rare earth oxidesTogether with monazite produced at its other HMS projects, the total rare earth production could supply up to 30% of US demand for light REE oxides and 85% of US demand for heavy REE oxides, Energy Fuels said, citing Benchmark Mineral Intelligence’s supply forecast.
Final investment decisionEnergy Fuels noted a final investment decision (FID) on the Vara Mada project would require the formalization of certain fiscal terms, including the addition of monazite production to the existing mining permit.
The company and the government of Madagascar are still in negotiations based on the previously disclosed memorandum of understanding signed by the parties in December 2024, it said.
In the feasibility report, the pre-FID capital costs for the project is estimated at $121 million, while the post-FID capital costs would total over $900 million over two stages.
Maine Medical Center nurses overwhelmingly ratify three-year union contract
Trump just took his most dramatic step yet against global climate action
President Trump’s withdrawal of the U.S. from the global fight against climate change has gone further than almost anyone expected.
During the first year of his second term in office, the president and his administration have cut foreign aid for climate resilience, pressured countries to delay crucial carbon tax agreements, and removed the U.S. from the Paris Agreement, the landmark 2015 accord that saw the world’s nations come together around a plan to limit global warming.
Some of this was anticipated, but on Wednesday Trump took arguably his most dramatic step yet against global climate action. In a brief memorandum, he announced that he would “effectuate the withdrawal” of the U.S. from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, or UNFCCC, the bedrock treaty that first brought countries together to discuss the climate crisis more than three decades ago.
In other words, Trump hasn’t just skipped out on the world’s plan for tackling climate change — he’s also decreeing that the U.S. will no longer take any part in international talks on the subject. And this latest move may prove far more durable than leaving the Paris accord. Because of ambiguity in U.S. law, future presidents may not be able to reverse withdrawal from the UNFCCC even if they want to.
If Paris was a contract to stop climate change, the UNFCCC was akin to the boardroom in which countries hashed out that contract. Trump’s withdrawal from the latter is an even more extreme measure because it means that the U.S. government will no longer be eligible to attend global climate talks, known as COPs, and will be the only country in the world that is unable to participate in multilateral debates about climate change.
“This is a short-sighted, embarrassing, and foolish decision,” said Gina McCarthy, who was the White House climate advisor to former President Joe Biden, in a statement. “The Trump administration is throwing away decades of U.S. climate leadership and global collaboration.”
The UNFCCC also has a stronger basis under domestic law than the Paris Agreement ever did. The U.S. Senate ratified the convention as a formal treaty in 1992 by a vote of 92 to 0, and it was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush. (By contrast, the Obama administration used executive action to join the Paris Agreement without needing congressional approval.) Trump did not attempt to leave the treaty during his first term, and indeed no nation has ever attempted to do so.
No one knows for sure how a future president could rejoin the UNFCCC. Some experts believe that a future president could rely on the 1992 Senate vote to justify rejoining, but others say that Trump’s withdrawal this week annuls that vote, requiring a new Senate vote with two-thirds support — a tall order in a far more polarized political environment.
Article II of the U.S. Constitution says that the president “shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the senators present concur.” But the document is silent about who has the authority to leave and rejoin those treaties; some legal scholars have argued that the president has unilateral power to terminate treaties, but others have argued the opposite. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat and leading climate hawk, said in a statement Thursday that only the Senate can withdraw from Senate-ratified treaties and that Trump’s move was illegal. The question of who has the authority to rejoin a treaty is even murkier. The Supreme Court has never ruled on the issue. In 1979, after evaluating a legal challenge to then-president Jimmy Carter’s termination of a defense treaty with China, the court referred to the issue as a “political question” not subject to judicial authority.
In their initial reactions to Trump’s move, climate experts offered a range of different views on the question of rejoining the UNFCCC, reflecting the extreme uncertainty on the issue. Sue Biniaz, who served for decades as a lead U.S. negotiator in climate talks, said that she believes the country “could rather seamlessly rejoin.” Michael Gerrard, a climate law expert at Columbia University, said by email that there are competing theories about Senate consent for rejoining treaties — and that he didn’t know immediately which theory was correct.
“I want to try to pin this down,” he said.
Read Next 2025: The year the US gave up on climate, and the world gave up on us Naveena SadasivamExperts also said it’s not even certain if Trump did withdraw from the treaty in a legal sense. His memo says that it pulls the U.S. from more than 60 international agreements covering everything from cyber security to cotton. It declares that, “For United Nations entities, withdrawal means ceasing participation in or funding to those entities to the extent permitted by law.” It is unclear if this means the U.S. will submit a formal withdrawal notice to the U.N. governing body, which is what would make the move official, or will simply not participate in negotiations for the remainder of Trump’s tenure. (The State Department did not immediately respond to Grist’s request for comment and clarification on the withdrawal.)
If the withdrawal goes forward, it could take the U.S. out of the international climate fight for far longer than the remainder of Trump’s term. Trump has cemented opposition to any form of climate action as a core commitment of the Republican party. And given that Republicans hold a durable advantage in the Senate, where rural states hold disproportionate sway, a future vote to rejoin the agreement looks remote. If a future president tried to rejoin the UNFCCC without Senate consent, anti-climate groups would likely file a legal challenge to the move by citing the Senate’s treaty authority.
For now, the other 197 countries that are party to the UNFCCC will continue to negotiate global agreements on climate change, albeit with the world’s largest economy missing. This was already the case in Brazil last year during the COP30 conference, which the Trump administration skipped even though the United States was still technically a party to the Paris Agreement at the time.
John Kerry, the former U.S. secretary of state and the lead climate envoy under the Biden administration, has said the move would further isolate the U.S. on the world stage.
“This is par for the course,” he said in a statement. “But it doesn’t change the fact that it’s a gift to China and a get-out-of-jail-free card to countries and polluters who want to avoid responsibility. It’s another self-inflicted wound on the world stage.”
Read Next 10 years after the Paris Agreement, world leaders are letting go of its most famous goal Zoya TeirsteinSome climate advocates echoed this view, saying that the absence of the U.S. could make it harder to achieve consensus at COPs. Under the Obama and Biden administrations, the United States played a crucial role in securing the Paris deal and a 2023 agreement to phase out fossil fuels, helping to overcome hesitation from countries including Saudi Arabia and China. A long-term withdrawal could empower large emitters to frustrate agreements on fossil fuels. This already happened at COP30, where a group of oil-producing countries tanked talks to produce a “road map” on transitioning away from oil and gas.
“It is sad to attend international meetings and see an empty space where the United States should be,” said Kaveh Guilanpour, the vice president for international strategies at the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions and a leading expert on climate talks. “This is harmful to the world, because the enormous energy, innovation, and authority of the United States is missed.”
Some negotiators from developing countries downplayed the significance of the U.S. exit, in part because they’ve seen administrations from both political parties obstruct important global climate action, whether or not those presidents endorsed the Paris Agreement. Over the past decade, developing countries have grown more vocal in demands for trillions of dollars in financial assistance from the rich countries that have emitted the most carbon dioxide. This money would help poor nations transition away from fossil fuels and adapt to climate disasters, but the U.S. and Europe have said that they can’t afford to pay up.
“The absence of the U.S. is unfortunate, but I don’t think it is going to reverse global progress,” said Ali Mohamed, the lead climate envoy for Kenya, in an interview with Grist. “You have seen how in many countries, from Europe to Southeast Asia to Africa, the revolution of renewables is overtaking fossil fuels, because it makes business sense. International policy will continue to evolve and be developed by the coalition of the willing.”
Other observers said the withdrawal announcement was just paperwork confirming what was already apparent in Trump’s actions.
“The Trump administration has de facto already halted cooperation and dialogue in this space,” said Allison Lombardo, the former State Department deputy assistant secretary for international organization affairs in the Biden administration. “This formalizes what has already become a reality.”
Zoya Teirstein contributed reporting to this story.
This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Trump just took his most dramatic step yet against global climate action on Jan 8, 2026.
Guyana oil and mining sectors gain as Venezuela risk eases
Guyana’s mining and oil industries are drawing renewed investor interest as recent US military action in Venezuela reshapes regional risk perceptions and reduces uncertainty around offshore operations.
For years, Guyana’s economic rise has been overshadowed by a territorial dispute with Venezuela over the Essequibo region, a resource-rich area of nearly 160,000 square kilometres that Caracas claimed as its own and that includes offshore oil reserves.
Tensions escalated last year after Guyana backed a US military deployment in the Caribbean, following reports of gunfire from the Venezuelan coast near a vessel linked to Guyana’s general elections.
Venezuela’s defence minister accused Georgetown of encouraging a “war front,” while President Irfaan Ali said Guyana would support any action that removed threats to its sovereignty.
That backdrop has shifted since recent US military operations on Venezuelan territory led to the capture of Nicolás Maduro this past weekend.
Ali said stability, respect for the rule of law and a democratic transition were essential for Venezuela and the wider region, and confirmed talks this week with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, citing Washington’s support for Guyana’s sovereignty and cooperation against transnational crime.
“The geopolitical risk associated with the regional environment could be reduced after the political change in Venezuela,” Angélica Méndez, a Guyana analyst at Control Risks, told Bloomberg Línea on Thursday, adding that a recurring source of uncertainty around offshore security, including Venezuelan military activity in Guyanese waters, had been removed.
Beyond oilOil has transformed Guyana since ExxonMobil (XOM) discovered major offshore reserves in 2015, but mining long predates the petroleum boom and remains central to the economy.
Gold, diamonds and bauxite, a raw material for producing aluminum, were being extracted commercially by the late 19th century, and bauxite production surged from the 1910s as foreign companies supplied aluminum markets during World War II and beyond.
After independence in 1966, bauxite assets were nationalized, then later reopened to foreign investment following privatization in the 1980s.
Today, gold is Guyana’s most important mineral export after oil and is produced largely by artisanal and small-scale miners, a sector formalized under the 1989 Mining Act and now a major source of employment.
Large-scale operators are also active. Zijin Mining runs Aurora mine, the only large-scale gold operation in the country. Other companies including Aris Mining (TSX. ARIS), G Mining Ventures (TSX: GMIN), Omai Gold Mines (TSXV: OMG) and G2 Goldfields (TSX: GTWO) are advancing projects across the interior.
Bauxite production continues under firms including BOSAI, the Bauxite Company of Guyana and First Bauxite Corporation.
Consultancy Control Risks said Guyana, despite lacking a formal sovereign credit rating, is viewed as a low- to medium-risk investment destination. Its main vulnerabilities lie in governance and institutional capacity rather than political or fiscal instability, a profile typical of small emerging economies.
The consultancy expects the outlook for oil and mining investment to remain positive, supported by President Ali’s pro-investment agenda, a planned auction of new offshore oil blocks this year and continued development of gas and energy transition projects.
Economic liftAnalyst Roberto Pérez told Bloomberg Línea that while global oil markets remain well supplied with moderate demand growth, broader geopolitical volatility poses a greater risk than price levels alone. Even with stable fuel prices, uncertainty around trade, diplomacy and energy policy could weigh on the global economy.
Guyana’s macroeconomic fundamentals, however, have strengthened sharply. World Bank data cited by Pérez show the loan risk premium averaged between 7.2% and 7.3% from 2020 to 2024, more than 350 basis points lower than in the previous five-year period. The IMF’s 2025 Article IV consultation noted that the country’s economic transformation continues to advance strongly.
Rapid growth in oil output, resilient mining activity and heavy public investment have pushed Guyana to the highest real GDP growth rate in the world. Growth in 2026 is projected at 22.4% by the World Bank and 24% by ECLAC. Non-oil GDP expanded by more than 13% in the first half of 2025, inflation hovered near 3% late in the year, and gross international reserves exceeded $1 billion in October 2025. The Natural Resource Fund held nearly $3.6 billion by September, equal to more than 12.5% of GDP.
“These factors explain the reduction in geopolitical risk and suggest Guyana’s fundamentals are strong enough to withstand current tensions between Venezuela and the US,” Pérez said.
(With files from Bloomberg)
Saudi Arabia issues last-minute climate plan with unclear emissions-cutting goal
On the last day of 2025, the Saudi Arabian government submitted an updated climate plan to the United Nations which contains a new but ambiguous emissions-reduction target and argues the world should keep buying the kingdom’s fossil fuels so that it can afford to shift its economy away from oil.
The 27-page nationally determined contribution (NDC) was sent to the UN’s climate arm (UNFCCC) on December 31 2025, just in time to meet the 2015 Paris Agreement’s requirement that governments submit an NDC every five years. The bottom of the front page says in capital letters “2025 SUBMISSION TO UNFCCC”.
The document was not uploaded to the UNFCCC website, and so was not publicly available, until the night of January 5-6.
Saudi Arabia’s third climate plan sets a new target for reducing emissions by 2040 – unlike most of the latest NDCs which contain a goal for 2035.
As with the oil-rich government’s earlier 2030 target, it is not clear what share of the oil producing-country’s emissions the 2040 goal equates to, as the baseline is not clearly specified. The Saudi government also states that it may change the baseline, effectively making the target less ambitious if it feels unfairly targeted by global climate policies.
The document says Saudi Arabia will aim to “reduce, avoid, and remove greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 335 million tons of [carbon dioxide equivalent] annually reached by 2040… on the basis of a dynamic baseline, with the year 2019 designated as the base year for this NDC”.
Saudi Arabia’s last NDC in 2021 had a similar format, aiming to cut emissions by 278 million tons a year (mtpa) by 2030. But neither target specifies the total against which the emissions reductions should be measured, leaving analysts unclear as to what level of absolute emissions Saudi Arabia is aiming for in 2030 and 2040.
Climate Action Tracker (CAT), which analyses climate plans from major-emitting nations, has yet to publish its view on Saudi Arabia’s new NDC.
But commenting on the 2021 NDC, it said that “although not explicitly mentioned in the document, the CAT interprets the NDC target to be a reduction below a baseline scenario. It is important to note that neither the previous nor the updated NDC includes a baseline projection to which the emissions reductions target is applied.”
A 2024 study by researchers from the Riyadh-based King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and Research Centre (KAPSARC) and the US’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory said “the Kingdom has not officially defined the baseline emissions in their updated NDCs”. They suggested that, under Saudi Arabia’s current policies, emissions will continue to rise until at least 2060.
Saudi authorities have not clarified what baseline the previous NDC’s targets are against and have not spoken publicly about the new NDC. The website for the government’s Vision 2030 initiative says only that the Kingdom aims to “reduce carbon emissions by 278 mtpa by 2030”.
NDC depends on continued oil exportsAs well as being unclear in terms of numbers, Saudi Arabia says the baseline for its 2040 target is contingent on “sustained economic growth and diversification, supported by a robust contribution from hydrocarbon export revenues to the national economy”.
Hydrocarbons are another word for fossil fuels, which the NDC says Saudi Arabia aims to become less reliant on by moving into sectors like financial and medical services, tourism, renewable energy and energy-efficiency technologies.
UN carbon accounting rules mean emissions of fossil fuels are counted where they are consumed, not where they are produced, so the emissions from exported Saudi oil do not count towards the kingdom’s emissions.
Saudi Arabia’s emissions-cutting ambitions also rest, the NDC says, “on the assumption that the economic and social consequences of international climate change policies and measures will not pose a disproportionate or abnormal burden on the Kingdom’s economy”.
The country – which gets about three-fifths of its export earnings from fossil fuels – has long been the leading opponent of international measures to reduce their production and use. It has recently opposed efforts to map out a transition away from fossil fuels in climate talks, measures to restrict plastics production in negotiations on a global treaty to cut plastic pollution and taxes on polluting ships at the International Maritime Organization.
If other governments do not continue to buy its fossil fuels in sufficient quantities, the NDC says that Saudi Arabia will use fossil fuels domestically to produce plastics and power heavy industries like cement, mining and metals production. In this scenario, Saudi Arabia’s emissions will be higher, the plan says.
The NDC lists green initiatives Saudi Arabia is pursuing, including carbon capture and storage, green hydrogen, direct air capture of greenhouse gases and renewables. To adapt to more extreme heatwaves and droughts, the NDC says the government is using cloud seeding technology to make rain artificially.
The country’s 2021 NDC set a target for Saudi Arabia to get half of its energy from renewables by 2030. That target is not mentioned in the new NDC. The International Energy Agency’s latest figures said that in 2023 the country still got far less than 1% of its energy from renewables.
Around 70 countries have yet to submit their latest NDCs, which were due in 2025, including India.
The post Saudi Arabia issues last-minute climate plan with unclear emissions-cutting goal appeared first on Climate Home News.
Alaska seeks control of federally-protected lakes and rivers
Alaska is aggressively seeking control of federal lands beneath rivers and lakebeds in the state, a move that could dismantle environmental protections in national parks and preserves and undermine the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System. The Trump administration is fast-tracking the state’s request for control of this land, according to public inspection notices published in the Federal Register Tuesday.
Alaska is asserting that it received title to all navigable waters when it became a state in 1959, including the land beneath them. State officials argue that federal control of these lands creates jurisdictional ambiguity and that Alaska should have the same sovereignty over its waterways as other states. But former federal officials say that transferring these lands to the state could weaken environmental protections established by the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act.
“This is part of the Dunleavy Administration’s effort to attack federal authority over natural resource management—including subsistence fishing and hunting under ANILCA,” Robert T. Anderson, who served as Interior solicitor in the Biden administration, told Bloomberg Law.
State ownership of these submerged lands would include any minerals found in them, according to legal experts.
BLM nominee has big ties to oil industrySteve Pearce, President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Bureau of Land Management, earned as much as $1 million last year from a business associated with oil and gas development and owned interests in oil leases in New Mexico and Oklahoma, according to a financial disclosure form posted last week by the Office of Government Ethics.
Pearce reported that he earned between $100 thousand and $1 million from “Industrial equipment (Frac tanks lease to purchase)” in the disclosure. Pearce and his wife have divested their oil lease holdings in New Mexico, according to the disclosure. If confirmed, Pearce said in his ethics agreement that he will sell his interest in oil and gas leases in Oklahoma and turn over leadership of his oilfield services company to his wife.
Quick hits White House completes plan to curb bedrock environmental law Trump and Burgum took an ax to public lands in 2025—but there’s more to come Colorado Parks and Wildlife launches potential hunting opportunity for wild bison Accessing public land in Wyoming remains complicated, even after corner-crossing case settled Public lands budgets largely skirt major cuts in bipartisan proposals Trump admin official reportedly made millions from fast-tracked lithium mine Moose torture case puts Wyoming back in national spotlight 4,000 landowners control over 60% of Montana’s private land Quote of the dayCongress is aware of the importance of renewable energy as part of the BLM’s contribution to energy generation, along with managing for conservation, recreation and wildlife. Hopefully the Department of the Interior can follow along.”
—Nada Wolff Culver, former principal deputy director of BLM, E&E News
Picture This@Interior A beautiful winter phenomenon, hoarfrost forms during clear, calm nights, turning America’s public lands into picturesque winter landscapes. The morning is the best time to look for hoarfrost because the sun melts the fragile crystals quickly. ❄️Photo by @yellowstonenps
Feature image: Togiak National Wildlife Refuge; Photo by: USFWS/Steve Hillebrand
The post Alaska seeks control of federally-protected lakes and rivers appeared first on Center for Western Priorities.
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